(2018) 2 African Human Rights Yearbook 49 African Commission has been unwilling to interpret the right of selfdetermination in a way that would, in its view, trump the principle of territorial integrity. The Commission has thus declined to uphold even what would seem to be legitimate and compelling external selfdetermination claims on the reasoning that the result would be the impairment of the integrity of the territory concerned. The instinctive reasoning of the Commission seems to be that in any situation of tension between the competing values of self-determination and territorial integrity, the latter must always prevail. This article examines the contest between these two norms in the African continent. It explores and interprets the primary texts governing them, and critiques their interpretation by the Commission. Ultimately, it demonstrates how the normative power of selfdetermination is constrained by the principle of territorial integrity and the Commission’s limited understanding of the two principles. 2 2.1 SELF-DETERMINATION Peoples’ aspirations, hopes and dignity Self-determination is a fundamental right in contemporary international law. It creates aspirations and hopes for dependent and other oppressed peoples. The norm quickly evolved from a political principle to a universal human right that gives expression to certain fundamental values of the international community and for that reason it is of international concern. It is embodied in articles 1(2) and 55 of the UN Charter and finds expression in a number of UN human rights instruments as well as in article 20 of the African Charter. It has two interconnected aspects, internal and external. When a community of people within a country claims internal selfdetermination it is asserting two things: (i) a right to autonomy within the state, that is, the right of the community freely to determine its constitutional political status (the form of state), and (ii) a right to regulate its own affairs in pursuit of its economic, social and cultural development.1 These matters are purely of domestic concern. By contrast, external self-determination or ‘complete self-determination’ is a territorial concept. It is about the right of a people freely to assert sovereign control over territory as an independent state and a subject of international law. The territorial dimension of self-determination is governed above all by international law. This is so because it concerns the birth of a new state in the community of states and therefore impinges on world order and the Westphalia state system on which contemporary world order is based. There are at least four theories of international relations relevant to external self-determination. One theory insists that territorial sovereignty is more important than national self-determination. Another theory holds that self1 L Sohn ‘Models of autonomy within the United Nations framework’ in Y Dinstein (ed) Models of autonomy.