133

Why Are Asians Less Interested
in Humanitarian Intervention?
Hideaki Shinoda

Introduction
Following the overall theme of this conference, “Asian Perspective on
Humanitarian Intervention in 21st Century,” this paper sets out a simple
question about the reasons why Asians are less interested in humanitarian
intervention. First, the paper clarifies how Asians seem to be less interested inhumanitarian interventions or related forms of international interventions.
Second, the paper presents the view that the mainstream international
community’s dominant ideological tendency is determined by liberal values withthe discussion of R2P as its most symbolic representation. Third, the paper
explores why and how Asians are less enthusiastic about advancing theinternational regime based upon Western-style liberalism. Finally, the paper
seeks to make some suggestions for developing viable involvements of Asians in
the matters concerning humanitarian intervention.

1. Asians’ Less Enthusiastic Involvements
in Humanitarian Interventions
The sphere of humanitarian intervention has been dramatically widenedwith the end of the Cold War. Although academic descriptions of the history ofhumanitarian intervention usually do not fail to mention the cases of India’s
military intervention in Bangladesh in 1971 and Vietnam’s military intervention
in Cambodia in 1978 as well as Tanzania’s military intervention in Uganda in
1979, these cases do not really provide examples of seriously claimed
1humanitarian intervention. It was after the end of the Cold War with the caseof international intervention in Northern Iraq in 1991 after the Gulf War thatthe international community began to regard the issue of humanitarian
intervention as a realistically viable topic of international society. Humanitarian

134

同志社グローバル・スタディーズ

別冊

2013

intervention was discussed as a policy option over the crises in Bosnia andHerzegovina, Somalia, Rwanda and Kosovo during the 1990s. In most cases theUnited Nations failed to meet the expectations for effective interventions, while
the United States and Europeans states with the umbrella of NATO emerged as
an actual conductor of intervention. This trend led the latter to controversial
cases of Afghanistan and Iraq in the context of the War on Terror. The only
exceptional case of intervention in Asia is East Timor after the referendum of
1999, although the intervention forces, INTERFET, were more or less led by
2

Australians as in the cases in the Pacific like the Solomon Islands.

Considering some other following cases of military interventions forhumanitarian purposes in the first decade of the 21st century like the British
intervention in Sierra Leone in 2000, the French-led EU intervention in theeastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2006, and the NATObombing of Libya in 2011, the major pattern is Western powers’ interventions in
Africa. It is notable that AU as well as sub-regional organizations like ECOWAS
has become active in promoting peacekeeping operations that havehumanitarian purposes as in the case of AU’s engagement in Darfur with thehelp of the UN. This means that African countries are not only acceptingintervention forces, but also actively engaged in conducting humanitarian
operations by themselves.
In contrast to this trend in Africa, Asia has seen few cases of humanitarian
interventions or related international operations for humanitarian purposes. It
could be because Asian countries have been more or less stable compared to
African countries in the last two decades. But there was no attempt ofhumanitarian intervention by Asian countries in East Timor in 1999 and 2006,
Afghanistan in 2001, Iraq in 2003 and Sri Lanka in 2009. Even if South Asian
countries like Bangladesh, Pakistan and India are the top troop contributing
countries for traditional types of UN peacekeeping operations, it is difficult tofind any indication of humanitarian intervention pursued by Asian countries
anywhere in the world. And in most cases Asian countries are unwilling toaccept large-size peacekeeping missions.
This trend is not a distinctive phenomenon solely in the field of militarystyle humanitarian intervention. Civilian-oriented political and legal
interventions in conflict-ridden areas have the same tendency. One of theoutstanding examples is the International Criminal Court (ICC). ICC is theWhy Are Asians Less Interested in Humanitarian Intervention?

