The first edition of this book attempted to assess the chances that an international society would be able to respond positively to the second chance identified by Boutros Boutros-Ghali, the then United Nations (UN) secretary-general. It did so by examining three major international interventions of the early post-Cold War period in Cambodia, former Yugoslavia and Somalia. Well before the book went to press, it was already clear that the answer was not a foregone conclusion. Partly in reaction to failures on the ground and partly due to the escalating demands for UN intervention around the world, optimism gave way to pessimism as the prevailing mood surrounding UN peacekeeping.

The involvement of the United Nations (UN) in Somalia was a product of the new international climate created by the end of the Cold War and by the dramatic success of Operation Desert Storm, and its aftermath in 1991. For the UN, the Somali operation, which at its height employed a force of 28,000 at an estimated cost of US $1.5 billion, broke new ground in two ways. Under Resolution 794 of 3 December 1992, the Security Council invoked Chapter VII of the Charter to authorise the establishment of an Unified Task Force (UNITAF), under US command and control, ‘in order to establish a secure environment for humanitarian relief operations in Somalia’. This was the first time that an unambiguously internal and humanitarian crisis had been designated as a threat to international peace and security, thus justifying peace-enforcement measures.

Second, with this and subsequent resolutions, the UN dropped the pretence that its involvement in Somalia arose out of an invitation from the government – although the Council continued to refer to ‘urgent calls from Somalia … to ensure the delivery of humanitarian assistance’ – since no government existed with the authority to issue such an invitation. For the first time, statelessness was acknowledged to be a threat to an international society composed of sovereign states.

The UN did not extend its prerogatives in these ways either willingly or as the result of a deliberate and carefully worked out international strategy.

The twentieth century witnessed the birth of the first global order the world has known. Few would dispute that the forces of imperialism and nationalism have played a major part in bringing this world into existence. The role played by political ideas about these concepts is more contentious, if only because there has seldom been agreement about what they mean, let alone their practical importance. It is the purpose of this chapter to suggest some of the ways in which ideas and events have interacted in the making and breaking of modern empires and nation states.

In outline, the story is quickly told. At the end of the nineteenth century the world was dominated by a few major powers, whose governments were engaged in territorial, economic and ideological expansion. In the United States and Russia, expansion involved consolidating their control of the North American and Eurasian continents respectively, without significant opposition, at least until the Russians were stopped in their tracks by Japan in 1904. Elsewhere, imperial competition brought the great powers to the verge of war, although in the end they drew back from the brink, most famously in the case of Africa, where the continent was divided at the 1884 Congress of Berlin, in the interests of preserving the balance of power and European peace. This phase of international history ended with the First World War. For the previous century, however, European energies were engaged in every corner of the globe, with little regard for the interests or cultural sensitivities of the local inhabitants.

The involvement of the United Nations in Somalia was a product of the new international climate created by the end of the Cold War and by the dramatic success of Operation Desert Storm, and its aftermath in 1991. For the UN, the Somali operation, which at its height employed a force of 28,000 at an estimated cost of US $1.5 billion, broke new ground in two ways. Under Resolution 794 of 3 December 1992, the Security Council invoked Chapter VII of the Charter to authorise the establishment of an Unified Task Force (UNITAF), under United States command and control, ‘in order to establish a secure environment for humanitarian relief operations in Somalia'. This was the first time that an unambiguously internal and humanitarian crisis had been designated as a threat to international peace and security, thus justifying peace-enforcement measures.

Secondly, with this and subsequent resolutions, the UN dropped the pretence that its involvement in Somalia arose out of an invitation from the government – although the Council continued to refer to ‘urgent calls from Somalia … to ensure the delivery of humanitarian assistance’ – since no government existed with the authority to issue such an invitation. For the first time, statelessness was acknowledged to be a threat to an international society composed of sovereign states.

The United Nations did not extend its prerogatives in these ways either willingly or as the result of a deliberate and carefully worked out international strategy.

What are the chances that international society will be able to respond positively to the second chance identified by the United Nations Secretary-General? The scale of UN activity since the end of the Cold War might be offered as evidence that we are entering an era when international obligations will at last rank alongside the defence of national interests, even if they will not necessarily take precedence over them. Of the twenty-nine ‘peacekeeping’ operations established by the UN since 1945, sixteen have been created since 1987. At the same time, few of these operations have been unqualified successes, and the demands placed on the UN system can equally be interpreted as evidence of spreading chaos and widespread threats to stability and international order in the wake of the collapse of familiar Cold War structures. Moreover, the potential demand for UN intervention around the world is clearly greater than the Organisation's ability to respond, given the resources currently available to it, or which seem likely to be made available in the foreseeable future. Indeed, by the end of 1993 there were clear signs that the governments of the major powers were more interested in limiting than extending their international commitments.

Section A

In Paris on 14 December 1995, the presidents of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Republic of Croatia, and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia signed the General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina, also known as the Dayton Agreement. This agreement, comprising 11 articles (for text, see Section B below), set out the principles for the maintenance of a unitary and sovereign Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, consisting of two Entities: Republika Srpska and the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The latter was to control 51 per cent of the territory of the republic. The agreement also set out a series of constitutional provisions relating to the bicameral legislature of the unitary state, the election of a three man presidency, the role and responsibilities of central government and the general relationship between the two Entities and the central government.

As a corollary to the seeming willingness of the Balkan parties to seal a peace deal after over three years of fighting in Bosnia, the Dayton Agreement also set out the responsibilities of the organs and institutions of the international community to ensure that the peace would be a lasting one. Included in these provisions were: the definition of the role to be played by the OSCE in the areas of confidence–building, monitoring elections, and arms control; the continuing operation of the International War Crimes Tribunal; the creation of a Commission of Human Rights to be monitored by both the OSCE and the Council of Europe; the creation of a UN International Police Task Force; and the nomination of a High Representative to monitor and oversee all civilian aspects of the peace plan.