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Australia and humanitarian operations: Morality and interests guiding the use of force for humanitarian purposes

This chapter explores Australia’s role in implementing the humanitarian operations in Cambodia and Timor Leste. It is organised into two sections. The first section introduces the main debates on peacekeeping and humanitarian intervention. In doing so it draws out normative perspectives on these issues and highlights their limits in understanding the motives of states (and outcomes for them) in choosing to act against abuses of human rights. This clarifies the moral realist contribution that subsequently follows. The second section applies the moral realist framework to Australia’s foreign policy choices in Cambodia and Timor Leste. It finds that in both cases Australia was motivated by an expectation of reciprocity in achieving broader strategic goals tied to regional security and defence capability. An expectation of material returns is strengthened by evidence of rational choice in that Australia decided to intervene based on when it could gain the most from its commitment.

Evidence of expectation of reciprocity and rational choice indicates the likelihood of moral and material outcomes, both of which occurred in Cambodia and Timor Leste. In Cambodia, I find moral outcomes from Australia’s proposal for a United Nations (UN) transitional authority that led to the withdrawal of Vietnam and the holding of democratic elections. The material benefits for Australia were in the closer economic relationship with Vietnam, which had been a long-term foreign policy priority. Likewise, Australia’s diplomacy and leadership in the peace-enforcement mission in Timor Leste brought security and stability to the province, minimising the bloodshed and ensuring Timorese self-determination. Australia benefitted in reputational payoffs from leading the mission. It did so materially in signing a more favourable oil and gas deal over the Timor Gap, and in resolving a long-running obstacle to developing closer relations with Indonesia. In sum, this chapter finds further evidence in support of the explanatory potential of moral realism, and this reinforces the claims made in the previous chapter on Australia’s aid and development policy.

Defining peacekeeping and humanitarian intervention

Peacekeeping is defined loosely here as the “support of peacemaking between states by creating the political space necessary for the belligerent states to negotiate a political settlement.”398 Thus, peacekeeping operations (henceforth PKOs) are usually deployed after a ceasefire has been negotiated and are not intended to enforce political solutions. They are only mandated to use force for the purpose of self-defence. Cambodia was an example of a traditional PKO as the peacekeepers were deployed to “supervise” the ceasefire, as well as the withdrawal of foreign military assistance. However, it also went further in that the UN had transitional administration of Cambodia, temporarily adopting sovereignty over the territory. In this regard, Cambodia was also a multidimensional operation that included military, police and civilian personnel that took control of the state’s administrative structures, such as foreign affairs, defence, finance and communications. The UN also ran the elections and ensured the peaceful transition to a new government. For clarity, this thesis refers to the UN operation in Cambodia as peacekeeping since the mandate on force remained within traditional parameters.399

Defining humanitarian intervention is a little more contentious. Some, such as J. L. Holzgrefe, restrict the practice of intervention to the coercive use of force without the consent of the recipient state, while others broaden the definition to include acts with the intent to punish, as well as those where any outside interference has taken place for the purpose of humanitarian assistance.400 This thesis defines humanitarian intervention as “coercive interference in the internal affairs of a state, involving the use of armed force, with the purpose of addressing massive human rights violations or widespread human suffering.”401 Using this definition means Timor Leste can be classified as humanitarian intervention or “peace enforcement”, as the multinational coalition was an armed military force authorised to

398 _{Alex Bellamy and Paul Williams, Understanding Peacekeeping (Polity Press: Cambridge, 2010), p. 8.} 399 _{Several studies on Cambodia have shared the same conclusion. See for instance, Michael Doyle, UN} Peacekeeping in Cambodia: UNTAC’s Civil Mandate (Lynee Reinner Publishers: Colorado, 1995); Janet Heininger, Peacekeeping in Transition: The United Nations in Cambodia (Twentieth Century Fund Press: New York, 1994); Gareth Evans, “Peacekeeping in Cambodia: lessons learned,” Nato Review 42, no. 4 (1994), pp. 24-27; and Karl Farris, “Peacekeeping in Cambodia: On balance – a success,” Parameters 24, no. 1 (1998), pp. 38-50.

400 _{J. L. Holzgrefe, “The humanitarian intervention debate,” in J.L. Holzgrefe and Robert O. Keohane eds.} Humanitarian Intervention: Ethical, Legal and Political Dilemmas (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2004), p. 18.

