Title XI · External Relations And Solidarity · Public Register of the Republic of Fluid

286

Conduct of external relations

Foreign relations rest on the equality of peoples, non-intervention, and public conduct.

1.The Republic conducts its external relations upon the sovereign equality of peoples, the peaceful settlement of disputes, non-intervention in the internal affairs of others, and solidarity with those subjected to domination or want.
2.Article 268 governs the renunciation of war and the limits upon armed force.
3.The Republic supports the self-determination of peoples, the reparation of colonial and ecological debt, and the reform of international bodies toward the equal weight of peoples within them.
4.In no case may the Republic recognise a territorial acquisition obtained by force, participate in a blockade that deprives a population of food, water, medicine or energy, or apply a measure whose effect falls upon a population instead of upon those governing it.
5.External relations are conducted publicly. Secret agreements, secret annexes, secret understandings and undisclosed commitments produce no effect and do not bind the Republic.

287

Competence and conduct

The competent committee conducts them, with mandates and negotiating texts published.

1.The executive committee competent in external relations conducts them under Article 153(1) and (3), and answers to the Assembly under Articles 144 and 151.
2.The Assembly determines the general orientation of external relations by law, examines their conduct annually in public sitting, and may constitute a committee of inquiry under Article 132.
3.Negotiating mandates, positions taken and the texts under negotiation are published, and the Assembly, the National Planning Congress, the Ecological Budget Authority, the councils of the territories and the branch federations are heard before a mandate is adopted.
4.Publication may be deferred during a negotiation only where the counterparty requires it, only for the duration of the negotiation, and only by reasoned decision published at the time it is taken, and in no case is the text withheld once the negotiation concludes.

288

Life-limiting regimes

A state is life-limiting because of what it does, never because of what it calls itself.

1.A state is life-limiting for the purposes of this Constitution where it does any of the following: practises or tolerates a treatment described in Article 47; holds persons in slavery, servitude or forced labour; denies to its population the minimum core of food, water, healthcare or shelter while possessing the means to furnish it; suppresses assembly, expression, association or the free formation of political will; persecutes persons upon a ground listed in Article 38(2); holds elections that determine no outcome, or holds none; imprisons persons for opinion; or conducts a war of aggression or an occupation.
2.The finding rests upon acts established by evidence, is made by the Assembly by law upon a public and reasoned procedure, is reviewed at intervals of no more than three years, and is reviewable by the Constitutional Court at the instance of any person.
3.In no case does a finding rest upon the doctrine, the ideology, the declared programme or the name of a regime, and a state calling itself socialist, communist, republican or democratic is examined upon its acts alone.
4.A finding attaches to the government of a state and never to its people, and in no case does it affect the rights that persons from that state hold under Title III, Article 59 or Article 289.

289

Defectors and persons in flight

Anyone fleeing such a state becomes a citizen on recognition, without the five-year wait.

1.A person who leaves a state found life-limiting under Article 288, or who leaves any state in flight from an act described in Article 288(1), acquires citizenship of the Republic upon recognition of that fact, without the residence required by Article 58(1), without examination, fee, oath or discretionary decision.
2.Recognition is made by the ordinary asylum procedure of Article 59, is decided within ninety days, and refusal states reasons and is appealable with suspensive effect.
3.From arrival the person holds every right of Title III in full, including provision under Chapter 5 of that Title, and Article 59(3) governs pending recognition.
4.In no case is such a person returned, expelled, extradited or surrendered, and Article 47(2) governs absolutely.
5.Renunciation of a former nationality is in no case required, and Article 58(4) governs.
6.Persons who assisted the flight of another, and members of the household of a person recognised, are recognised upon the same footing.
7.In no case does an agreement with another state, a request for extradition, or a listing by a foreign or international body displace this Article.

290

Negotiation, signature and ratification

Treaties need two thirds of the Assembly and a court check, and unions and borders need a referendum.

1.Treaties are negotiated and signed by the committee competent in external relations, upon a mandate adopted under Article 287(3).
2.Ratification is made by law adopted by a majority of two thirds of the members of the Assembly, and the Presiding Officer signs the instrument under Article 146(3).
3.A treaty establishing, amending or terminating membership of a union, and a treaty opening or closing a frontier to the free movement of persons, requires in addition the approval of a referendum under Article 140.
4.Every treaty is submitted to the Constitutional Chamber before ratification, which verifies its conformity with this Constitution within sixty days, and a treaty declared contrary to this Constitution is in no case ratified.
5.Treaties are published in full before the vote of the Assembly, together with every annex, protocol, exchange of letters and interpretative declaration, and Article 286(5) governs anything withheld.
6.Article 15 governs the rank of a ratified treaty, and in no case may a treaty diminish the rights of Title III or the ecological budgets of Title II.

