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Power And Responsibility, André Nollkaemper

André Nollkaemper

This paper critically reviews the popular proposition that 'power breeds responsibility'. It first explains why this proposition is intuitively appealing. Particularly in situations where multiple actors contribute to harm, power can be a criterion for determining who of a multitude of actors should bear responsibility. For instance, much of the case law on extra territorial human rights protection is based on a concept of power. The paper then explains why this intuition can be misleading. Saying that power informs responsibility is begging the question what type of power triggers what type of responsibility in what way. The paper focuses in …