135

international judicial organ which has the mission of advancing the regime ofinternational humanitarian law, namely, it is an international institution forjudicial intervention. Currently, the ICC has 121 states parties consisting of 33
states from Africa, 18 from Asia-Pacific, 18 from Eastern Europe, 27 from Latin
America and Caribbean states, and 25 from Western European and other States.
This regional division is somewhat outmoded in the sense that Europe is divided
into East and West, which however would not make blurred the fact that Africa
and Europe are the two major sources of the ICC providing 33 states parties
respectively. This means that majorities of states in both regions have joined in
the ICC. Importantly, the ICC has been dealing with seven countries, all ofwhich are African countries. It is as if the ICC is an institution through which
3

Europeans handles African affairs.

By contrast, the Asia-Pacific region provides only 18 states, out of which 6
states are Pacific island states and two are Central Asian countries like
Tajikistan and Mongolia. There are only three states, Cambodia, Timor-Lesteand the Philippines, from South East Asia, while ASEAN has 10 member states.
Three states, Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Maldives are from South Asia, while
SAARC has 8 member states. There are only two states parties from the Middle
East, Jordan and, vaguely from the region to say the least, Cyprus. Thanks toJapan’s accession in 2007, there are two states from East Asia together with theRepublic of Korea. So, the participation rates in South East Asia and the Middle
East are quite modest, and the lack of China and India makes a significant blow
to the ICC regime. Not a single case from Asia has been investigated by the ICC.
The same pattern is identified in a more political and diplomatic organ likethe UN Peacebuilding Commission (PBC). Since its establishment in 2005, thePBC has picked up six countries on its agenda. All the six countries are Africancountries. While the chair of the organizational committee of the PBC tend to be
Asian countries like Japan and Bangladesh, country-specific meetings whichorganize substantive discussions on peacebuilding strategies and priorities forcountries on the agenda of PBC tend to be chaired by European states. Again,
there is a tendency of political intervention by Europeans in domestic affairs ofAfrican states through the window of the UN PBC. Asians handle organizational
matters of the PBC itself in New York, while they are not quite active inorganizing more substantive issues of peacebuilding strategies for particular
4

countries.

136

同志社グローバル・スタディーズ

別冊

2013

2. Liberalism as the Framework of International Intervention
It can be widely observed that Asian countries are less prone to conduct andaccept humanitarian intervention or related interventions for humanitarian
purposes. It would not be correct to assert that the reason for such an Asian
attitude is the small nations’ abhorrence of intervention in contrast to the great
powers’ preference for it. Not all Asian countries are necessarily small. Many
African countries are more prone to accept and conduct interventions. It is
worth asking thus why Asians are less interested in new interventionist issues
including humanitarian intervention.
Out of some explanatory factors, this paper first illustrates the ideologicalfactor at the level of political theory. There have been many discussions onliberalism as the dominant ideology in the field of the study of peacebuilding,which more or less applies to some broader topics like humanitarian
intervention. The linkage between humanitarian intervention and liberalism
can be explained by the contemporary doctrine of sovereignty.
The liberal theory implies that not all interventions in sovereign states
violate sovereignty. Even when an intervention repudiates a certain
governmental power, it might not be a violation of sovereignty. If governmental
power was abused, the constitutional order of the state would be destroyed.
Then a revolutionary action would be required and justified to replace thegovernmental power holder in the name of the supreme power of the people.
This is a typical logic of justification for contemporary humanitarian
intervention.
The basic argument for the “Responsibility to Protect” is, surprisingly ornot, in line with the very traditional liberal theory of sovereignty. The two “Basic
Principles” of their argument is these;
A. State sovereignty implies responsibility, and the primary responsibility
for the protection of its people lies with the state itself.
B. Where a population is suffering serious harm, as a result of internal war,
insurgency, repression or state failure, and the state in question is
unwilling or unable to halt or avert it, the principle of non-intervention
5

yields to the international responsibility to protect.

Why Are Asians Less Interested in Humanitarian Intervention?

