Showing papers in "Global Governance in 2003"

Climate Governance Beyond the State

Abstract: When the new Bush administration, announced in March 2001 that the United States would abandon the 1997 Kyoto protocol, governments, media, and environmental organizations all launched major protests. The statement by John Prescott (UK deputy prime minister) that the Kyoto protocol is "the only game in town" was significant for these protests. (1) It is, however, only in a very limited sense that the Kyoto protocol, or the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, can be conceived of as the only game in town. In this article, we maintain that both the will and the capacity to govern the atmosphere is diffused among several "governors." Our understanding of climate governance is derived from more general approaches to global governance, leading us to suggest that global climate governance should refer to all purposeful mechanisms and measures aimed at steering social systems toward preventing, mitigating, or adapting to the risks posed by climate change. Proceeding from such a conception, global (climate) governance must not be performed by states only; it is also a matter for other authorities--for example, nongovernmental organizations and epistemic communities. In line with this reasoning, we argue that private authority is an important form of climate governance and that several of the climate-related measures taken by the insurance industry ought to be viewed as instances of global climate governance. Further, the emergence of the insurance industry in climate politics raises questions not just about the efficiency and equity of governance necessary for mitigating climate change, but also about the much less debated governance required for adapting to climate change. Defining Global (Climate) Governance The absorptive capacity of the atmosphere is a limited resource in the sense that the quantity and physical quality of emissions is a matter of great significance. The atmosphere is a common good and open to everyone's use--that is, no one can be denied the right to utilize it. Accordingly, individuals, private industry, and states alike have traditionally used the atmosphere to harbor their emissions. As early as 1896, the Swedish scientist Svante Arrhenius showed that there exists a physical limit to the amount of emissions that the atmosphere can absorb without causing serious changes to the global climate. (2) Scientifically, there is today a fairly general agreement that we are approaching this limit with increasing speed. (3) What type of authority and government is required to reverse this trend? The answer is not straightforward because effective government over the climate issue does not exist. Indeed, government does not exist over any transboundary issues. This is not to say that no action can or does take place. It only means that globally there is no government responsible for this action. Since the international system lacks such government, the concept of global governance has been suggested instead. (4) While government has only one form--that is, government is synonymous with governmental authority--governance can take on various forms. To many observers, state authority is still the main form of governance, but it is increasingly asserted that state authority is not the only game in town. Among others, Ole Waever has pointed out that because authority has shifted location, the political map over the last four centuries is no longer adequate. Instead of one level being the most important point of reference, there is now a set of overlapping authorities. (5) The concept of global governance has emerged and is being developed as a way to comprehend these changes in the present international political order. However, no consensus has emerged as to the exact meaning of the concept. In a recent attempt to structure the various uses of the global governance concept, Martin Hewson and Timothy Sinclair point to three different (competing and complementary) meanings, which, in fact, generate quite different research agendas. …

How ‘New’ Are ‘New Wars’? Global Economic Change and the Study of Civil War

Abstract: Attempts to comprehend, through empirical inquiry and philosophical reflection, the likely effects of deeper, seemingly unstoppable processes of socioeconomic change on patterns of violent conflict within and across societies are not new Indeed, the relationship between the momentous transformations wrought by industrialization and the longterm prospects for war and peace was a prominent theme of political and sociological thought in nineteenth-century Europe In a celebrated lecture, delivered at the London School of Economics in 1957, Raymond Aron observed how thinkers such as Auguste Comte and Herbert Spencer, both profoundly conscious of "living in a period of transition," had been prepared to make prophecies about the future of war "whose boldness and dogmatism astound us" (1) By the time Aron himself came to reflect on the subject, the horrors of two world wars and the terrifying prospect of another even more destructive conflict ensured that "long-range historical predictions" were decidedly out of fashion Instead, the Cold War came to be marked by an acute concern with the present; a concern that shaped and, in important respects, also distorted thinking about war and peace The latter was true in particular for the study of civil or intrastate wars, wars whose local sources and regional dynamic were often overshadowed by a preoccupation with the central strategic balance and the competition for influence between East and West The end of the Cold War, then, involved more than just a release from the balance of terror It also had a liberating impact on the study of conflict, causing a "strong feeling of living in a period of transition" to again permeate much of the writings and debates about sources of war and peace in the international system While the emergence of industrial society had preoccupied an earlier generation of thinkers, "globalization" has, to many, assumed a similar role of describing the sense that we are living through a period of universal, far-reaching, and irreversible changes Structure, Qualifications, and Argument in Brief Of special interest to this article is the more specific suggestion that processes of globalization have contributed to changes in the nature of war so profound that one is justified in talking of "New Wars" (2) This claim to newness rests, in part, on the assertion that changes in the nature and workings of the global economy, especially in the 1980s and 1990s, are impacting uniquely on the patterns and character of intrastate and/or region-wide conflict around the world This article examines this assertion in greater detail It does so, however, against the backdrop of a wider debate, one that has focused on the economic agendas of belligerents, local populations caught up in conflict, and external actors in the emergence and consolidation of contemporary wars There are two reasons for thus widening the debate In the first place, the salience of economic agendas in contemporary wars is considered by many to be directly and causally connected to changes in the global economic environment over the past quarter century or so Secondly, by assessing the comparative importance of one set of factors, the article hopes to contribute to a broader discussion, which the New Wars debate has helped to stimulate, about the nature of contemporary wars It is a basic premise of the article that this can most usefully be done by drawing upon the actual knowledge, however incomplete and fragmentary, that we now have of individual conflicts As such, what follows is not an exercise in grand theorizing about global economic change and war It represents a more modest, though necessary, effort to test generalizations, unspoken assumptions, and implied causal connections that are often made about contemporary forms of warfare, against our understanding of individual cases To this end, special attention is given throughout the article to what we know (and, indeed, what we do not fully comprehend) about wars in West and Central Africa, Algeria, and the former Yugoslavia …

What the Democratization Literature Says?or Doesn't Say?About Postwar Democratization

