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The “Discourse” of International Law and Humanitarian Intervention
Author(s) -
Gozzi Gustavo
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
ratio juris
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.344
H-Index - 10
eISSN - 1467-9337
pISSN - 0952-1917
DOI - 10.1111/raju.12159
Subject(s) - humanitarian intervention , sovereignty , doctrine , law , responsibility to protect , intervention (counseling) , hegemony , international humanitarian law , legitimation , political science , international law , population , state (computer science) , humanity , sociology , law and economics , politics , psychology , demography , algorithm , psychiatry , computer science
This essay analyzes the doctrine of “humanitarian intervention” in the frame of international law in the second half of nineteenth century and identifies the ground of legitimation of this intervention in the violation of presumed universal laws of humanity. The analysis emphasizes the transformation of the paradigm of “humanitarian intervention” into the current doctrine of the “responsibility to protect,” which under the rubric of “responsibility” legitimizes limitations on a state's sovereignty in cases where the state fails to guarantee the protection of its own population. This reconstruction of the genealogy of “humanitarian intervention” illustrates the continual exceptions to the principle of nonintervention, which means that the Westphalian principle of sovereignty has always been violated. Both doctrines—humanitarian intervention and the responsibility to protect—can be considered “hegemonic techniques” that use so‐called universal concepts in order to legitimize unilateral power interests.