Can Might Make Rights?: Building the Rule of Law after Military Interventions

This book looks at why it's so difficult to create 'the rule of law' in post-conflict societies such as Iraq and Afghanistan, and offers critical insights into how policy-makers and field-workers can improve future rule of law efforts. A must-read for policy-makers, field-workers, journalists and students trying to make sense of the international community's problems in Iraq and elsewhere, this book shows how a narrow focus on building institutions such as courts and legislatures misses the more complex cultural issues that affect societal commitment to the values associated with the rule of law. The authors place the rule of law in context, showing the interconnectedness between the rule of law and other post-conflict priorities, such as reestablishing security. The authors outline a pragmatic, synergistic approach to the rule of law which promises to reinvigorate debates about transitions to democracy and post-conflict reconstruction.

Jane Stromseth is Professor of Law at Georgetown University Law Center where she teaches in the fields of international law and constitutional law. She has written widely on international law governing the use of force, humanitarian intervention, accountability for human rights atrocities, and constitutional war powers. She is editor and contributor to Accountability for Atrocities: National and International Responses (2003), contributor to Humanitarian Intervention: Ethical, Legal, and Political Dilemmas (Cambridge University Press, 2003), contributor to Enforcing Restraint: Collective Intervention in Internal Conflicts (1993), contributor to The US Constitution and the Power to Go to War (1994), and author of The Origins of Flexible Response: NATO's Debate over Strategy in the 1960s (1988). She has published in law journals including the American Journal of International Law, the Yale Law Journal, and the Georgetown Law Journal, and she has appeared on CNN, NBC, C-SPAN, and National Public Radio. She has served in government as a Director for Multilateral and Humanitarian Affairs at the National Security Council (1999–2000), and as an Attorney-Adviser in the Office of the Legal Adviser at the US Department of State (1989–90). A Rhodes Scholar, Stromseth holds a doctorate in International Relations from Oxford University, a law degree from Yale Law School, and a BA degree from Swarthmore College. She serves on the Editorial Board of the American Journal of International Law.

Rosa Brooks is a Professor at Georgetown University Law Center and an Associate Professor at the University of Virginia School of Law. She is a consultant for the Human Rights Watch and for the President's Office at the Open Society Institute. She was on the Board of Directors for Amnesty International USA from 2002–3 and a Fellow at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at the Kennedy School of Government from 2000–1. She also worked for the US Department of State as a Senior Advisor in the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor. Brooks is a weekly columnist for The Los Angeles Times. She has written articles for The Washington Post and Harpers and published in scholarly journals such as The University of Chicago Law Review, Michigan Law Review, Georgetown Law Review and The Yale Journal of Law and Feminism.

David Wippman is Vice Provost for International Relations, Cornell University, and Professor of Law at Cornell University Law School. He previously served as: Partner in Reichler and Appelbaum, a firm specializing in the representation of developing countries, 1984–92; as a Director in the office of Multilateral and Humanitarian Affairs, National Security Council, 1998–9; visiting scholar, University of Ulster, 2000–3; associate dean, Cornell Law School, 2004. Wippman is co-author of International Law: Norms, Actors, Process (2002, with Steve Ratner and Jeff Dunoff); co-editor and contributor, New Wars, New Laws? Applying the Laws of War in 21st Century Conflicts (2005).