Nicholas J Wheeler
Biographic Data
| ID | 3775844 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Nicholas J Wheeler |
| GIVEN NAMES | Nicholas J |
| FAMILY NAME | Wheeler |
| SIGNATURE | WHEELER N J |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Birmingham |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 49 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 357 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 48 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1985 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 8 |
New Perspectives on Trust in International Conflicts
This forum proposes to rethink the specific conditions and dynamics under which trust can endogenously emerge in international conflicts. Traditionally, International Relations (IR) scholars have viewed trust and conflict as opposites or antagonists, with trust being seen as essential to overcoming conflict, and conflict seen as corrosive of trust. However, this framing is of limited use when it comes to understanding the complex role of trust in…
The role of artificial intelligence in nuclear crisis decision making: A complement, not a substitute
This article explores the nuanced interplay between artificial intelligence (AI) and human decision making in the high-stakes arena of nuclear crisis management. We argue that AI, despite its lack of emotional intelligence and experiential learning, presents unique opportunities to enhance decision-makers' ability to navigate the complexities of nuclear crises. By juxtaposing AI's data-driven insights with human intelligence's depth in emotional …
Overcoming the Four Horsemen of Reassurance Diplomacy: Explaining Variation in Face-to-Face Engagement
The decision to engage in face-to-face diplomacy aimed at reassuring an adversary is one of the most salient ones a state leader will have to make. However, often leaders choose not to engage in such diplomacy because they follow those scholars and pundits who are skeptical of the reassurance value of interpersonal face-to-face diplomacy. This creates an important puzzle. Why do leaders sometimes choose to promote reassurance through meeting pers…
Trust or Perish? The Responsibility to Protect and Use of Force in a Changing World Order
As part of the roundtable, “The Responsibility to Protect in a Changing World Order: Twenty Years since Its Inception,” this essay asks the reader to consider the role that trust, distrust, and ambivalence play in enabling and constraining the use of force under pillar three of the Responsibility to Protect (RtoP). Drawing on interdisciplinary studies on trust, it analyzes the 2011 military intervention in Libya for evidence on how trust, distrus…
The strength of weak bonds: Substituting bodily copresence in diplomatic social bonding
One of the central puzzles in the study of diplomacy is why some interactions between leaders result in positive social bonds, while others are mired in distrust and hostility. Recent research in the field of microsociology, the study of everyday interactions, most notably the pioneering research of American sociologist Randall Collins, suggests several critical ingredients for a successful interaction, including bodily copresence. In this articl…
A presumption of trust' in international society
This article reflects on Nicholas J. Rengger's 1997 article in International Affairs on 'The ethics of trust in world politics'. The article has received comparably little attention, which is a shame because as I explore in my contribution it remains two decades on a highly important intervention in the on-going debate over the possibilities for developing and sustaining trust in an anarchic international system. Rengger argued that international…
Social bonding in diplomacy
It is widely recognized among state leaders and diplomats that personal relations play an important role in international politics. Recent work at the intersection of psychology, neuroscience, and sociology has highlighted the critical importance of face-to-face interactions in generating intention understanding and building trust. Yet, a key question remains as to why some leaders are able to ‘hit it off,’ generating a positive social bond, whil…
Great illusions or great transformations? Human rights and international relations a hundred years on
Human rights have been in the practice of international relations, but they have not been central to academic thinking on International Relations (IR) for most of the century since the discipline became institutionalized in 1919. We suggest two related reasons for this relative neglect by the IR community. First, the US heartland of IR prioritized other institutions of international order during the 1950s and 1960s, primarily the balance of power…
From Interpersonal Trust to Security Communities
The previous chapter showed the limits of ‘incrementalist’ theories of trust-building when it comes to the building of trust and the accurate interpretation of signals. This chapter examines what identity -based approaches to trust can contribute to the challenge of building trust between two enemies. The chapter examines security community theory and democratic peace theory. It argues that neither of these identity-based approaches has a persuas…
Trusting Enemies
How can two enemies, locked into a spiral of fear and insecurity, transform their relationship into a trusting one? Trusting Enemies argues that the field of International Relations has not done a good job of answering this question. This is because it has been looking in the wrong place. Where trust-building has been theorized by the discipline of International Relations, the focus has been on the state and the individual. This book argues that …
Trusting enemies: Interpersonal relationships in international conflict
