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Abstract. The challenge of ensuring the space environment's long-term sustainability in the context of the exploration and commercialisation of outer space raises several important issues and dimensions with respect to both international environmental law and sustainable development. The research question analyses the extent to which such exploration benefits humanity and expands the province of all humankind. In this article, historical achievements of the international legal framework governing the area of space exploration are presented. Opportunities for further developing and strengthening this framework to ensure the cooperative, transparent, inclusive and equitable development of space exploration are deliberated, notably those that do not limit the interests and opportunities of space-faring countries. The key finding and proposition of this article is that while discussing the need to improve and strengthen the international regulatory framework, developing countries' needs and interests should also be effectively incorporated. More equitable, inclusive and sustainable development is as much in the interest of developed countries as it is of developing countries. Keywords: The Outer Space Treaty, space law, UNCOPUOS, space commercialisation, Sustainable Development Goals, inclusive and balanced development, international environmental law

This article evaluates the extent to which Melbin's (1978) ideal type of frontiers can be applied to a new frontier, outer space. Although outer space fits Melbin's model of frontiers in a number of ways, several deviations are also apparent. These deviations from the model are linked to a combination of four characteristics of outer space as a frontier: the highly technological nature of travel, dependence on Earth, government control, and the initially perceived limitlessness of space. This application leads to further specifications of Melbin's conceptualization of frontiers and provides the basis for speculation concerning the future of outer space as a frontier.

The development of such an immense strategic domain as an outer-space is based upon two pillars – civil and military. Space is a subject of competition between the most influential world powers, with the participation of state and inter-state structures, as well as private companies. Areas of panEuropean cooperation in the space sector are analyzed, including the participation of France and the EU and ESA, and the key and in some cases the leading role of France in these processes. The geopolitical significance of the outer-space in global competition and the evolution of the position of European powers and specifically of France in relation to the military component of space exploration are studied. Outer-space and cyber-space now are interpreted in Western military strategies as the fourth and the fifth "domains" of military operations, together with land-, sea- and air-domains. Western powers are coordinating and integrating their military-space activities. France and the governing structures of the European Union place an emphasis on assuring the strategic independence of Europe from the USA and from the technologies of "third countries" in space exploration, the military exploration of space included. The EU pays great attention to the formation and development of the "space economy" and the links between the state space programs with the private sector and private investments. The outer- space in the third decade of the XXI century has become a domain of everyday and constant activities of "space powers", and because of the role of space technologies in the areas of communications, internet and cell communications, geo-positioning, TV-broadcasting, etc. widely interfere in the life of all other states on the planet. The militarization of the outer-space in different formats is actively progressing and requires active political efforts to ensure its peaceful use.

In the present climate of discouragement that threatens all of us who hold the Humanities dear, one of the worst threats, or so it seems, has been the dumbing down consequent on digital media and the rise of hate speech on digital platforms. I want to offer some countervailing reflections and hopes, and explore the activity and the potential of the World Wide Web as a forum for literature; in spite of the instinctive recoil and bristling horror I feel for social media as currently used, it is possible to consider and reframe the question of reading on the web. Doing so leads to the questions, what is literature and can literature be found beyond the printed book? It is my contention – perhaps my Candide-like hope – that the internet is spurring writers on to creating things with words that are not primarily aimed at silent readers but at an audience that is listening and viewing and feeling, and maybe also reading all at the same time, participating in word events channelled through electronic media.