Diplomacy and International Institutions

International Law

  • Space
    The Outer Space Treaty
    Outer space is growing more crowded and contested. Rajeswari Pillai Rajagopalan recommends regulating activities that disrupt, deny, or destroy space systems to ensure outer space is available to all.
    Report by Rajeswari Pillai Rajagopalan February 23, 2021 International Institutions and Global Governance Program
  • China
    China’s Abuse of the Uighurs: Does the Genocide Label Fit?
    While multiple reports indicate that China has committed major abuses of the Uighur minority group, determining the most serious charges is difficult.
    Article by John B. Bellinger III February 3, 2021 U.S. Foreign Policy Program
  • Transition 2021
    Save the world — America's greatest priority
    When the United States and the world emerged from the Cold War 30 years ago, the watchword in foreign affairs was “change.” Now, on so many global fronts, the imperative goal is far more arresting: to save humanity and the planet. The coronavirus pandemic has delivered one soccer punch after another to the gut of nearly every society, emphasizing not only the dominating impact of global health but also the singular goal of survival as the Joe Biden administration, with its ambitious agenda, enters office. Before I entered the Clinton administration in 1993 (becoming the first ambassador at Large for War Crimes Issues in the second term), I served as senior consultant to the Carnegie Endowment National Commission on America and the New World and helped draft its report, Changing Our Ways. It was a blueprint for the post-Cold War foreign policy of the United States and it advocated transforming America’s mindset from containment to change. The end of the Cold War had opened a whole new playing field to institute bold initiatives that would create a progressive foreign policy unshackled from the constraints of the long struggle with the Soviet Union.   The Carnegie report presaged some of the Clinton administration’s agenda, although its implementation fell short of expectations. My own slice of the change agenda focused on United Nations peacekeeping and international criminal justice, which we pursued to expand their reach globally. I was a carpenter of change, but then the George W. Bush administration reset the nation’s goals. When Barack Obama rode into the presidency on a change agenda (“Yes we can”), the prominent survival imperative was his administration’s dedication to confronting climate change. Other initiatives, like the Affordable Care Act (ACA), were difficult and innovative steps toward real change, but they were not survival initiatives. Today the survival imperative eclipses the change agenda. The former recognizes there is no way out because the stakes are so high, while the latter can rise and fall on the vicissitudes of politics. The coronavirus and its horrendous death count compel isolationism in domestic life, economic upheavals and suspensions of travel as the world awaits widespread vaccinations. Our shared predicament screams out for multilateral initiatives, global cooperation and shared sacrifice last experienced during World War II.  There are inescapable realities: The fate of the planet and humanity are the masters of policymaking now. They require, for example, the end of American exceptionalism, a tiresome battle cry whose time is long expired, and the beginning of a new era of assertive American collaboration with other nations and international organizations.    Science will rule in global health and the environment: A new global compact on prevention of infectious diseases must be conceived so that pandemics and epidemics are not only reduced, but the worst outcomes prevented with multilateral planning and stockpiling. Climate change can only be minimized now with audacious innovative policies, including targeted investments, that radically reduce harmful emissions, a goal that compels international cooperation driven by courageous political leadership across the globe. The nuclear arms race, which verges on a breakout moment that will accelerate extreme risk to both humanity and the environment, must be dramatically reversed with strong diplomatic initiatives on arms reductions and non-proliferation. Cyberspace has to be tamed so that it helps shape a peaceful and prosperous world and is no longer permitted to relentlessly propagate hate, misinformation and even genocidal violence. Preventing atrocities and massive refugee flows is essential to stop the hemorrhaging of humanitarian crises in the 21st century and to liberate resources for saving rather than rescuing humanity. Major powers must forge new initiatives with the United Nations and humanitarian agencies to intervene early during armed conflicts and internal repression to obviate atrocity crimes and migrant expulsions. Though in recent years the United States slipped into near irrelevance in many global arenas, that need not be the future of the American role in the world. Ideological jousts offer few answers. The pandemic has exposed the life-threatening realities that must be wrestled down by powerful actors on the world stage. The Biden administration, Congress and even the American judiciary will be judged by how pragmatically, eschewing partisanship, they use their vast powers to help build a global coalition of survivalists. The greatest priority is no longer to change the world; it is to save the world.  
