For International Peace

"Necessity and proportionality occupy a firm place in the international law governing the use of force by states. Perhaps most importantly for practical purposes, the exercise of the right of self-defense, as recognized in Article 51 of the United Nations Charter, is subject to the requirements of necessity and proportionality, as the International Court of Justice determined in the Nicaragua case. Necessity and proportionality are also firmly anchored in the international law governing armed conflicts. In its Nuclear Weapons Advisory Opinion, the International Court of Justice even referred to one articulation of the idea of necessity, that directed against the causing of unnecessary suffering, as one of two "cardinal principles" of this body of law. However, beyond statement in such general terms, the realms of uncertainty and controversy soon begin. It is far from clear, for example, how to distinguish with precision between necessity and proportionality in the international law on self-defense and, in immediate connection herewith, what it means precisely to say that forcible action taken in the exercise of self-defense must be proportionate. It is all the less clear what legal significance, if any, necessity and proportionality possess in other contexts of the international law governing the use of force"--

Getting Russia Right offers policymakers, students, and stakeholders in the U.S.-Russia relationship an understanding of what Russia is and is not.

Preventing humanitarian atrocities is becoming as important for the United Nations as dealing with inter-state war. In this book, Ramesh Thakur examines the transformation in UN operations, analysing its changing role and structure. He asks why, when and how force may be used and argues that the growing gulf between legality and legitimacy is evidence of an eroded sense of international community. He considers the tension between the US, with its capacity to use force and project power, and the UN, as the centre of the international law enforcement system. He asserts the central importance of the rule of law and of a rules-based order focused on the UN as the foundation of a civilised system of international relations. This book will be of interest to students of the UN and international organisations in politics, law and international relations departments, as well as policymakers in the UN and other NGOs.

For as long as there has been war, there have been demands for its elimination. The quest for world peace has excited and eluded political leaders, philosophers, religious elders, activists, and artists for millennia. With war on the rise once again, we rarely reflect on what world peace might look like; much less on how it might be achieved. World Peace aims to change all that and show that world peace is possible. Because the motives, rationales, and impulses that give rise to war - the quest for survival, enrichment, solidarity, and glory - are now better satisfied through peaceful means, war is an increasingly anachronistic practice, more likely to impoverish and harm us humans than satisfy and protect us. This book shows that we already have many of the institutions and practices needed to make peace possible and sets out an agenda for building world peace. In the immediate term, it shows how steps to strengthen compliance with international law, improve collective action such as international peacekeeping and peacebuilding, better regulate the flow of arms, and hold individuals legally accountable for acts of aggression or atrocity crimes can make our world more peaceful. It also shows how in the long term, building strong and legitimate states that protect the rights and secure the livelihoods of their people, gender equal societies, and protecting the right of individuals to opt-out of wars has the potential to establish and sustain world peace. But it will only happen, if individuals organize to make it happen.

At the end of the twentieth century, as at its beginning, the Balkans stand at a crossroads, facing the choice of being marginalized, or overcoming their problems and creating the conditions for their integration into the European mainstream. The stakes for the West are also high. Another war in the region might not threaten the West directly, but it would have a corrosive effect on Western unity.