As tension heats up in the South China Sea, some bordering countries insist on solving the dispute simply within the framework of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), but this insistence ignores history and violates inter-temporal law, a doctrine of international law.

As early as 1843, former United States secretary of state Abel P. Upshur wrote in an official letter: "A people's right to land discovered in the 16th century is determined on the basis of international law as understood at that time and not on the basis of improved upon or more enlightened views 300 years later."

Robert Y. Jennings, British scholar in international law and former president of the International Court of Justice, has said: "A juridical fact must be appreciated in light of the law contemporary with it, and not the law in force at the time when a dispute in regard to it arises or falls to be settled."