Abstract: Herodotus was probably right when he argued that wars make history, but whether and when wars make democracy remain open questions. The classics in the democratization literature are surprisingly reticent about the links between war and lasting democracy. Most of our theoretical literature on democratic transitions or democratic consolidation leaves the connection to war either wholly neglected or seriously undertheorized. This is perplexing because so many new and renewed democracies emerge in the context of war. Of the seventy-three democracies founded after 1945 that still exist today, over half emerged either in the immediate aftermath of a war or as a means of bringing an ongoing war to an end. Table 1 shows how many electoral democracies emerged in a postwar setting. The cases in Table 1 are electoral democracies--meaning that they are regimes in which leaders are selected in competitive elections. If we define democracy more strictly and consider only cases in which a full (or nearly full) range of individual liberties is provided, the pattern is the same. Half of all "free" regimes formed after World War II that are still in existence today were formed in the immediate aftermath of war (see Table 2). The percentage of free regimes that were founded in postwar settings was as high ten years ago as it is today, so the existence of "postwar" democracies is far from new. (1) The subject of democratization after war is clearly worthy of close attention. What do we currently know (or think we know) about how war affects democratization? What does the democratization literature teach us about building democracy in postwar settings? I sketch brief answers to both of these questions in the following sections. For the purposes of this article, my definition of democracy corresponds to the definition used most often in the canon of democratization literature: democracy "is a system of governance in which rulers are held accountable . . . by citizens acting indirectly through the competition and cooperation of their elected representatives." (2) Though I acknowledge that this is a minimalist version of a much more complex and multifaceted phenomenon, I focus on electoral democracy because it defines a politically important and numerically large subset of regimes. Can War Be Good for Democracy? The democratization literature portrays the association between war and the transition to democracy as broadly positive. Indeed, wars seem to be associated with democratic transitions whether the state in question is vanquished, victorious, or simply a partner in an inconclusive struggle. It is ironic that a devastating defeat seems to be an especially propitious setting for a transition to be made. Yet several scholars have marshaled sound evidence in favor of this proposition. They remind us that "the great majority of historical examples of successful redemocratization ... are ones in which warfare and conquest play an integral part" (3) that conquest by a democratic power allows for the dismantling of problematic military and political institutions; (4) "that military failure contributed to the downfall or weakening of at least five authoritarian regimes between 1974 and l989" (5); and that "defeat in warfare" often precipitates the elite settlements that lasting democracy requires. (6) The defeats that l ead "most readily" to a democratic regime change are the devastating ones in which "elites are thoroughly replaced." (7) Authoritarian regimes that conduct a war successfully may be toppled too. Victory in wars against "subversion" can eliminate a dictatorship's raison d'etre and provoke a crisis of legitimacy. (8) Surprisingly, elites who face neither victory nor defeat may still make the transition to democracy if their armed struggle appears to be both "costly and inconclusive." (9) Theorists insist that the elite compromise that democracy requires emerges when leaders recognize "that the next round of conflict is likely to visit disaster on all sides. …

The "Knowledge Bank" and the Global Development Network

Abstract: There are many research networks in existence but few so grand in design as the Global Development Network (GDN). Why has the World Bank devoted so much effort and so many resources to think tanks? Some of the answers lie in broader objectives of the World Bank to become the "knowledge bank." (1) The GDN represents one program to operationalize this policy discourse of knowledge. The network is designed to allow greater scope for "home-grown" policy, information sharing, and enhanced research capacity in and between developing countries for the coproduction of local, regional, and global knowledge. The World Bank and other sponsors of the network are promoting the creation and distribution of a global public good--knowledge. Stimulating the supply of both the quantity and quality of policy-relevant research aids the transmission of international "best practices." Such laudable aspirations have been welcomed within the development studies community. Yet there are also concerns about the uncritical view of knowledge and the assumptions about how that knowledge is utilized. There is a rationalist tendency within the GDN that portrays (scientific) research as independent from its social context. Knowledge is utilized as an intellectual tool that allows rational policy actors to reduce and control uncertainty in decisionmaking and advance social progress. This is best captured in the GDN motto "Better research/better policy/better world." However, neither ideas nor the research that codifies them are neutral. Accordingly, in this article, I outline a specific form of power--ideational power--that is central to emerging patterns of global governance. Importantly, the impact of ideas or discourses or knowledge can be greatly magnified when in coalition with broader social and economic forces. Consequently, in the analysis, I draw on some policy network concepts to sugges t that creating knowledge and sharing research to promote development serves the interests primarily of the institutions advocating the knowledge agenda and the researchers in their orbit. "Knowledge for development" serves a particular kind of interest--that is, the cognitive interest of researchers in their professional regeneration and advancement into new institutional arrangements such as global policy networks. Under the auspices of the GDN, research that is broadly supportive of open economies and free markets research has been produced and disseminated. Furthermore, it is created predominantly by development economists. Indeed, key objectives of the GDN are cast in the public goods language of economics. This does not mean that the GDN is in the hegemonic grasp of neoliberal economics. Knowledge is contested within the network. I focus in this article on GDN dynamics from mid-1999 when the GDN Secretariat was created in the World Bank until the third annual conference in Rio de Janeiro in December 2001, by which time the GDN had become an independent nonprofit organization. The following discussion criticizes the public goods approach to knowledge for its apolitical assumptions about research utilization. It adopts three network concepts: epistemic communities, embedded knowledge networks, and transnational discourse communities. These provide not only differing interpretations of GDN activities but also tools to argue that World Bank-sponsored research is not policy neutral but represents a discursive or ideational form of power that helps set and sustain development agendas. A Global Network for Development Research In December 1999, the GDN was launched by the World Bank in cooperation with the UN; the governments of Japan, Germany, and Switzerland; seven regional research networks; and other private and public international development institutions. The three broad objectives of the GDN are to "create, share and apply knowledge." The network is intended to incorporate the research community of developing and transition countries more efficiently into development policy. …

Emerging Global Actors: The United Nations and National Human Rights Institutions

