The Legality of Cluster Munitions in International Humanitarian Law and an Assessment of the Need for the New Treaty

2008 ◽  
Author(s):  
Konstantinos Mastorodimos
Keyword(s):  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Cluster Munitions

scholarly journals Weapons prohibitions through immanent critique: NGOs as emancipatory and (de)securitising actors in security governance

2018 ◽  
Vol 44 (4) ◽  
pp. 619-653 ◽  
Author(s):  
Margarita H. Petrova
Keyword(s):  
Use Of Force ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Security Governance ◽  
Military Commanders ◽  
Cluster Munitions ◽  
Agents Of Change ◽  
Immanent Critique ◽  
Us Hegemony

AbstractThe article examines the roles of NGOs in banning cluster munitions that resulted in the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions and the campaign against landmines in the 1990s. It argues that NGOs have managed to move questions about the use of force from the closed decision-making sphere of military commanders and arms control diplomats into open public debate. Thus NGOs have simultaneously desecuritised the use of force by states, securitised certain weapons technologies, and made human beings the referent object of security. This has marked a shift from state security and strategic disarmament to human security and humanitarian disarmament, without fundamentally challenging the laws of war. However, in contrast to realist views that only militarily useless weapons ever get banned and radical critical perspectives that see new legal regimes as legitimating war and US hegemony, I argue that NGOs have engaged in immanent critique of military arguments and practices based on prevailing principles of international humanitarian law. The resulting weapon ban treaties have both restrained US policy and undermined its legitimacy. The article explores the discursive choices that underpinned the remaking of the security agenda by NGOs and their role as de/securitising actors and emancipatory agents of change.

scholarly journals Banning Evil

2012 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Denise Garcia
Keyword(s):  
Fast Track ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Normative Structure ◽  
International Norm ◽  
Cluster Bombs ◽  
Moral Force ◽  
Cluster Munitions ◽  
Forward Looking ◽  
Production Acquisition

The rise and entry into force of the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions (CCM) that prohibits cluster bombs constitutes a global prohibition regime. I argue that this new prohibition regime and the arising new international norm set by the CCM, i.e. the prohibition of the use, development, production, acquisition, stockpiling, retention or transfer of cluster munitions developed due to a strong moral opprobrium, initially elicited by commanding moral force of International Humanitarian Law as a robust and compelling previously existing normative structure and then by the success of the ban on landmines that acted as a model of activism and fast-track diplomacy a decade before. The ban on cluster bombs is about military doctrines succumbing to the higher authority of moral and humanitarian concerns propelled by activist non-governmental actors and a few forward-looking states.

THE CLUSTER MUNITIONS CONVENTION: AROUND THE WORLD IN ONE YEAR

2008 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
pp. 391-404
Author(s):  
Nout van Woudenberg ◽  
Wouter Wormgoor
Keyword(s):  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Future Role ◽  
Short Overview ◽  
The World ◽  
Cluster Munitions ◽  
The Future ◽  
One Year ◽  
Short Explanation

AbstractOn 3 December 2008, theConvention on Cluster Munitions(hereinafter the Convention), a legally binding instrument on cluster munitions that cause unacceptable harm to civilians, was signed by 94 states in Oslo. The Convention is the result of a Norwegian initiative of November 2006 which, ultimately led to negotiations conducted in Dublin from 18-30 May 2008 between 111 states. Below, a short overview will be given with regard to the process that led to the Convention, followed by a short explanation of the most relevant Articles of the Convention and the ideas behind it. Finally, a determination will be given with regard to the future role of the Convention in the field of international humanitarian law.

International Humanitarian Law

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emily Crawford ◽  
Alison Pert
Keyword(s):  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law

Using African Truth and Reconciliation Commission documentation for truth telling and reconciliation

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-5
Author(s):  
Proscovia Svärd
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation Commission ◽  
International Humanitarian Law ◽  
Humanitarian Law ◽  
Truth Telling ◽  
Reconciliation Commission ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation ◽  
Post Conflict ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation Commissions ◽  
Reconciliation Process

Truth and Reconciliation Commissions (TRCs) are established to document violations of human rights and international humanitarian law in post-conflict societies. The intent is to excavate the truth to avoid political speculations and create an understanding of the nature of the conflict. The documentation hence results in a common narrative which aims to facilitate reconciliation to avoid regression to conflict. TRCs therefore do a tremendous job and create compound documentation that includes written statements, interviews, live public testimonies of witnesses and they also publish final reports based on the accumulated materials. At the end of their mission, TRCs recommend the optimal use of their documentation since it is of paramount importance to the reconciliation process. Despite this ambition, the TRCs’ documentation is often politicized and out of reach for the victims and the post-conflict societies at large. The TRCs’ documentation is instead poorly diffused into the post conflict societies and their findings are not effectively disseminated and used.

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