Humanitarian Intervention: In the Process of Legalization?

Humanitarian intervention is one of the most debatable concepts in the field of international relations and international law. Most of the debate surrounding the concept of humanitarian intervention is centered on its legality, and with the absence of any authoritative decision as to whether it is a legal practice or not, one’s only recourse is to assess existing literature in the hope of resolving the debate as to the legality of humanitarian intervention in international law. Hence, this thesis not only traces the origins of the practice of humanitarian intervention or questions the definitions which have been provided for the concept, but it also examines how the problem of the legality of humanitarian intervention has been debated in literature and/or doctrine using the vocabulary of Article 38(1) paragraph 4. Moreover, it examines the motives of the intervening agents, and more importantly, this work seeks to determine if the practice of humanitarian intervention is indeed in the process of becoming legalized, or whether the future of humanitarian intervention lies in the theory of fragmentation of international law. By assessing and identifying whether humanitarian intervention is in conformity with international law or not, this thesis hopes that it would provide a better understanding of the concept of humanitarian intervention, and thus help clarify some of the controversies which have surrounded interventions such as Kosovo and Libya. Keywords: Humanitarian Intervention, Process of Legalization, Process Theory, Theory of Fragmentation, Discourse Analysis.