Decolonisation, as a process, has more or less run its course, but not entirely. There is a small number of colonies that exist.

About Philippe Sands
"I’m Professor of Law at University College London, Director of the Centre on International Courts and Tribunals in the Faculty, and a key member of staff in the Centre for Law and the Environment. I am a Barrister at Matrix Chambers and a writer.

Everything that I do – teaching, research, writing, litigating cases – revolves around my great passion, which is international law, the settlement of international disputes (including arbitration), and environmental and natural resources law."

Key Points

• In 1945, as the United Nations Charter was being negotiated, the countries of the world decided that it was time to bring colonialism to an end.
• There are still a small number of colonies that exist. Britain’s last colony in Africa is called the Chagos Archipelago, where the United Kingdom is an unlawful occupier.
• The devastating irony is that the United States and the United Kingdom created the rules that are premised around the United Nations Charter, but they have now upended those rules.
A commitment to decolonise

We all know that in the 18th and 19th centuries, European countries went around the world picking up bits of territory and colonising them. It was known as colonialism in Africa, in South America and in Asia. Spain, France, Britain, Germany, Italy, Denmark, Holland and various other countries were rather expert in this practice, which proceeded until the 20th century.

Then, in 1945, as the United Nations Charter was being negotiated, the countries of the world decided that it was time to bring colonialism to an end. They negotiated a Charter, which contained two new rules: one rule articulated the proposition that every human being had minimum rights under international law. It coined the phrase “human rights” in modern parlance. The second new rule was a commitment of every country in the world to decolonise – for the colonial powers to leave their colonies and to allow the inhabitants of those colonies to exercise something that is known as “the right of self-determination”: being in charge of their own futures, deciding for themselves how they wish to be governed, and not being governed by outsiders or by others. That is the principle of decolonisation.