137

These simple two sentences represent the core value of liberalism from thetime of John Locke. Sovereignty is an inalienable principle of domestic legal/
political/social order as well as international legal/political/social order. But thisnotion of sovereignty contains the principle of responsibility between the twosupreme powers; the exerciser of sovereignty is responsible for protecting thefundamental rights of individuals. Once it is proved that the power holder/
government is unwilling or unable to take responsibility, the ultimate supreme
power holder resumes sovereignty. The sovereign people are then allowed to“appeal to the Heaven” or even resort to a revolution. This is the theory ofsovereignty in the Anglo-American tradition of liberal democracy. We can justadd that in the context of contemporary international society this act of “appeal
to the Heaven” could justify humanitarian intervention to help people protect
6

themselves in case of serious abuse or negligence of governmental power. Thisis the theory of sovereignty in the school of the “Responsibility to Protect.”
The ICISS continues that “The foundations of the responsibility to protect,as a guiding principle for the international community of states, lie in (1)obligation inherent in the concept of sovereignty; (2) the responsibility of the
Security Council, under Article 24 of the UN Charter, for the maintenance ofinternational peace and security; (3) specific legal obligations under humanrights and human protection declarations, covenants and treaties, international
humanitarian law and national law; and (4) the developing practice of states,
regional organizations and the Security Council itself.” In short, the ICISS
insists that conflict prevention, humanitarian intervention and peacebuilding
are the matters of “responsibility” on the side of the international community,
while the initial primary responsibility is “inherent in the concept of
7

sovereignty.”

The same kind of logic can be found in the Resolutions simultaneously
adopted by the Security Council and the General Assembly on December 20,
2005 actually decided on the establishment of the PBC as well as PBSO. The
Resolutions recognize “the primary responsibility of national and transitional
Governments and authorities of countries emerging from conflict or at risk of
relapsing into conflict, where they are established, in identifying their priorities
and strategies for post-conflict peacebuilding, with a view to ensuring national
ownership.” They also underline “the primary responsibility of the (Security)
Council for the maintenance of international peace and security in accordance

138

同志社グローバル・スタディーズ

別冊

2013

8

with the Charter.” These two responsibilities are not contradictory to eachother and to the responsibility of the PBC, since a system of responsibility is
supposed to be coexistent with state sovereignty. The PBC will help
governments of post-conflict states, as long as they are not sufficiently willing or
capable enough to exert their sovereign powers properly. This help istheoretically understood to be in line with sovereignty, as the PBC simply helps
the exercises of sovereignty. But when the government of a post-conflict state isapparently unwilling or unable to meet its responsibility, the Security Council
will be asked to take its international responsibility to deal with such states.

3. Liberal Theory of Revolution
The Anglo-American theory of liberal democracy has its theoretical origins
in the social contract theory in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The
revolutions in the period in Great Britain and the United States established thepolitical systems which remain the oldest in our contemporary world. Thomas
Hobbes in his Leviathan published in 1651 argued that in order to establish acommon power to end the “state of nature,” the necessity of a covenant of every
man with every man is requiredin such manner, as if every man should say to every man, I Authorise
and give up my Right of Governing myself, to this Man, or to thisAssembly of men, on this condition that thou give up thy Right to him,and Authorise all his Actions in like manner. This done, the Multitude
so united in one Person, is called a COMMON-WEALTH, in Latine
CIVITAS. This is the Generation of that great LEVIATHAN, or rather(to speak more reverently) of the Mortall God, to which wee owe under9

the Immortall God, our peace and defence.

Hobbes started his theory with the natural rights of individuals, which
symbolized the liberal nature of his theory. He argued that in order to keep
individual rights well in reality, a political community needs sovereign power.
The word “authorise” is important here, because autonomous authorisation
is a condition of self-sufficient commonwealth and signifies the autonomous
status of liberal theory. What is symbolic is that the “Mortall God” is at theWhy Are Asians Less Interested in Humanitarian Intervention?

