The Responsibility to Protect: What is the Basis for the Emerging Norm of R2P?

TitleThe Responsibility to Protect: What is the Basis for the Emerging Norm of R2P?
Publication TypeWebsite
Year of Publication2012
AuthorsBranch, Adam
Place PublishedNew York
Abstract

The United Nations advocates the Responsibility to Protect (R2P), a controversial doctrine related to military interventions. Yet many fundamental practical questions remain unanswered and "no-one seems sure of what R2P even is." Practically, there is no clearly defined legal status, set of implementing mechanisms, and monitoring bodies limiting potential for abuses, as well as "no consensus on what actions R2P actually legitimates, nor by whom or when." In fact, the author argues that "it is precisely R2P's indeterminacy that makes it so popular today," as countries have the flexibility to "protect" according to their will and without worrying about their need to be accountable. The author explains how this lack of conceptual clarity is particularly worrying for the African continent, where three-quarters of the crises in which R2P has been invoked or applied. Ultimately, R2P engenders a divide between Western "protectors" and African states, whose legitimacy and sovereignty are to be judged by the "international community". But it is also increasingly segmenting Africa itself as countries have to choose on which "side" they stand.

URLhttps://archive.globalpolicy.org/qhumanitarianq-intervention/52035-the-responsibility-to-protect-what-is-the-basis-for-the-emerging-norm-of-r2p.html?itemid=id#26087
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