Photo: Joao Silva for The New York Times

Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili recently described the Russian invasion and occupation of his country as an example of “21st Century barbarism”.

http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2008/08/108289.htm

Unfortunately it appears that the term would apply even more broadly than intended, and that this conflict, like most, has no clearly discernible “good and bad guys”. What this means is that resolution of the conflict cannot begin by choosing sides, but by understanding the principles that are being called upon by all sides and identifying the contradictions that occur within them. At the root of so-called barbarism is an inability to make this imaginative leap, understanding others not simply as creatures of instinct and interests (so as to ask- What will they do next?) but as intelligent and ethical creatures like ourselves.

This is not to say that all of us are incapable of irrational or unethical behaviour. One can point to barbaric acts on all sides in the context of this particular conflict: a Georgian offensive on an ethnic enclave while the world’s attention was turned to the Olympics; a Russian counter-offensive intended at least partly for national aggrandizement; a push on the part of America and NATO in Eastern Europe and the Caucasus to pen in other powers with advanced (though unproven) missile defence technologies and military alliances; and the ethnic cleansing being carried out by militias, mercenaries and perhaps government forces also.

All have their excuses to fight. What are the reasons for peaceful settlement?

At root in this conflict is a contradiction between two essentially incompatible principles. On the one hand there is the claim to national, territorial sovereignty and to the rightness of the use of force to secure this interest. All of the parties involved, incredibly also including the United States in its missile defence shields, invoke this notion as their principle of right. On the other hand is the right and responsibility of international intervention in situations where governments are guilty of abusing or neglecting their populations, or the so-called Responsibility to Protect (R2P). What is contradictory is the alignment of sovereign interests and intervention on ethical grounds. So for Russian forces to simultaneously claim the rights to assert its sovereignty and to invade and occupy Georgian territory on ethical grounds makes a mockery of those ethical principles. It is clear that humanitarian interventions must be carried out by neutral parties, if their purposes aren’t to be called into disrepute as masks of underlying interests. The escalation of this particular conflict and the breakdown of earlier UN moderated peace agreements demonstrates the urgent need for UN peace-keepers responsible to higher principles than the interests of one particular state or group.

It is equally clear that the ethical principles of the R2P are crucial justifications, otherwise, if it were simply a matter of sovereignty and achieving a monopoly on the use of organized violence, great powers and separatist groups would have nothing more to do than to fight it out. Perceived legitimacy is essential in an interconnected world. Sovereignty is not the inviolable given that it once was. It is time to accept the reality that in a world of overlapping interests the most solid basis for establishing political legitimacy is through open dialogue and appeals to a rational, universal ethic. What is barbaric is clinging to the gun as the ultima ratio and cause of peace at a time when universal rights speak much louder.

Dr. Toivo Koivukoski, Political Science, Nipissing University

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