The Globalisation of Justice: Amplifying and Silencing Voices at the ICC

Abstract

Part of the book Mobilising International Law for “Global Justice” (edited by Jeff Handmaker and Karin Arts, forthcoming with Cambridge University Press), this chapter argues that the very first situation before the International Criminal Court is illustrative of how the globalisation of international criminal justice amplifies some voices while silencing others. The chapter shows how in northern Uganda the globalisation of criminal justice offered a site for what Martti Koskenniemi has called ‘the politics of re-description’ and we give four examples: (1) the struggle between a military approach and reconciliation efforts in the period prior to ICC intervention; (2) the ICC referral as a way to re-describe the conflict and to continue a military approach; (3) the Juba peace process as a negotiation between legal and other approaches and (4) the post-Juba period, in which a political agreement is approached legalistically.

Keywords: International Criminal Court, northern Uganda, globalisation, international criminal justice, peace versus justice, Acholi