Abstract: There is a new and significant development in the field of human rights: the U.N. led proliferation of national human rights institutions (NHRIs). NHRIs are government agencies whose purported aim is to implement international norms domestically. These institutions have expanded considerably since the early 1990s, quadrupling in number and appearing in almost 100 countries. What explains the diffusion of such similar institutions across diverse national contexts? In this article, I argue that the entry of this actor onto the world stage cannot be understood without examining the role of international organizations, especially the United Nations. Whereas international support for NHRIs in the past merely defined appropriate institutional structures and functions, today international actors are directly engaged in creating and strengthening these institutions. Support from the UN and other international organizations, both governmental and nongovernmental alike, has allowed NHRIs to take the unprecedented step of forging transgovernmental alliances and to even begin acquiring formal international standing. While students of international relations have overlooked these developments, NHRIs do signal an important innovation in global governance. (1) The emergence of these institutions marks a potentially significant step in the implementation of international human rights law. In the words of the Canadian government, NHRIs may be "the practical link between international standards and their concrete application, the bridge between the ideal and its implementation." (2) Given this transformative agenda, we need a much better understanding of how international actors like the UN, which has been at the forefront of these human rights activities, actually engage in national institution building. (3) At the same time, as long as states remain the principal "makers" and "breakers" of international law, support for NHRIs may be a doubleedged phenomenon, presenting both opportunities and challenges for the local protection of human rights norms. In addressing these trends, I advance two sets of arguments. First, I contend that, contrary to conventional state-centric expectations, the UN has played a crucial role in creating and strengthening NHRIs. It has done so by means of four mechanisms: standard setting, capacity building, network facilitating, and membership granting. I provide support for this general proposition by tracing UN support historically, presenting descriptive statistics, and using counterfactual reasoning. Other actors--including government agencies, human rights nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and international organizations like the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE)--have contributed to these activities, especialty in terms of capacity building; but only the UN has been equipped to coordinate and legitimate the global diffusion of these national institutions. Second, drawing on the nascent experience of NHRIs, I propose that, while the creation of NHRIs is a welcome development, insofar as it serve s to embed international norms in local structures, it also can have perverse consequences. National human rights institutions can have the unintended effect of heightening social expectations, which governments are then unwilling or unable to meet; in some instances, this could lead to less rather than more human rights protection. Although I structure the article around these two central arguments, in an introductory section I survey the functions and relevance of emerging NHRIs, namely their role in implementing international norms domestically. In the remainder of the article I focus on the interplay between the UN and national institutions. Domestic Implementation of International Norms The stated objective of all governmental human rights institutions is to implement international norms domestically. Put differently, NHRJs are intended to be the permanent, local "infrastructure" upon which international human rights norms are built; they are not to be confused with ad hoc truth commissions or other temporary crisis-driven institutional arrangements. …

The Helmet and the Hoe: Linkages between United Nations Development Assistance and Conflict Management

Abstract: Analysts frequently note that the UN was established in very different times, when interstate war dominated the international security agenda and the wave of decolonization had barely begun. The UN's membership was one-quarter the current size. Concepts such as human security, human development, governance, and peacebuilding, if they existed at all, were little used or understood, and it was the rights of and relationships between states (rather than individuals or groups) that enjoyed the spotlight. Some geopolitical fault lines were as pertinent then as now. The first ever General Assembly (GA) resolution called for the elimination of atomic and other weapons of mass destruction, (1) and in its first five years the Security Council was preoccupied by the Middle East, India-Pakistan, Indonesia, the Korean peninsula, and the Balkans. (2) But it is noticeable that Africa, which today represents over 50 percent of the docket of the Council, barely featured in the early days. The structure of the UN still largely reflects its birth. On the intergovernmental side, there was a clear distinction from the outset between the arenas for development issues-the GA and the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC)--and the forum for peace and security, the Security Council. The same distinction was evident within the UN Secretariat and its agencies, funds, and programs. As a result, two quite different communities-the development community and the conflict management (3) community--evolved, with separate procedures, financial arrangements and decisionmaking forums. Over time, however, and specifically with the end of the Cold War, the international community began to focus on the linkages between peace and development. This necessitated an enormous and ongoing institutional adaptation within the UN, whereby the development and conflict management communities began to work closely together, bridging the gaps created by their separate approaches. In this article I describe that adaptation, with a specific look at its application in Afghanistan. While I take into account both the intergovernmental (the UN as an arena) and the international civil service (the UN as an actor) sides of the UN, (4) my focus is mostly on the latter. On the other hand, major institutional innovations within the UN rarely occur without the explicit sanction of an intergovernmental body--the executive board in the case of an agency such as the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Security Council and GA political and budget committees in the case of Secretariat departments--and for that reason, I also describe the debates in those bodies. The UN and Development Cooperation The assumption by the UN of development functions was foreseen in the charter and early GA resolutions, (5) but development did not acquire real prominence on the UN agenda until the 1960s. Before then, development assistance was almost exclusively bilateral, but perceptions that multilateral channels were less political and more efficient led to an expansion in multilateral assistance, particularly after the Pearson Report of 1969. Already by the late 1940s, however, assistance to "underdeveloped" countries was being discussed, and in 1948 the GA approved a budget line for technical assistance (advisory social welfare services) amounting to U.S.$750,000. In 1950, the UN Expanded Programme of Technical Assistance (EPTA)--the first multilateral development program financed from voluntary contributions--was established. (6) In 1966, EPTA merged with the Special Fund for Economic Development to create the main UN agency for development, UNDP. (7) UNDP was primarily intended as a funding agency, providing funds for and assisting governments with the planning and management of national development programs. Programs were frequently executed by UN specialized agencies, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), or by UNDP's own Office for Project Services (spun off in 1995). …