139

same time “an Artificiall Man,” “in which, the Soveraignty is an Artificiall Soul,as giving life and motion to the whole body.” Hobbes’ theory of authorisation
makes possible the emergence of an autonomous state.
There appeared shortly after Hobbes in the age of the Glorious Revolution
the champion of the Anglo-American tradition of the liberal theory, John Locke.
He did not fully elaborate upon the theory of sovereignty, but his standpoint onsovereignty is evident in his Two Treatises of Government. It was his criticism of
the absolute notion of sovereignty that led to his creation of two supreme
powers.
Locke developed a theory of an autonomous political society by establishingtwo “supreme powers.” On the one hand, Locke asserted that even after
consenting to make one community, “there remains still in the people a SupremePower.” According to Locke, “the Community perpetually retains a SupremePower.” Individuals never give up their right to property, which all politicalpowers are set up to secure. Furthermore, they have the right to the appeal to“Heaven,” namely, the right to resistance and revolution, in case of abuse ofgovernmental power. On the other hand, Locke noted that although thecommunity is “always the Supreme Power, but not as considered under any
Form of Government, because this Power of the People can never take place till
the Government be dissolved.”

10

By avoiding the word, sovereignty, Locke asserted two supreme powers. The
theory of two supreme powers is possible, because he distinguished between “theDissolution of the Society, and the Dissolution of the Government.” One supreme
power reigns in society, while the other represents the supreme power ofgovernment. This “distinction between constituent and ordinary power” was thefoundation of civil revolutions, since abuse of governmental power would now
11result in invoking the other supreme power of the people. This distinction leads
to the most important premises of modern constitutionalism: the distinction
between constitutive authority and ordinary power, i.e. between constitutionalrules and ordinary laws. This was the logic of legitimizing the Glorious
Revolution, to which revolutionaries in the thirteen colonial States in North
America later resorted.
If we introduce Locke’s theory of the state in contemporary terms, we willfind the two supreme powers in the liberal theory of sovereignty. The exerciserof governmental supreme power must protect the fundamental rights of140

同志社グローバル・スタディーズ

別冊

2013

individuals, since the people as a whole keeps the supreme power ofauthorization. Both of the supreme powers are part of the integrative theory ofsovereignty in the political theory of liberal democracy. This is a conception ofsovereignty in contemporary constitutional states. This liberal conception ofsovereignty cultivates a foundation of the political theory of peacebuilding andhumanitarian intervention. Governmental power may sometimes be unwillingor unable to protect citizens, or it may not be willing and capable enough toprotect citizens properly. That is the case of a failed state. Under such a
circumstance, some kind of peacebuilding activities, or even humanitarian
intervention, could be justified. The international community may encourageand help the government protect citizens. This is a theoretical logic of justifying
international peacebuilding activities and humanitarian intervention.
What is lacking in most parts of Asia is this tradition of theoreticalframework of liberalism which has a solid historical foundation of revolution.
Humanitarian intervention seen in the eyes of the logic of domestic constitution
is a form of revolution or an exercise of the right to resistance. The Glorious
Revolution was impossible without the intervention by the Netherlands, thenhegemonic power in Europe’s classic example of humanitarian intervention in
the 17th century. The American revolutionary independence was impossible
without the intervention by France and other European powers. Most of theevents called revolutions in Asia, if not simply military victories of a certain
armed group, were still not revolutions based on liberal values like humanrights. With some exceptions of the Philippines and the Republic of Korea whichhave achieved their own democratic transition, Asian countries do not know
liberal value oriented civil revolutions. Japan is a notable example whichbecame a liberal democracy as a result of rather radical foreign surgicaloccupation.
The “Lockean” model of liberal order which this paper characterizes as a
typical justification of humanitarian intervention is not an orthodox doctrine in
Asia. While many Asian countries accommodate basic principles of liberalism in
the form of Western-style constitutionalism, their political aspirations for stateled economy as a source of political order tend to illustrate a different direction.
Japan is not a beacon of Western-style liberalism, even though it is true thatJapan contributed to consolidation of liberal values in Asia. The country’s
modern history shows a typical Asian model of state-led modernization throughWhy Are Asians Less Interested in Humanitarian Intervention?

141

benign developmental authoritarianism after radical political centralization.
The belief that external interventions would do harm is most conspicuous in
Asia, especially in East Asia, while many international actors including United
Nations agencies have been spreading virtually liberal doctrines in Africa in thenames of human rights, humanitarian law, human security, gender equality,
good governance, etc.

