Theorising the Responsibility to Protect
Description:... "One of the most important developments in world politics in the last decade has been the spread of the twin ideas that state sovereignty comes with responsibilities - both domestic and international - as well as privileges, and that there exists a global responsibility to protect people threatened by mass-atrocity crimes. The 2001 report of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty entitled The Responsibility to Protect put these ideas into active circulation, and United Nations resolutions in 2005 on the 60th anniversary of the establishment of the United Nations gave the idea further substance. More recently, the justification of NATO action in Libya on the strength of Security Council Resolutions 1970 and 1973, which made explicit reference to the principle of the Responsibility to Protect, has put this particular notion at the centre of discussion of some of the most challenging political dilemmas of our times. As international leaders struggle to find ways to deal with mounting political violence in Syria and more recently with the emergence of the self-styled 'Islamic State in Iraq and Syria', the idea of the Responsibility to Protect, now increasingly labelled simply R2P, is never far below the surface"--
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