AKA, THE REMY DOCTRINE:

Obama is dragged into doing the right thing on Libya (Michael Gerson, March 22, 2011, Washington Post)

President Obama's decision to participate in the air campaign against Moammar Gaddafi's regime is a vast improvement over previous policy, a victory for human rights idealists within the administration, and the application of an important international standard known as "the responsibility to protect."

In 2005 - with the gruesome lessons of Cambodia, Rwanda and Bosnia having finally sunk in - the United Nations General Assembly and the United States, followed in 2006 by the Security Council, endorsed the principle that the prevention of mass atrocities trumps the claim of national sovereignty. When a government engages in genocide, ethnic cleansing or crimes against humanity - effectively waging war against its own citizens - other nations have the right and duty to intervene. In Libya, this abstract norm became a basis for action. The Obama administration deserves credit for its part in establishing this precedent.

The introduction of a normative component into the concept of sovereignty is a function of the End of History.

Posted by oj at March 22, 2011 4:52 PM
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