Karen_A._Mingst,_Ivan_M._Arregu_n-Toft]_Essentia

(Amelia) #1
Analyzing IGOs, International Law, and NGOs 255

the protection of their individual national interests. Realists can point to both the
failures of the League of Nations and the weaknesses of the UN. They can legitimately
point to the Cold War era, when the Security Council proved impotent in addressing
the conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union. And the failure in 2003
of the United Nations to enforce Security Council resolutions against Iraq and its
in effec tive ness in addressing the Syrian crisis are more reminders of the organ ization’s
weakness and supposed irrelevance.
To realists, international law may create some order, but they remind us that states
can opt out of following international law, and if the more power ful do so, other states
can do little about it.
In the state- centric world of the realists, NGOs are generally not on the radar
screen at all. After all, most NGOs exist at the plea sure of states; states grant them
legal authority, and states can take away that authority. To realists, NGOs are not
in de pen dent actors.


the radical view


Radicals in the Marxist tradition are also very skeptical about IGOs, international
law, and many NGOs, albeit for very diff er ent reasons from those of the realists. Radi-
cals see con temporary international law and organ ization as the product of a specific
time and historical pro cess. Emerging from Western cap i tal ist state experiences, interna-
tional law and organ ization serve the interests of the dominant cap i tal ist classes. The
actions by the United Nations following the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990, includ-
ing a series of resolutions condemning Iraq and imposing sanctions on that country,
were designed to support the position of the West, most notably the interests of the
hegemonic United States and its cap i tal ist friends in the international petroleum
industry. To radicals, the UN- imposed sanctions provide an excellent example of
hegemonic interests injuring the marginalized— Iraqi men, women, and children
striving to eke out meager livings. Radicals also view NATO’s actions in Kosovo as
another example of hegemonic power harming the poor and the unprotected.
According to radicals, international law is biased against the interests of socialist
states, the weak, and the unrepresented. For example, international legal princi ples,
such as the sanctity of national geographic bound aries, were developed during the
colonial period to reinforce the claims of the power ful. Attempts to alter such bound-
aries are, according to international law, wrong, even though the bound aries them-
selves may be unfair or unjust. Radicals are quick to point out these injustices and
support policies that overturn the traditional order.
To most radicals, the lack of representativeness and the lack of accountability of
NGOs are key issues. NGOs are largely based in the North and are dominated by
members of the same elite that run the state and international organ izations. They

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