Liberal Legal Norms Meet Collective Criminality

International criminal law ( ICL ) tends to focus on the same question asked by the Cambodian survivor above: who was ultimately most responsible? Focusing on the culpability of senior leaders has powerful appeal. It resonates with a natural human tendency to personify misdeeds and identify a primary locus for moral blame. It also serves political ends by putting a face on mass crimes, decapitating the old regime, and leaving room for reconciliation at lower levels. But what happens when smoking guns do not point clearly toward high-ranking officials? And how can the law address the fact that most atrocities are committed by lower-level functionaries in the field? It is seldom possible to put all-or even mostof the culprits of mass atrocities on trial. What legal doctrines and policy practices best help a society achieve the delicately intertwined goals of justice, peace, and reconciliation? Mark Osiel tackles these vexing questions in Making Sense of Mass Atrocity. Osiel is a seasoned and accomplished analyst of ICL. In this latest work, the fifth in a series of books dealing with responses to mass atrocity, he compels readers to reflect on how such crimes really happen, how the law currently addresses them, and how it should. He offers trenchant critiques of ICL and proposes significant doctrinal and policy reforms, focusing on how legal rules and practices can incentivize relevant actors to prevent or deal with such abuses. His book may rankle some of ICL\u27s true believers, but it offers an important and constructive contribution to a field that can sometimes use a bit more introspection

Liberal Legal Norms Meet Collective Criminality

International criminal law ( ICL ) tends to focus on the same question asked by the Cambodian survivor above: who was ultimately most responsible? Focusing on the culpability of senior leaders has powerful appeal. It resonates with a natural human tendency to personify misdeeds and identify a primary locus for moral blame. It also serves political ends by putting a face on mass crimes, decapitating the old regime, and leaving room for reconciliation at lower levels. But what happens when smoking guns do not point clearly toward high-ranking officials? And how can the law address the fact that most atrocities are committed by lower-level functionaries in the field? It is seldom possible to put all-or even mostof the culprits of mass atrocities on trial. What legal doctrines and policy practices best help a society achieve the delicately intertwined goals of justice, peace, and reconciliation? Mark Osiel tackles these vexing questions in Making Sense of Mass Atrocity. Osiel is a seasoned and accomplished analyst of ICL. In this latest work, the fifth in a series of books dealing with responses to mass atrocity, he compels readers to reflect on how such crimes really happen, how the law currently addresses them, and how it should. He offers trenchant critiques of ICL and proposes significant doctrinal and policy reforms, focusing on how legal rules and practices can incentivize relevant actors to prevent or deal with such abuses. His book may rankle some of ICL\u27s true believers, but it offers an important and constructive contribution to a field that can sometimes use a bit more introspection

A Prospective Enlargement of the Roles of the Bretton Woods Financial Institutions in International Peace Operations

This Article reviews the principal means of IFI peace-building and offers several proposals to enhance the effectiveness of those means. Focusing primarily on the World Bank Group and the IMF, this Article posits that profound changes are necessary if the Bretton Woods institutions are to realize their potential as leaders in the international peace process. Part I of this Article provides a brief historical account of the Bretton Woods institutions and discusses relevant provisions in their charters, elucidating the factors that have traditionally prevented IFI participation in peace operations. Part II describes and reviews IFI post-conflict reconstruction programs in the post-Cold War era, devoting particular attention to the 1997 World Bank initiative entitled A Framework for World Bank Involvement in Post-Conflict Reconstruction (the Framework ). Part III reviews conditionality, as exercised by the IMF and the World Bank Group, and discusses its potential as a tool for peace-building. Finally, Part IV offers proposals for greater IFI impact and efficiency in peace operations, including a reinterpretation of the concept of political action as employed in the IBRD, IDA, and regional bank Articles of Agreement; a more flexible and country-specific approach to conditionality; and a greater coordination with relief agencies, non-governmental organizations, bilateral donors, and other U.N. organizations