No More Rwandas vs No More Kosovos: Intervention and Prevention

Abstract:     
The type of problem confronting human rights today is not Kosovo but Rwanda. Put differently, the problem is not the legitimacy of humanitarian intervention, but the overwhelming prevalence of inhumanitarian non-intervention. Empowering the United Nations, in this context, requires mobilizing the political will of member states as much as it does the creation of new legal rules. In this context, the rhetorical shift adopted by the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty - from a right of intervention to the responsibility to protect - may mark the strongest advance in this contested area of international relations. Nevertheless, as recent years have demonstrated, enthusiasm about intervention can be - to say the least - a mixed blessing.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 20

Keywords: responsibility to protect, Kosovo, Rwanda, prevention, humanitarian intervention

Accepted Paper Series