291

Prohibited commitments

Treaties may never accept arbitration, privatisation, patents, debt or foreign bases.

1.In no case may the Republic conclude a treaty that: submits it to a foreign or arbitral jurisdiction in a dispute with an economic entity, contrary to Article 21(6); requires the opening of a sector to enterprises operating for profit; requires the recognition or grant of an exclusive right over knowledge, contrary to Article 10(2); requires the alienation, lease or pledge of a commons resource; permits a foreign military installation, contrary to Article 8(2); creates external debt or accepts financial conditionality, contrary to Article 117(5); obliges the Republic to a measure prohibited by Article 265; or restricts the amendment of this Constitution.
2.A commitment within paragraph 1 is void, produces no effect, and requires the obedience of no organ or person.
3.Where an existing obligation conflicts with this Constitution, Article 15(3) governs, and the committee competent in external relations seeks its revision or the withdrawal of the Republic from it, reporting to the Assembly every six months until the conflict ends.

292

Withdrawal

Withdrawal follows the same route, and is immediate if a treaty would require a void act.

1.Withdrawal from a treaty follows the procedure by which it was ratified, and withdrawal from a treaty approved by referendum requires a referendum.
2.Withdrawal is immediate, by decision of the Assembly by a majority of its members, where continued participation would require an act void under Article 265 or a commitment within Article 291(1).

293

Membership

The Republic belongs to the Democratic Socialist Bloc, and joins no union requiring a free market.

1.The Republic is a member of the Democratic Socialist Bloc, a union of states founded upon social ownership of the means of production, ecological limits, democratic self-government and the equality of its members.
2.Membership is open to any state satisfying those conditions, and in no case is it conditioned upon the size, the wealth, the location or the alignment of a state.
3.The Republic joins no union whose constituting instrument requires the existence of a market in the means of production, in labour, in land, in dwellings, in health, in education or in knowledge, and in no case does it accept such a requirement as a condition of any benefit.
4.The Republic remains a member of no union that ceases to satisfy paragraph 1, and Article 292(2) governs.

294

Effect of union acts

Union standards take effect only when the Assembly enacts them, and nothing applies of its own force.

1.The Republic agrees common standards within the union in ecological limits, in conditions of labour, in the safety and durability of goods, in health, in the recognition of qualifications, in the movement of persons, and in the matters the constituting instrument names.
2.A common standard takes effect within the Republic only through a law of the Assembly or a regulation adopted under it. In no case does an act of the union, of its organs or of its officers apply within the territory of its own force, bind a court of the Republic directly, or confer a right or an obligation upon any person until the Assembly has enacted it.
3.Where the Assembly enacts a common standard, it is a law of the Republic and is interpreted, applied and reviewed as such, and Article 137 and Article 195 govern.
4.Where the Assembly declines to enact a common standard, it states its reasons publicly, and the consequences within the union are those the constituting instrument provides.
5.In no case may the Republic transfer a competence of the Assembly, of the planning bodies, of the courts, of the offices of Title IX or of the territories to a union organ.
6.The Republic adopts a common standard stricter than its own, and in no case adopts a common standard weaker than its own, Article 25(5) governing by analogy.

295

Union settlement and currency

Exchange is settled in kind, and a common currency can never be accepted.

1.Exchange within the union is settled in goods, in labour, in technique and in knowledge, recorded in the physical units of Article 7(2), through the single external account of Article 117(1).
2.The Republic may agree with the union or with any state a clearing arrangement in which obligations are set off in kind, and it uses a unit of settlement only where a counterparty requires one and only for the computation of the balance.
3.A unit of settlement in no case circulates within the territory, is held by no resident, and is neither a store of value, nor an instrument of accumulation, nor a claim upon labour, Articles 7(5) and 114(5) governing.
4.The Republic pursues, within the union and beyond it, the settlement of exchange without currency, and Article 267 governs the direction.
5.In no case may the Republic accept a common currency, a common monetary authority, or an obligation to maintain a rate, a reserve or a convertibility.

