A declaration "declares existing law, with or without modification, or creates new law, ... [or] affirms some common principle of policy .... ([or may be] published after a conference of ... heads of State .... The contents of these documents are partly agreements to do or not to do something, and partly records of agreement upon a common policy; the method of their conclusion is unorthodox, they differ in their purpose, and it is unsafe to generalize upon them, but there is no reason in principle why binding obligations should not be created in this way....") McNair, Law of Treaties 23 (2d ed. 1961).
