Invoking Humanity: War, Law and Global Order

(Paperback)

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Danilo Zolo considers Carl Schmitt's maxim in the context of the "humanitarian war" waged against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in the Spring of 1999 by 19 NATO countries. He offers a political, legal and philosophical reflection on an extraordinary display of Western power and its present and future impact on the global system of international politics. Zolo's account of the war is located within the context of the irresistible drive of globalization which he argues brings economic, financial and military, ecological and ethnic-religious turbulence in its wake. Not only the future of the Balkan region, he suggests, is at stake here, but the fate of international law, the future role of the United Nations and the political destiny of Europe.

Reviews

"This is a powerful and well-argued book. All those who believe in the justice of humanitarian military intervention and the legality of the enforcement of human rights by international tribunals should read it. It will force them to think whether they are right."--Paul Hirst, Birkbeck College, University of London
"Danilo Zolo has written a brilliantly provocative and fascinating critique of US-led NATO strategy in the Balkans that is a troubling indictment of all aspects of 'humanitarian diplomacy'.--Richard Falk, Princeton University

Author Bio

Born in Rijeka, Danilo Zolo is Professor of Philosophy and Sociology of Law at the University of Florence. He has been a visiting Fellow at the Universities of Boston, Cambridge, Harvard, Oxford, Pittsburgh, Princeton and the Federal University of Paraiba in Brazil. He is the author of eight books, including Democracy and Complexity (1992), and Cosmopolis: Prospects for World Government (1996) and he has been widely translated.