International Intervention: The Future?

Transcription

1 CRonEM International Intervention: The Future? cii - The Centre for International Intervention, Department of Politics University of Surrey of July 2016 Programme cii Centre for International Intervention Researching motivations and consequences of international Intervention

2 ABOUT US WELCOME cii The Centre for International Intervention, Department of Politics Making Sense of International Intervention cii the Centre for International Intervention in the Department of Politics at the University of Surrey aims to provide critical scrutiny of the range of interventions used in international relations today. These include developmental projects situated within peace building/state building operations in conflict-affected and fragile states, military intervention and humanitarian assistance in situations of extreme crisis, and softer forms of intervention such as mediation and diplomacy. cii s purpose is to develop an in-depth, solid, understanding of how interveners conceptualise, rationalise, and operationalise their interventions, the response from recipient communities, and the consequences for both. It undertakes this task with the aim of enhancing both academic and practical understanding of intervention. cii provides a forum for the exchange of ideas, research, and data to enable local and international stakeholders from diverse fields and backgrounds to make sense of international intervention in line with the above perspective. It achieves this by carrying out innovative multi-disciplinary research into theoretical and practical dimensions of international intervention, developing strong collaborative links with other institutions involved in the study and practice of intervention, and organising workshops and conferences aimed at feeding back insights to relevant bodies and to inform future research in the area. This is done by producing briefs for different audiences including academics, policy-makers, the military, NGOs, and the corporate sector. Front cover image: Rural African Villagers Holding Portable Solar Charger- org/wiki/file:rural_african_villagers_holding_portable_solar_charger.jpg (Creative Commons Licensing) Welcome We are delighted to welcome you to this mini-conference, the final in a 3-year, ESRC-funded, seminar series entitled Explaining the Intervention Matrix: Theory and Practice from Northern and Southern Perspectives. Throughout this project we have deliberately defined intervention in broad terms, not restricted to the coercive often military use of the term traditionally employed by international lawyers and international relations theorists. We knew this carried a risk of confusion, but we believe that the narrow use of the term encourages a narrow approach to policy, and we have sought to examine the wider range of options available to policymakers in response to situations of crisis and conflict, as well as encouraging a more critical approach to the use of the term intervention by academic researchers. The opening mini-conference in 2014 considered whether it is reasonable and useful to bring together different kinds of international intervention e.g. diplomacy, conflict mediation, development assistance - under a single conceptual framework, and concluded that it was. A year later we focused on the stories people tell to justify intervening in other people s affairs, and also on those told by people on the receiving end to make sense of their experience. Four smaller seminars along the way have dealt respectively with: the political economy of decision-making about international intervention in the intervening countries; the role of technology in shaping decisions about intervention and the way it is conducted; the utility of the construct of Women, Peace, and Security in framing and judging peace-making interventions; and the concept of Resilience as an organising principle for international development interventions. This brings us to the final event in the series, which will consider how international intervention is likely to evolve in future. We will examine in turn the changing justifications for intervention, new and evolving approaches to intervention, and some unresolved challenges that lie ahead. For the UK this comes at a particularly timely, not to say poignant, moment as the country considers its future international role following the EU referendum vote in June. How, if at all, will the UK approach to international intervention change under new political leadership and in a redefined political context? We will not be short of interesting things to discuss over the next two days! Professor Sir Mike Aaronson 2 University of Surrey 3

3 PROGRAMME PROGRAMME Day 1: 18th July 2015, Meeting Centre (Room 1 09:00 09:30 Registration and Coffee (Meeting Centre Lounge) 09:30 09:45 Welcome from Professor Sir Mike Aaronson, Director, cii 09:45 10:30 Keynote Markus Geisser 10:30 10:45 Tea/Coffee Break (Meeting Centre Lounge) 10:45 12:15 PANEL 1 Paul Dixon, Matthew Bywater, Anika Bergman Rosamond, Lance Davies & Derek Averre 12:15 13:15 Lunch (Meeting Centre Lounge) 13:15 14:45 PANEL 2 James Flint, Ryan O Connor, Katharine Wright 14:45 15:00 Tea/Coffee Break (Meeting Centre Lounge) 15:00 15:45 Keynote John MacMillan 15:45 17:15 PANEL 3 Paul Schulte, Georgina Holmes, Alex Neads 17:30 Depart by minibus for drinks and dinner in Guildford Day 2: 19th July 2015, Meeting Centre (Room 1) Roundtable: The Future of Intervention? Roberta Guerrina University of Surrey Caroline Kennedy, University of Hull Jamie Shea, NATO Keynotes Markus Geisser ICRC, London Principled humanitarian action - a remedy, interference or intervention? John MacMillan Brunel University The crisis of interventionism and beyond: A political-historical analysis Philip Cerny Rutgers University Intervention and the New Medievalism: Endemic Crisis or Durable Disorder? 09:00-09:15 Tea/Coffee (Meeting Centre Lounge) PANEL 4 Toni Haastrup & Annika Bergman Rosamond, Kseniya Oksamytna, Alan Channer 10:45 11:30 Keynote Philip Cerny 11:45 13:15 PANEL 5 Peter, Dixon, Modupe Oshikoya, Benjamin Nutt 13:15 14:15 Lunch (Meeting Centre Lounge) 14:15 15:15 Round Table: The Future of Intervention : Jamie Shea, Caroline Kennedy, Roberta Guerrina 15:15 16:00 Closing remarks Mike Aaronson 16:00 16:15 Tea/Coffee (Meeting Centre Lounge) 16:15 Departures 4 University of Surrey 5