4. Geopolitical Background of Asian Attitudes
and their Future Course
This paper does not necessarily argue that the tradition of political theory is
the only reason why Asians are less interested in humanitarian intervention.
There are some more explanatory factors like those at international power
politics. We assume that the end of the Cold War prepared a historic turn forhumanitarian intervention due to the disappearance of the world-wide
structural confrontation between the two super-powers in addition to the
expansion of normative power of international humanitarian and human rights
law. However, the end of the Cold War did not bring any dramatic change in
Asia, as in the case of Europe. The presenter does not argue that the Cold War
structure still exists in East Asia despite continuous risks over the Korean
Peninsula and the Taiwan Strait, as long as we define the Cold War as theconfrontation between the two super-powers. Nevertheless, the impact of theend of the Cold War was more or less modest, to say the least, and positive, ifany, unlike Africa where so many negative events took place in the last two
decades. The Indochina Peninsula, which was a major hotspot of Cold War
battles, is now stable, while comparatively stable countries during the Cold War
in West and Central Africa began to fall into serious armed conflicts in the
1990s (although Southern Africa could be said to be similar to the pattern ofSoutheast Asia with the factor of South Africa too).
The presence of the de-facto new super-power, China, also defines the major
characteristic of international politics in Asia. In contemporary Asia, any
political events can be immune from connotations in the context of theinternational politics defined by super-powers. The level of attention paid by
China will significantly differ, if humanitarian intervention is conducted in
Asia. The effect of humanitarian intervention upon international political scenes

142

同志社グローバル・スタディーズ

別冊

2013

tends to be great in Asia where China proclaims many areas of their vitalinterests and the United States remains a cornerstone of regional security. The
high tensions concerning the territorial disputes in East Asia are certainly grave
concerns, which would make any attempt of humanitarian intervention morefragile and risky. As any miscalculation of political impacts would entail graverisks in Asia, international actors have good reasons to be cautious in deciding
on their possible actions.

5. Concluding Remarks
This paper may provide some suggestions for the future of Asian attitudes
toward humanitarian intervention in a highly cautious way. It is not likely that
Asian states will become leading proponents of humanitarian intervention in its
currently understood form at least in the near future. Recently, the Arab Spring,
especially Syria, critically highlighted the hole of debates and practices onhumanitarian intervention that exists in the Middle East. Humanitarian
intervention is in the end a dependent variable of some other factors like
ideological traditions and geopolitical situations. When all or some of thesefactors change, Asians’ attitudes would change. But it may not happen in aforeseeable future.

Why Are Asians Less Interested in Humanitarian Intervention?

143

End Notes
1 See, for instance, Nicholas J. Wheeler, Saving Strangers: Humanitarian Intervention inInternational Society (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000).
2 Jennifer M. Welsh (ed.), Humanitarian Intervention and International Relations (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2006).
3 See the website of the International Crminal Court [http://www.icc-cpi.int/Menus/ASP/
states+parties/], accessed June 25, 2012.
4 See the website of the United Nations Peacebuilding Commission [http://www.un.org/en/
peacebuilding/pbso/index.shtml], accessed June 25, 2012.
5 The International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, The Responsibility toProtect (Ottawa: International Development Research Centre, 2001), p.xi.
6 See John Locke, Two Treatises of Government (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1967),
first published in 1690, p.385.
7 One of the core members of the ICISS, Ramesh Thakur, suggested that sovereignty as
responsibility can be explained by the tradition of constitutional sovereignty by referring to thepresent author’s book, Hideaki Shinoda, Re-examining Sovereignty: From Classical Theory to the
Global Age (London: Macmillan, 2000). See Ramesh Thakur, “Intervention, Sovereignty and the
Responsibility to Protect,” Security Dialogue, vol.33, no.3, 2002.
8 General Assembly Draft Resolution A/60/L.40, Security Council Resolution S/RES/1645 andResolution S/RES/1646 (21 December 2005).
9 Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan (London: Penguin Books, 1985), p.227.
10 Locke, Two Treatises of Government, p.385.
11 See Julian H. Franklin, John Locke and the Theory of Sovereignty: Mixed Monarchy and theRight of Resistance in the Political Thought of the English Revolution. (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1978), p.124.