Gaddafi and Grotius: Some Historical Roots of the Libyan Intervention
In: Global Responsibility to ProtectSearch for other papers by Luke Glanville in
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It is increasingly well understood that concepts of ‘humanitarian intervention’ and the ‘responsibility to protect’ enjoy a long and rich history. Nevertheless, it is surprising how plainly the arguments offered by states seeking to justify intervention in Libya in 2011 echo those used by theologians, jurists, and philosophers to justify intervention in the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries. Those advocating intervention in Libya drew not just on the language of ‘human rights,’ that emerged relatively recently, but on a wider and much older range of idioms and ideas to make their case. In this article, I identify three key arguments that were employed by states in support of the intervention and I demonstrate their parallels with three principal arguments that have been advanced to justify intervention in response to tyranny since the sixteenth century. The three arguments are: the need to protect ‘innocents’; the need to hold ‘tyrants’ to account; and the need to defend the will of a sovereign people. After exploring each argument, I conclude by noting that the claim often heard today, that intervention is under certain circumstances a responsibility rather than merely a right, also has deep roots in early modern thought.
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7
UN Document S/PV.6498, 17 March 2011, p. 4.
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8
UN Document S/PV.6491, p. 5.
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9
UN Document S/PV.6491, p. 8.
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10
James Muldoon, Popes, Lawyers, and Infidels: The Church and the Non-Christian World 1250-1550 (Philadelphia: Pennsylvania University Press, 1979), pp. 5-15.
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11
Quoted in Daniel Schwartz, ‘The Principle of the Defence of the Innocent and the Conquest of America: “Save Those Dragged Towards Death”’, Journal of the History of International Law 9/2: 263-91 (2007): p. 281, n. 68.
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12
Francisco de Vitoria, ‘On the American Indians’, in Political Writings, ed. Anthony Pagden and Jeremy Lawrance (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 2.5.
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13
Quoted in Schwartz, ‘The Principle of the Defence of the Innocent and the Conquest of America’, p. 281, n. 70.
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14
Francisco Suarez, ‘De Triplici Virtute Theologica, Fide, Spe, Et Charitate’, in Selections from Three Works, ed. Gwladys L. Williams, Ammi Brown, and John Waldron, vol. II (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1944), xiii.iv.4, p. 817.
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21
Richard Tuck, The Rights of War and Peace: Political Thought and the International Order from Grotius to Kant (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), p. 103.
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26
Francisco de Vitoria, ‘On Dietary Laws, or Self-Restraint’, in Political Writings, ed. Anthony Pagden and Jeremy Lawrance (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 1.5, fifth conclusion.
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28
Vitoria, ‘On Dietary Laws, or Self-Restraint’, 1.5, fifth conclusion.
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29
Quoted Bernice Hamilton, Political Thought in Sixteenth-Century Spain: A Study of the Political Ideas of Vitoria, De Soto, Suarez and Molina (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1963), pp. 128-29.
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30
Suarez, ‘De Triplici Virtute Theologica, Fide, Spe, Et Charitate’, xiii.v.3, p. 824.
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31
Ibid., xviii.iv.4, p. 770.
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41
UN Document S/PV.6498, p. 6.
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42
Ibid., p. 5.
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44
Brad R. Roth, Governmental Illegitimacy in International Law (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).
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45
Thomas Paine, Rights of Man (New York: Penguin, 1984), p. 267.
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46
Ibid., pp. 151-52.
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47
Quoted in Thomas C. Walker, ‘Two Faces of Liberalism: Kant, Paine, and the Question of Intervention’, International Studies Quarterly 52/3: 449-68 (2008), p. 461.
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48
See ibid., pp. 461-63.
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49
Quoted in ibid., p. 461.
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50
Mlada Bukovansky, Legitimacy and Power Politics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002), p. 168.
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51
Ibid., p. 202.
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55
J.S. Mill, ‘A Few Words on Non-Intervention’, in The Collected Works of John Stuart Mill. Volume XXI. Essays on Equality, Law and Education (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1984), pp. 122-23.
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56
UN Document S/PV.6498, p. 6.
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57
J.S. Mill, ‘Vindication of the French Revolution of February, 1848; in Reply to Lord Brougham and Others’, in Dissertations and Discussions: Political, Philosophical, and Historical (Boston: William V. Spencer, 1849), p. 51.
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58
ICISS, The Responsibility to Protect: Report of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty (Ottawa: IDRC, 2001).
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63
Ibid., p. 183.
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65
Suarez, ‘De Triplici Virtute Theologica, Fide, Spe, Et Charitate’, xviii.iv.4.
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Gaddafi and Grotius: Some Historical Roots of the Libyan Intervention
In: Global Responsibility to ProtectSearch for other papers by Luke Glanville in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
It is increasingly well understood that concepts of ‘humanitarian intervention’ and the ‘responsibility to protect’ enjoy a long and rich history. Nevertheless, it is surprising how plainly the arguments offered by states seeking to justify intervention in Libya in 2011 echo those used by theologians, jurists, and philosophers to justify intervention in the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries. Those advocating intervention in Libya drew not just on the language of ‘human rights,’ that emerged relatively recently, but on a wider and much older range of idioms and ideas to make their case. In this article, I identify three key arguments that were employed by states in support of the intervention and I demonstrate their parallels with three principal arguments that have been advanced to justify intervention in response to tyranny since the sixteenth century. The three arguments are: the need to protect ‘innocents’; the need to hold ‘tyrants’ to account; and the need to defend the will of a sovereign people. After exploring each argument, I conclude by noting that the claim often heard today, that intervention is under certain circumstances a responsibility rather than merely a right, also has deep roots in early modern thought.
| All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 661 | 116 | 15 |
| Full Text Views | 370 | 12 | 0 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 467 | 35 | 0 |