4 PANEL 1 PANEL 1 Theme 1: New and Old Justifications for Intervention Paul Dixon Kingston University Human Rights, Humanitarianism and Righteous War This paper focuses on the way the Liberal Hawks continue to use a narrative of human rights and humanitarianism to justify war. Liberal Hawks have an ambitious rights-based approach that accentuates the overthrow and remaking of states into democracies in order to protect human rights. This narrative has encouraged humanitarian organisations to adopt a more ambitious approach moving beyond providing immediate relief to more long-term, developmental, state-building goals that transform states in the global south into liberal democracies. After the end of the Cold War and under the influence of human rights based narratives humanitarian organisations became more sympathetic to Western military intervention to achieve humanitarian goals. The article will: first, discuss how human rights can be framed by the Right and Left to achieve contradictory political goals. Second, describe how the promotion of the human rights approach militarized humanitarianism. Third, illustrates how arguments over humanitarianism and human rights were deployed by Liberal Hawks to justify an escalation of the war in Syria. Matthew Bywater London School of Economics From the Bosnian Alibi to the Afghanistan War: The Constancy of Instrumentalized Humanitarianism From a mere cursory glance at the current state of international affairs, it seems nowadays that everyone is, or at aspires to be, a humanitarian. It is not only the narrative into which humanitarianism has apparently permeated; it is political and operational situations, war strategy, military, diplomatic and developmental investments and international interventions. Taking note of the entrance into an era of embeddedness of humanitarianism within, rather than at the margins of contemporary conflict, this paper seeks to analyse the period of the immediate post-cold War era where this move occurred. Its focus is the professed shift in the use of humanitarian rationale and discourse as well as military use of humanitarian aid. According to this shift, humanitarianism passed from a flag of convenience to excuse inaction ( humanitarian alibi ) to a justification and moral warrant for war ( humanitarian war / military humanitarian intervention ), accompanied by a move from military protection of aid operations to direct military involvement in humanitarian activity ( military humanitarianism ). Contra the narrative of a turning point, it is argued that a more appropriate description is a constant but varying degree of instrumentalization that comprises both substitution and appropriation of humanitarianism. Furthermore, the concept of the humanitarian alibi by definition posits a natural continuum between humanitarian and state action to which reality does not correspond, as well as implying a right of military humanitarian intervention. As such, it remains a highly normative concept that is difficult to justify in substantive terms. In addition, this paper provides a theoretical basis to consider the relationship between state and humanitarian action and outlines strategies available to humanitarian agencies to tackle the humanitarian alibi. It is suggested that agencies redirect their focus from denouncing the blurring of military-humanitarian lines to highlighting the disjuncture between governments use of humanitarian rhetoric and the corresponding intangible commitment. Annika Bergman Rosamond Lund University Digital celebrity politics and emotion: the sexual violence agenda Social media has blurred the distinction between celebrity and political actor, with a range of celebrities communicating their ethical agendas and emotions through a variety of digital platforms. There is a link between celebrity stories, often couched within emotional language, whether digitally narrated by the celebrities themselves or reproduced by others, and the constitution of conflict, war and disaster. The emotive messages delivered by celebrities produce ethical responses and affects amongst global audiences. This paper focuses on the emotive celebritisation and digitalisation of global ethical concerns. The analysis of celebrity humanitarianism is situated within discourses and practices of war and conflict. I suggest that the advocacy of the eradication of conflict is an outflow of digital celebrity politics and the emotions emerging from such activism. My analysis draws upon digital material and is theoretically situated within the academic fields of celebrity humanitarianism and the politics of emotion. I identify discursive mechanisms in the texts that recount celebrity humanitarianism, including ethical obligation across borders and gendered notions of protection and emotion. This also involves an investigation into the discursive emotive signs employed by celebrity activists themselves. I employ a broad discourse analytical framework, in particular the field of digital discourse analysis. Lance Davies & Derek Averre University of Birmingham Russia and the Responsibility to Protect: pillar II and responsible intervention The failure to protect civilians and to halt the ongoing violence in Syria further complicated by the emergence of ISIS has demonstrated a lack of political will and public support for military interventions, and raised significant questions regarding the resilience of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) and, in particular, pillar III. Instead, there has been a focus on prevention under R2P s pillar II which has gained wider traction in both policy and academic communities as a response to atrocity crimes. With its opposition towards the use of force against the Assad government stemming from fears of regime change in light of Western military intervention in Libya in 2011, Russia has played a central role in shaping this debate as a means to flag its concerns about the current Western-led practice of R2P. While Moscow has vehemently opposed the way in which Pillar III has been practised, crucially 6 University of Surrey 7

