The United Nations Security Council and War:The Evolution of Thought and Practice since 1945 (146 page)

¹⁹
Kishore Mahbubani, ‘The Permanent and Elected Council Members’, in David M. Malone (ed.),
The UN Security Council: From the Cold War to the 21st Century
(Boulder, London: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2004), 259.

²⁰
See Teresa Whitfield, ‘Groups of Friends’, in Malone,
UN Security Council
, 320.

²¹
Prantl sees Groups of Friends as more representative, though his discussion of their role in ‘balancing P-5 preponderance’ and in ‘disguising U.S. hegemony’ is somewhat contradictory: Prantl, ‘Informal Groups of States’.

²²
See Bailey and Daws,
Procedure of UN Security Council
, 66–75; Susan C. Hulton, ‘Council Working Methods and Procedure’, in Malone,
UN Security Council
, 237–51. See also the summary of Council efforts in UN doc. S/2006/78 of 7 Feb. 2006, and the standards set out in UN doc. S/2006/507 of 19 July 2006.

²³
UN doc. S/1999/165 of 17 Feb. 1999; S/2006/507 of 19 July 2006, para. 41; see also Whitfield, ‘Groups of Friends’, 320–21.

²⁴
See also Ian Hurd, ‘Security Council Reform: Informal Membership and Practice’, in Bruce Russett (ed.),
The Once and Future Security Council
(Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1997), 141–7.

²⁵
GA Res. 60/1 of 24 Oct. 2005, para. 154, following similar recommendations in the report of the High-level Panel,
A More Secure World: Our Shared Responsibility – Report of the High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change
, UN doc. A/59/565 of 2 Dec. 2004, para. 258.

²⁶
Ian Hurd, ‘The Strategic Use of Liberal Internationalism: Libya and the UN Sanctions, 1992–2003’,
International Organization
59 (2005), 495–526.

²⁷
See the decisions by the OAU’s Council of Ministers, CM/Dec.416 (LXVIII), June 1998; and the OAU’s General Assembly, AHG/Dec.127 (XXXIV), June 1998, threatening non-compliance.

²⁸
Boutros Boutros-Ghali,
Supplement to an Agenda for Peace
, UN doc. A/50/60 of 3 Jan. 1995, para. 70. See also David Cortright and George A. Lopez,
The Sanctions Decade: Assessing UN Strategies in the 1990s
(Boulder, London: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2000), 23–6, 208–13.

²⁹
See the revised guidelines of the Committee at
www.un.org/Docs/sc/committees/1267/1267_guidelines.pdf
On the background, see Per Cramér, ‘Recent Swedish Experiences with Targeted UN Sanctions: The Erosion of Trust in the Security Council’, in Erika de Wet and André; Nollkaemper (eds.),
Review of the Security Council by Member States
(Antwerp, New York: Intersentia, 2003), 91–5.

³⁰
See Hulton, ‘Council Working Methods and Procedure’, 237–8.

³¹
Hurd, ‘The Strategic Use of Liberal Internationalism’, 506.

³²
David M. Malone,
Decision-Making in the UN Security Council: The Case of Haiti, 1990–1997
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998), 168.

³³
O’Neill, ‘Power and Satisfaction in the UN Security Council’.

³⁴
See Johnstone, ‘Security Council Deliberations’; and see generally, Thomas Risse, ‘“Let’s Argue!”: Communicative Action in World Politics’,
International Organization
, 54 (2000), 1–39.

³⁵
This extends also to international human rights standards for governmental action: see the judgment of the European Court of Human Rights of 18 Feb. 1999,
Waite and Kennedy
v.
Germany
, available at
cmiskp.echr.coe.int

³⁶
Even if this requirement is interpreted as requiring only the absence of a veto: see Bruno Simma, Stefan Brunner, and Hans-Peter Kaul, ‘Article 27’, in Simma,
Charter of the UN
, 493–9.

³⁷
See David M. Malone, ‘Introduction’, in Malone,
The UN Security Council
, 7.

³⁸
On the early example of non-aligned resistance to authorizing force against Iraq in 1990, see David M. Malone,
The International Struggle Over Iraq: Politics in the UN Security Council 1980–2005
(Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, 2006), 65–70.

³⁹
Nigel Thalakada, ‘China’s Voting Pattern in the Security Council, 1990–1995’, in Russett,
The Once and Future Security Council
, 104.