When commentators look back on the state of trust in contemporary world politics, the words of Charles Dickens in A tale of two cities will seem sadly appropriate: ‘It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness’. On the one hand, the president of the world's supposed…
Interview with Robert Jervis
This interview with Robert Jervis explores the early influences on his career, his time working with Thomas Schelling and Erving Goffman, that led to his path-breaking 1970 book, The Logic of Images in International Relations, and his more widely known (although according to Jervis himself less original) Perception and Misperception in International Politics. The rich and wide-ranging interview goes on to explore his views on the nuclear revoluti…
Investigating diplomatic transformations
This article investigates the role that diplomacy—especially at the highest levels—can play in transforming adversarial relationships. Building on Martin Wight's exploration of these issues, in particular the question of how two adversaries can convince each other that they are serious negotiating partners, the article contends that achieving a significant de-escalation of a conflict depends upon the growth of trust. In contrast to Wight's limite…
Special Responsibilities: Global Problems and American Power
The language of special responsibilities is ubiquitous in world politics, with policymakers and commentators alike speaking and acting as though particular states have, or ought to have, unique obligations in managing global problems. Surprisingly, scholars are yet to provide any in-depth analysis of this fascinating aspect of world politics. This path-breaking study examines the nature of special responsibilities, the complex politics that surro…
I Had Gone to Lahore With a Message of Goodwill But in Return We Got Kargil” 1: The Promise and Perils of “Leaps of Trust” in India-Pakistan Relations
This article explores how it became possible for the former Indian Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, to make a major trust-building initiative with his Pakistani counterpart, Nawaz Sharif, at the 1999 Lahore Summit. Building on security dilemma theorizing in the field of International Relations, the present article develops the concept of a “leap of trust” as a way of understanding how decision-makers trapped in security dilemmas might break …
The puzzle of trusting relationships in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty
A successful outcome of the 2010 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference is widely seen as vital if the NPT is to continue to play an important role in preventing nuclear proliferation. Focusing on the concept of trust, this article offers a novel perspective on the treaty and its future prospects. Too often dismissed as impossible or dangerous in international politics, trust has received little attention from both academics and…
Beyond Waltz's Nuclear World: More Trust May be Better
In 1981 Kenneth Waltz published a controversial Adelphi Paper, 'The Spread of Nuclear Weapons: More May Be Better', in which he turned the conventional wisdom on its head by arguing that the spread of nuclear weapons would not be a terrifying prospect. This article rejects the proposition that fear of nuclear destruction can serve as a permanent basis of international order, and argues that securing order depends upon the building of trust betwee…
To Put Oneself into the other Fellow's Place: John Herz, the Security Dilemma and the Nuclear Age
It is well known in the literature on security dilemma theorising that John Herz coined the concept in the early 1950s, with Herbert Butterfield developing a very similar concept at the same time. What is less well appreciated is that Butterfield powerfully argued in his 1951 book History and Human Relations that there was no prospect of state leaders and diplomats overcoming the dynamics of mutual suspicion and distrust that created what he had …
The Security Council's Crisis of Legitimacy and the Use of Force
Roundtable: Humanitarian Intervention After 9/11
Tom Farer opens the roundtable by outlining a five-part test for legitimate humanitarian intervention and questioning the utility of the term 'cosmopolitan' in this context. Five responses are offered. Daniele Archibugi highlights the problem of legitimate authority for intervention and offers a separate four-stage process which he believes contributes to institutionalizing cosmopolitanism. Chris Brown questions the value of creating a set of cri…
We the Peoples: Contending Discourses of Security in Human Rights Theory and Practice
This article develops a critical conception of security by showing the limits of traditional realist and pluralist discourses. It does this by exploring the deficiencies of realist and pluralist approaches when it comes to thinking about the promotion of human rights. Realism leads to moral indifference and a myopic approach to security and pluralism is complacent about how the rules and norms of international society exclude humanitarian concern…
India as Rescuer? Order Versus Justice in the Bangladesh War of 1971
Examines the justifications, motives, and outcomes surrounding India's use of force against Pakistan in December 1971. It shows how international society as reflected in the positions taken by the Security Council and the General Assembly interpreted India's action as a breach of the legal rules prohibiting the use of force rather than as a rescue of the Bengali people.
A Solidarist Moment in International Society? The Case of Safe Havens and No‐Fly Zones in Iraq
Charts how the Western powers came to intervene in Iraq after the Gulf War to protect Kurds in the north and Shiites in the south. Charts how the Security Council adopted in Resolution 688 a new understanding of Chapter VII of the UN Charter that provided the legitimating ground for Western action in the form of the safe havens and no‐fly zones.
