Noam Chomsky: Dialogue on the Responsibility to Protect
Address to the United Nations General Assembly Thematic Dialogue on the Responsibility to Protect, the United Nations, New York, 23 July 2009
The discussions about Responsibility to Protect (R2P), or its cousin "humanitarian intervention," are regularly disturbed by the rattling of a skeleton in the closet: history, to the present moment.
Throughout history, there have been a few principles of international affairs that apply quite generally. One is the maxim of Thucydides that the strong do as they wish, while the weak suffer as they must. A corollary is what Ian Brownlie calls "the hegemonial approach to law-making": the voice of the powerful sets precedents.
Another principle derives from Adam Smith's account of policy-making in England: the "principal architects" of policy -- in his day the "merchants and manufacturers" -- make sure that their own interests are "most peculiarly attended to" however "grievous" the effect on others, including the people of England -- but far more so, those who were subjected to "the savage injustice of the Europeans," particularly in conquered India, Smith's own prime concern.
A third principle is that virtually every use of force in international affairs has been justified in terms of R2P, including the worst monsters. Just to illustrate, in his scholarly study of "humanitarian intervention," Sean Murphy cites only three examples between the Kellogg-Briand pact and the UN Charter: Japan's attack on Manchuria, Mussolini's invasion of Ethiopia, and Hitler's occupation of parts of Czechoslovakia, all accompanied by lofty rhetoric about the solemn responsibility to protect the suffering populations, and factual justifications. The basic pattern continues to the present. The historical record is worth recalling when we hear R2P or its cousin described as an "emerging norm" in international affairs. They have been considered a norm as far back as we want to go.
The founding of this country is an example. In 1629, the Massachusetts Bay Colony was granted its Charter by the King, stating that rescuing the natives from their bitter pagan fate is "the principal end of this plantation." The Great Seal of the Colony depicts an Indian saying "Come Over and Help Us." The English colonists were thus fulfilling their responsibility to protect as they proceeded to "extirpate" and "exterminate" the natives, in their words -- and for their own good, their honored successors explained. In 1630, John Winthrop delivered his famous sermon depicting the new nation "ordained by God" as "a city on a hill," inspirational rhetoric that is regularly invoked to this day to justify any crime as at worst a "deviation" from the noble mission of responsibility to protect.
There is no difficulty adding similar examples from other great powers in their day in the sun. It is understandable that the powerful should prefer to declare that we should forget history and look forward. For the weak, it is not a wise choice.
The skeleton in the closet made an appearance in the first case considered by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) 60 years ago, the Corfu Channel case. The Court determined that it "can only regard the alleged right of intervention as the manifestation of a policy of force, such as has, in the past, given rise to most serious abuses and such as cannot, whatever be the defects in international organization, find a place in international law. . .; from the nature of things, [intervention] would be reserved for the most powerful states, and might easily lead to perverting the administration of justice itself."
The same perspective informed the first-ever meeting of the South Summit of 133 states, convened in April 2000. Its declaration, surely with the bombing of Serbia in mind, rejected "the so-called 'right' of humanitarian intervention, which has no legal basis in the United Nations Charter or in the general principles of international law." The wording reaffirms the important UN Declaration on Friendly Relations (UNGA Res. 2625, 1970). It has been repeated since, among others by the Ministerial Meeting of the Non-aligned Movement in Malaysia in 2006, again representing the traditional victims in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and the Arab world.
The same conclusion was drawn in 2004 by the high-level UN Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change. The Panel adopted the view of the ICJ and the Non-aligned Movement, concluding that "Article 51 needs neither extension nor restriction of its long-understood scope." The Panel added that "For those impatient with such a response, the answer must be that, in a world full of perceived potential threats, the risk to the global order and the norm of nonintervention on which it continues to be based is simply too great for the legality of unilateral preventive action, as distinct from collectively endorsed action, to be accepted. Allowing one to so act is to allow all" -- which is, of course, unthinkable.
The same basic position was adopted by the UN World Summit in 2005. While reaffirming stands that had already been accepted, the Summit also asserted the willingness "to take collective action . . . through the Security Council, in accordance with the Charter . . . should peaceful means be inadequate and national authorities are manifestly failing to protect their populations" from serious crimes. At most, the phrase sharpens the wording of Article 42 on authorization for the Security Council to resort to force. And it keeps the skeleton in the closet -- if, and it is a large if, we can regard the Security Council as a neutral arbiter, not subject to the maxims of Thucydides and Adam Smith, a matter to which I will return.
There have been efforts to draw a sharp distinction between R2P and its cousin. They may have some merit, but they go far beyond the evidence. There is a good reason why "the right of humanitarian intervention" has been hotly contested, in substantial part along North-South lines, while R2P was affirmed -- more accurately reaffirmed -- by consensus at the Summit. The reason is that the Summit acceptance of R2P rhetoric adds nothing substantially new.
The rights articulated in the crucial paragraphs 138 and 139 of the Summit declaration had not been seriously contested, and in fact had been affirmed and implemented, for example, with regard to apartheid South Africa. Furthermore, the Security Council had already determined that it can even use force under Chapter VII to end massive human rights abuses, civil war, and violation of civil liberties: Resolutions 925, 929, 940, June-July 1994. And as J. L. Holzgrefe observes, "most states are signatories to conventions that legally oblige them to respect the human rights of their citizens." The few successes of R2P that have been widely hailed, as in Kenya, had no need for the Summit resolution, though the terminology of R2P was invoked...
