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Outlines and evaluates the political, legal, and ethical objections to humanitarian intervention. In so doing, it questions not only whether the doctrine of ‘sovereignty as responsibility’ has taken hold in international society, but also whether it should – particularly in the form suggested by Western states. The author argues that the ethical position of pluralism – as articulated by non-Western states – represents the most compelling case against humanitarian intervention, by emphasizing the impact on international society of relaxing the norm of non-intervention. Despite these pluralist objections, military intervention in cases of supreme humanitarian emergency can be defended on moral grounds, provided the intervention meets certain tests of legitimacy. Given the unintended consequences of military action, the author also suggests that more attention should be paid to the non-military means of operationalizing ‘sovereignty as responsibility’.

After the end of the Cold War, many in the West viewed Africa as a testing ground for the solidarist argument that sovereignty was no longer an absolute principle and that the international community could intervene to protect individual from human rights violations. This argument seems particularly challenging in the African context, given the continental leadership’s historic commitment to territorial integrity and non-intervention. However, as the author shows, African leaders from 1945 to 1990 were largely upholding the pluralist international norms of the time. In other words, the case for humanitarian intervention – and the problems posed by the practice – are not region-specific. The early 1990s, during which the United Nations intervened in Somalia, seemed to confirm the solidarist position. However, the failure to intervene in Rwanda in 1994, and the more recent experience of interventions in Sierra Leone, present a more mixed picture. Humanitarian intervention remains a controversial practice because of its coercive means, and its tendency to attribute blame or responsibility in what are often very complex civil conflicts.

This chapter presents four case studies covering all of the substantive domains in which international courts operate. The case studies show World Trade Organization (WTO) litigation pressuring the US Congress to change a tax policy that promoted US exports; the Andean Tribunal facilitating a retreat on the issuing of “second use patents”; and the Community Court of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) leading Niger to compensate Hadijatou Mani for enslavement in the customary family law system, as well as the indictment and arrest of Charles Taylor for crimes committed in a neighboring country. In all of these case studies, the ability of ICs to offer a remedy mobilized litigants, and ICs' rulings constructed focal remedies that compliance supporters could demand.

This chapter explores the strategies (or lack thereof) employed by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and the UN for their exits from Sierra Leone. It compares ECOWAS’s lack of an exit strategy and its dependence on one troop contributor, Nigeria, with the UN Mission in Sierra Leone, which had an exit strategy that was based on key benchmarks—the most successful exit process by the UN to date. ECOWAS’s exit from Sierra Leone was dictated largely by domestic political developments in Nigeria, which proved problematic. While progress in revamping Sierra Leone’s security and political institutions has been relatively easy to achieve, the same cannot be said for revitalizing Sierra Leone’s postwar economy. This points to a huge deficit in international responses to postconflict reconstruction, despite the establishment of the Peacebuilding Commission, which in its initial period has fallen short of expectations.

This chapter examines the legitimation efforts of ECOWAS from three perspectives: norms, institutions, and compliance. It highlights how military interventions by ECOWAS to address the civil wars in Liberia and Sierra Leone in the 1990s strongly challenged its legitimacy in the eyes of a number of some of its member states, not least because they were seen at odds with the traditional principle of non-intervention. It shows that this resulted in efforts by ECOWAS members to develop a new regional norm emphasising “non-indifference” over the traditional norm of “non-interference”, and the strengthening of its security architecture to enforce the principle of non-indifference and legitimise ECOWAS’s new role. Through several examples, the chapter also highlights the limits of ECOWAS’s legitimation efforts, not least the reliance on the regional hegemon, Nigeria, to provide the necessary resources to enforce ECOWAS’s decisions.

This concluding chapter summarizes the book’s findings, and considers the emergence of cosmopolitan legal systems beyond Europe. Under the tutelage of its Court, the ECHR regime has helped post-authoritarian states transition to constitutional democracy, provoked reform of domestic legal systems, and sustained dialogues that have served to raise the standards that officials must meet wherever they exercise authority over persons. Beyond Europe, it is a brute fact that many powerful states reject the model of a rights-based constitutional structure. However, there are also reasons for optimism. The Inter-American Convention on Human Rights, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), and other international regimes have gradually developed capacity to influence domestic systems in unexpected and significant ways. As this book documents, progress toward achieving a Rightful condition has been made, but the process will continue to be an arduous one, as Kant had predicted.

Building on Liberia’s social and political inheritance, this chapter places the Liberian civil war in historical context and shows how conflict dynamics affected the development of extralegal groups. It examines the period of political instability leading up to the war (1979–89) and the post-conflict transition period that followed it (post-2003), as well as the war itself (1989–2003). The emphasis is not on the battles fought, nor the military tactics employed. Instead, the intention is to understand how the practices and interactions that were specific to Liberia’s war impacted upon the emergence of extralegal groups. Understanding the war economy, its incentives, and the patterns of interaction embedded within it is critical to the commodity chapters that follow. War leaves behind a legacy of conflict capital, and this legacy of relationships, interactions, and social expectations persists long after war ends.

This chapter examines whether the ECOWAS Community Court of Justice (ECCJ or Court), as an international court operating in the West African region with its peculiar sociopolitical and economic context, enjoys any form or degree of actual authority in any of its main functions. The ECCJ’s two contrasting epochs represent a variation in the authority of the Court. Whereas under its 1991 Protocol, the Court enjoyed limited de jure authority with little potential for growing its de facto authority, the 2005 Supplementary Protocol introduced expansions that increased the potential for enhanced de facto authority. Ultimately, the Court’s authority varies significantly both in terms of areas of competence, as among different court-users and in relation to wider communities in its State Parties. Arguably, these variations indicate that different factors influence the responses that the Court attracts from different user-groups.

Two low-level armed conflicts, Indonesia’s East Timor and Ivory Coast’s post-2010 election crises, provide detailed qualitative evidence of highly structured intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) engaging in effective civil warpreventing activities in member-states. Highly structured IGOs threatened and sanctioned each of these states and offered (long-term) benefits conditional on successful crisis resolution. The governments were aware of and responded to these IGOs’ concerns, as did the rebels in these respective cases. The early stages of the conflict in Syria in 2011 provide a counterpoint. With Syria’s limited engagement in only few highly structured IGOs, the Syrian government ignored international calls for peace. And, without highly structured IGOs’ counterweight to curtail the government, the rebels saw little reason to stop their armed resistance. The result was a brutal and deadly civil war that continues today.