The Global Promotion of Transparency in Emerging Markets

Abstract: Globalization through financial integration holds out the promise of economic growth and development for emerging market countries (1) Over the past decade, we have witnessed financial crises in emerging economies across the globe, characterized by weaknesses in the domestic financial sector These weaknesses very quickly took on systemic proportions, which could only be checked through the immediate mobilization of international financing, notably in Mexico (1995), East Asia (1997), Russia (1998), Brazil (1998), and Turkey (2001) (2) Market analysts characterize patterns of global financial crises as a "flight to quality," where investment capital moves to stable environments in times of crisis International policy experts and political leaders alike fear that global economic competition for profits will exacerbate societal and ethnic differences, drive polarization between advanced industrialized and underdeveloped countries, and cultivate political extremism globally (3) Motivated by these concerns, international financial institutions (IFIs) such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, and regional banks such as the Asian Development Bank (ADB) have claimed leading roles in promoting global market governance Among the range of proposals, consensus has emerged on the global strategy to increase transparency of domestic financial sectors across the globe (4) Indeed, for many market analysts, transparency is the cornerstone of any global financial architecture aiming to weather the inherent volatility of global financial markets (5) IFI policy experts reason that distortions of information within financial markets are the key to explaining the large influx of foreign capital into emerging markets as well as its rapid departure in times of crisis Thus, "transparency" in global markets holds the promise of fewer foreign investor overreactions due to unclear market signals, quicker and smaller adjustments by investors in reaction to new information, better planning by locally based firms in managing investment flows, and overall greater market efficiency Global investors also demand greater market transparency, hoping that the greater flow of information regarding the actions of governments and firms in emerging market economies will allow them to better manage their investments While few emerging-market governments, banks, or private firms openly dispute the need for increased transparency, transparency has proven difficult to achieve (6) IFIs rely on their existing multilateral mandates for surveillance, financial data collection, and data diffusion In promoting transparency in emerging markets, however, they have found themselves drawn into battles with a range of transnational, multinational, domestic, and international authorities over the production of financial information and the diffusion of financial information These political battles cast a critical light on seemingly apolitical assumptions that motivate much of the theoretical rationale for international governance strategies inspired by the goal of a transparent global financial system This article is fundamentally motivated by IFIs' apolitical bias in framing the promotion of transparency as a global governance strategy I argue that the challenge of global governance through market transparency is a political challenge and that politics emerge in two dimensions: (1) the standardization of the regulatory processes through which such financial information is produced for global investor consumption; and (2) the procedures that govern the diffusion of this information (7) The financial information that guides investor decisions--such as credit ratings, bond ratings, and measures of interest rate or exchange rate risk--only proves useful when the processes through which this information is produced are themselves standardized across markets and when these data are indeed accessible throughout global markets …

Entitlement Quotients as a Vehicle for United Nations Reform

Abstract: The ability to create order is no less important to human survival than the ability to overcome famine, construct great edifices, write great books, or compose great symphonies. Norman Cousins, The Human Adventure The ability of the United Nations to function effectively is limited by several serious structural deficiencies. First, the one nation-one vote system of decisionmaking in the General Assembly (GA) is unrealistic, bearing no relationship to the actual distribution of power in the world. Hence, it is hardly surprising that its decisions are only recommendatory rather than binding. Second, the method of allocating seats in the more powerful Security Council is neither fair nor representative. Finally, the Security Council's legitimacy in dealing with many important issues is compromised by the anachronistic special status of the five permanent members and, in particular, by their being endowed with the veto power. The fact that so many nations consider themselves marginalized by the present system contributes significantly to anti-Western and, in particular, anti-U.S. sentiment. All of the foregoing deficiencies can and should be corrected by appropriate revisions of the UN Charter. In this article, I detail the case for the needed reforms, quantify and explain their likely systemic effects, discuss obstacles in the way of their acceptance, and suggest appropriate charter amendments. The key to the proposed reforms is to adopt a coherent system of weighted voting, by nations in the GA and/or by individual nations or caucuses of nations in the Security Council. Weighting would be according to objectively calibrated "entitlement quotients" (EQs), based on simultaneous consideration of three principles for representation: (1) the present legal principle of the sovereign equality of nations, (2) a population-based democratic/demographic principle, and (3) a capability principle based on contributions to the regular UN budget, which are essentially a function of national wealth. Ideally, the concept of EQs would be applied to both the GA and the Security Council, but it could be used for either of those two bodies alone should there be insufficient support for its application to the other. As regards the Security Council, in place of permanent membership, seats would be allocated to certain powers with EQs in excess of a stipulated threshold value and also to self-formed caucuses of nations whose combined EQs exceeded that threshold. The veto would be terminated or gradually phased out. The proposed system would be not only objective but also nuanced and flexible, thereby maximizing fairness and enabling changes consistent with changing demographic and economic realities. (1) While any radical shift in power within the UN would meet with vigorous initial opposition from certain nations, transitional arrangements are suggested that would preclude excessive shocks to the existing system. Moreover, because of demonstrably desirable trade-offs to which the use of EQs would lead, the global system as a whole would greatly benefit, leading to a more orderly and more democratic international order. In this anticipated outcome lies the hope that the suggested reforms will eventually receive the requisite support for their adoption. Reform of the General Assembly The Growing Need for Voting Reform The profound changes in the General Assembly since the founding of the UN were clearly not anticipated by those who drafted the UN Charter. By the year 2000, to which all figures used in this article relate (unless otherwise specified), the UN had become a virtually universal body, encompassing some 99.7 percent of the world's people (99.3 percent if Taiwan is excluded). (2) The number of members has almost quadrupled, and their geographic redistribution has shifted radically (see Figure 1 and Maps 1 and 2). Africa, for example, which accounted for a mere four members in 1945 (7. …