296

Open frontiers

Open frontiers are the goal, and no agreement may make the Republic police anyone's departure.

1.The Republic pursues the free movement of persons across every frontier, and holds the removal of barriers to human movement to be a standing objective of its external policy.
2.Frontiers within the union are open, and residents of member states enter, remain, work, study and receive care upon the footing of residents of the Republic.
3.The Republic seeks agreements opening a frontier with any state, upon reciprocity, and concludes such an agreement where it imposes no obligation contrary to Titles II, III or IV.
4.An agreement under paragraph 3 requires a referendum under Article 290(3).
5.In no case may an agreement oblige the Republic to prevent departure from another state, to detain persons on behalf of another state, to conduct an asylum or removal procedure in the territory of another state, or to return a person contrary to Article 47(2), and Article 57(6) governs.
6.The Republic funds, equips or trains no foreign body whose function is the prevention of movement, and in no case does it contribute to a mechanism whose effect is the interception of persons in flight.

297

Rescue and assistance

Rescue is owed to anyone in distress, and rescuers are never prosecuted.

1.Assistance and rescue are owed to any person in distress at sea or at a frontier under Article 57(5), and the Republic maintains the means to furnish them.
2.The Republic assists rescue conducted by others, and in no case does it obstruct, penalise, detain or prosecute a person or a vessel engaged in rescue.
3.A person rescued is brought to the nearest place of safety, and a place governed by Article 47(2) is in no case a place of safety.

298

Order of supply

Needs are met at home first, and unused domestic capacity is developed before importing.

1.Need is met, in the following order: from the production of the Republic; by exchange within the union; by exchange with other states not found life-limiting under Article 288; and by exchange under Article 300.
2.Before an import is authorised, the planning bodies establish that the need cannot be met from domestic capacity within the ecological budgets, and they publish the finding with the capacity examined.
3.Where domestic capacity exists and is unused, the plan develops it, and the import is authorised only for the period the development requires. Land, water, buildings and equipment capable of meeting a need are brought into use under Titles IV and VII before an import replaces them, and Article 29(2) governs land held unused.
4.Development under paragraph 3 conforms to Articles 22, 23 and 29, and in no case does the reduction of imports justify exceeding an ecological ceiling, converting primary habitat, or degrading soil.
5.Article 117 governs external exchange in every case, and Article 23(2) counts embodied materials and energy against the budgets of the Republic.

299

Costly imports and project licences

Costly imports need a public licence, and the Ecological Authority can refuse it outright.

1.An import whose materials, energy or embodied labour exceed the threshold fixed by organic law, or which the Republic would depend upon for an essential provision, requires a project licence.
2.The National Planning Congress grants the licence, upon a published test comprising: the need served and its rank under Article 91(2); the domestic capacity examined under Article 298(2) and (3); the quantity, the duration and the terminal date of the import; the effect upon the ecological budgets; the dependence created and the plan for ending it; and the alternatives considered.
3.The Ecological Budget Authority is heard upon every application, and may refuse the licence where the import would exceed a budget or would foreclose the attainment of one. Its refusal is final and is reviewable only under Article 27.
4.Licences are published in full, are limited in time, state the date on which the dependence is to end, and are examined annually by the Congress and by the Commissioner for Future Generations under Article 257.
5.A licence may authorise an import for the construction of an installation that reduces future imports, including intensive cultivation under cover, upon a demonstration that the installation returns the materials and energy it consumes within the period the licence states.
6.In no case does a licence authorise an import from a source prohibited by Article 117(3) or by Article 300.

300

Exchange with life-limiting regimes

Trade with a life-limiting state is banned, except for materials available nowhere else.

1.Exchange with a state found life-limiting under Article 288 is prohibited, except under this Article.
2.Exchange is permitted only where the good is a material or component that exists in no state not so found, is required for a purpose ranked under Article 91(2), and cannot be substituted, recovered from existing stock or produced within the Republic.
3.Each transaction requires a licence of the National Planning Congress, granted upon the published test of Article 299(2) together with a statement of the searches made for an alternative source, and the Ecological Budget Authority is heard under Article 299(3).
4.Every licence, every quantity, every counterparty and every consideration is published before the transaction and is reported annually to the Assembly, which may revoke a licence by a majority of its members.
5.The Assembly may determine by law that no exchange whatever is conducted with a particular state, permitting humanitarian assistance and rescue alone, and that determination is reviewed at intervals of no more than three years.
6.Humanitarian assistance, rescue, medical supply, and the reception of persons under Article 289 are permitted with every state without exception, and in no case does a prohibition under this Article extend to them.
7.In no case does exchange under this Article include a weapon, a component of a weapon, a technique of surveillance or coercion under Article 270(3), or anything applied to the acts described in Article 288(1).

