Legal Mechanisms For Reducing And Controlling Space Debris

The decrease and control of space debris is of great importance for the flightsafety of spacecraft and space activity of human. The Legal Mechanism of SpaceDebris Mitigation is the law and rule mode in order for the decrease of space debrisgeneration and protection of spacecraft from space debris. The study of LegalMechanism of Space Debris Mitigation includes five mechanisms of duty and rightorganizations, constraint and admission, pre-warning and protection, resourceguarantee, and liability investigation.At present, the international rules for the decrease and control of space debrismainly include Outer Space Treaty, Registration Convention, Liability Convention,Space Debris Mitigation Guideline of UNCOPUOS, and Inter-Agency Space DebrisCoordination Committee (IADC) Mitigation Guidance. The interior lawmaking aboutthe mitigation of space debris can mainly be divided into America mode and Russiamode. The America mode is characteristic of system of decentralization, and its legalnorm contains different aspects of congress lawmaking, federal regulations andjudicial precedent by excellent legislative technique, rich legal practice and highlawmaking quality. And Russia one is characteristic of system of centralization, withthe emphasis on generality and guidance at law lay, and is restricted and regulatedclearly and specially by technical standards.The study of space debris of China begun at1989. In December2009our firstdepartment regulations to specify the space debris mitigation activity–TemporalMethod of Space Debris Mitigation and protection Management–was formallyissued; it initially established the legal mechanism of space debris mitigation andcontrol of our country, and incarnated our decision and effort in space debrismitigation. The legal mechanism of space debris mitigation of our country, however,is only a matter of primary and rough, and must be improved greatly.With a view to the reality and need of our development of aerospace industry, weshould insist on the basic principle of obligation "Be charge with liability, doaccording to one’s abilities, skill engagement, and get accomplishment", making greatefforts to reach an effective balance between international liability and nationalinterest. The perfection of Temporal Method of Space Debris Mitigation andprotection Management is hanged on the breakthrough in specifying and constraining admission mechanism and constructing liability investigation mechanism. For theformer we shall fully use America’s lawmaking practice for reference, consolidate theinspection function of National Defense Science and Industry Bureau, and moredefine and detail evaluating and checkup standards. For the latter we shall at the sametime establish the administrative penalty system, civil recovery and insurance systemabout space debris damage, and construct a more varying space encroachment liabilityand rule system in order to reply effectively the complexion of a great deal of spacedebris damage events caused by space debris criticality.