International Law and the Entitlement to Democracy After War

Abstract: Since the end of the Cold War, the international community has engaged in two tasks that run contrary to traditional notions of state sovereignty. The first is the reconstruction of domestic political institutions in states emerging from civil war. The second is the promotion of liberal democracy as the preferred form of national governance. Whether one understands state sovereignty in territorial or functional terms, both tasks break new ground. At the heart of most Westphalian conceptions of state autonomy is the capacity for self-government. International law prior to the end of the Cold War was highly protective of how states selected their leaders and designed their constitutional systems. As a respected international law treatise stated in 1905, "The Law of Nations prescribes no rules as regards the kind of head a State may have. Every State is, naturally, independent regarding this point, possessing the faculty of adopting any Constitution according to its discretion." (1) It is commonplace that state sovereignty has never been absolute, either in theory or practice; however, for the international community to involve itself in matters of internal governance--let alone to specify a model of liberal democracy as the normative ideal--intrudes upon functions that even the most permeable conceptions of sovereignty have regarded as wholly domestic. These assumptions have now changed. External actors, led primarily by the United Nations, have become negotiators of peace agreements to end civil wars; drafters of new constitutions, electoral laws, and judicial procedures; and supervisors of all aspects of postwar transitions. These postconflict reconstruction or peacebuilding missions (the terms are used interchangeably) have taken place on every continent. They have become so common that, at the end of the twentieth century, it was the rare civil conflict that ended without the UN being assigned an important role in the state's reconstruction. (2) A UN panel has defined peacebuilding as "activities undertaken on the far side of conflict to reassemble the foundations of peace and provide the tools for building on those foundations something that is more than just the absence of war." (3) Between 1991 and 2002, seventeen UN peacebuilding missions were deployed. (4) During the same period, international law has increasingly identified liberal democracy as the preferred form of national governance. (5) Scholars have identified an emerging "democratic entitlement" in international law--the view that representative government, chosen in fair and periodic elections, is a human right of all citizens. (6) The state practice underpinning this emerging norm is widespread and diverse: resolutions of the Security Council urging free and fair elections; clarification of the treaty-based right to political participation by international human rights bodies; refusal of states and international organizations to recognize regimes taking power by extraconstitutional means; the conditioning of foreign aid on comportment with "democratic" norms; and the conditioning of treaty relations on the maintenance of democratic institutions. These and other similar acts are the raw data from which norms of customary international law emerge. Postconflict reconstruction initiatives bring together these two normative strains of reconstructing state institutions after conflict and democracy promotion. When the UN has contributed to the political and legal structure of postconflict societies, it has invariably drawn on the body of emerging democratic norms. While this cross-pollination is not often explicit, the institutions and procedures it has recommended for postconflict states find direct parallels in the body of human rights norms concerning political participation. On issues ranging from universal suffrage to party pluralism to media access for opposition groups, international norms and the practice of democracy promotion missions are remarkably congruent. …

Universal Jurisdiction for Human Rights: From Legal Principle to Limited Reality

Abstract: In the early 1600s, Grotius and other international legal scholars began to advance the idea that certain kinds of crimes should be subject to the jurisdiction of any court in the world, no matter where they were committed or by whom?a principle that has come to be known as "universal jurisdiction."1 About 200 years later, Clausewitz considered international legal principles so irrelevant that he discussed them only in passing as "self-imposed restrictions, almost imperceptible and hardly worth mentioning."2 Nearly two centuries again passed, when Great Britain arrested former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet on a warrant from a Spanish judge for heinous crimes against Chileans and foreign citizens. The case set off a worldwide storm of debate as universal jurisdiction became a familiar term. Stoked by the ongoing political brawl over the International Crimi nal Court (ICC) and dramatic prosecutions for crimes in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, the debate on universal jurisdiction continues unabated, though it is marked by immense confusion and dramatically different interpretations echoing Grotius and Clausewitz. Proponents of universal jurisdiction?often found among international human rights lawyers and activists?commonly argue that the principle is well estab lished in international law and that a wide range of human rights offenses are subject to universal jurisdiction. One such prominent group recently drafted the "Princeton Principles on Universal Jurisdiction," which hold that the following offenses can be tried by any court in the world without regard to where the crime occurred or who committed it: piracy, slavery, war crimes, crimes against peace, crimes against humanity, genocide, and torture.3 In stark contrast, universal jurisdiction skeptics?who often include scholars and policymakers in the realist international relations tra dition and ideologically conservative analysts?dismiss universal jurisdic tion as dangerous legal activism. A variety of positions are included in the broad tent of skepticism: in his recent article in Foreign Affairs, Henry Kissinger suggests that the concept is a recent invention of activists and 347

The International Regulation of Money Laundering

Abstract: This vile paper-money and funding system; this system of Dutch descent, begotten by Bishop Burnet and born in hell; this system has turned everything into a gamble. There are hundreds of men who live by being the agents to carry on gambling ... many of the gamblers live in the country; they write up to their gambling agent, whom they call their stockbroker; he gambles according to their order; and they receive the profit or stand to the loss. Is it possible to conceive a viler calling than that of an agent for the carrying on of gambling! And yet the vagabonds call themselves gentlemen. ********** So the English radical William Cobbett wrote in his Rural Rides of 1830. (1) People do not write like Cobbett (or Carlyle, Dickens, and Marx) anymore. Not about "hellish systems" of paper money, at any rate. Technical prudence comes more naturally now than systematic denunciation; vigor is applied to policy initiatives and convention drafting, rather than to prophecies of "approaching convulsion," jeremiads against villains and vagabonds, "the unhanged knaves of paper-money." The international monetary system is, to be sure, now more complicated than the question of the national debt for Cobbett, yet we get less agitated about phenomena such as money laundering. We put them into that ethical side category of "matters for international regulation." It is interesting, if idle, to speculate on the tongue-lashings Cobbett would have administered to "walking trust accounts," "smurfing," creative accountancy, and cashing in casino chips, to name but some of the laundering techniques masterfully described by Michael Levi in a recent state-of-the-art article. (2) Not only do we no longer live in a world where not to be a gentleman was a withering reproach; we also live in a world of euphemisms, such as money laundering itself. As a subject of regulation, it leads our eyes away from the immediate sources of serious crime to their mediated proceeds. (3) As a metaphor, money laundering implies that "dirty" money can indeed come out from the wash whiter than white: it blends so smoothly with legitimate financial investment activities that we are hard put to tell the difference. Unfortunately perhaps, this makes the international banking system appear to work as a new and improved detergent. Understandably then, one runs up against a paradox when approaching the sources of crime from the perspective of proceeds. Dirty money is doing pretty much the same thing as clean money--moving around in search of profits. Or, in a crisper definition, such as William Gaddis's: "'Money is credit, get that?' 'It's what?' 'Tells you your money should work for you ... the trick's to get other people's money to work for you, get that?'" (4) Getting other people's money to work for them would be one definition of the criminality of money laundering were it not so akin to what pension trust managers for example, as well as corporate tax evaders, also do. Once the dirty money is in the wash it is as clean as any other; we are back to Cobbett's "system of gambling and fictitious money." This brings us to the second pertinent euphemism, regulation. We have wars against crime and terrorism, as well as the prohibition and "eradication at source" of drugs, but we speak of cautious regulation of the proceeds of crime. Regulation is a fence-sitting word. At one end of the spectrum, it suggests exacting and strong rule; in the middle, a moderate adaptation to requirements; and at the other end, the maintenance of the status quo. The international regulation of money laundering to date can be set midway between the middle and the latter end of the spectrum, Regulation thus means protecting order while accepting dysfunctional components of that order. The basis for this claim rests upon our last, least heroic of euphemisms, results. In the technical literature, results are almost always, and by definition, modest. When they are extremely modest we can infer that they have much to be modest about. …

