---
type: claim
domain: space-development
description: "61 nations signed bilateral accords establishing resource extraction rights, safety zones, and interoperability norms outside the UN framework — this 'adaptive governance' pattern produces faster results than universal consensus but risks crystallizing competing blocs as China and Russia pursue alternative frameworks"
confidence: likely
source: "Artemis Accords text (2020), signatory count (61 as of January 2026), US State Department bilateral framework, comparison with Moon Agreement ratification failure"
created: 2026-03-08
challenged_by: "The Accords may be less durable than treaties because they lack binding enforcement. If a signatory violates safety zone norms or resource extraction principles, no mechanism compels compliance. The bilateral structure also means each agreement is slightly different, creating potential inconsistencies that multilateral treaties avoid. And the China/Russia exclusion creates a bifurcated governance regime that could escalate into resource conflicts at contested sites like the lunar south pole."
---

# the Artemis Accords replace multilateral treaty-making with bilateral norm-setting to create governance through coalition practice rather than universal consensus

The Artemis Accords represent a fundamental shift in how space governance forms. Rather than negotiating universal treaties through the UN (which produced the Outer Space Treaty in 1967 but has failed to produce binding new agreements since), the US built a coalition through bilateral agreements that establish practical norms: resource extraction rights, safety zones around operations, interoperability requirements, debris mitigation commitments, and heritage preservation.

Starting with 8 founding signatories in October 2020, the Accords grew to 61 nations by January 2026 — spanning every continent. The strategy is explicitly "adaptive governance": establish norms through action first, with formal law following practice. The Accords affirm that space resource extraction complies with the Outer Space Treaty and deliberately reject the Moon Agreement's "common heritage of mankind" principle. Safety zones — where operations could cause harmful interference — are defined by the operator and announced, not negotiated through multilateral process.

This is a governance design pattern with implications far beyond space. It demonstrates that when multilateral institutions stall, coalitions of the willing can create de facto governance through bilateral norm convergence. The risk is fragmentation — China and Russia haven't signed and view the Accords as the US creating favorable legal norms unilaterally. But the pattern produces faster results than universal consensus, and each new signatory increases the norm's gravitational pull.

The Accords exemplify two foundational principles simultaneously: [[Hayek argued that designed rules of just conduct enable spontaneous order of greater complexity than deliberate arrangement could achieve]] — the Accords are designed rules enabling spontaneous coordination among willing participants — and [[protocol design enables emergent coordination of arbitrary complexity as Linux Bitcoin and Wikipedia demonstrate]] — they function as a coordination protocol with voluntary adoption driving emergent order. The question is whether this converges toward universal governance or crystallizes into competing blocs.

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Relevant Notes:
- [[Hayek argued that designed rules of just conduct enable spontaneous order of greater complexity than deliberate arrangement could achieve]] — the Accords exemplify designed rules enabling spontaneous commercial coordination
- [[protocol design enables emergent coordination of arbitrary complexity as Linux Bitcoin and Wikipedia demonstrate]] — the Accords function as a coordination protocol with voluntary adoption
- [[Ostrom proved communities self-govern shared resources when eight design principles are met without requiring state control or privatization]] — the Accords test whether voluntary governance can manage shared space resources
- [[the Outer Space Treaty created a constitutional framework for space but left resource rights property and settlement governance deliberately ambiguous]] — the Accords fill the governance vacuum the OST created
- [[space governance gaps are widening not narrowing because technology advances exponentially while institutional design advances linearly]] — the Accords are the most significant attempt to close the governance gap
- [[designing coordination rules is categorically different from designing coordination outcomes as nine intellectual traditions independently confirm]] — the Accords design coordination rules (safety zones, interoperability) rather than mandating outcomes

Topics:
- [[_map]]
