Use Of Force And International Norm Compliance From A Network Analysis Perspective

Many are familiar with the concept of a moral dilemma - a situation where a person faces a choice between two mutually exclusive actions. This book considers whether situations of this kind could and should exist within the sphere of international law.

A runner-up for the 2018 Chadwick Alger Prize, International Studies Association's International Organization Section, this provocative reassessment of the rule of law in world politics examines how and why governments use and manipulate international law in foreign policy.

This book offers a comprehensive overview of the international law applicable to cyber operations. It is grounded in international law, but is also of interest for non-legal researchers, notably in political science and computer science. Outside academia, it will appeal to legal advisors, policymakers, and military organisations.

In this paper, Michael Schmitt explores the legality of the attacks against Al Qaeda and the Taliban under the "jus ad bellum," that component of international law that governs when a State may resort to force as an instrument of national policy. Although States have conducted military counterterrorist operations in the past, the scale and scope of Operation Enduring Freedom may signal a sea change in strategies to defend against terrorism. This paper explores the normative limit on counterterrorist operations. Specifically, under what circumstances can a victim State react forcibly to an act of terrorism? Against whom? When? With what degree of severity? And for how long? The author contends that the attacks against Al Qaeda were legitimate exercises of the rights of individual and collective defense. They were necessary and proportional, and once the Taliban refused to comply with U.S. and United Nations demands to turn over the terrorists located in Afghanistan, it was legally appropriate for coalition forces to enter the country for the purpose of ending the ongoing Al Qaeda terrorist campaign. However, the attacks on the Taliban were less well grounded in traditional understandings of international law. Although the Taliban were clearly in violation of their legal obligation not to allow their territory to be used as a terrorist sanctuary, the author suggests that the degree and nature of the relationship between the Taliban and Al Qaeda may not have been such that the September 11 attacks could be attributed to the Taliban, thereby disallowing strikes against them in self-defense under traditional understandings of international law. Were the attacks, therefore, illegal? Not necessarily. Over the past half-century the international community's understanding of the international law governing the use of force by States has been continuously evolving. The author presents criteria likely to drive future assessments of the legality of counterterrorist operatio7.

'International law' is no longer a sufficient rubric to describe the complexities of law in an era of globalization. Accordingly, this collection situates cross-border norm development at the intersection of interdisciplinary scholarship on comparative law, conflict of laws, civil procedure, cyberlaw, legal pluralism and the cultural analysis of law, as well as traditional international law. It provides a broad range of seminal articles on transnational law-making, governmental and non-governmental networks, judicial influence and cooperation across borders, the dialectical relationships among national, international and non-state legal norms, and the possibilities of 'bottom-up' and plural law-making processes. The introduction situates these articles within the framework of law and globalization and suggests four important ways in which such a framework enlarges the traditional focus of international law. This book, therefore, provides a crucial reference for scholars and practitioners seeking to understand the varied processes of norm development in the emerging global legal order.

This volume of essays examines the development of political and legal thinking regarding the use of force in international relations. It provides an analysis of the rules on the use of force in the political, normative and factual contexts within which they apply and assesses their content and relevance in the light of new challenges such as terrorism, weapons of mass destruction and cyber-attacks. The volume begins with an overview of the ancient and medieval concepts of war and the use of force and then concentrates on the contemporary legal framework regulating the use of force as moulded by the United Nations Charter and state practice. In this regard it discusses specific issues such as the use of force by way of self-defence, armed reprisals, forcible reactions to terrorism, the use of force in the cyberspace, humanitarian intervention and the responsibility to protect. This collection of previously published classic research articles is of interest to scholars and students of international law and international relations as well as practitioners in international law.

In 2005, the international community made a landmark commitment to prevent mass atrocities by unanimously adopting the UN’s “Responsibility to Protect” (R2P) principle. As often as not, however, R2P has failed to translate into decisive action. Why does this gap persist between the world’s normative pledges to R2P and its ability to make it a daily lived reality? In this new book, leading global authorities on humanitarian protection Alex Bellamy and Edward Luck offer a probing and in-depth response to this fundamental question, calling for a more comprehensive approach to the practice of R2P – one that moves beyond states and the UN to include the full range of actors that play a role in protecting vulnerable populations. Drawing on cases from the Middle East to sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia, they examine the forces and conditions that produce atrocity crimes and the challenge of responding to them quickly and effectively. Ultimately, they advocate both for emergency policies to temporarily stop carnage and for policies leading to sustainable change within societies and governments. Only by introducing these additional elements to the R2P toolkit will the failures associated with humanitarian crises like Syria and Libya become a thing of the past.

Examines the difficulties in applying international law to recent armed conflicts known as 'new wars'.

The law of international responsibility is one of international law's core foundational topics. Written by international experts, this book provides an overview of the modern law of international responsibility, both as it applies to states and to international organizations, with a focus on the ILC's work.