Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

From Just War To Just Intervention, Susan J. Atwood

New England Journal of Public Policy

What is Just War? What is Just Intervention? This paper examines the evolution of the criteria for Just War from its origins in the early Christian church to the twenty-first century. The end of the Cold War era has expanded the discussion to include grounds for intervention. Indeed, in the 1990s, a number of multilateral interventions took place on humanitarian grounds. But the debate is ongoing about whether the criteria applied in the Just War theory — proper authority, just cause, and right intent — remain valid in an era of Just Intervention. The author examines as case studies some …

The United Nations And War In The Twentieth And Twenty-First Centuries, Robert Weiner

New England Journal of Public Policy

The United Nations was created in 1945 to prevent another world war. It was designed, as the Preamble to the Charter states, to eliminate the scourge of war. The failure to agree on a permanent UN international army meant that the UN had to improvise in dealing with wars. Peacekeeping, which is not mentioned anywhere in the UN Charter, had to be invented. This study investigates how peacekeeping has evolved through four “generations,” culminating in Unsanctioned multinational forces consisting of “coalitions of the willing.” The study also stresses how one of the greatest peacekeeping failures of the UN in the …

Editor's Note, Padraig O'Malley

New England Journal of Public Policy

Much has changed in the world since the last issue of this journal. All is indeed changed and changed utterly. But we have no terrible beauty with which to console ourselves. For the foreseeable future, the debate over whether we live in a unilateral or multilateral world is moot. A new Rome rules with an arrogance only the truly certain can master.

The invasion of Iraq definitively answered the question: What is the New World Order? America is, and America’s order will continue until Americans themselves decide otherwise, and that, in the short term at least, means whether they will …