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Full-Text Articles in International Relations

Libya: A Multilateral Constitutional Moment?, Catherine Powell Apr 2012

Libya: A Multilateral Constitutional Moment?, Catherine Powell

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The Libya intervention of 2011 marked the first time that the UN Security Council invoked the “responsibility to protect” principle (RtoP) to authorize use of force by UN member states. In this comment the author argues that the Security Council’s invocation of RtoP in the midst of the Libyan crisis significantly deepens the broader, ongoing transformation in the international law system’s approach to sovereignty and civilian protection. This transformation away from the traditional Westphalian notion of sovereignty has been unfolding for decades, but the Libyan case represents a further normative shift from sovereignty as a right to sovereignty as a …


Adoption Of The Responsibility To Protect, William W. Burke-White Jan 2011

Adoption Of The Responsibility To Protect, William W. Burke-White

All Faculty Scholarship

This book chapter traces the legal and political origins of the Responsibility to Protect doctrine from its early origins in the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty through the 2005 World Summit Outcome Document and up to January 2011. The chapter examines the legal meaning of the Responsibility to Protect, the obligations the Responsibility imposes on states and international institutions, and its implications in for the international legal and political systems. The chapter argues that while the Responsibility to Protect has developed with extraordinary speed, it is still a norm in development rather than a binding legal rule. Its …