Musings of a UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights. (Global Insights)

Abstract: The United Nations Commission on Human Rights (CHR) appointed its first special rapporteur in 1979 to report on abuses in Chile under the Augusto Pinochet dictatorship. This initiative established an important precedent for the institution of special procedures to examine serious human rights violations in any country. In 1982, for the first time, a thematic rapporteurship was set up to examine summary and arbitrary executions. Consequently, the fifty-three member states of the CHR have taken steps toward a worldwide system for monitoring human rights. In mid-2002, there were forty-one special rapporteurs: thirty on thematic issues, eleven working in specific countries. (1) My first appointment as special rapporteur for Burundi lasted from 1995 to 1999. In December 2000, I began a second mandate for Myanmar, a position I continue to hold. (2) The selection process for special rapporteurs is somewhat inscrutable, perhaps even byzantine. It is entirely controlled by the chair of the CHR. Through direct consultations with the members of the bureau, (3) the chair appoints specialists. The overall quality of appointees thus depends largely on the courage, insight, and negotiating skills of the chair. It does not suffice to want to be a special rapporteur, much less to nominate oneself, nor does having a particular interest in a given country or theme carry much weight. Vacancies arise when the CHR, which authorizes and renews mandates, proposes new missions or when someone resigns. Country-specific and thematic mandates are reviewed annually. In April 1999, the commission instituted a term limit of six years for experts. It is extremely unlikely to assign special rapporteurs who do not have at least the acquiescence of their own governments, although some candidates may not enjoy enthusiastic support from their home countries. Many civil society organizations, at higher decibel levels since the CHR's fifty-eighth session in spring 2002, have criticized the growing politicization of the appointment process, in which the expertise of candidates sometimes appears to be secondary to their political acceptability. (4) In my own experience, special rapporteurs have demonstrated considerable independence of mind and action. Criticisms have also arisen related to the advisability of appointing special rapporteurs who originate from the same region in which their mandate is located. During the fifty-eighth session, for example, the African group insisted on appointing a mandate holder by name i n the resolution on racism, clearly contrary to established procedures. Whatever the merits of the candidate, this initiative was criticized vociferously and appropriately by civil society organizations because of the precedent-setting implications and the perceived threat to the autonomy of appointments. (5) A common complaint raised by the special rapporteurs themselves is the lack of availability and poor quality of support they receive from the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR). Threats to international human rights norms require the creation of new mandates each year; as a result, services quickly become overloaded, especially because they were inadequate in the first place. Quite simply, mandates proliferate without a corresponding increase in the resources to support them. To perform their duties, special rapporteurs must secure invitations from member states. Too many governments do not reply or delay responding to requests for a mission. A small but growing group, consisting of thirty-eight forthcoming countries, has issued "standing invitations." Brazil, Costa Rica, Georgia, Peru, and Switzerland have just joined this select group. Donor governments should provide incentives for others to join the club. Special rapporteurs take pains to maintain their independence, impartiality, and objectivity; to weigh the information on human rights provided by governments and civil society groups; and to report fully on the progress made and obstacles faced. …

Democratic Governance: Toward a Framework for Sustainable Peace. (Global Insights)

Abstract: The events following the September 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States have refocused global attention, in an urgent manner, on the conditions for guaranteeing long-term peace within societies that have faced varying degrees of internal breakdown and have hence become possible breeding grounds for terrorism. Some have argued that the maintenance of internal security is sufficient for this purpose. I believe that maintaining internal security is simply one of several outcomes-sustainable peace and sustainable development being the most visible-that will result from a thorough reform of governance, or democratization in the broader sense, within these societies. I urge the international community to focus its efforts toward this end, particularly within countries that have either been affected by, or face the potential for, violent conflict. One of the most vexing questions of our modem times has been that of the viable reconstruction and revival of societies torn by armed conflict. In earlier times, societies could continue warring for decades or even centuries and find in due time their internal peace or equilibrium. In modern times, neither these societies nor their neighbors have this luxury. As was amply demonstrated in 2001 by the terrorist attacks on the United States, the violent collapse of countries has consequences far beyond their borders and is in turn fed by transboundary influences. Yet the task of the wholesale revival of societies often appears arduous and daunting to even the most enthusiastic interveners, and many words have been written and monies spent in the search for the ideal formula for building lasting peace in war-torn societies. Recent years have seen a growing conviction among governments and civil society in many member states of the United Nations about the centrality of democratic governance in achieving both sustainable peace and development. In addition, many in the development community are convinced that in the absence of democratic governance, no amount of development assistance is likely to lead to sustainable outcomes. The intellectual and political capacity of a society to use this assistance in a fair, equitable, and participatory manner may be of greater significance in ensuring sustainable development than the level of development assistance itself. Hence, in recent years the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has gradually moved its programming toward the promotion of democratic governance, which is often associated with accountable and transparent public institutions; a system of justice that provides for peaceful settlement of disputes; rule of law that protects the rights of all; and genuine popular partic ipation in political decision-making, whatever form such participation might take. Democratic governance is also underpinned by a vital consensus on its parameters among all key sectors within a society. It is my strong belief that democratic governance is vital not just for ensuring sustainable development, but also for sustaining peace within societies. In his report of 2001 on the prevention of armed conflicts, the UN secretary-general called on the United Nations to assist member states in building their internal capacity for dealing peacefully with internal tensions and disputes. (1) In my view, democratic governance, implemented by a strong leadership and based on a firm consensus within a society on its parameters, is at the very core of this capacity. In the past two decades, the international community has learned a number of important lessons from experiences in countries as diverse as Haiti, Papua New Guinea, Cambodia, Guatemala, Afghanistan, and Bosnia-Herzegovina. A key lesson is that if a society does not have its own indigenous capacity for resolving internal tensions before they lead to violent conflict, then even the most generous provision of humanitarian or reconstruction assistance may not lead to sustainable peace. …

