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Sovereignty as irresponsibility? A Realist critique of the Responsibility to Protect

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 May 2012

JEREMY MOSES
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Abstract

This article aims to cast a critical light on the concept of ‘sovereignty as responsibility’, which lies at the heart of the Responsibility to Protect (RtoP). It argues that there are two distinct strands of theorising about sovereignty, de facto and de jure, which are not often clearly distinguished in the literature. After establishing the concept of ‘sovereignty as responsibility’ as a de jure theory of sovereignty, the article goes on to contrast the de facto theory, based upon the sovereignty theories of Hobbes, Schmitt, and Morgenthau. I argue that the de facto theories of sovereignty, concerned as they are with unlimited power and decision as the essence of sovereign authority, can be used to highlight the lack of appreciation of power in the literature surrounding the Responsibility to Protect. This is particularly the case in relation to the just war principles of ‘right authority’ and ‘reasonable prospects of success’, both of which lie at the heart of the RtoP criteria for assessing when military interventions for human protection purposes may take place. In conclusion, it is argued that any attempt to advance the RtoP norm must engage with the problem of unlimited power in a more sustained manner.

Type
Research Article
Information
Review of International Studies , Volume 39 , Issue 1 , January 2013 , pp. 113 - 135
Copyright
Copyright © British International Studies Association 2012

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References

1 It must be noted at this point that this understanding of irresponsible sovereignty is not limited to Realist thought. Jacques Derrida, for example, also maintained that sovereignty, defined as decisive power, amounted to an ability to act without responsibility. See, for example, Derrida, Jacques, Rogues: Two Essays on Reason (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2005)Google Scholar; Leitch, Vincent, ‘Late Derrida: The Politics of Sovereignty’, Critical Inquiry, 33 (2007), pp. 229–47, at pp. 232–40CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Martel, James, ‘Can There Be Politics Without Sovereignty? Arendt, Derrida and the Question of Sovereign Inevitability’, Law, Culture and the Humanities, 6 (2010), pp. 153–66, at pp. 160–4CrossRefGoogle Scholar. This article, however, will focus on the Realist literature.

2 Reus-Smit, Christian, The Moral Purpose of the State (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1999), p. 32Google Scholar.

3 For a critique of cosmopolitan thought on sovereignty along these lines see Cohen, Jean L., ‘Whose Sovereignty? Empire Versus International Law’, Ethics and International Affairs, 18 (2004), pp. 1–24CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Even Morgenthau felt compelled to make a critique of the excessively optimistic evaluations of the transformative implications of globalisation. See Morgenthau, Hans, Scientific Man vs. Power Politics (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1974), pp. 86–7Google Scholar.

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5 This is elaborated by Hobbes in Chapter XXI, ‘Of the LIBERTY of Subjects’, in Leviathan: Hobbes, Thomas, ‘Leviathan’, in Flathman, Richard and Johnston, David (eds), Leviathan: Authoritative Text, Background and Interpretations (New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 1997), pp. 1–260, at pp. 115–22Google Scholar.

6 See, in particular, Morgenthau, Hans, In Defense of the National Interest: A Critical Examination of American Foreign Policy (New York: Knopf, 1951)Google Scholar.

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9 Earlier iterations of a conditional sovereignty argument, but without the language of ‘sovereignty as responsibility’, can be found in Reisman, Michael, ‘Sovereignty and Human Rights in Contemporary International Law’, American Journal of International Law, 84 (1990), p. 866CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Tesón, Fernando R., Humanitarian intervention : an inquiry into law and morality (Dobbs Ferry, NY: Transnational Publishers, 1988)Google Scholar; Lyons, Gene and Mastanduno, Michael (eds), Beyond Westphalia? State Sovereignty and International Intervention (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995)Google Scholar.

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11 Deng, et al., Sovereignty as Responsibility, p. 4.

12 Ibid., pp. 6–10.

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14 Ibid.

15 The International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, The Responsibility to Protect, (Ottawa: 2001), p. 11.

16 Ibid., p. 7.

17 Ibid.

18 Ibid., p. 13.

19 Ibid.

20 Ibid., p. 14.

21 Ibid., p. 13

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26 The Libyan intervention was clearly backed by the Global Center for the Responsibility to Protect. Thomas Weiss has subsequently reiterated the connections between the Libyan intervention and the RtoP, but at the time of writing, it remains to be seen if Libya will ultimately be understood as a successful application of the RtoP doctrine. See Global Center for the Responsibility to Protect, ‘The Georgia-Russia Crisis and the Responsibility to Protect: Background Note’ (New York: The Global Center for the Responsibility to Protect, 2008), {http://globalr2p.org/pdf/related/GeorgiaRussia.pdf}; Thomas Weiss, ‘RtoP Alive and Well after Libya’, available at: {http://globalr2p.org/media/pdf/Weiss_RtoP_Libya_E_and_I_A_2011_(2).pdf}, accessed 29 August 2011.