    Article by David J. Scheffer January 19, 2021
  • International Law
    U.S. Supreme Court Assesses Corporate Complicity in Child Slavery
    Should U.S. companies be held responsible for child slavery on West African farms where cocoa beans are harvested? The top U.S. court’s decision could have major consequences for chocolate companies and global supply chains.
    Article by David J. Scheffer December 9, 2020
  • Global Governance
    The ICC, the Trump Administration, and Africa
    On November 2—the day before the U.S. presidential election—more than seventy-one states party to the treaty that established the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued a statement in a UN General Assembly plenary session that affirmed their commitment "to preserve the tribunal's independence undeterred by any measures or threats against the Court, its officials, and those cooperating with it." Though the statement did not mention the United States, it was a response to the Trump administration's sanctions against the court's chief prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, and other ICC personnel. The statement was supported by NATO member states—except the United States—as well as by most other U.S. allies and friends. It was also supported by Nigeria, South Africa, and other African states. The 1998 Rome Statute established the ICC as a mechanism for holding governments accountable for crimes against humanity and genocide. A total of 123 states are party to it. In effect, it imposes limits on the national sovereignty of those states that accept its jurisdiction. Under President Bill Clinton, the United States signed [PDF] the Rome Statute. However, the George W. Bush administration declined to submit it to the Senate for ratification, and no U.S. administration has accepted ICC jurisdiction over the country or its citizens, though Barack Obama’s administration actively cooperated with it. The ICC is based in the Hague. Four of its eighteen judges are African, as is the chief prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, from The Gambia. However, all eight of its active investigations and eighteen active prosecutions involve African states and Africans. Authoritarian African rulers tend to loathe the ICC, accusing it of "racism" and "colonialism." Among others, Uganda (under President Yoweri Museveni) and South Africa (under former President Jacob Zuma) have threatened to withdraw from the court's jurisdiction, though none has actually done so. Fatou Bensouda, however, has pointed out that that six of the eight active investigations have been undertaken at the request of African governments.  At present, the chief prosecutor is looking into whether there are grounds for an ICC investigation in Afghanistan that would primarily focus on the Taliban and Afghani forces but also U.S. military units. She is also looking at complaints about Israel. (The Palestinian State accepts ICC jurisdiction, Israel does not.) Consistent with U.S. policy, the Trump administration forcefully rejects any ICC investigatory role regarding U.S. military forces in Afghanistan. Accordingly, it has imposed economic sanctions on Fatou Bensouda and other ICC personnel that presumably involve personal hardship, including revocation of visas and freezing of U.S. bank accounts. Administration use of economic sanctions has long been common—the Obama administration imposed some two thousand. But their focus was primarily criminals or rogue states, not human rights lawyers such as Bensouda. Further, the Trump administration's rhetoric against the ICC has been strong—a senior administration figure has raised the prospect of abolishing it. The Trump administration's rhetoric and imposition of sanctions on individuals are consistent with its "America First" ideology and adherence to maintenance of absolute American sovereignty, including over American forces stationed abroad. However, its style and rhetoric, more than the substance of its position, distance itself from its traditional allies and partners and human rights organizations. But the rhetoric is likely to be welcomed by authoritarian leaders in Africa—as well as elsewhere.
    Blog Post by John Campbell November 4, 2020 Africa in Transition
  • Cybersecurity
    Why Do States Publicly Attribute Cyber Intrusions?
    Public attribution of cyber intrusions serves different functions in the short, medium, and long-term and and has important implications for policymakers.
    Blog Post by Guest Blogger for Net Politics October 14, 2020 Digital and Cyberspace Policy Program