Search Results

The Kosovo Report is a final product of the work by the Independent International Commission on Kosovo, established to examine key developments prior to, during, and after the Kosovo war, including systematic violations of human rights in the region. The report assesses effectiveness of diplomatic efforts to prevent the war, legality of the NATO bombing campaign against Yugoslavia, and the progress of the United Nations in post‐conflict reconstruction. The Report makes a recommendation for the future status of Kosovo and proposes a new general framework for humanitarian intervention based on principles of legitimacy. It argues that the intervention by the international community in the Kosovo conflict did not so much create a precedent for intervention elsewhere as raise vital question about the legitimacy and practicability of the use of military force to defend human rights. The intervention, the Report concludes, exposed the limitations of the current international law on the balance between the rights of citizens and the rights of states; it demonstrated the difficulties that ensue when even the most sophisticated and professional military forces are deployed to achieve humanitarian goals; and it showed the immense obstacles that lie in the path of creating multi‐ethnic cooperation in societies torn apart by ethnic war.

This book examines the dynamics between informal groups of states and the UN Security Council in the management of conflicts in Namibia, El Salvador, and Kosovo. It sets forth three main arguments. Firstly, that informal groups of states are agents of incremental change. They proliferated in the 1990s out of the increasing demands on the United Nations to adapt to the new security environment of the post-bipolar world, without formally changing the constitutional foundation of the Organization. Secondly, that informal mechanisms may narrow the operational and participatory gap growing out of the multiple incapacities that prevent the Security Council from formulating an effective response to crisis situations. Informal groups of states may enhance Council governance if they strike a balance between competing demands of inclusiveness, efficiency, informality, transparency, and accountability. Thirdly, that the post-Cold War era has fostered an environment where the substance of conflict resolution and the process of its legitimation have become increasingly detached. The former tends to be delegated to informal groups or coalition of states, while the Security Council provides the latter. The successful merger of right process and substantive outcome may strengthen the legitimacy of the Council and make actions taken by informal settings more acceptable.

This book analyses the normative framework underlying the statebuilding activities of the international administrations in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, and East Timor. It argues that a particular understanding of sovereignty has shaped the efforts of these international administrations, and examines the influence of this conception on three aspects of statebuilding: institution-building, the behaviour of international institutions towards local actors, and the timing and nature of the transition from international to local authority — the exit strategies of international administrations. The book argues that international administrations hold a conception of ‘sovereignty as responsibility’: states have to fulfil a set of responsibilities towards their population, in particular administrative effectiveness, the protection of human rights, democracy, the rule of law, and maintaining a free market economy. These responsibilities constitute a ‘standard of civilisation’, which legitimises sovereign authority, and failure to fulfil this standard can lead to international intervention and the denial of sovereign rights. The book shows how this ‘standard of civilisation’ is used by international administrations both to justify the denial of self-governance, and to serve as a blueprint for their institution-building activities. The restructuring of political and administrative practices to help post-conflict territories to meet this standard creates a sovereignty paradox: international administrations compromise one element of sovereignty — the right to self-government — in order to implement domestic reforms to legitimize the authority of local political institutions, and thus strengthen their sovereignty. In the light of the governance and development record of the three international administrations, the book assesses the promises and the pathologies of statebuilding, and develops recommendations to improve their performance.

The imperatives of sovereignty, human rights, and national security very often pull in different directions, yet the relations between these three different notions are considerably more subtle than those of simple opposition. Rather, their interaction may at times be contradictory, at others tense, and at others even complementary. This collection presents an analysis of the irreducible dilemmas posed by the foundational challenges of sovereignty, human rights, and security, not merely in terms of the formal doctrine of their disciplines, but also of the manner in which they can be configured in order to achieve persuasive legitimacy as to both methods and results. The chapters in this volume represent an attempt to face up to these dilemmas in all of their complexity, and to suggest ways in which they can be confronted productively both in the abstract and in the concrete circumstances of particular cases. This book is of huge topical importance in the post 9/11 era and in the wake of the Kosovan declaration of independence. It looks at the impact of national security needs on the development of the international legal regime.

