Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-5r2nc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-09T22:08:51.224Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Constructing an Atrocities Regime: The Politics of War Crimes Tribunals

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 July 2003

Christopher Rudolph
Get access

Abstract

From the notorious “killing fields” of Cambodia to programs of “ethnic cleansing” in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, the grizzly nature of ethnic and identity-centered conflict incites horror, outrage, and a human desire for justice. While the drive to humanize warfare can be traced to the writing of Hugo Grotius, current efforts to establish an atrocities regime are unparalleled in modern history. Combining approaches in international relations theory and international law, I examine the role political factors (norms, power and interests, institutions) and legal factors (precedent and procedure) play in the development of an atrocities regime. International tribunals have convicted generally low-level war criminals in both Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia, but they have had much more limited success in achieving their more expansive goals—deterring atrocities and fostering national reconciliation in regions fraught with ethnic violence. This analysis reveals additional institutional modifications needed to construct a more effective regime and highlights the importance of placing this new regime within a comprehensive international strategy of conflict management.

Type
Articles
Information
International Organization , Volume 55 , Issue 3 , Summer 2001 , pp. 655 - 691
Copyright
Copyright © The IO Foundation 2001

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Abbott, Kenneth W. 1999. International Relations Theory, International Law, and the Regime Governing Atrocities in Internal Conflicts. The American Journal of International Law 93 (2):361–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Abbott, Kenneth W., Keohane, Robert O., Moravcsik, Andrew, Slaughter, Anne-Marie, and Snidal., Duncan 2000. The Concept of Legalization. International Organization 54 (3):401–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Abbott, Kenneth W., and Snidal., Duncan 1998. Why States Act Through Formal International Organizations. The Journal of Conflict Resolution 42 (1):3–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Abbott, Kenneth W. 2000. Hard and Soft Law in International Governance. International Organization 54 (3):421–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Alvarez, Jose E. 1999. Crimes of States/Crimes of Hate: Lessons from Rwanda. Yale Journal of International Law 24 (2):365–483.Google Scholar
Anderson, Benedict. 1983. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso.Google Scholar
Axelrod, Robert. 1984. The Evolution of Cooperation. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Axelrod, Robert, and Keohane., Robert O. 1985. Achieving Cooperation Under Anarchy: Strategies and Institutions. World Politics 38:226–54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bakuramutsa, Manzi. 1995. Panel III: Identifying and Prosecuting War Crimes: Two Case Studies–The Former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. New York University Law School Journal of Human Rights 12 (3):631–88.Google Scholar
Bass, Gary Jonathan. 2000. Stay the Hand of Vengeance: The Politics of War Crimes Tribunals. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bennett, Christopher. 1995. Yugoslavia's Bloody Collapse: Causes, Course, and Consequences. New York: New York University Press.Google Scholar
Beres, Louis René. 1988. Justice and Realpolitik: International Law and the Prevention of Genocide. American Journal of Jurisprudence 33:123–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brown, Michael E., Coté, Owen R. Jr,Lynn-Jones, Sean M., and Miller, Steven E., eds. 1997. Nationalism and Ethnic Violence. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Bull, Hedley. 1977. The Anarchical Society. New York: Columbia University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Callahan, David. 1997. Unwinnable Wars: American Power and Ethnic Conflict. New York: Hill and Wang.Google Scholar
Carr, E. H. 1961. The Twenty Years' Crisis, 1919–1939. London: Macmillan and Co.Google Scholar
Chayes, Abram, and Chayes., Antonia Handler 1995. The New Sovereignty: Compliance with International Regulatory Agreements. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Christopher, Paul. 1994. The Ethics of War and Peace: An Introduction to Legal and Moral Issues. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall.Google Scholar
Cohen, Laurie A. 1997. Application of the Realist and Liberal Perspectives to the Implementation of War Crimes Trials: Case Studies of Nuremberg and Bosnia. UCLA Journal of International Law and Foreign Affairs 2 (1): 113–70.Google Scholar
Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe. 1996. The War Crimes Trials for the Former Yugoslavia: Prospects and Problems. Washington, D.C.: Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe.Google Scholar
Conot, Robert E. 1983. Justice at Nuremberg. New York: Harper and Row.Google Scholar
Crawford, Beverly. 1994. Germany's Unilateral Recognition of Croatia and Slovenia: A Case of Defection from International Cooperation. Working Paper Series, 2.21. Berkeley: Center for German and European Studies, University of California.Google Scholar
David, Marcella. 1999. Grotius Repudiated: The American Objections to the International Criminal Court and the Commitment to International Law. Michigan Journal of International Law 20 (2):337–412.Google Scholar
Des Forges, Alison. 1999. Leave None to Tell the Story: Genocide in Rwanda. New York: Human Rights Watch.Google Scholar