Conclusion
Humanitarian Intervention and International Society
Explores traditional realist and pluralist objections to the practice of humanitarian intervention in international society. It then develops a solidarist theory of humanitarian intervention that rebuts these criticisms. A key part of the chapter lies in drawing on English School theory, constructivism, and Quentin Skinner's work to develop the claim that legitimacy is constitutive of state actions.
Saving Strangers: Humanitarian Intervention in International Society
Argues that there has been a change of norm in relation to the legitimacy of humanitarian intervention in the 1990s. It shows how humanitarian justifications for the use of force lacked legitimacy in Cold War international society, focusing on the cases of India, Vietnam, and Tanzania's interventions in the 1970s. This reflected the dominance of pluralist international society thinking in shaping the legal rules and institutions of international …
Pluralist or Solidarist Conceptions of International Society: Bull and Vincent on Humanitarian Intervention
Social bonding in diplomacy
It is widely recognized among state leaders and diplomats that personal relations play an important role in international politics. Recent work at the intersection of psychology, neuroscience, and sociology has highlighted the critical importance of face-to-face interactions in generating intention understanding and building trust. Yet, a key question remains as to why some leaders are able to ‘hit it off,’ generating a positive social bond, whil…
Good International Citizenship: A Third Way for British Foreign Policy
To date, there has not been a sustained attempt to bring the philosophy of the Third Way into foreign policy. In order to fill this gap, the authors turn to the idea of ‘good international citizenship’ pioneered by the former Australian Foreign Minister, Gareth Evans. It is argued that good international citizenship provides a conceptual rationale for an ethical foreign policy as well as a standard for judging the priority accorded to the goals o…
Hedley Bull's pluralism of the intellect and solidarism of the will
Hedley Bull is one of the most influential theorists of his generation. His attempt to build a theory of international politics which was neither the servant of realpolitik nor the child of Wilsonian idealism remains the most convincing framework for understanding state practice. This article seeks to reassess Bull's contribution to the subject by addressing two important questions. In the first half of the article the authors argue that Bull bec…
Trusting enemies: Interpersonal relationships in international conflict
When commentators look back on the state of trust in contemporary world politics, the words of Charles Dickens in A tale of two cities will seem sadly appropriate: ‘It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness’. On the one hand, the president of the world's supposed…
The puzzle of trusting relationships in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty
A successful outcome of the 2010 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference is widely seen as vital if the NPT is to continue to play an important role in preventing nuclear proliferation. Focusing on the concept of trust, this article offers a novel perspective on the treaty and its future prospects. Too often dismissed as impossible or dangerous in international politics, trust has received little attention from both academics and…
East Timor and the new humanitarian interventionism
The fate of East Timor provides a barometer for how far the normative structure of international society has been transformed since the end of the Cold War. In 1975, the East Timorese were abandoned by a Western bloc that placed accommodating the Indonesian invasion of the island before the protection of human rights. Twenty-five years later, it was the protection of the civilian population on the island that loomed large in the calculations of t…
Dying for `Enduring Freedom: Accepting Responsibility for Civilian Casualties in the War against Terrorism
This article examines what moral theories are available to justify the harming of the innocent in war. Focusing on US conduct of the war against the Taliban and al-Qaeda, the article examines how far the US is responsible for the deaths of Afghan civilians. Although US actions have been justified in terms of respect for the Just War principle of non-combatant immunity, the article shows how this principle rested uneasily with alternative moral th…
Investigating diplomatic transformations
This article investigates the role that diplomacy—especially at the highest levels—can play in transforming adversarial relationships. Building on Martin Wight's exploration of these issues, in particular the question of how two adversaries can convince each other that they are serious negotiating partners, the article contends that achieving a significant de-escalation of a conflict depends upon the growth of trust. In contrast to Wight's limite…
The Security Council's Crisis of Legitimacy and the Use of Force
We the Peoples: Contending Discourses of Security in Human Rights Theory and Practice
