October 2012

Revisiting 'Envoys of Mankind' in the Era of Commercial Human Spaceflight

This publication raises a number of questions about commercial space travel and its relationship to the Outer Space Treaty. Must a commercial space traveler, for example, work as an agent of a state, or is the answer dependent on the actual activity to be conducted? And what about sub-orbital commercial flights -- how do they fit in within existing international space agreements and protocols? These questions and more must be answered if private activities in space are to occur within the framework of proper legal regimes, or so this paper argues.

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