The core structure of the regulatory regime for international civil aviation (the ‘Chicago System’) is inter–national. The features of the Chicago System were designed in an era when the world’s airlines were State–owned, and the most pressing international concerns were for navigation and safety regulation. Economic liberalization and intense globalization since the Second World War have impacted on the industry; today, it is global.

This book observes the developing governance of global aviation, taking into account the concepts of sovereignty, jurisdiction and territoriality, and the proliferation of actors and participants as partners in a global public policy network, to posit that an upgraded system of global governance for civil aviation helps to explain the emerging complex landscape for global governance of civil aviation.

As evidence of the emerging, complex matrix of governance of global aviation, this book identifies and reviews a selection of contemporary, transnational economic and environmental challenges facing the globalized aviation sector, e.g. fair competition safeguards, consumer protection, noise pollution and greenhouse gas emissions, and the respective ‘legal’ and policy actions taken at national level (United Arab Emirates, Qatar and People’s Republic of China), regional level (the European Union) and international level (UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and International Civil Aviation Organization).

The book concludes that economic and environmental regulation of international aviation, designed for an inter–national world of yesterday, evolves into global governance of aviation, which is more suited for today’s global world.

This book will be of particular interest to scholars and practitioners of aviation law, competition law and environmental law, as well as in the areas of transnational law, global governance and international relations.