Description
In the 20th century membership of intergovernmental organisations (IOs), in particular the United Nations, became a widely accepted proxy for sovereign statehood. One of the defining characteristics of IOs today is that they have sovereign states as members, therefore its members must be sovereign states. Yet historically this relationship between statehood and IO membership is far from straightforward. 19th century IOs routinely admitted colonies and so-called semi-sovereign states to full membership alongside sovereign states. This paper seeks to map the extent of this phenomenon up to WW2 based on a new (partial) dataset. Which IOs admitted non-sovereign members? Who were these non-sovereign members? The paper adds to recent literature which demonstrates that the international order in the 19th century was far more complex than portrayed by the simplistic IR narrative of European expansion. A number of polities both inside and outside Europe were allowed to take part in international negotiations, regardless of their formal sovereign status, indicating a more inclusive international order than previously assumed.
