The three recent cases involving the United States and Iran, Nicaragua and the United States, and the United States and Canada exemplify a pattern that has developed in recent years. Without a special agreement by the parties to submit a specific dispute to the Court, the nation against which an action is brought generally takes one or more actions to challenge the Court's authority. Thus, it may challenge the Court's jurisdiction, refuse to appear in all or part of the proceedings, refuse to carry out the provisional measures or orders resulting from the Court's judgments on the merits of the case, or take action to limit its consent to the jurisdiction of the Court in future cases. The result of these responses is a reduction in perceptions of the Court's relevance and effectiveness in resolving disputes. To avoid compounding this problem the Court should avoid trying to reach out to adjudicate more difficult cases and subjects and should wait until the international environment is more supportive of this method of dispute resolution. Footnotes and table showing cases involving non-appearance and non-compliance.