International Law Blog Postings

The emergent and controversial humanitarian doctrine of "responsibility to protect," also referred to as R2P, confers upon states the primary duty to ensure individual human rights domestically and, in the event of a failure of that affirmative duty, seeks to create an ethical and legal justification for international intervention, including the possibility of military action, in the absence of state consent. The recent doctrine developed largely in response to inaction by the international community in response to the genocide in Rwanda and to the controversial military interventions to halt ethnic cleansing in Bosnia and crimes against humanity in domestic conflicts from East Timor to Angola. These experiences have challenged the presumptive notion of state sovereign immunity and the status quo, which holds that intrastate violence, ethnic wars, and solely domestic issues cannot constitute internationally wrongful acts justifying intervention unless the state provides prior consent to be bound to consequences.

Given that prior humanitarian interventions in domestic crises under Security Council Chapter VII powers occurred with state consent or the elements of consent in situations of failed states, such as Yugoslavia, the UN Secretary-General in 1999 challenged world leaders to rethink human security and the Charter's principles of intervention in the context of a new era of collective responsibility. See The Secretary-General, Speech before the General Assembly, (Sept. 20, 1999). He asserted an emerging normative shift from state consent to state responsibility and the growing belief that state sovereignty is not absolute and is subject to scrutiny by other governments when a state fails to uphold its obligations towards its citizens, particularly with regards to gross human rights violations and humanitarian emergencies. He concluded with four aspects of intervention for future interventions: (1) a broadened definition of intervention, (2) sovereignty cannot preclude effective global engagement to human rights and humanitarian crises, (3) the Security Council must act in defense of "common humanity," and (4) the necessity of crisis prevention. His call to action for a humanitarian rationale for intervention prompted academic debate and efforts to develop standards for international humanitarian intervention without consent.

In 2001, the newly created International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty released The Responsibility to Protect Report as a means to address the scope, state responsibilities, thresholds for international action, and the Security Council's role. The report identified what should be the new legal framework under international law, asserting "that sovereign states have a responsibility to protect their own citizens from avoidable catastrophe - from mass murder and rape, from starvation - but that when they are unwilling or unable to do so, that responsibility must be borne by the broader community of states." Proponents of the responsibility to protect highlight that the doctrine confers an affirmative obligation by sovereign states to protect individual rights domestically rather than an automatic and affirmative right by the international community to intervene except in extraordinary circumstances. Opponents question the legality, procedural safeguards, and potential misuse of the power by the international community.

The Commission's report received endorsement in 2004 when a UN High-Level Panel made responsibility to protect a central concept in its recommendations for collective security as premised on three pillars: (1) the globalization of threats domestically and internationally, (2) the inability of any one state to respond solely and effectively to globalized threats, and (3) the assumption that states may be unwilling or unable to carry out obligations to protect individual rights domestically and to avoid harm to the people of other countries. The Panel called upon states to redefine collective security as inclusive of a commitment to human security and collective responsibility and urged states to create broader criteria for when to react collectively to threats or state failure to act. See Chairman, High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges, and Change, Report of The High-Level Panel On Threats, Challenges And Change, A More Secure World: Our Shared Responsibility, U.N. Doc. A/59/565 (Dec. 2, 2004).

The global community has reached consensus on some obligations under responsibility to protect. In 2005, the UN General Assembly recognized the specific obligation of all states to prevent genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity and asserted a concurrent responsibility by the international community to support states' efforts of prevention and capacity building. See World Summit Outcome Document, G.A. Res. 60/1 139, U.N. Doc. A/60/L.1 (Sept. 20, 2005). The General Assembly's endorsement, while lauded for its support of ending human rights violations with grave humanitarian consequences, created political obligations but not necessarily legal obligations.

InsideJustice.com

• More International Law Background Fact Sheets
• International Law Terms / Glossary

Organizations

• Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect
• International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty
• ResponsibilityToProtect.org/
• R2PCoalition.org

R2P Documents

• The Responsibility to Protect Report, International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty (2001).
• Chairman, High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges, and Change, Report of The High-Level Panel On Threats, Challenges And Change, A More Secure World: Our Shared Responsibility, U.N. Doc. A/59/565 (Dec. 2, 2004).
• World Summit Outcome Document, G.A. Res. 60/1 139, U.N. Doc. A/60/L.1 (Sept. 20, 2005).
• UN Security Council, Resolution 1674 (28 April 2006).
• UN Security Council, Resolution 1706 (31 August 2006).

Articles

• Global Responsibility to Protect (quarterly journal)
• The Schizophrenias of R2P by José E. Alvarez (2007)