5 PANEL 1 PANEL 2 this has not ruled out Russia s advocacy for pillar II. We argue therefore that Moscow s understanding of R2P is firmly based on a reading of pillar II as the central means through which R2P should be implemented. This is premised upon an understanding of R2P which although framed within a largely rational argument rooted in traditional state-centred international law, does not exclude the protection of civilians and human rights. By building upon our existing work, we put forward the argument that Moscow regards pillar II as a form of responsible intervention, which is in accordance with the current shift in thinking from a reactive to a preventive response. To demonstrate this, we first highlight key arguments in the scholarly debate on R2P with a focus on pillar II before going on to interrogate Russia s views on these issues drawing insight from its involvement in managing conflict in the Balkans. Based on these experiences, we then go on to analyse Moscow s response towards the Libya and Syria conflicts in terms of its advocacy for pillar II practices. Finally, we offer some insights about how Russia s support for pillar II reflects core trends in its foreign policy thinking. James Flint Plymouth University The Europeanization of Aid Policy: Managing Post-9/11 Security and Development This (proposed) paper mounts a discourse analysis of a historical international intervention. Its focus is on the UK s mission in Afghanistan during Operation Herrick 8 (summer 2008) in Helmand Province, Afghanistan, and the geo-political historical context in the years immediately before and after this temporal dimension. The paper builds towards tentative conclusions in the form of lessons-identified which pertain to and to some degree may inform the future of international intervention. Utilising discourse analysis, the paper adopts hermeneutic methodology, and the study of text and language. The actors holding agency over this discourse which this paper takes intrigue in are UK institutions of government; prominently the Ministry of Defence, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, and the Department for International Development. These institutions are departments of government which broadly hold vertical (hierarchical) institutional structures, and which had to operate in cooperation to fulfil the broader UK government s mission. Being post-2002 (and the Bonn Agreement) this mission was essentially one of international/overseas aid assistance to a legitimate foreign government. The paper takes a holistic approach and conceptualisation to aid assistance, in the spirit of Morgenthau, and uses this as a critical lens in order to study the aforementioned institutional discourse. Most overtly this finds institutional professional contention between domains of security and domains of development. Furthermore, it finds a clear gap in praxis between the use of language, and the contemporary practical undertakings on the ground. As a result, there was both institutional tension and a predisposition to say one thing and do another. In the UK this has been recognised to some degree through the progression of the Stabilisation Unit, although structures such as the Provisional Reconstruction Teams remain highly contentious. Ryan O Connor University of Leeds Creating the Conditions for Conflict: Discourse Analysis of Media Representations of the Soviet Union Military Intervention in Afghanistan This paper seeks to deconstruct print media representations of the Soviet Union s 1979 military intervention. By analysing both the contents of articles and the images (when available) that accompany them I will display how a conflict comes to be constructed as legitimate or not. Contrary to the military endeavours of the colonial era or the myriad of one sided unilateral U.S. military incursions of recent years, the Cold War was contested by two apparent equals, jockeying for pole position on scientific, military, cultural, and ideological fronts. It is precisely due to this assumed equality of status that each respective discourse could not be flippantly overlooked or ignored. This in turn provided a unique display of two differentiating discourses striving to achieve a normative status. It is with this in mind that I will 8 University of Surrey 9

