1933 жылғы Америка мемлекеттерінің мемлекеттік мәртебе туралы келісімі

1933 pan American treaty on statehood
The conference is notable in U. S. history, since one of the U. S. representatives was Dr. Sophonisba Preston Breckinridge, the first U. S. female representative at an international conference.

In most cases, the only avenue open to self determination for colonial or national ethnic minority populations was to achieve international legal personality as a nation state. The majority of delegations at the International Conference of American States represented independent states that had emerged from former colonies. In most cases, their own existence and independence had been disputed or opposed by one or more of the European colonial empires. They agreed among themselves to criteria that made it easier for other dependent states with limited sovereignty to gain international recognition.

As a restatement of customary international law, the Montevideo Convention merely codified existing legal norms and its principles and therefore does not apply merely to the signatories, but to all subjects of international law as a whole. The European Union, in the principal statement of its Badinter Committee, follows the Montevideo Convention in its definition of a state: by having a territory, a population, and a political authority. The committee also found that the existence of states was a question of fact, while the recognition by other states was purely declaratory and not a determinative factor of statehood. Switzerland, although not a member of the European Union, adheres to the same principle, stating that "neither a political unit needs to be recognized to become a state, nor does a state have the obligation to recognize another one. At the same time, neither recognition is enough to create a state, nor does its absence abolish it."