Donnelly, Jack. 1998. Unfinished Business. PS: Political Science and Politics 31 (3):530–34.Google Scholar
Fearon, James D. 1998. Commitment Problems and the Spread of Ethnic Conflict. In The International Spread of Ethnic Conflict, edited by Lake, David A. and Rothchild, Donald, 107–26. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ferencz, Benjamin B. 1980. An International Criminal Court, A Step Toward World Peace: A Documentary History and Analysis. Vol. 1. Dobbs Ferry, N.J.: Oceana Publications.Google Scholar
Finnemore, Martha. 1996. Constructing Norms of Humanitarian Intervention. In The Culture of National Security, edited by Katzenstein, Peter J., 153–85. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Fox, Hazel. 1993. An International Tribunal for War Crimes: Will the UN Succeed Where Nuremberg Failed? The World Today 49 (10):194–97.Google Scholar
Franck, Thomas M. 1990. The Power of Legitimacy Among Nations. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
George, Alexander L., and Smoke., Richard 1974. Deterrence in American Foreign Policy: Theory and Practice. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Girard, René. 1977. Violence and the Sacred. Baltimore, Md.: Johns Hopkins University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goldstein, Judith, and Keohane, Robert O., eds. 1993. Ideas and Foreign Policy. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goldstein, Judith, Kahler, Miles, Keohane, Robert O., and Slaughter, Anne-Marie. 2000. Introduction: Legalization and World Politics. International Organization 54 (3):385–99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goldstein, Judith, Kahler, Miles, Keohane, Robert O., and Slaughter, Anne-Marie, eds. 2000. Legalization and World Politics. International Organization 54 (3). Special issue.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grotius, Hugo. [1925] 1962. The Law of War and Peace [De Jure Belli ac Pads Libri Tres]. Translated by Kelsey, Francis W.. Reprint, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Co.Google Scholar
Guest, Iain. 1996. The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia: A Preliminary Assessment. In The War Crimes Trials for the Former Yugoslavia: Prospects and Problems, 75–84. Washington, D.C.: Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe.Google Scholar
Gutman, Roy. 1993. A Witness to Genocide. New York: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Harvey, Frank. 1998. Deterrence Failure and Prolonged Ethnic Conflict in the Case of Bosnia. In Peace in the Midst of Wars: Preventing and Managing International Ethnic Conflicts, edited by Carment, David and James, Patrick, 230–64. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press.Google Scholar
Hasenclever, Andreas, Mayer, Peter, and Rittberger, Volker. 1997. Theories of International Regimes. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Henkin, Louis. 1990. The Age of Rights. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Howland, Todd, and Calathes, William. 1998. The UN's International Criminal Tribunal: Is It Justice or Jingoism for Rwanda? A Call for Transformation. Virginia Journal of International Law 39 (1):135–67.Google Scholar
Jackson, John H. 1984. Perspectives on the Jurisprudence of International Trade: Costs and Benefits of Legal Procedures in the United States. Michigan Law Review 82 (5/6): 1570–87.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jacobson, David. 1996. Rights Across Borders: Immigration and the Decline of Citizenship. Baltimore, Md.: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Jentleson, Bruce W. 1998. Preventive Diplomacy and Ethnic Conflict: Possible, Difficult, Necessary. In The International Spread of Ethnic Conflict, edited by Lake, David A. and Rothchild, Donald, 293–316. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kahler, Miles. 1995. International Institutions and the Political Economy of Integration. Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution.Google Scholar
Katzenstein, Peter J., ed. 1996. The Culture of National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Kaufmann, Chaim. 1996. Possible and Impossible Solutions to Ethnic Civil Wars. International Security 20 (4):136–75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Keohane, Robert O. 1984. After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Keohane, Robert O. 1997. International Relations and International Law: Two Optics. Harvard International Law Journal 38 (2):487–502.Google Scholar
Keohane, Robert O., and Martin, Lisa L.. 1995. The Promise of Institutionalist Theory. International Security 20 (1):39–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Koremenos, Barbara. 1999. On the Duration and Renegotiation of International Agreements. Ph.D. diss., University of Chicago.Google Scholar
Krasner, Stephen D. 1999. Sovereignty: Organized Hypocrisy. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Krasner, Stephen D., ed. 1983. International Regimes. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Kuperman, Alan J. 2000. Rwanda in Retrospect. Foreign Affairs 79 (1):94–118.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lake, David A., and Rothchild, Donald. 1998a. Spreading Fear: The Genesis of Transnational Ethnic Conflict. In The International Spread of Ethnic Conflict, edited by Lake, David A. and Rothchild, Donald, 3–32. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lake, David A., and Rothchild, Donald. 1998b. Ethnic Fears and Global Engagement. In The International Spread of Ethnic Conflict, edited by Lake, David A. and Rothchild, Donald, 339–50. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lake, David A., and Rothchild, Donald, eds. 1998c. The International Spread of Ethnic Conflict. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lawyers Committee for Human Rights. 1997. Prosecuting Genocide in Rwanda: A Lawyers Committee Report on the ICTR and National Trials. Available online at ⟨//www.lchr.org/pubs/rwanda.htm⟩ (accessed May 2001).Google Scholar