6 PANEL 2 PANEL 3 attempt to display the manner in which competing discourses react to, and interact with, one other in an attempt to achieve a normative representation of a conflict. By highlighting how words and imagery are implemented to achieve these aims this paper will demonstrate how we come to accept or reject the validity of an intervention. Katharine A. M. Wright University of Surrey Theme 2: Evolving Approaches to Intervention Paul Schulte Kings College, University of London The (Discreet) New Normal? Combat Drones in non - reconstructive Western interventions: The instructively emerging cases of North Africa and South Arabia Return to Hope(?): Telling NATO s Story of Afghanistan This paper examines NATO s story of Afghanistan, a story told in the web documentary Return to Hope which was released in September 2014 by NATO s Public Diplomacy Division to coincide with the withdrawal of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) from Afghanistan. Return to Hope focuses on six individuals and through an interactive website produces co-constituting narratives of heroism, transformation, grief, and progress. The documentary is intended to engage publics in ISAF contributing states at an emotional level and analysis of the documentary provides an opportunity to interrogate how NATO seeks to shape public perceptions of its military action. This paper interrogates the gendered narrative underpinning the Western intervention, which serves to instrumentalise Afghan women. This paper makes two arguments. First, that there has been a shift in the original emancipatory narrative used to justify the intervention in 2001, with NATO s story of Afghanistan focusing on Afghan military women, rather than the civilian women (and children) used in the initial justificatory narrative of intervention. These (few) military women do not undermine the Western emancipatory narrative, but nevertheless demonstrate how Afghan women continue to be used instrumentally. Second, that the documentary reinforces a narrative that Afghanistan has made progress under ISAF - symbolised through Afghan women - even if the reality is that the documentary (and NATO) continue to deny Afghan women a voice. The outcome is that Afghan (women s) national history is displaced in order to mediate an acceptable conclusion to the ISAF mission palatable for publics back home. Kseniya Oksamytna University of Warwick The Changing Character of Intervention: The Expansion of UN Peacekeeping After the Cold War The paper investigates the changes in the practices of UN peacekeeping missions that took place in the post-cold War period. For the first forty years of its existence, peacekeeping entailed the monitoring of cease-fires, separation lines, and troop withdrawals by unarmed military observers. Contemporary peacekeeping operations undertake a great variety of new tasks, including electoral assistance, confidence-building through quick-impact projects, reforms of security and justice sectors, the protection of cultural heritage, and support for transitional justice. The problem of the so-called Christmas tree mandates, which reflect the priorities of different Security Council members and of external actors lobbying them, has led to calls for making mandates more focused and realistic. The paper investigates how various actors, like UN member states, UN Secretariat officials, NGO activists, and experts, participate in the discussions on appropriate activities for UN peacekeeping operations. It uses insights from the norm diffusion literature to analyse why some advocates succeed at promoting new visions of appropriate behaviour for UN peacekeeping missions while others fail. The paper investigates how two new tasks have been contested, adopted, and institutionalised in UN peacekeeping practice. The first task is the development of public information campaigns for the local population, an innovation that dates back to the late 1980s. The second task is the physical protection of civilians which became a part of the UN s repertoire at the end of the 1990s. By illuminating how various actors negotiate notions of appropriate behaviour for UN peacekeeping operations, the paper trued to understand the causes of the current mandate creep. 10 University of Surrey 11