Civil Wars: What We Don't Know. (Review Essay)

Abstract: Why are some enduring civil conflicts resolved with essentially self-enforcing agreements, as in El Salvador and South Africa, while others seem unamenable to negotiated resolution even with extensive third-party intervention, as in Colombia and the Israeli/Palestinian conflict? Recent scholarly studies have identified important empirical regularities in the emergence, persistence, and negotiated resolution of civil wars. The marketing of war commodities such as diamonds and cocaine by parties to the conflict and by their regional allies contributes to the intractability of conflict. Third-party intervention sometimes contributes to a cessation of hostilities, particularly in the form of mediation services during the negotiation period or of security guarantees during the demobilization period. Ethnic polarization--especially where the parties perceive the stakes of war to be strictly indivisible--makes negotiated settlements difficult to reach. Ethnic violence (particularly in the form of ethnic cleansing), rhetorical manipulation of ethnic fears by political entrepreneurs, the ease of arms and cash flows in the increasingly globalized world economy (particularly where states are weak), and the all-too-often insufficient response of international and regional actors to initial violence also contribute to civil conflict and render peacebuilding difficult. Yet there is a lot we do not yet understand about civil war and therefore, I argue, about negotiated settlements and peacebuilding. In some contexts, elites succeed in polarizing communities along ethnic lines, but in others they fail. International aid sometimes serves as a "carrot" that can bring warring parties to the table; in other contexts, aid sustains conflict. Diplomatic intervention sometimes reinforces beliefs that the other party is serious this time about peace although they backtracked last time, but it can lead to the emergence of "spoilers" in other contexts. We know that efforts to negotiate an end to civil war more often fail than succeed. According to one estimate, the parties to civil war engage in formal negotiations in about half the cases but successfully implement a negotiated settlement ending the war in less than a fifth of all civil wars. (1) Understanding why some civil wars but not others are amenable to negotiated resolution and sustained peacebuilding is, of course, more than a scholarly puzzle; it is essential for policymakers and others seeking to curtail the civil violence that continues to generate great human suffering. In this article I explore how what we don't know about civil wars may detract from peacebuilding efforts. I discuss three related issues and their implications for peacebuilding: the political economy of civil war and negotiated settlements; the microfoundations of civil war violence; and, more tentatively, distinct types of civil war. In the conclusion, I reflect on how these issues impact peacebuilding efforts. The Political Economy of Civil War and Negotiated Settlements Much of the recent literature on the political economy of civil war has focused on how the presence of war commodities such as cocaine and diamonds, particularly when controlled by insurgent forces, renders civil conflicts more likely, longer, and more difficult to resolve.2 In analyzing a new database of civil wars, Paul Collier and Anke Hoeffler found that the likelihood that a civil war will emerge from civil conflict and persist is significantly greater in those countries highly dependent on the export of primary commodities: "greed" displaces "grievance" as insurgents develop netwofrks to market commodities from areas they control, frequently through the collusion of governments and military forces of neighboring countries.3 Classic examples are "war diamonds" in Sierra Leone and Angola and cocaine in Colombia. Collier and Hoeffler's focus on the export of primary commodities is intended to capture statistically such cases where highly "lootable" resources are available to armed groups, which can then pay for arms and new recruits. …

Bridging the Genomics Divide. (Global Insights)

Abstract: In a time of profound interdependence and amazing technological developments, one could imagine a better quality of life for the majority of the world's people. And yet, growing gaps exist between rich and poor, between peoples of the North and the South. We are now on the verge of a new divide. With the release of The Report of the Advisory Committee on Health Research on Genomics and World Health by the World Health Organization, attention will turn to growing inequities in the distribution of benefits from genome-related biotechnologies. (l) An appropriate response by the world community--governments, citizens, and experts from industry and academia--would be to foster global dialogue and provide a forum for shaping the necessary governance framework through a commission on genomics and global health. Technology is a powerful tool for development. The United Nations Development Programme's Human Development Report 2001: Making New Technologies Work for Human Development makes the case that technologies present boundless opportunities for those who create them but often end up shaping a world of inequity. (2) With the introduction of information technologies, our vocabularies expanded to include the concept of a digital divide. Similarly, advances in agricultural biotechnology, with the promise to the developing world of increased crop yields, additional nutritional properties, and solutions to pest control and drought, were subject to the creation of a biosafety regime designed by the North. The next wave of technology--genome-related biotechnologies in health--does not have to follow that pattern. There are stark disparities in health around the globe. In industrialized countries like Norway and Australia, life expectancy is around eighty years and rising. In sub-Saharan Africa, it is forty years and falling, largely as a result of HIV/AIDS. Many in the developing world die of "pedestrian" (malaria, tuberculosis, pneumonia) but persistently devastating infectious diseases. A coming epidemic of noncommunicable disease will produce a "double burden" on developing countries. The North has neglected decisive action to combat these diseases, which are now backyard menaces as the potential for pathogens to cross borders increases and changes of climate create new habitats for disease agents. This mutual destiny could be strongly influenced by the emergence of the science of genomics. Genomics is a disruptive technology with the potential to widen or ameliorate these inequities in global health. Will we harness genomics to improve global health? Will our priority be to invest in designer pharmaco-genomics or to sequence the genome of the malaria parasite to discover new classes of drugs and develop an effective vaccine? Simply put, genomics is the study of the entire genetic material of an organism. In recent decades, new analytical tools and advances in information technology have allowed scientists to map and sequence massive amounts of genetic information and to better understand gene interactions. The first draft of the sequence of the human genome was published in 2001, an event that raised enormous hopes. These developments hold great promise to improve the prevention, identification, and treatment of some of the major diseases affecting humankind, including HIV, malaria, and tuberculosis. Already there are examples of successful application of these technologies to health problems in developing countries. For example, using genome-related biotechnologies, health workers can diagnose infectious diseases like dengue fever more rapidly and less expensively than using current techniques. It is known that minor genetic variations between people can influence their responsiveness to certain drug treatments, such as HIV drugs; therefore, tailoring drugs to the specific characteristics of individuals or communities can improve health and cost effectiveness. Yet health benefits, with their accompanying economic benefits, are not guaranteed. …

