Redefining Sovereignty: The Use Of Force After The Cold War

With considerable insight and analysis, the editors and contributors to the book―the world’s leading ethicists, political scientists and international lawyers―investigate the use of force since the end of the Cold War and, simultaneously, what changes have or should occur with respect to sovereignty and the law in the 21st century.


Redefining Sovereignty has resulted from three groundbreaking workshops on international law and the use of force: the first was held in Rome soon after NATO’s 1999 intervention in Kosovo; the second took place in Frankfurt after the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan; and the third occurred in Columbus, Ohio after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. Together, these and other uses of armed force since the end of the Cold War have raised new and challenging questions for the international law and policy on the regulation of armed conflict.

These questions are explored in the thoughtful text, including: With the end of superpower rivalry have these uses of force had a particular impact on the state system? Have they, for example, affected the concept of state sovereignty? Have they affected the legal regime on the use of force? By the time of the Iraq invasion in March 2003, had some uses of force long-considered prohibited by the principle of non-intervention become lawful? Did the use of force to protect human rights, to respond to terrorism, for arms control or to preempt future threats become lawful or if not lawful, somehow otherwise legitimate?


Published under the Transnational Publishers imprint.

Mary Ellen O’Connell is William B. Saxbe Designated Professor of Law at The Ohio State University Moritz College of Law, Columbus.

Michael Bothe is Professor of Law at J.W. Goethe-Universitat, Frankfurt, Germany.



Natalino Ronzitti is Professor of Law at Luiss University, Rome, Italy.