Lebow, Richard Ned, and Stein, Janice Gross. 1990. When Does Deterrence Succeed and How Do We Know? Occasional Papers Series, 8. Ottawa: Canadian Institute for International Peace and Security.Google Scholar
Leigh, Monroe. 1996. The Yugoslav Tribunal: Use of Unnamed Witnesses Against Accused. American Journal of International Law 90 (2):235–38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lutz, Ellen L., and Sikkink, Kathryn. 2000. International Human Rights Law and Practice in Latin America. International Organization 54 (3):633–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Meron, Theodor. 1995. International Criminalization of Internal Atrocities. American Journal of International Law 89 (3):554–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Meron, Theodor. 1997. Answering for War Crimes: Lessons from the Balkans. Foreign Affairs 76 (1): 2–8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Meyer, John W., Boli, John, and Thomas, George M.. 1987. Ontology and Rationalization in the Western Cultural Account. In Institutional Structure: Constituting State, Society, and the Individual, edited by Thomas, George M., Meyer, John W., Ramirez, Francisco O., and Boli, John, 12–37. Newbury Park, Calif.: Sage.Google Scholar
Morgan, Patrick M. 1977. Deterrence: A Conceptual Analysis. Beverly Hills, Calif.: Sage.Google Scholar
Morgenthau, Hans J. 1985. Politics Among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace. 6th ed. New York: Knopf.Google Scholar
Morris, Madeline H. 1997. The Trials of Concurrent Jurisdiction: The Case of Rwanda. Duke Journal of Comparative and International Law 7 (2):349–74.Google Scholar
Morris, Virginia, and Scharf, Michael P.. 1995. An Insider's Guide to the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia: A Documentary History and Analysis. Irvington-on-Hudson, N.Y.: Transnational Publishers.Google Scholar
Neier, Aryeh. 1998. War Crimes. New York: Times Books.Google Scholar
Oye, Kenneth A., ed. 1986. Cooperation Under Anarchy. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pejic, Jelena. 1998. Creating a Permanent International Criminal Court: The Obstacles to Independence and Effectiveness. Columbia Human Rights Law Review 29 (spring):291–354.Google Scholar
Posen, Barry R. 1993. The Security Dilemma and Ethnic Conflict. In Ethnic Conflict and International Security, edited by Brown, Michael E., 103–24. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Risse, Thomas, Ropp, Stephen C., and Sikkink, Kathryn, eds. 1999. The Power of Human Rights: International Norms and Domestic Change. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rosecrance, Richard N. 1999. Emulation in International Politics. Paper presented at the 95th Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, 2–5 September, Atlanta, Georgia.Google Scholar
Scharf, Michael P. 1997. Balkan Justice. Durham, N.C.: Carolina Academic Press.Google Scholar
Scharf, Michael P., and Epps, Valerie. 1996. The International Trial of the Century? A “Cross-Fire” Exchange on the First Case Before the Yugoslavia War Crimes Tribunal. Cornell International Law Journal 29 (3):635–63.Google Scholar
Schrag, Minna. 1995. The Yugoslav Crimes Tribunal: A Prosecutor's View. Duke Journal of Comparative and International Law 6 (1): 187–95.Google Scholar
Sikkink, Kathryn. 1993. The Power of Principled Ideas: Human Rights Policies in the United States and Western Europe. In Ideas and Foreign Policy, edited by Goldstein, Judith and Keohane, Robert O., 139–70. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Sikkink, Kathryn. 1998. Transnational Politics, International Relations Theory, and Human Rights. PS: Political Science and Politics 31 (3):517–21.Google Scholar
Silber, Laura, and Little, Allan. 1996. Yugoslavia: Death of a Nation. New York: TV Books.Google Scholar
Slaughter, Anne-Marie. 1993. International Law and International Relations Theory: A Dual Agenda. American Journal of International Law 87 (2):205–39.Google Scholar
Stein, Arthur A. 1990. Why Nations Cooperate. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Taylor, Telford. 1992. The Anatomy of the Nuremberg Trials: A Personal Memoir. New York: Knopf.Google Scholar
Thornberry, Cedric. 1996. Saving the War Crimes Tribunal. Foreign Policy 104 (fall):72–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Trimble, Phillip R. 1990. International Law, World Order, and Critical Legal Studies. Stanford Law Review 42 (3):811–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Van Schaack, Beth. 1999. The Definition of Crimes Against Humanity: Resolving the Incoherence. Columbia Journal of Transnational Law 37 (3):787–850.Google Scholar
Walter, Barbara F. and Snyder, Jack, eds. 1999. Civil Wars, Insecurity, and Intervention. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Watson, Adam. 1992. The Evolution of International Society. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Weber, Max. 1920. Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Religionssoziologie. Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr.Google Scholar
Wendt, Alexander. 1992. Anarchy Is What States Make of It: The Social Construction of Power Politics. International Organization 46 (2):391–425.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wendt, Alexander. 1999. Social Theory of International Politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Young, Oran R. Regime Dynamics: The Rise and Fall of International Regimes. In International Regimes, edited by Krasner, Stephen D., 93–113. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar