by Charli Carpenter
Download the Full Article: Libya and the Responsibility to Protect
There has been a fair amount of debate over Obama's decision to join Western powers in using force to protect civilians in Libya. Among various refrains is the claim that "Responsibility to Protect" (R2P) doctrine lacks moral strength if applied selectively.
According to this line of thinking, the international community can't legitimately go after Qaddafi if it won't/can't also go after every other dictator. However, it is important to recall that R2P doctrine, as laid out by the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty and acknowledged as a legal principle in several multilateral documents, actually promotes military force for civilian protection not in every case where it might be merited, but rather only in limited circumstances mapping roughly onto just war theory.
Download the Full Article: Libya and the Responsibility to Protect
Charli Carpenter, Associate Professor of Political Science at University of Massachusetts-Amherst, is the author of two books on the protection of civilians. She blogs about human security and asymmetric warfare at The Duck of Minerva and Lawyers, Guns and Money.
