Humanitarian Intervention Research Paper

Pol: 108 Introduction to Global Politics
Essay Plan and Annotated Bibliography

Essay Question 8- Is humanitarian intervention inconsistent with notions of international order?
Thesis Statement:
Humanitarian intervention challenges traditional notions of international order, however when circumstances in a state threatens human rights norms or international peace and security intervention may be necessary to maintain order. The legality of intervention has increased as global bodies have created greater legal capability to impede on a state’s sovereignty when severe human rights abuses are occurring. The global impact of these atrocities is unavoidable, thereby requiring a level of international involvement. However, intervention can be used

1. Significant tensions between intervention and order arise when the perpetrator of abuse is the state itself.
2. Non-interference is crucial under the Westphalian System; however, the ‘responsibility to protect’(R2P), an outcome of the United Nation’s (UN) Millennium Summit, reflects the increased importance of human rights. It agrees states must protect its populations from severe human rights violations and if the state is inflicting the abuses the international community is to take collective action against the perpetrator
3. In this situation, the sovereign authority is incapable and sovereignty is transferred to the population of the state, thereby avoiding a declaration of intervention against a member of the UN and retaining international order
Argument 2:
Severe human rights abuses within states are rarely self-contained and have regional and international effect, thereby humanitarian intervention can maintain international order.
1. According to the R2P the human rights atrocities that could trigger intervention are crimes against humanity, genocide, war crimes and ethnic cleansing. All four of these have such devastating effects that they will have a global

2015. Human Rights Norms, State Sovereignty, and Humanitarian Intervention. Human Rights Quarterly, 37(2), pp.383-413
In this journal article, Booth Walling examines the evolution of the UNSC’s discussions and actions regarding humanitarian intervention and state sovereignty from the 1990s to the modern day. She examines the increasing importance of human rights over time and identifies the incorporation of human rights protection as part of sovereign expectations. The article provides a succinct history of humanitarian intervention in the last three decades, the reasoning for changing global perceptions on intervention and sovereignty as well as multiple countries positions and statements regarding the shift. However, as the source is confined to discussions made by the UNSC it does not explore the results of intervention or a lack thereof. Additionally, it only provides an understanding of authorised interventions in recent history and does not critique the long-term consequences and failings of some interventions. Booth Walling concludes that in the future UNSC’s debates will focus on what determines a sovereign as legitimate, rather than issues of non-interference. This article provides a background for the current position of intervention in relation to international order and a basis for its future values. It will be useful in discussing how shifting norms within the international community allows humanitarian intervention to be consistent within