This article develops a critical conception of security by showing the limits of traditional realist and pluralist discourses. It does this by exploring the deficiencies of realist and pluralist approaches when it comes to thinking about the promotion of human rights. Realism leads to moral indifference and a myopic approach to security and pluralism is complacent about how the rules and norms of international society exclude humanitarian concern…
The strength of weak bonds: Substituting bodily copresence in diplomatic social bonding
One of the central puzzles in the study of diplomacy is why some interactions between leaders result in positive social bonds, while others are mired in distrust and hostility. Recent research in the field of microsociology, the study of everyday interactions, most notably the pioneering research of American sociologist Randall Collins, suggests several critical ingredients for a successful interaction, including bodily copresence. In this articl…
To Put Oneself into the other Fellow's Place: John Herz, the Security Dilemma and the Nuclear Age
It is well known in the literature on security dilemma theorising that John Herz coined the concept in the early 1950s, with Herbert Butterfield developing a very similar concept at the same time. What is less well appreciated is that Butterfield powerfully argued in his 1951 book History and Human Relations that there was no prospect of state leaders and diplomats overcoming the dynamics of mutual suspicion and distrust that created what he had …
Agency, Humanitarianism and Intervention
This article examines some of the justifications that have been proffered as to why “we” should sacrifice in the name of common humanity. The first section examines the views of two leading thinkers who reject the statist paradigm, Bhikhu Parekh and Michael Walzer. Focusing on Parekh's and Walzer's conception of the state as a moral agent, and their conviction that states should engage in humanitarian intervention, the article argues that the pro…
A presumption of trust' in international society
This article reflects on Nicholas J. Rengger's 1997 article in International Affairs on 'The ethics of trust in world politics'. The article has received comparably little attention, which is a shame because as I explore in my contribution it remains two decades on a highly important intervention in the on-going debate over the possibilities for developing and sustaining trust in an anarchic international system. Rengger argued that international…
I Had Gone to Lahore With a Message of Goodwill But in Return We Got Kargil” 1: The Promise and Perils of “Leaps of Trust” in India-Pakistan Relations
This article explores how it became possible for the former Indian Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, to make a major trust-building initiative with his Pakistani counterpart, Nawaz Sharif, at the 1999 Lahore Summit. Building on security dilemma theorizing in the field of International Relations, the present article develops the concept of a “leap of trust” as a way of understanding how decision-makers trapped in security dilemmas might break …
Beyond Waltz's Nuclear World: More Trust May be Better
In 1981 Kenneth Waltz published a controversial Adelphi Paper, 'The Spread of Nuclear Weapons: More May Be Better', in which he turned the conventional wisdom on its head by arguing that the spread of nuclear weapons would not be a terrifying prospect. This article rejects the proposition that fear of nuclear destruction can serve as a permanent basis of international order, and argues that securing order depends upon the building of trust betwee…
Roundtable: Humanitarian Intervention After 9/11
Tom Farer opens the roundtable by outlining a five-part test for legitimate humanitarian intervention and questioning the utility of the term 'cosmopolitan' in this context. Five responses are offered. Daniele Archibugi highlights the problem of legitimate authority for intervention and offers a separate four-stage process which he believes contributes to institutionalizing cosmopolitanism. Chris Brown questions the value of creating a set of cri…
Humanitarian Intervention After Kosovo: Emergent Norm, Moral Duty or the Coming Anarchy? 1
Journal Article Humanitarian Intervention After Kosovo: Emergent Norm, Moral Duty or the Coming Anarchy? Get access Nicholas J. Wheeler Nicholas J. Wheeler Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar International Affairs, Volume 77, Issue 1, January 2001, Pages 113–128, https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-2346.00181 Published: 16 December 2002
Reflections on the legality and legitimacy of Nato's intervention in Kosovo
(2000). Reflections on the legality and legitimacy of NATO's intervention in Kosovo. The International Journal of Human Rights: Vol. 4, The Kosovo Tragedy The Human Rights Dimensions, pp. 144-163
The role of artificial intelligence in nuclear crisis decision making: A complement, not a substitute
This article explores the nuanced interplay between artificial intelligence (AI) and human decision making in the high-stakes arena of nuclear crisis management. We argue that AI, despite its lack of emotional intelligence and experiential learning, presents unique opportunities to enhance decision-makers' ability to navigate the complexities of nuclear crises. By juxtaposing AI's data-driven insights with human intelligence's depth in emotional …
