Question 3: Will the Great Powers Intervene to protect Human Rights?

Non-intervention is agreeable as the norm in international society, however

should it be allowable by other countries when the governments massively violate their
own citizens human rights and are incapable to stop and prevent such violations, or if
states have collapsed into anarchy and civil war? The complex issue of humanitarian
intervention has remained a difficult and compelling foreign policy issue. In 1999,
intervention in Kosovo by NATO brought the controversy to its most intension head
because it gives prominence to the tension between the necessity to protect human rights
across the borders and the principle of state sovereignty. The theory of humanitarian
intervention states that one state has the right to exercise an international control by
military force over the acts of another state in regard to its internal sovereignty when
contrary to the laws of humanity. The sole purpose of humanitarian intervention is to
prevent or stoping human suffering within sovereign borders. During the Cold War, the
world has witnessed unilateral interventions on humanitarian grounds by great powers.
Over the last decade, many calls for intervention, however some of them are answered
while some of them are ignored. There is intervention in Iraq, Afghanistan, Kosovo,
Sierra Leone and Libya but not in Rwanda, Darfur, Zimbabwe, Burma and Syria. Rivalry
for autonomy or political power or territorial control, violent ethnopolitical conflicts,
separatist movements, economic dislocation, among others, assail the integrity of the
developing state. This will thus force the great powers to intervene because they have the
responsibility to protect and the moral obligations to protect civilians to enforce human
rights practices.
The Responsibility to Protect (R2P) concept began to develop at the beginning of
the 2000s after the intervention of the US and NATO in Kosovo, which was criticized for
its aims, consequences and legality (Bostan). The concept Responsibility to Protect is
structured as a comprehensive framework for the containment and also prevention of
massive human rights violations. Responsibility to Protect is known as a norm, but not a
law, however, it is strongly grounded in international law particularly those that related to
human rights, sovereignty, armed conflict and peace and security. According to one of the
foundation of the Responsibility to Protect, it states that if the state manifestly unable to

protect its citizens from the four mass atrocities namely genocide, crimes against
humanity, war crimes and ethnic cleansing and peaceful measures have failed, the
international community has the responsibility to intervene through obliged measures
such as economic sanctions and the last resort will be carried out military intervention.
Intervention in the name of the responsibility to protect can be seen in the intervention of
the 2007-08 Kenyan crisis and also Libya crisis in 2011. Great power comes with great
responsibility. The great powers have the responsibility to protect, to prevent, to react and
to rebuild when the human rights of another state is being violated.
There is a moral duty for the great powers to intervene to protect civilians when
their human rights are being violated or to stop the civilians from being genocide. In
todays globalized world, it is so integrated that massive human rights violations in one
part of the world will have an effect on every other part, creating moral obligations. The
claim for a moral duty for intervention to protect human rights start from the fundamental
claim that all individuals should have a minimum level of protection from harm by virtue
of their common humanity. Everyone knows that there is a moral agreement between all
major religions and ethical systems that genocide and mass killing are wrong and the
others have a duty to prevent it and punish the perpetrators (The Responsibility to
Protect) therefore, the great powers will intervene to protect human rights. A
government's sovereignty and legitimacy are not inviolable if it abuses its own citizens.
Sometimes norms and values are even more important than international law to justify
intervention to protect human rights.
In addition, the great powers will intervene to protect human rights to create a
good image for themselves and to show power. This can improve their country's standing,
as the image and reputation of a nation can dramatically influence its success in attracting
tourism receipts and investment capital in exports and also in attracting a talented and
creative workforce. Good nation image can also increase their cultural and political
influence in the world. Besides, by intervening they can also show their nation military
force and let the world see how powerful they are.
One may argue that the great powers, especially the United States and its coalition
partners, are using the name Human Rights Protection as an excuse to pursue their own

interest and they seldom wanted to sacrifice their own army for another state, of course,
unless they have own national reasons for doing so. An example of great powers attempt
to use Human Rights Protection as a pretext for their own interest is the crisis in
Georgis and Russia in 2008. Russia uses the name Responsibility to Protect to invade
Georgia in 2008. Russia desired to justify its invasion by invoking Responsibility to
Protect claiming that Georigas actions over South Ossetia were genocide however, it
was not accepted by responsibility to protect that Russia was not responsible of the
people outside its borders and an intervention of responsibility to protect can only be a
collective action (ICISS). It is true that state always has their own national motives, but
the truth is who doesnt, as long as it helps the people. One of the successful intervention
is the 1999 wave of air strikes to protect the Albanian population of Kosovo. The air
strikes create pressure, together with aggressive multi-lateral diplomacy and ground
operations by the guerrilla Kosovo Liberation Army, forced Serbia to cede de facto
control of the region, preventing further Serbian atrocities and allowing the return of the
refugees to their homes. Further, all of this was accomplished without the use of ground
forces, as the KLA swiftly occupied the province and established order (Wrzesniewski,
2011).
In the current globalized world, with modern communication technology and
social networking services such as Facebook, YouTube and Twitter, every humanitarian
crisis in even the furthest place in the world will immediately become a current issue and
the sensitivity to human rights violations is highly concerned in all over the world.
Intervention in order to protect human rights is necessary because if it is an unacceptable
assault on sovereignty, then how should we should respond to what happen in Rwanda or
Srebrenica to gross and systematic violations of human rights that affect every precept
of our common humanity (The Responsibility to Protect)? With the moral obligation to
protect civilians and the responsibility to protect, the great powers will intervene to
protect human rights and according to a realist point of view asserts that the most
powerful democracies seek to externalize their values, coercing or enticing weaker and
less democratic governments to accept human rights regimes (Moravcsik, 1998).

Reference
Moravcsik, Andrew. Explaining the Emergence of Human Rights Regimes.
Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, 1998. Print.
Bostan, Zeynep. Responsibility to Protect. Academia. Print.
The Responsibility to Protect. International Development Research Centre, 2001.
Print
ICISS,The Crisis in Georgia-Russia, Available
at:http://www.responsibilitytoprotect.org/index.php/crises/178-other-rtopconcerns/2749-the-crisis-in-georgia-russia.
Wrzesniewski, Kuba. Humanitarian Intervention in Libya. The breakthrough, 2011.
Print.