27 Deng, et al., Sovereignty as Responsibility, p. 33, emphasis added. See also Thakur, Ramesh, The Responsibility to Protect: Norms, laws and the use of force in international politics (Oxford: Routledge, 2011), pp. 191–2Google Scholar.

28 See, for example, Carr, E. H., The Twenty Years Crisis 1919–1939: An Introduction to the Study of International Relations (Houndmills: Palgrave, 2001)Google Scholar; Morgenthau, Scientific Man vs. Power Politics.

29 Glanville, ‘The antecedents of ‘sovereignty as responsibility’, p. 234.

30 A tentative critique along these lines appears in Suganami, Hidemi, ‘Understanding sovereignty thorugh Kelsen/Schmitt’, Review of International Studies, 33 (2007), pp. 511–30, at pp. 523–6CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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32 Thomas Hobbes, ‘Leviathan’, in ibid., pp. 1–260.

33 Quoted in Hampton, Jean, Hobbes and the Social Contract Tradition (Cambridge: Cambridge Univesity Press, 1986), p. 98Google Scholar.

34 Ibid., p. 97. Hampton's critique of Hobbes's absolute sovereign is essentially focused upon its non-absoluteness. She suggests that the reciprocal tie of protection-obedience between sovereign and subject means that the sovereign is not absolute, that the private judgment of the citizenry remains decisive, and that therefore Hobbes's absolute sovereign is fallacious: ibid., pp. 204–7. On the contrary, I would argue that the relation between sovereign and subject can be understood as one of ‘mutual prudence’, where each acts to maintain their internal and external security. From this perspective, a leader that abuses his or her own population to the extent that they incite a popular rebellion has failed to act prudently or, to put it another way, in a self-interested manner. As Sorell puts it, ‘the more [the sovereign] acts out of narrow self-interest, and at the expense of the interests of his subjects, the more he stands to lose the power that makes such acts tempting’: Sorell, Tom, ‘The Burdensome Freedom of Sovereigns’, in Sorell, Tom and Foisneau, Luc (eds), Leviathan After 350 Years (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), pp. 183–96, at p. 184CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

35 Hampton, Hobbes and the Social Contract Tradition, p. 104.

36 Hoekstra, Kinch, ‘The de facto Turn in Hobbes' Political Theory’, in Sorell, Tom and Foisneau, Luc (eds), Leviathan After 350 Years (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2004), pp. 33–73, at p. 49CrossRefGoogle Scholar. It is important to note here that Hoekstra is reluctant to place Hobbes as a de facto theorist of sovereignty, preferring to describe him as a ‘naturalist’ who sought to develop a theory of sovereignty based on both ‘the fact of power and the facts of human nature’. See ibid., pp. 72–3.

37 This issue has been at the centre of a long-running debate over Hobbes's theory of sovereignty. For an overview see Hoekstra, ‘The de facto Turn in Hobbes' Political Theory’.

38 Ibid., p. 68, emphasis added.

39 Ibid., at p. 55

40 See also Morgenthau's discussion of the possibilities of a world state: Morgenthau, Hans, Politics Among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace (New York: Alfred Knopf, 1972), chap. 29Google Scholar.

41 Strauss, ‘From Natural Right and History’, p. 330.

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45 Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations, p. 314.

46 Ibid., p. 308.

47 Ibid., p. 311.

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51 Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations, p. 320.

52 Whilst the focus in this article is on the classical Realism of Morgenthau, Kenneth Waltz adopts a similar ‘decisionist’ definition of sovereignty: ‘To say that a state is sovereign means that it decides for itself how it will cope with its internal and external problems including whether or not to seek assistance from others and in doing so limit its freedom by making commitments to them.’ See Waltz, Kenneth, Theory of International Politics (Boston, MA: McGraw Hill, 1979), p. 95Google Scholar.

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55 Scheuerman, ‘Carl Schmitt and Hans Morgenthau: Realism and Beyond’, pp. 84–5.

56 Koskenniemi, The Gentle Civilizer of Nations, pp. 436–45; Nardin, Terry, ‘Theorising the International Rule of Law’, Review of International Studies, 34 (2008), pp. 385–401, at pp. 388–9CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

57 Koskenniemi, The Gentle Civilizer of Nations, p. 439.

58 Ibid., p. 445.

59 Morgenthau, quoted in ibid., p. 458.

60 Ibid., at 455

61 Morgenthau, Hans, ‘The Political Conditions for an International Police Force’, International Organization, 17 (1963), pp. 393–403, at p. 402CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

62 Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations, p. 323.

