Regional Peacekeeping in the Post-Cold War Era

by Hilaire;Morris Justin;Kluw er Law International McCoubrey

The end of the Cold War, which had significantly shaped international relations and global security structures for nearly half a century, imposed a practical burden of peace support upon the U.N. which it had always faced in theory but had never put into practice. The post-1991 debacles in the former Yugoslavia, Somalia, the African Great Lakes region and East Timor swiftly and painfully demonstrated that the U.N. organisation lacked the resources and infrastructure effectively to meet the enhanced demands being placed upon it. The idea that regional organisations and arrangements might fill the gap thus disclosed was prominent amongst the immediate responses to this problem. The role of the NATO-led forces, IFOR, SFOR and KFOR, in successive episodes of the former-Yugoslav crisis lent some support to this idea, but also illustrated some of its dangers. As the post-Cold War era has moved on, it has become manifest that whilst the regional options may have much to offer they can afford no simple solution to the post-Cold War peace support crisis. It is the purpose of this book to explore both the potential and the limitations of regional agencies as significant peace support actors at the dawn of a new century. This book has been written upon a trans-disciplinary basis, involving both international relations and international legal perceptions, proceeding from the presumption that these disciplines are not ultimately separable. The nature and the diversity of regional capacities are examined, as is the continuing importance of global control. The ultimate conclusion that the key issue for the twenty-first-century is one of appropriate selection amongst many options, within the meaning of article 53 of the U.N. Charter, need perhaps occasion little surprise. The nature of these options and the actual or potential processes of selection are, however, of vital importance in the initiation of a meaningful twenty-first-century defence and security debate.

Hardcover

First published April 1, 2000