The Global Water Partnership : Between Institutional Flexibility and Legal Legitimacy

E. Fromageau

The Global Water Partnership : Between Institutional Flexibility and Legal Legitimacy, International Organizations Law Review, 2011, vol. 8, no. 2, p. 367-395.

The Global Water Partnership (GWP) represents a new kind of institution that raises variousinteresting questions in terms of international institutional law. Established in 1996 as a “virtualorganization”, it progressively evolved to become in 2002 a twofold institution structured around,on the one hand, a network without legal personality and, on the other hand, an internationalorganization with full legal personality under international law. This article aims to analyze thisunique structure and its consequences on membership and organic issues. The reasons underpinningthis evolution will also be studied. If institutional flexibility prevailed in the early life of theinstitution, practical problems and concerns about legal legitimacy have led to a more formalstructure in its later life. Principles such as those developed by the Global Administrative Law(GAL) project, namely legitimacy, transparency and accountability, have been also widely usedto shape and organize this structure.

2012