The issue of humanitarian intervention has generated one of the most heated debates in international relations over the past decade, for both theorists and practitioners. At its heart is the alleged tension between the principle of state sovereignty, and the evolving norms related to individual human rights. This edited collection examines the challenges to international society posed by humanitarian intervention in a post-September 11th world. It brings scholars of law, philosophy, and international relations together with those who have actively engaged in cases of intervention, in order to examine the legitimacy and consequences of the use of military force for humanitarian purposes. The book demonstrates why humanitarian intervention continues to be a controversial question not only for the United Nations but also for Western states and humanitarian organisations.

Transitional administrations represent the most complex operations attempted by the United Nations. The missions in Kosovo (1999—) and East Timor (1999–2002) are commonly seen as unique in the history of the United Nations. But they may also be seen as the latest in a series of operations that have involved the United Nations in ‘state‐building’ activities, in which it has attempted to develop the institutions of government by assuming some or all of those sovereign powers on a temporary basis. Viewed in light of earlier UN operations, such as those in Namibia (1989–1990), Cambodia (1992–1993), and Eastern Slavonia (1996–1998), the idea that these exceptional circumstances may not recur is somewhat disingenuous. The need for policy research in this area was brought into sharp focus by the weighty but vague responsibilities assigned to the United Nations in Afghanistan (2002—) and its contested role in Iraq (2003—).

This book seeks to fill that gap. Aimed at policy‐makers, diplomats, and a wide academic audience (including international relations, political science, international law, war studies, and development studies), the book provides a concise history of transitional administration and a treatment of the five key issues confronting such operations: peace and security, the role of the United Nations as government, establishing the rule of law, economic reconstruction, and exit strategies. Research for the book has been conducted through extensive field research and interviews with key UN staff and local representatives in almost all of the territories under consideration. The unifying theme is that, while the ends of transitional administration may be idealistic, the means cannot be.

Since the mid-1990s, the United Nations and other multilateral organizations have been entrusted with exceptional authority for the administration of war-torn and strife-ridden territories. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, Eastern Slavonia, Kosovo, and East Timor, these organizations have assumed responsibility for governance to a degree unprecedented in recent history. These initiatives represent some of the boldest experiments in the management and settlement of intra-state conflict ever attempted by third parties.

This book is a study of recent experiences in the international administration of war-torn territories. Examines the nature of these operations—their mandates, structures, and powers—and distinguishes them from kindred historical and contemporary experiences of peacekeeping, trusteeship, and military occupation. Analyses and assesses the effectiveness of international administrations and discusses, in thematic fashion, the key operational and political challenges that arise in the context of these experiences. Also reflects on the policy implications of these experiences, recommending reforms or new approaches to the challenge posed by localized anarchy in a global context. Argues that despite many of the problems arising from both the design and implementation of international administrations—some of them very serious—international administrations have generally made a positive contribution to the mitigation of conflict in the territories where they have been established.

The international administration of troubled states—whether in Bosnia, Kosovo, or East Timor—has seen a return to the principle of trusteeship: i.e. situations in which some form of international supervision is required in a particular territory in order both to maintain order and to foster the norms and practices of fair self‐government. This book rescues the normative discourse of trusteeship from the obscurity into which it has fallen since decolonization. It traces the development of trusteeship from its emergence out of debates concerning the misrule of the East India Company (Ch. 2), to its internationalization in imperial Africa (Ch. 3), to its institutionalization in the League of Nations mandates system (Ch. 4) and in the UN trusteeship system, and to the destruction of its legitimacy by the ideas of self‐determination and human equality (Ch. 5). The book brings this rich historical experience to bear on the dilemmas posed by the resurrection of trusteeship after the end of the cold war (Ch. 6) and, in the context of contemporary world problems, explores the obligations that attach to preponderant power and the limits that should be observed in exercising that power for the sake of global good. In Ch. 7, the book concludes by arguing that trusteeship remains fundamentally at odds with the ideas of human dignity and equality.