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The discussions about Responsibility to Protect (R2P), or its cousin "humanitarian intervention," are regularly disturbed by the rattling of a skeleton in the closet: history, to the present moment.
Throughout history, there have been a few principles of international affairs that apply quite generally. One is the maxim of Thucydides that the strong do as they wish, while the weak suffer as they must. A corollary is what Ian Brownlie calls "the hegemonial approach to law-making": the voice of the powerful sets precedents.
Another principle derives from Adam Smith's account of policy-making in England: the "principal architects" of policy -- in his day the "merchants and manufacturers" -- make sure that their own interests are "most peculiarly attended to" however "grievous" the effect on others, including the people of England -- but far more so, those who were subjected to "the savage injustice of the Europeans," particularly in conquered India, Smith's own prime concern.
A third principle is that virtually every use of force in international affairs has been justified in terms of R2P, including the worst monsters. Just to illustrate, in his scholarly study of "humanitarian intervention," Sean Murphy cites only three examples between the Kellogg-Briand pact and the UN Charter: Japan's attack on Manchuria, Mussolini's invasion of Ethiopia, and Hitler's occupation of parts of Czechoslovakia, all accompanied by lofty rhetoric about the solemn responsibility to protect the suffering populations, and factual justifications. The basic pattern continues to the present. The historical record is worth recalling when we hear R2P or its cousin described as an "emerging norm" in international affairs. They have been considered a norm as far back as we want to go.
The founding of this country is an example. In 1629, the Massachusetts Bay Colony was granted its Charter by the King, stating that rescuing the natives from their bitter pagan fate is "the principal end of this plantation." The Great Seal of the Colony depicts an Indian saying "Come Over and Help Us." The English colonists were thus fulfilling their responsibility to protect as they proceeded to "extirpate" and "exterminate" the natives, in their words -- and for their own good, their honored successors explained. In 1630, John Winthrop delivered his famous sermon depicting the new nation "ordained by God" as "a city on a hill," inspirational rhetoric that is regularly invoked to this day to justify any crime as at worst a "deviation" from the noble mission of responsibility to protect.
There is no difficulty adding similar examples from other great powers in their day in the sun. It is understandable that the powerful should prefer to declare that we should forget history and look forward. For the weak, it is not a wise choice.
The skeleton in the closet made an appearance in the first case considered by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) 60 years ago, the Corfu Channel case. The Court determined that it "can only regard the alleged right of intervention as the manifestation of a policy of force, such as has, in the past, given rise to most serious abuses and such as cannot, whatever be the defects in international organization, find a place in international law. . .; from the nature of things, [intervention] would be reserved for the most powerful states, and might easily lead to perverting the administration of justice itself."
The same perspective informed the first-ever meeting of the South Summit of 133 states, convened in April 2000. Its declaration, surely with the bombing of Serbia in mind, rejected "the so-called 'right' of humanitarian intervention, which has no legal basis in the United Nations Charter or in the general principles of international law." The wording reaffirms the important UN Declaration on Friendly Relations (UNGA Res. 2625, 1970). It has been repeated since, among others by the Ministerial Meeting of the Non-aligned Movement in Malaysia in 2006, again representing the traditional victims in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and the Arab world.
The same conclusion was drawn in 2004 by the high-level UN Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change. The Panel adopted the view of the ICJ and the Non-aligned Movement, concluding that "Article 51 needs neither extension nor restriction of its long-understood scope." The Panel added that "For those impatient with such a response, the answer must be that, in a world full of perceived potential threats, the risk to the global order and the norm of nonintervention on which it continues to be based is simply too great for the legality of unilateral preventive action, as distinct from collectively endorsed action, to be accepted. Allowing one to so act is to allow all" -- which is, of course, unthinkable.
The same basic position was adopted by the UN World Summit in 2005. While reaffirming stands that had already been accepted, the Summit also asserted the willingness "to take collective action . . . through the Security Council, in accordance with the Charter . . . should peaceful means be inadequate and national authorities are manifestly failing to protect their populations" from serious crimes. At most, the phrase sharpens the wording of Article 42 on authorization for the Security Council to resort to force. And it keeps the skeleton in the closet -- if, and it is a large if, we can regard the Security Council as a neutral arbiter, not subject to the maxims of Thucydides and Adam Smith, a matter to which I will return.
There have been efforts to draw a sharp distinction between R2P and its cousin. They may have some merit, but they go far beyond the evidence. There is a good reason why "the right of humanitarian intervention" has been hotly contested, in substantial part along North-South lines, while R2P was affirmed -- more accurately reaffirmed -- by consensus at the Summit. The reason is that the Summit acceptance of R2P rhetoric adds nothing substantially new.
The rights articulated in the crucial paragraphs 138 and 139 of the Summit declaration had not been seriously contested, and in fact had been affirmed and implemented, for example, with regard to apartheid South Africa. Furthermore, the Security Council had already determined that it can even use force under Chapter VII to end massive human rights abuses, civil war, and violation of civil liberties: Resolutions 925, 929, 940, June-July 1994. And as J. L. Holzgrefe observes, "most states are signatories to conventions that legally oblige them to respect the human rights of their citizens." The few successes of R2P that have been widely hailed, as in Kenya, had no need for the Summit resolution, though the terminology of R2P was invoked...