What UN Principles? A U.S. Debate on Iraq

Abstract: The quality and depth of the broad public debate in the United States before Washington loosed its military might on Iraq suggests that the internalization of international norms in American political life is remarkably thin. Although no survey data are immediately available that evaluates the performance and resonance of the message conveyed by the mass media, little more than tactical appraisals were visible even while the Security Council was actively engaged in debate. Not once did I encounter a popular article or broadcast that called attention to the obligation to settle disputes peacefully and the prohibition on the use of force in international relations contained in Article 2 (pars. 3 and 4) of the UN Charter. This prohibition stands except in circumstances when the Security Council authorizes measures deemed appropriate to address a breach or threat to the peace (Chapter VII). Occasionally some commentator remarked that preventive violence was new in the UN context, but the limitations on self-defense, found in Article 51, which member states are obliged to observe, was never mentioned. Nor was the difference between the conciliatory aims in Chapter VI and the coercive exceptions given much attention. And even more fundamentally, the obligations that the U.S. government assumed in ratifying the charter's provisions as part of its own public law never got more than an inaudible whisper. Yet as anyone who has worked in a governmental milieu knows, the first point of reference in policy formulation is the public law because it provides the foundation for both goals and methods. The UN Charter, moreover, sets out an agreed procedure to maintain international peace and security. It provides an understood and universally applicable public law to which governments are beholden. None of this thinking has to be invented anew. The charter is more concrete than concepts of just war, with their heavy philosophical baggage, and more worldly than prayer. Nevertheless, outside of specialist publications and conferences, Washington's complaints against Iraq presented to the Security Council and the process that followed were treated as a question of win or lose--as if it involved merely tactical concerns brought before a village council. During his frenetic campaigning before the November 2002 election, President George Bush challenged the Council, "Show the world whether you've got the backbone necessary to enforce your edicts." (1) Moreover, as the public discussion concentrated on tactics, it gave the impression that a mere majority vote in the Security Council would be able substantially to affect the announced U.S. strategy in Iraq. This ignores the essential facts of the UN process. Among those procedural realities are the existence of the veto (a cautionary device originated by Washington to safeguard its national interests as well as to demonstrate the solidarity of the strongest powers) and the implications of voting on the basis of what members regarded as their sovereign right to determine what constitutes an imminent threat. It became immediately apparent that a majority of members of the Security Council would be, at the very least, reluctant to back U.S. leadership. This was unmistakable during the involved diplomatic dance that resulted in Resolution 1441 in November 2002. Later, the bilateral diplomatic machinery began to whir at full speed in pursuit of the famous "second resolution," which one assumed would sanction military force. The press reported in late February 2003 that President Bush still intended to go to war without this resolution. U.S. diplomats began telling Security Council members "that a military attack is inevitable and that any attempt to delay would destroy United Nations' credibility." (2) The president also telephoned heads of governments, especially those of the permanent members, to seek their support. Typically, such reports as well as editorial comment, even in "serious" newspapers, never mentioned the explicit constraints of the charter. …

Afghanistan: The Way Forward. (Global Insights)

Abstract: Since the rout of the Taliban, after two and a half decades of nearly continuous conflict, Afghanistan has embarked on a complex triple transition: from war to peace; from a repressive, militaristic theocracy to a society based on democratic principles, the rule of law, and respect for human rights; and from a state-controlled, war-torn economy to private sector-led economic development. This postconflict transition (PCT) will take many years. In the short run, the heart of this transition is the daunting challenge of economic reconstruction. Economic reconstruction entails various and complex tasks, including strengthening internal security; rehabilitating a dilapidated physical infrastructure; building formal economic institutions and a legal system that respects property rights; and promoting employment-generating growth as a basis for poverty alleviation. Accomplishing these tasks, while simultaneously attending to the basic needs of large segments of the Afghan population, requires a framework of macroeconomic stability (consistent fiscal, monetary, and exchange rate policies) and good governance (good, fair, and transparent allocation of resources). A great deal rides on the success--or failure--of Afghanistan's economic reconstruction. Without rebuilding, and establishing a simple policy framework to attract foreign capital and support private initiative, Afghanistan's chances of getting into a sustainable development path are slim. Without rapid and broad-based improvement in the appalling living conditions of the Afghan population, peace and political stability in Afghanistan, and indeed in the entire region, will be elusive. Afghanistan: A Sovereign Country As a sovereign country Afghanistan must be in charge of its own destiny. But as a very poor society destroyed by foreign forces (rather than by civil conflict alone) and subject to continuous meddling by its neighbors over the last quarter of a century, Afghanistan has had little latitude to chart its development path or formulate policies for managing its economy. Given the legacy of interference in Afghanistan, outside powers now have a major responsibility to put things right and to assist in the economic reconstruction of the state. This will require providing adequate funding as well as technical assistance and training as needed, but it should not mean taking over the process of policymaking. To be successful, Afghan ownership of the reconstruction strategy is critical. Afghanistan's own leaders have to be involved in the strategy design and in the setting of priorities. Further, the Afghan population at large must believe in the reconstruction effort and be willing to support the tough policy decisions necessary to implement it. History has taught us that the Afghan people are fiercely independent. A solution to their problems cannot be imposed from abroad. Will donors understand and accept this simple fact? It may be difficult for bilateral and multilateral donors, as well as for nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), to take the backseat in Afghanistan given recent precedents. The inherent dangers of proceeding in Afghanistan as in Kosovo and East Timor are real, but the situations are quite different. The latter two were not independent countries when they embarked on their PCT, and the Security Council put the UN "in charge" of economic reconstruction. In fact, in both places, the Security Council mandated the Special Representative of the Secretary-General (SRSG) to exercise all executive and legislative powers through the issuance of regulations. Under such conditions, donors enjoyed pretty much a free hand in carrying out their activities, usually after receiving a green light from the UN to do so, but often even without it. The temptation for donors to do things in their own way (without serious consultation with the government) may be especially strong i n Afghanistan, where they have developed the habit of doing so in the past. …