Simon Chesterman

Making states work: State failure and the crisis of governance

This publication is the result of a joint interdisciplinary project of the International Peace Academy and the United Nations University. It focuses on situations when state structures begin to break down or collapse, encompassing a range of crises from states in which basic public services are neglected to the total collapse of governance. It looks at the roles and responsibilities of key actors in the situation in relation to their own populations and the international community, and considers the lessons that can be drawn from a range of countries to develop effective strategies to address such situations.

Ownership in Theory and in Practice: Transfer of Authority in UN Statebuilding Operations

The language of ‘ownership’ is commonly used in statebuilding operations, but it is not clear that the term has either consistency or substance. It certainly does not have its literal meaning, in the sense of rights of possession either of property or a formal stake in an organization, such as shares in a corporation. Instead ownership tends to be used figuratively – much as ‘buy-in’ in this context usually does not suggest an actual financial transaction – to refer in a more vague way to the relationship between stakeholders, with meanings ranging from a sense of attachment to a programme or operation, to (rarely) actual controlling authority. This essay explores how ownership emerged as a shibboleth of the development community and how it has influenced UN statebuilding operations. The emphasis will be on rule of law institutions, but the critique of ownership applies to post-conflict operations more generally.

'Leading from Behind': The Responsibility to Protect, the Obama Doctrine, and Humanitarian Intervention After Libya

Humanitarian intervention has always been more popular in theory than in practice. In the face of unspeakable acts, the desire to do something, anything, is understandable. States have tended to be reluctant to act on such desires, however, leading to the present situation in which there are scores of books and countless articles articulating the contours of a right - or even an obligation - of humanitarian intervention, while the number of cases that might be cited as models of what is being advocated can be counted on one hand. So is Libya such a case? It depends on why one thinks that precedent is important. From an international legal perspective, debates have tended to focus on whether one or more states have the right to intervene in another for human protection purposes. From the standpoint of international relations and domestic politics, the question is whether states have the will to intervene. From a military angle, a key dilemma is whether states have the ability to intervene effectively. This essay considers these three issues in turn. The legal significance of Libya is minimal, though the response does show how the politics of humanitarian intervention have shifted to the point where it is harder to do nothing in the face of atrocities. At the same time, however, military action to the end of May 2011 suggested a continuing disjunction between ends and means.

Legality Versus Legitimacy: Humanitarian Intervention, the Security Council, and the Rule of Law

This article sketches out the nature of legal responses to humanitarian intervention in general and the Kosovo intervention in particular, with particular attention given to arguments that were not made. Though some possible arguments appear to have been omitted through oversight, the nature of the discussion suggests a view of international law as one policy justification among others. These debates are then situated in a broader historical context by drawing parallels between the current international framwork and earlier historical periods in which no body comparable to the Security Council existed. It is argued that developments since the end of the Cold War, and in the past few years in particular, suggest a reversion to pre-Charter paradigms, where the council exists merely to advise member-states and international order is contingent, once more, on the goodwill of the powerful. The reluctance of the Great Powers to submit themselves to law may yet have a more lasting effect on the international order than NATOs decision to wage war on behalf of the Kosovo Albanians.

Does the UN Have Intelligence

Is collective security possible when evaluating and responding to threats depend on access to intelligence that, by its nature, cannot be shared openly? Debates over whether the United States should share intelligence with and through the United Nations have arisen in every administration and have been won each time by those who showed that it was in the US interest to do so. The question is no longer whether intelligence should be shared, but rather how and to what effect.

'I'll Take Manhattan': The International Rule of Law and the United Nations Security Council

AbstractFrequent agreement on the rule of law in theory is possible in large part because of divergent views on what it means in practice. This essay briefly addresses the content of the rule of law at the international level before discussing the challenge to this idea presently posed by the United Nations Security Council — the one international body with the power to enforce the law, but which is nevertheless loath to submit to it.

The International Court of Justice in Asia: Interpreting the Temple of Preah Vihear Case

This essay examines the 2013 decision by the International Court of Justice interpreting its 1962 judgment in the Temple of Preah Vihear case between Cambodia and Thailand, situating the more recent decision in the context of the Court’s evolving role in Asia. Only eight Asian states have accepted the compulsory jurisdiction of the Court; only nine have ever appeared before it. The narrowness of the recent decision is of interest in part because of the modest role it ascribes to judicial institutions, but also for what this modesty heralds for the Court’s status in Asia. A key conclusion is that Asian states are likely to retain a general preference for bilateral resolution of disputes. For smaller disputes, however, especially those concerning subjects that cannot be divided or traded — such as a temple (and, as we shall see, an island) — the ICJ may play an important role.

Bush, the United Nations and Nation-building

US President George W. Bush has repeatedly stated that the United Stateswill not cut and run from Iraq. More accurately, his administration seemsto be trying to calculate how much it can cut, prior to the November 2004American election, without appearing to run. This is a mistake. Quite apartfrom the unstable situation in which a premature transfer of power wouldleave Iraq, an accelerated handover could prove the one thing that topplingSaddam Hussein was meant – rightly or wrongly – to disprove: thatterrorism works.

Privacy and Surveillance in the Age of Terror

The Obama administration changed many things in its approach to dealing with the threat of terrorism, but has not confronted larger questions of the limits of government power to spy on its citizens. In Britain, a new government has scrapped proposals for an identity card system, yet remains at the forefront of video surveillance and has one of the largest DNA databases in the world. Existing rules have proven inadequate to the task of regulating the new surveillance powers. New rules are required.

International Territorial Administration and the Limits of Law

The year 2009 was one of many anniversaries for the state-building project. It marked ten years since the United Nations began its bold experiments of state-building in East Timor and Kosovo, now the independent state of Timor-Leste and the embryonic Republic of Kosovo respectively. It was twenty years since Namibia held elections in the course of becoming independent, heralding a new post-Cold War activism. It was also ninety years since the League of Nations established the mandate system, which – even though it applied only to the colonies of enemy states defeated in the Great War – marked the beginning of the end of colonialism.