63 Morgenthau, Scientific Man vs. Power Politics, chap. 29.

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65 Roth, Kenneth, ‘Was the Iraq War a Humanitarian Intervention? And What are our Reponsibilities Today?’, in Cooper, Richard and Kohler, Juliette Voinov (eds), Responsibility to Protect: The Global Moral Compact for the 21st Century (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), pp. 101–13Google Scholar; Weiss, Thomas, ‘The Sunset of Humanitarian Intervention? The Responsibility to Protect in a Unipolar Era’, Security Dialogue, 35 (2004), pp. 135–53CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Bellamy, Alex J., ‘Ethics and Intervention: The “Humanitarian Exception” and the Problem of Abuse in the Case of Iraq’, Journal of Peace Research, 41 (2004), pp. 131–47CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

66 The International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, The Responsibility to Protect, p. 13.

67 If we look further into the ICISS report, however, we can see that while the ‘international community’ persists as the ultimate holder of responsibility for human rights protection, the door is left open for the possible bypassing of the UN system if it fails to act in ‘conscience-shocking situation[s] crying out for action’. Hence, ‘if collective organizations will not authorize collective intervention against regimes that flout the most elementary norms of legitimate governmental behaviour, then the pressures for intervention by ad hoc coalitions or individual states will surely intensify’. Moreover, it is argued that the UN will lose ‘stature and credibility’ if such situations recur. Ibid., at p. 55. While the issue of authority being potentially vested in individual states is important, I leave it aside in this context to focus solely on the widely agreed-upon role of the UNSC as the most legitimate judge of when intervention should take place.

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70 Cunliffe, Philip, ‘Sovereignty and the Politics of Responsibility’, in Bickerton, Christopher, Cunliffe, Philip, and Gourevitch, Alexander (eds), Politics Without Sovereignty: A critique of contemporary international relations (Oxford: University College London Press, 2006), pp. 39–57, at p. 54Google Scholar.

71 While Morgenthau accepted that the UNSC had the potential to act as a sovereign power over weaker states, he did not see this as a realistic possibility, primarily due to differences of interest amongst the five permanent members: Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations, pp. 317–18. Importantly, this also shows that Morgenthau did not see sovereignty as being solely attached to the modern state, but as amenable to shifts in global power structures.

72 Bellamy, Alex J., Global Politics and the Responsibility to Protect: From Words to Deeds (Oxford: Routledge, 2011), p. 164Google Scholar.

73 For a discussion of these two possibilities see Cohen, ‘Whose Sovereignty? Empire Versus International Law’.

74 Morgenthau, In Defense of the National Interest, p. 36.

75 Koskenniemi, The Gentle Civilizer of Nations, p. 451.

76 The International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, The Responsibility to Protect, p. 37.

77 The International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, The Responsibility to Protect, p. 37. See also Evans, The Responsibility to Protect, pp. 62–3 and pp. 145–6.

78 Evans, The Responsibility to Protect, p. 62.

79 Pattison, James, Humanitarian Intervention and the Responsibility to Protect: Who Should Intervene? (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), p. 79CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

80 Ibid., p. 78.

81 Evans, The Responsibility to Protect, pp. 61–4; Pattison, Humanitarian Intervention and the Responsibility to Protect, pp. 250–3; Bellamy, Global Politics and the Responsibility to Protect, chap. 5.

82 Morgenthau, Politics Among Nations, p. 309. emphasis added.

83 See, for example, Bartelson, Jens, A Genealogy of Sovereignty (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Reus-Smit, The Moral Purpose of the State.

84 Morgenthau, In Defense of the National Interest, p. 102.

85 International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, The Responsibility to Protect: Research, Bibliography, Background (Ottawa: International Development Research Center, 2001), p. 7Google Scholar.

86 Edward C. Luck, ‘Remarks to the General Assembly on the Responsibility to Protect’ (New York: United Nations, 2009), available at: {http://www.un.org/ga/president/63/interactive/protect/luck.pdf}.

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89 See, for example, Global Center for the Responsibility to Protect, ‘The Georgia-Russia Crisis and the Responsibility to Protect: Background Note’; Roth, K., ‘Humanitarian intervention and the Iraq War – On target?’, World Today, 60 (2004), pp. 10–11Google Scholar.

90 Morgenthau, Hans, ‘To Intervene or Not to Intervene’, Foreign Affairs, 45 (1967), pp. 425–36, at p. 430CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

91 Ibid., p. 436.