301

Technological sovereignty

Public systems must run without any foreign supplier's consent, licence or continued existence.

1.The public information systems, the planning apparatus, the systems of essential and general provision, the electoral systems of Article 245, and the systems of the courts and of the offices of Title IX operate upon software the Republic can obtain, examine, build, modify, maintain and run without the consent, the licence, the account, the service or the continued existence of any foreign supplier.
2.Articles 109(5) and (6) and 164(1) and (4) apply to every such system, and in no case is one of them acquired under an exclusive licence or made dependent upon a single supplier.
3.Energy, water, communication, transport and the systems on which they depend are operated by the Republic, its territories and its cooperatives, and in no case is any of them placed under the control of a foreign economic entity, Article 21 governing.
4.Where a component, a technique or a body of knowledge is obtained from abroad, the plan provides for its documentation, for the training of persons able to maintain it, and for its replacement by domestic capacity, and Article 21(3) requires the transfer of technique to the knowledge commons as a condition of licence.
5.The Republic maintains a public inventory of every external dependence in the matters of paragraphs 1 and 3, states for each the risk and the plan for ending it, and reviews it annually. The Office of Democratic Integrity reports upon it under Article 261.
6.A foreign economic entity holds no licence in the matters of paragraph 1, and Article 163(3) governs the functions that are delegated to no body.

302

Obligation of solidarity

Solidarity is owed to peoples in want, without conditions and without debt.

1.The Republic furnishes solidarity to peoples subjected to want, to domination, to occupation, to disaster or to ecological harm.
2.Solidarity is furnished in goods, in labour, in technique, in knowledge, in training and in the reception of persons, is recorded in physical units, and is counted within the plan and the ecological budgets under Article 118.
3.In no case does a transfer create a claim, a debt or an obligation upon the receiving people, nor carry a condition touching their internal affairs, their form of government, their economy or their alignment.
4.Transfers of knowledge pass through the knowledge commons under Article 10, without exclusive right and without restriction upon use.

303

The floor

At least one hundredth of all allocated resources goes to solidarity, and can never be cut.

1.The plan devotes to solidarity no less than one hundredth of the aggregate resources it allocates in each period, computed in the physical units of Article 7(2) upon the method organic law publishes.
2.The National Planning Congress may exceed the floor, and states its reasons publicly.
3.In no case may the floor be reduced, suspended or deferred, including during a state of emergency, an armed attack or an ecological emergency, and a measure doing so is void under Article 265(1) and Article 266.
4.The floor is met after the minimum core of Article 41 and the restoration of Article 23(1)(j), and before every purpose ranked below them in Article 91(2).
5.Solidarity furnished is published in full each period, by recipient, by category and by quantity.

304

Direction and refusal

Solidarity reaches peoples through their own organisations, never through an apparatus of coercion.

1.Solidarity is directed to peoples, and it reaches them through their own organisations, cooperatives, communes, unions and public bodies wherever these exist.
2.The Republic furnishes no resource that would sustain an act described in Article 288(1), strengthen an apparatus of coercion, or reach a government to the exclusion of its people, and it states publicly when it refuses on this ground.
3.Refusal under paragraph 2 extends in no case to food, water, medicine, shelter, energy for households, or assistance after a disaster, which are furnished to a population without regard to the government it lives under.
4.Recipients are consulted upon what is furnished and upon how it is furnished, and in no case does the Republic determine the use to which a transfer is put.
5.The Commissioner for Future Generations and the Audit Office examine solidarity transfers under Articles 257 and 249, and their reports are published.

305

Ecological and colonial reparation

The Republic accounts its ecological debt, and returns what was taken from other peoples.

1.The Republic accounts the ecological debt it owes for materials and energy drawn historically from other territories, publishes the account, and discharges it through the transfers of this Chapter.
2.Objects, remains and records taken from another people are returned upon request, without condition and without charge, and in no case does a museum, an establishment or a collection of the Republic retain them.
3.The Republic supports the claims of other peoples to reparation, and in no case does it obstruct, delay or dilute such a claim in an international body.

External Relations And Solidarity

Chapter 1 · Principles