⁴⁰
See Malone,
Decision-Making
, 107, 117.

⁴¹
See Nico Krisch,
Selbstverteidigung und kollektive Sicherheit
(Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer, 2001), 104–5.

⁴²
See Michael Byers, ‘Agreeing to Disagree: Security Council Resolution 1441 and Intentional Ambiguity’,
Global Governance
, 10 (2004), 165–186; and on Chinese interpretative declarations, see Thalakada, ‘China’s Voting Pattern’, 88–95.

⁴³
See e.g. on Chinese acceptance of sanctions against Libya despite early resistance, ibid., 104.

⁴⁴
Erik Voeten, ‘Outside Options and the Logic of Security Council Action’,
American Political Science Review
, 95 (2001), 845–58; see also Lloyd Gruber,
Ruling the World: Power Politics and the Rise of Supranational Institutions
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000), ch. 3.

⁴⁵
For Voeten, US failure to gain Russian support for a Council authorization of the Kosovo intervention was due to a lack of credibility of the NATO threat of unilateral force: Voeten, ‘Outside Options’, 855–6. It is doubtful, though, that this was still true in early 1999 – it is more likely that the proposed compromise was simply too far from Russia’s negotiation goals.

⁴⁶
On China, see Thalakada, ‘China’s Voting Pattern’, 103–7; Sally Morphet, ‘China as a Permanent Member of the Security Council: October 1971–December 1999’,
Security Dialogue
31 (2000), 165.

⁴⁷
See Krisch,
Selbstverteidigung
, 118–33.

⁴⁸
David D. Caron, ‘The Legitimacy of the Collective Authority of the Security Council’,
American Journal of International Law
87, no. 4 (1993), 578–88.

⁴⁹
See Jochen A. Frowein and Nico Krisch, ‘Introduction to
Chapter VII
and Articles 39 to 43’, in Simma,
Charter of the UN
, 714.

⁵⁰
See also Erik Voeten, ‘The Political Origins of the UN Security Council’s Ability to Legitimize the Use of Force’,
International Organization
59 (2005), 527–8.

⁵¹
See Malone,
The International Struggle Over Iraq
, 190–200.

⁵²
See the observation in Helen Milner, ‘International Theories of Cooperation among Nations: Strengths and Weaknesses’,
World Politics
44 (1992), 475.

⁵³
See Frowein and Krisch, ‘Introduction to
Chapter VII
’, 705–6, 722; Christine Gray,
International Law and the Use of Force
, 2nd edn. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), 197; but see the emphasis on the Council’s jury function in Thomas M. Franck,
Recourse to Force: State Action Against Threats and Armed Attacks
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002).

⁵⁴
See Steven D. Krasner, ‘Global Communications and National Power: Life on the Pareto Frontier’,
World Politics
43 (1991), 362–4; Gruber,
Ruling the World
, 112–13.

⁵⁵
See also Kenneth W. Abbott and Duncan Snidal, ‘Why States Act through Formal International Organizations’,
Journal of Conflict Resolution
42 (1998), 10; Voeten, ‘Political Origins’, 548. On issue-linkage and iteration in institutions, see Robert Axelrod and Robert O. Keohane, ‘Achieving Cooperation under Anarchy: Strategies and Institutions’,
World Politics
38 (1985), 226–54; Charles Lipson, ‘International Cooperation in Economic and Security Affairs’,
World Politics
37 (1984), 1–23.

⁵⁶
See generally Krasner, ‘Global Communications’.

⁵⁷
For different assessments, see Thomas M. Franck, ‘What Happens Now? The United Nations after Iraq’,
American Journal of International Law
97, no.3 (2003), 607–20; Ian Johnstone, ‘US-UN Relations after Iraq: The End of the World (Order) As We Know It?’,
European Journal of International Law
15, no. 4 (2004), 813–38. Glennon sees the Security Council as necessarily inoperative under conditions of unipolarity: Glennon, ‘UN Security Council in a Unipolar World’.

⁵⁸
See the examples in Voeten, ‘Political Origins’, 532.

⁵⁹
Ibid., 543–4.

⁶⁰
On the US, see Richard C. Eichenberg, ‘Victory Has Many Friends: U.S. Public Opinion and the Use of Military Force, 1981–2005’,
International Security
30 (2005), 159–61.

⁶¹
See Krisch, ‘More Equal’, 156–7.