Overcoming the Four Horsemen of Reassurance Diplomacy: Explaining Variation in Face-to-Face Engagement
The decision to engage in face-to-face diplomacy aimed at reassuring an adversary is one of the most salient ones a state leader will have to make. However, often leaders choose not to engage in such diplomacy because they follow those scholars and pundits who are skeptical of the reassurance value of interpersonal face-to-face diplomacy. This creates an important puzzle. Why do leaders sometimes choose to promote reassurance through meeting pers…
Trust or Perish? The Responsibility to Protect and Use of Force in a Changing World Order
As part of the roundtable, “The Responsibility to Protect in a Changing World Order: Twenty Years since Its Inception,” this essay asks the reader to consider the role that trust, distrust, and ambivalence play in enabling and constraining the use of force under pillar three of the Responsibility to Protect (RtoP). Drawing on interdisciplinary studies on trust, it analyzes the 2011 military intervention in Libya for evidence on how trust, distrus…
Humanitarian vigilantes or legal entrepreneurs: Enforcing human rights in international society
(2000). Humanitarian vigilantes or legal entrepreneurs: Enforcing human rights in international society. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy: Vol. 3, Human Rights and Global Diversity, pp. 139-162
British nuclear weapons and Anglo-American relations 1945–54
Journal Article British nuclear weapons and Anglo-American relations 1945–54 Get access N. J. Wheeler N. J. Wheeler Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar International Affairs, Volume 62, Issue 1, Winter 1985, Pages 71–86, https://doi.org/10.2307/2618068 Published: 01 January 1985
United States Foreign Policy-Making: Chaos or Design
Pluralist or Solidarist Conceptions of International Society: Bull and Vincent on Humanitarian Intervention
Aspects of Chinese Music -- The Art of Negotiation: Teahouse Courtship Dialogues (quing-ge) from Guiyang & Transcriptions of Vocal Polyphony of the Dong, Buyi, Zhuang, Yi, Mulao, Yao and She Minority …
The logic of anarchy: Neorealism to structural realism
Journal Article The logic of anarchy: neorealism to structural realism Get access The logic of anarchy: neorealism to structural realism. By Barry Buzan, Charles Jonesand Richard Little. New York: Columbia University Press. 1993. 267pp. Index. $46.00; ISBN 0 231 08040 9. Pb.: $18.00; ISBN 0 231 08041 7. Nicholas Wheeler Nicholas Wheeler 1University of Wales, Aberystwyth Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Inte…
War and law since 1945
Journal Article War and law since 1945 Get access War and law since 1945. By Geoffrey Best. Oxford: Clarendon. 1994. 434pp. Index. £25.00. ISBN 0 19 821991 1. Nicholas Wheeler Nicholas Wheeler 1University of Wales, Aberystwyth Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar International Affairs, Volume 71, Issue 2, April 1995, Pages 381–382, https://doi.org/10.2307/2623471 Published: 01 April 1995
Guardian Angel or Global Gangster: A Review of the Ethical Claims of International Society
Hedley Bull's pluralism of the intellect and solidarism of the will
Hedley Bull is one of the most influential theorists of his generation. His attempt to build a theory of international politics which was neither the servant of realpolitik nor the child of Wilsonian idealism remains the most convincing framework for understanding state practice. This article seeks to reassess Bull's contribution to the subject by addressing two important questions. In the first half of the article the authors argue that Bull bec…
Humanitarian intervention: Just war vs. pacifism and Reflections on violence
Journal Article Humanitarian intervention: just war vs. pacifism and Reflections on violence Get access Humanitarian intervention: just war vs. pacifism. By Robert L. Philipsand Duane L. Cady. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield. 1996. 122pp. Index. $42.40; ISBN 0 8476 8141 6. Pb.: $16.95; ISBN 0 8476 8142 4.Reflections on violence. By John Keane. London: Verso. 1996. 200pp. Index. £29.95; ISBN 1 85984 979 2. Pb.: £9.95; ISBN 1 85984 1155. Nichola…
Agency, Humanitarianism and Intervention
This article examines some of the justifications that have been proffered as to why “we” should sacrifice in the name of common humanity. The first section examines the views of two leading thinkers who reject the statist paradigm, Bhikhu Parekh and Michael Walzer. Focusing on Parekh's and Walzer's conception of the state as a moral agent, and their conviction that states should engage in humanitarian intervention, the article argues that the pro…
Good International Citizenship: A Third Way for British Foreign Policy
To date, there has not been a sustained attempt to bring the philosophy of the Third Way into foreign policy. In order to fill this gap, the authors turn to the idea of ‘good international citizenship’ pioneered by the former Australian Foreign Minister, Gareth Evans. It is argued that good international citizenship provides a conceptual rationale for an ethical foreign policy as well as a standard for judging the priority accorded to the goals o…
Human Rights in Global Politics
