Fascism: A Warning

by Madeleine K. Albright

The crisis in Kosovo involved a small place and a big issue. There had been a time, not much earlier, when the global community would have disclaimed any official interest in what a government did to men and women within its own jurisdiction. National sovereignty was the acknowledged cornerstone of the international system. Hitler, however, had shown how a dictator can make the arguably legal morally intolerable. After the death camps, there had to be a line drawn by people of conscience—a line beyond which a ruler (and those under his command) couldn’t go. The Nuremberg trials established the principle that neither “obeying the law” nor “following orders” is a sufficient legal defense for those accused of violating basic standards of civilization. In 1948, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights spelled out a framework for holding governments accountable, followed in three years by the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide. In the 1970s and ’80s, international sanctions were lodged against racist Rhodesia and South Africa, ultimately transforming both countries. In the same period, the United States and Western Europe began making respect for human rights a condition of foreign military assistance. During the Bosnian conflict, an international tribunal was established to prosecute the perpetrators of crimes against humanity. I was a firm advocate of the tribunal because only through a judicial process is it possible to establish individual culpability ...