⁶²
See José E. Alvarez, ‘Hegemonic International Law Revisited’,
American Journal of International Law
97, no. 4 (2003), 874–8; Nico Krisch, ‘The Rise and Fall of Collective Security: Terrorism, US Hegemony, and the Plight of the Security Council’, in Christian Walter et al. (eds.),
Terrorism as a Challenge for National and International Law: Security vs. Liberty?
(Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer, 2004), 881–93. On the critique by states, see Roberto Lavalle, ‘A Novel, if Awkward Exercise in International Law-Making: Security Council Resolution 1540 (2004)’,
Netherlands International Law Review
51 (2004), 425–8.

⁶³
See also Abbott and Snidal, ‘Why States Act’, 27–9, on the Council’s ‘laundering’ function.

⁶⁴
In a Jan. 2003 poll of public opinion in 41 countries, approval rates for military action against Iraq were significantly higher with UN authorization than without, in all but three countries: see Gallup International Association, ‘Iraq Poll 2003’, available at
www.gallup-international.com
See also Alexander Thompson, ‘Coercion Through IOs: The Security Council and the Logic of Information Transmission’,
International Organization
60 (2006), 21–6, on the 1990/1991 Gulf War. As discussed below, and in line with Thompson’s observations, this result need not reflect a principled belief that UN authorization is necessary; it might be based on more consequentialist considerations.

⁶⁵
Inis L. Claude, ‘Collective Legitimization as a Political Function of the United Nations’,
International Organization
20 (1966), 367–79 (though with an emphasis on the General Assembly).

⁶⁶
On the stabilizing effects of international institutions for Great Power status, see Ikenberry,
After Victory
; also Nico Krisch, ‘International Law in Times of Hegemony: Unequal Power and the Shaping of the International Legal Order’,
European Journal of International Law
16, no. 3 (2005), 373–5.

⁶⁷
Voeten’s interpretation of the Council as an elite pact fails to account for the different dynamics in those aspects: Voeten, ‘Political Origins’.

⁶⁸
See Cortright and Lopez,
The Sanctions Decade
, 209, on the limits to compliance with UN sanctions.

⁶⁹
As it would be vis-à-vis a focal point set by a powerful state: see Lisa L. Martin, ‘Interests, Power, and Multilateralism’,
International Organization
, 46 (1992), 777.

⁷⁰
See ibid., 768–77.

⁷¹
Thompson (‘Coercion through IOs’) focuses solely on the restraint element and its utility in signalling benign intentions to other governments, but this downplays the opportunities of influence and participation the Council offers these governments even when they are not Council members.

⁷²
See Pew Research Center for the People and the Press,
The Pew Global Attitudes Project: Views of a Changing World
, 3 June 2003, available at
pewglobal.org/reports/pdf/185.pdf
, 27;
The Pew Global Attitudes Project: A Year After Iraq War
, 16 March 2004, available at
pewglobal.org/reports/pdf/206.pdf
, 10.

⁷³
Ian Hurd, ‘Legitimacy and Authority in International Politics’,
International Organization
, 53 (1999), 379–408.

⁷⁴
However, in a number of countries, participation in Council-authorized military action is both legally and institutionally easier than unilateral action: see Voeten, ‘Political Origins’, 532. Security Council sanctions also often enjoy a privileged status in domestic law: see Vera Gowlland-Debbas, ‘Concluding Remarks’, in Gowlland-Debbas (ed.),
National Implementation of United Nations Sanctions: A Comparative Study
(The Hague, Leiden: Martinus Nijhoff, 2004), 644–5.

⁷⁵
See Andrew Hurrell, ‘International Society and the Study of Regimes’, in Volker Rittberger (ed.),
Regime Theory and International Relations
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993), 59.

⁷⁶
See the NAM statements in UN doc. S/1999/451 of 21 Apr. 1999 (on Kosovo) and A/58/68-S/2003/357 of 21 Mar. 2003 (on Iraq).

⁷⁷
See Nicholas J. Wheeler,
Saving Strangers: Humanitarian Intervention in International Society
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000). On African positions, see James Mayall, ‘Humanitarian Intervention and International Society: Lessons from Africa’, in Jennifer Welsh (ed.),
Humanitarian Intervention and International Relations
(Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), 120–41; Evarist Baimu and Kathryn Sturman, ‘Amendment to the African Union’s Right to Intervene’,
African Security Review
12, no. 2 (2003), 37–45.