2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 38
Author(s):  
Muhammad Nadzir

Water plays a very important role in supporting human life and other living beings as goods that meet public needs. Water is one of the declared goods controlled by the state as mentioned in the constitution of the republic of Indonesia. The state control over water indicated that water management can bring justice and prosperity for all Indonesian people. However, in fact, water currently becomes a product commercialized by individuals and corporations. It raised a question on how the government responsibility to protect the people's right to clean water. This study found that in normative context, the government had been responsible in protecting the people’s right over the clean water. However, in practical context, it found that the government had not fully protected people's right over clean water. The government still interpreted the state control over water in the form of creating policies, establishing a set of regulations, conducting management, and also supervision.


Author(s):  
Richard Caplan

States – Western ones, at least – have given increased weight to human rights and humanitarian norms as matters of international concern, with the authorization of legally binding enforcement measures to tackle humanitarian crises under Chapter VII of the UN Charter. These concerns were also developed outside the UN Security Council framework, following Tony Blair’s Chicago speech and the contemporaneous NATO action over Kosovo. This gave rise to international commissions and resulted, among other things, in the emergence of the ‘Responsibility to Protect’ (R2P) doctrine. The adoption of this doctrine coincided with a period in which there appeared to be a general decline in mass atrocities. Yet R2P had little real effect – it cannot be shown to have caused the fall in mass atrocities, only to have echoed it. Thus, the promise of R2P and an age of humanitarianism failed to emerge, even if the way was paved for future development.


Author(s):  
James Pattison

If states are not to go to war, what should they do instead? In The Alternatives to War: From Sanctions to Non-violence, James Pattison considers the case for the alternatives to military action to address mass atrocities and aggression. He covers the normative issues raised by measures ranging from comprehensive economic sanctions, diplomacy, and positive incentives, to criminal prosecutions, non-violent resistance, accepting refugees, and arming rebels. For instance, given the indiscriminateness of many sanctions regimes, are sanctions any better than war? Should states avoid ‘megaphone diplomacy’ and adopt more subtle measures? What, if anything, can non-violent methods such as civilian defence and civilian peacekeeping do in the face of a ruthless opponent? Is it a serious concern that positive incentives can appear to reward aggressors? Overall, Pattison provides a comprehensive account of the ethics of the alternatives to war. In doing so, he argues that the case for war is weaker and the case for many of the alternatives is stronger than commonly thought. The upshot is that, when reacting to mass atrocities and aggression, states are generally required to pursue the alternatives to war rather than military action. Pattison concludes that this has significant implications for pacifism, Just War Theory, and the responsibility to protect doctrine.


Author(s):  
Marco Meyer

This chapter argues that even non-abusive interventions (those that are motivated purely by altruistic concern, have a just cause, are a last resort etc.) are morally problematic due to their effects on the international order. The trouble is that ‘bystander states’—those that are neither prosecuting the intervention nor targeted by it—usually do not have sufficient direct evidence that the intervention is just and properly motivated, nor can they trust the testimony of the intervening state. Thus, for all that bystander states know, any and every instance of humanitarian intervention is abusive: an act of unjust international aggression masquerading as something else. This, in turn, weakens the willingness of these bystander states to comply with the non-aggression norm themselves, since states are ‘conditional cooperators’—they abide by norms only insofar as they are reasonably assured that other states in the international arena are abiding.


An enduring concern about armed humanitarian intervention, and the ‘Responsibility to Protect’ doctrine that advocates its use under certain circumstances, is that such interventions are liable to be employed as a foreign policy instrument by powerful states pursuing geopolitical interests. This collection of essays critically investigates the causes and consequences, as well as the uses and abuses, of armed humanitarian intervention. Some of the chapters interrogate how the presence of ulterior motives impact on the moral credentials of armed humanitarian intervention. Others shine a light on the potential adverse effects of such interventions, even where they are motivated primarily by humanitarian concern. While some of these unwanted consequences will be familiar to readers, others have been largely neglected in the scholarship. The volume also tracks the evolution of the R2P norm, and draws attention to how it has evolved, for better or for worse, since UN member states unanimously accepted it over a decade ago. In some respects, the norm has been distorted to yield prescriptions, and to impose constraint, fundamentally at odds with the spirit of the R2P idea. This gives us all the more reason to be cautious of unwarranted optimism about humanitarian intervention and the Responsibility to Protect.


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