7 PANEL 3 PANEL 4 Alexander Neads University of Exeter Building other people s armies: military capacity building and civil-military relations during international intervention in Sierra Leone. Western defence policies appear to be undergoing a re-orientation in the post Iraq and Afghanistan era, increasingly eschewing large-scale interventions and population-centric counter-insurgency in favour of local proxy forces. While this strategy might appeal to the war-weary and cash strapped interventionist, frequent use of military capacity building as a tool of policy inevitably raises questions about the accountability of those local forces being trained. Using the International Military Advisory and Training Team (IMATT) in Sierra Leone as a case study, this paper examines the exportation of Western concepts of civil-military relations during intervention and post-conflict stabilisation. It argues that the defence reforms undertaken in the Republic of Sierra Leone Armed Forces (RSLAF) by IMATT represent a novel blend of top-down and bottom-up change, intended to develop a new culture of norms and behaviour to underpin both RSLAF accountability and effectiveness. This example provides a counterpoint to prevailing scholarship on military adaption and innovation, by suggesting that low-level military change must be sustained through institutional and organisational processes in order to endure. In the RSLAF, this process proved both collaborative and contested; raising further questions about the nature of local ownership during security sector reform. Toni Haastrup/Annika Bergman Rosamond University of Kent/Lund University The EU and gendered violence within and beyond borders Protection has become a global buzzword within the EU s external commitments to crisis management in the world. In particular, women (and children) are considered most worthy of protection in especially during conflict. This position is historically embedded within notions of women less as agents, but as requiring male protection (Elshtain 1987, 1995; Young, 2005). UN Security Council Resolution (SCR) 1325 echoes this assumption with its broad agenda focusing on women in far off conflict zones primarily as victims. Conversely, despite the commitment to creating national and regional action plans, the EU has less to say about vulnerabilities of women within its own polity. Gendered violence is of course borderless, and victimises both men and women. Within the EU for instance, one in three women in the EU have been affected by gendered violence. Yet, the EU has not as yet adopted a distinct common policy on sexual and gendered violence, even when ad-hoc emphasis has been placed on victim support, the prevention of female genital mutilation and child prostitution, amongst others. So, while the EU clearly recognises that there is a need to do more to eradicate sexual and gender-based violence within its jurisdiction, there is a discrepancy between its internal and external policy priorities. This is thus the paper focus of this paper. We examine the discrepancy between the Union s external commitment to the eradication of the sexual violence agenda, and what appears to be its limited efforts to do so within the EU polity. In this paper we explore this incoherence through a normative lens and by employing discursive analytical techniques to show the limits of the EU as an ethical gender/security actor. Georgina Holmes University of Reading Applying gender as the lens of security and intervention in post-conflict Rwanda More than twenty years after the 1994 genocide, the current Government of Rwanda, led by the ruling party the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), continues to implement an ambitious security sector reform programme which aims to rebuild Rwanda s security forces, left decimated in the aftermath of genocide and civil war. Examining the current Government of Rwanda s reaction to the international community s failure to intervene during the 1994 genocide, and the ruling party s attempts to develop home grown initiatives, this paper explores how gender is being used as a lens for security and intervention in postconflict Rwanda. Focusing specifically on the gender program of the Rwanda Defence Forces, the paper draws on field research conducted in Rwanda in , including interviews with over 50 female military personnel, trainers, RDF senior leaders and government officials. It is argued that although the Government of Rwanda is taking a holistic approach to gender and security, drawing synergies between combating all forms of gender insecurities and post-conflict recovery and stability, the RDF s gender program supports broader party-driven strategic policy priorities, including strengthening the legitimacy of the authoritarian state. 12 University of Surrey 13