There is a stark contradiction between the theory of universal human rights and the everyday practice of human wrongs. This timely volume investigates whether human rights abuses are a result of the failure of governments to live up to a universal human rights standard, or whether the search for moral universals is a fundamentally flawed enterprise which distracts us from the task of developing rights in the context of particular ethical communit…
Humanitarian vigilantes or legal entrepreneurs: Enforcing human rights in international society
(2000). Humanitarian vigilantes or legal entrepreneurs: Enforcing human rights in international society. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy: Vol. 3, Human Rights and Global Diversity, pp. 139-162
Reflections on the legality and legitimacy of Nato's intervention in Kosovo
(2000). Reflections on the legality and legitimacy of NATO's intervention in Kosovo. The International Journal of Human Rights: Vol. 4, The Kosovo Tragedy The Human Rights Dimensions, pp. 144-163
Introduction: The political and moral limits of western military intervention to protect civilians in danger
Humanitarian Intervention After Kosovo: Emergent Norm, Moral Duty or the Coming Anarchy? 1
Journal Article Humanitarian Intervention After Kosovo: Emergent Norm, Moral Duty or the Coming Anarchy? Get access Nicholas J. Wheeler Nicholas J. Wheeler Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar International Affairs, Volume 77, Issue 1, January 2001, Pages 113–128, https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-2346.00181 Published: 16 December 2002
East Timor and the new humanitarian interventionism
The fate of East Timor provides a barometer for how far the normative structure of international society has been transformed since the end of the Cold War. In 1975, the East Timorese were abandoned by a Western bloc that placed accommodating the Indonesian invasion of the island before the protection of human rights. Twenty-five years later, it was the protection of the civilian population on the island that loomed large in the calculations of t…
India as Rescuer? Order Versus Justice in the Bangladesh War of 1971
Examines the justifications, motives, and outcomes surrounding India's use of force against Pakistan in December 1971. It shows how international society as reflected in the positions taken by the Security Council and the General Assembly interpreted India's action as a breach of the legal rules prohibiting the use of force rather than as a rescue of the Bengali people.
A Solidarist Moment in International Society? The Case of Safe Havens and No‐Fly Zones in Iraq
Charts how the Western powers came to intervene in Iraq after the Gulf War to protect Kurds in the north and Shiites in the south. Charts how the Security Council adopted in Resolution 688 a new understanding of Chapter VII of the UN Charter that provided the legitimating ground for Western action in the form of the safe havens and no‐fly zones.
Conclusion
Humanitarian Intervention and International Society
Explores traditional realist and pluralist objections to the practice of humanitarian intervention in international society. It then develops a solidarist theory of humanitarian intervention that rebuts these criticisms. A key part of the chapter lies in drawing on English School theory, constructivism, and Quentin Skinner's work to develop the claim that legitimacy is constitutive of state actions.
The Limits of Humanitarian Intervention from the Air: The Cases of Bosnia and Kosovo
Shows how the international community learnt particular lessons from the Bosnian conflict that it applied to the crisis in Kosovo. It explores the legality and legitimacy of NATO action in bombing Yugoslavia, focusing on the reaction in the Security Council to NATO's use of force without explicit Security Council authorization.
Good or Bad Precedent? Tanzania's Intervention in Uganda
Examines why Tanzania's overthrow of the Ugandan Government of Idi Amin was greeted with almost tacit approval compared to Vietnam's reception in overthrowing Pol Pot. International society did not endorse the principle of humanitarian intervention in this case, but it did show by its reaction that it understood the moral context in which Tanzania had acted.
Vietnam's Intervention in Cambodia: The Triumph of Realism Over Common Humanity?
Investigates why Vietnam was so heavily sanctioned for its use of force against the murderous regime of Pol Pot. The reactions of other states reflected the domination of a pluralist conception of international society. However, I argue that Vietnam's use of force should have been legitimated on solidarist grounds as humanitarian.
Global Bystander to Genocide: International Society and the Rwandan Genocide of 1994
Charts the limits of the new norm of humanitarian intervention by showing how international society failed to prevent and end the genocide in Rwanda in 1994. After three months of the genocide, France did intervene and the chapter considers the dubious humanitarian credentials of this intervention.
Political science (46 works) · Law (43 works) · Sociology (38 works) · Politics (31 works) · Global Peace and Security Dynamics (26 works) · Psychology (18 works) · Epistemology (15 works) · Law (15 works) · Philosophy (15 works) · Peacebuilding and International Security (14 works)