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RtoP Alive and Well after Libya

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 August 2011

Thomas G. Weiss
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Extract

With the exception of Raphael Lemkin's efforts on behalf of the 1948 Genocide Convention, no idea has moved faster in the international normative arena than “the responsibility to protect” (RtoP), which was formulated in 2001 by the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty (ICISS). Friends and foes have pointed to the commission's conceptual contribution to reframing sovereignty as contingent rather than absolute, and to establishing a framework for forestalling or stopping mass atrocities via a three-pronged responsibility—to prevent, to react, and to rebuild. But until the international military action against Libya in March 2011, the sharp end of the RtoP stick—the use of military force—had been replaced by evasiveness and skittishness from diplomats, scholars, and policy analysts.

Type
Roundtable: Libya, RtoP, and Humanitarian Intervention
Information
Ethics & International Affairs , Volume 25 , Issue 3 , Fall 2011 , pp. 287 - 292
Copyright
Copyright © Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs 2011

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References

NOTES

1 International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, The Responsibility to Protect (Ottawa: International Development Research Centre, 2001)Google Scholar. See also Weiss, Thomas G. and Hubert, Don, The Responsibility to Protect: Research, Bibliography, Background (Ottawa: International Development Research Centre, 2001)Google Scholar.

2 See Barnett, Michael and Weiss, Thomas G., Humanitarianism Contested: Where Angels Fear to Tread (London: Routledge, 2011)Google Scholar.

3 See Kuperman, Alan J., “Mitigating the Moral Hazard of Humanitarian Intervention: Lessons from Economics,” Global Governance 14, no. 2 (2008), pp. 219–40;Google ScholarKuperman, Alan J., “The Moral Hazard of Humanitarian Intervention: Lessons from the Balkans,” International Studies Quarterly 52 (2008), pp. 49–80CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Kuperman, Alan J., “Darfur: Strategic Victimhood Strikes Again?” Genocide Studies and Prevention 4, no. 3 (2009), pp. 281–303CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

4 The author's version is Weiss, Thomas G., Humanitarian Intervention: Ideas in Action (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2007)Google Scholar.

5 Ban Ki-moon, “Implementing the Responsibility to Protect: Report from the Secretary-General,” UN document A/63/677, January 12, 2009.

6 Ban Ki-moon, “Early Warning, Assessment and the Responsibility to Protect: Report of the Secretary-General,” UN document A/64/864, July 14, 2010.

7 Bellamy, Alex J., “The Responsibility to Protect—Five Years On,” Ethics & International Affairs 24, no. 2 (2010), p. 166CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

8 I. William Zartman, “Preventing Identity Conflicts Leading to Genocide and Mass Killings,” International Peace Institute, 2010, p. 4.

9 Pattison, James, Humanitarian Intervention and the Responsibility to Protect: Who Should Intervene? (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), p. 250,CrossRefGoogle Scholar emphasis in original.

10 Akonor, Kwame, “Assessing the African Union's Right of Humanitarian Intervention,” Criminal Justice Ethics 29, no. 2 (2010), pp. 157–73CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

11 Chesterman, Simon, “Hard Cases Make Bad Law: Law, Ethics, and Politics in Humanitarian Intervention,” in Lang, Anthony F. Jr., ed., Just Intervention (Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 2003)Google Scholar, p. 54.

12 Welsh, Jennifer, “Implementing the Responsibility to Protect: Where Expectations Meet Reality,” Ethics & International Affairs 24, no. 4 (2010), p. 428CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

13 Chopra, Jarat and Weiss, Thomas G., “Sovereignty Is No Longer Sacrosanct: Codifying Humanitarian Intervention,” Ethics & International Affairs 6 (1992), pp. 95–117CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

14 See Thomas G. Weiss, “Politics, the UN, and Halting Mass Atrocities,” in Adam and Ernesto Verdeja, eds., The International Politics of Genocide (Boulder, Co.: Lynne Rienner, forthcoming).

15 Collinson, Sarah et al. , Realising Protection: The Uncertain Benefits of Civilian, Refugee and IDP Status (London: Overseas Development Institute, 2009), HPG Report 28, p. 3Google Scholar.

16 Bass, Gary J., Freedom's Battle: The Origins of Humanitarian Intervention (New York: Knopf, 2008), p. 382Google Scholar.

17 Mani, Rama and Weiss, Thomas G., eds., The Responsibility to Protect: Cultural Perspectives in the Global South (London: Routledge, 2011)Google Scholar.