8 PANEL 4 PANEL 5 Alan Channer FLTfilms Documentary film as a tool for conflict transformation and peacebuilding: lessons and opportunities. Documentary film can challenge assumptions, break down stereotypes and forge new narratives. It can bring an enemy into the safety of one s own home, touch emotions, foster mutual understanding and amplify the dynamics of reconciliation. Yet documentary films that serve as tools for conflict transformation and peacebuilding are uncommon. Documentaries made in fragile states tend to focus on investigation, advocacy and depiction of human interest stories, often for viewing outside the state itself. Deliberately crafting a film to act as a catalyst for change within a set of conflict dynamics requires skills not normally in a film producer s repertoire. The first requirement is research and analysis to identify the hinge topic and the local actors best placed to address it; the second is a high level of trust between outsider film team and insider local actors, and the third is a participatory production process to ensure inculturation of the film. For example, in post-genocide Cambodia in the mid 1990s, there was a need for grass-roots social rehabilitation. A key solution was fostering the social engagement of the national religion, Buddhism. The films The Serene Smile and The Serene Life addressed this and were distributed across the country by multiple donor and national agencies. In the early 2000s, when communal clashes between Christians and Muslims were rife in northern Nigeria, a key solution was depicting Muslim and Christian militia leaders who had made peace. The Imam and the Pastor film achieved this and spawned further peacebuilding and film-making initiatives in Kenya and Chad. When a film is made about a community that has generated a new narrative, the film itself can contribute to the narrative becoming self-fulfilling. There is scope for documentary film to play a more significant role in conflict transformation and peacebuilding in future. Theme 3: Unresolved Challenges of Intervention Peter Dixon University of Cambridge Inform, Support, Resource: A Future for Soft Intervention The term soft intervention invites comparison with Joseph Nye s soft power and the consequent assumption that it is an instrument designed to foster state (predominantly US) foreign policy goals. Indeed, most literature about the concept takes this line. A more constructive definition, however, would be broader and less manipulative. With a focus on the prevention, resolution and recovery from violent conflict, this paper aims to examine what true soft intervention might look like. Factors such as a state-based focus, a short time horizon for success and the power imbalance between intervener and intervened-upon often lead to unintended consequences, even from well-meaning interventions. Grounded in international conflict resolution theory, the paper suggests that states and IGOs, if not simply the wrong actors to be intervening, at least need to be acting in multi-faceted peacebuilding with other less powerful and threatening external agencies. Together, they can make available information from elsewhere in the world, provide non-prescriptive support to inclusive multi-level peace processes and supply the modest resources often lacking at the grassroots and mid-range levels of society. Such action can only help in progress towards sustained peace and stability if it works in non-invasive support of the conflict-affected society, at all levels and with a very long time horizon. Recognition that a civil war is a complex, dynamic open system suggests that interventions should take place at strategic points in the system on the basis of a locally-owned analysis. Achieving soft intervention along these lines is far from easy; the paper concludes by examining some of the barriers to its success and by giving two examples where modest attempts have been made to put it into practice. Modupe Oshikoya University of Massachusetts Failing to win hearts and minds: the challenge of Nigeria s counterinsurgency strategy The current counterinsurgency tactics employed by the transnational Multinational Joint Task Force (MNJTF) between Nigeria, Chad and Niger to combat the insurgent group Jamā at Ahl as-sunnah lid-da wah wa l-jihād, otherwise known as Boko Haram, have resulted in wide spread human rights abuses suffered by young boys and men that include torture, mass shootings and arbitrary arrests, most recently documented by an Amnesty International report in June Boko Haram s continued violent incursions (including attacking and burning villages, suicide bombings, killing men and abducting women, girls and young boys) across borders into Cameroon, Chad and Niger, have proved challenging for the security forces to deal with. However, the counterinsurgency tactics not only highlight the enduring effectiveness of Boko Haram s methods but also the limits of the security forces in meeting the new threats of fighting wars in under-governed spaces. The challenges of a successful counterinsurgency strategy rely on gaining the trust of the communities they military operates within; 14 University of Surrey 15

9 PANELS yet the security institutions have failed not only to adequately respond to human rights abuses and violence, but are the perpetrators of such abuses against the most vulnerable members of society, thus exacerbating the human insecurity of the civilian population. This negative impact on the wider population raises questions about the gendered vulnerabilities a population faces during a military s counterinsurgency strategy and tactics. Using Nigeria as a case study, and based on primary field research conducted over 8 months in north Nigeria, the following paper will examine the challenges of counterinsurgency strategies in under-governed spaces. Furthermore, an analysis of the civilians experience of the military in areas affected by the insurgency will illustrate a wider understanding of the undesirable effects of the structural gendered character and tactics employed by the military. Benjamin Nutt Plymouth University Sunken Vessel of Judicial Phoenix? The Future of the International Criminal Court and the Pursuit of International Criminal Justice Although still inchoate, the International Criminal Court (ICC) has developed into one of international society s most divisive and controversial organisations. From questionable leadership actions, collapsed cases and a low number of convictions to an ongoing rift with Africa and accusations of great power manipulation, the ICC s existence has been far from comfortable and more often than not justice has been denied not served. However, promising developments in 2016, including a new premise and a more focused prosecutorial policy, have ushered in hopes for improvement. In light of this new optimism, this paper s intention is to offer some thoughtful comments on the future of the ICC and the broader regime of international criminal justice. The paper is divided into three sections: the first addresses some of the ICC s current dissensions; the second proposes areas for improvement; and the last considers how accountability for international crimes may be pursued in the future. The paper argues that the improvements to the personnel and organisational practice of the ICC may give validity to the newfound enthusiasm of Yet, concedes that the wider international political environment may continue to pose a barrier to the ICC s credibility, effectiveness and legitimacy. Furthermore, it notes that the ICC s less than convincing early practice means that the Court begins this potential new era from a position of weakness; a reality that may have a significant bearing on its future. 16 University of Surrey 17

10 NOTES NOTES 18 University of Surrey 19

11 cii-the Centre for International Intervention Department of Politics University of Surrey Guildford, Surrey GU2 7XH, UK Faculty of Arts and Human Sciences University of Surrey Guildford, Surrey GU2 7XH UK Disclaimer Every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of the information contained in this brochure at the time of going to press. The University reserves the right, however, to introduce changes to the information given including the addition, withdrawal or restructuring of degree programmes