401 _{Jennifer Welsh, “Introduction,” in Welsh ed., Humanitarian Intervention and International Relations} (Oxford University Press: Oxford, 2004), p. 3

use “all necessary means” to enforce peace and address widespread abuses of human rights.402 _{This thesis refers to both cases collectively as humanitarian operations/missions.} The “moral” views of humanitarian operations: Solidarity of human rights

There is an exhaustive amount of literature on the moral dimension of humanitarian missions. And as has been mentioned earlier, proponents of the English School (ES) have tended to claim ownership over how to understand morality within these debates. On the one side are the solidarists, like Timothy Dunne and Nicholas Wheeler, who follow cosmopolitanism in viewing the increase of state interdependence as evidence of the emergence of an international society motivated by norms of common humanity.403 From this perspective, the state system is morally bound together through the establishment of a global consciousness where states are obligated to act in response to human suffering. Mutual consent is then formed that justifies the use of force based on a set of agreed upon rules or codes of conduct. After WWII ideas of pluralism, mutual recognition of sovereignty and individual rights were recognised in the UN Charter, which defined sovereignty and human rights as separate moral and legal elements of the international order. But for solidarists, this began to change towards the end of the Cold War as the effects of globalization increased transnational relations and connected individuals across state borders, signalling the potential emergence of a “world society.” The end of bipolarity accelerated this process by ushering in a more cooperative international environment that opened space for an increased role for Global Civil Society (GCS), which was free to promote its human rights agenda. The GCS was joined by evidence of states’ willingness to use force against another sovereign for the achievement of humanitarian objectives, and these operations were legitimized under Chapter VII of the UN

402 _{Timor Leste has been used as a case of humanitarian intervention in numerous studies. Some like Dunne and} Wheeler have argued that it represents the evolution of “legitimate” forms of intervention as it achieved the consent of the recipient nation. Dunne and Wheeler, “East Timor and the new humanitarian interventionism,” International Affairs 77, no. 4 (2001), pp. 805-827. Tania Voon made similar conclusions, looking at the differences between legality and legitimacy in invited and coercive intervention using Kosovo and Timor Leste as examples. Voon, “Closing the gap between legality and legitimacy of humanitarian intervention: Lessons for Kosovo and East Timor,” Journal of International law and Foreign Affairs, 7, no. 1 (2002), pp. 31-98. Others have referred to Timor Leste as an example of operationalizing human security in foreign policy. See Nicholas Thomas and William Tow, “The utility of human security: sovereignty and intervention,” Security Dialogue 33, no. 2 (2002), pp. 177-192. Despite the differences on the legality and legitimacy of states in intervening, these authors shared a consensus in viewing Timor Leste as an instance of humanitarian intervention.

403 _{See Dunne and Wheeler, “Hedley Bull’s pluralism of the intellect and solidarism of the will,” International} Affairs 72, no. 1 (1996), pp. 91-107 and Dunne “The social construction of international society,” European Journal of International Relations 1, no. 3 (1995), pp. 367-389.

Charter. As a result, international societal norms evolved to no longer view state sovereignty as consistently superior to individual rights.

On the other side of the ES are the pluralists whose views on humanitarian operations tend to vary. Some, like Robert Jackson and Robert Vincent, are critical of the practice as it violates the central rule of international society: respect for sovereignty and non-intervention.404 Others, such as Jennifer Welsh, have argued that consensus on what is meant by the norm of sovereignty has changed to the extent that in exceptional circumstances (like genocide, ethnic cleansing and mass atrocities), it is both just and legal for states to intervene into another state’s sovereign territory. 405 This was particularly so after shifts in international perceptions on the norm of sovereignty, which made it conditional on the obligation of the state to protect its own citizens, and tied this to a “just cause” of international society to react if the state fails to uphold its sovereign responsibility.406 Here, the solidarists and the “humanitarian pluralists” are similar in melding the moral and legal principles of international order to explain the rise of PKOs and humanitarian intervention following the end of the Cold War.

404 _{Robert Jackson, The Global Covenant: Human Conduct in a World of States (Oxford: Oxford University} Press, 2000). As has been mentioned in chapter 1, Bull’s views on universal human rights and the use of force are difficult to pin down. In the one breath he argued that the best way to ensure international order was in respecting the coexistence of equal sovereigns and thus held a position of moral scepticism on the ability of norms and rules to transform state behaviour. However, in the same breath, he also argued that this was the best way to protect individual freedoms, prompting some such as John Vincent to claim that the purpose of Bull’s society was normative and hence solidarist. For more see Vincent, Human Rights and International Relations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986). Vincent was also quite critical of military intervention and argued that legitimizing the practice through international legal frameworks would lead to more wars and the advancement of an imperialist cosmopolitanism. Yet in his later writings, Vincent argued that states had to abide by certain standards in order to receive the respect and mutual recognition of sovereignty by others within international society. For more see Vincent and Peter Wilson, “Beyond non-intervention”, in Ian Forbes and Mark Hoffman, eds, Political Theory, International Relations and the Ethics of Intervention (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1993), p. 125.

405 _{Jennifer Welsh, “A normative case for pluralism: reassessing Vincent’s views on humanitarian intervention,”} International Affairs 87, no. 5 (2011), pp. 1193-1205.

406 _{It is not the intention of this thesis to go deeper into debates on the “right” of sovereignty versus sovereignty} as “responsibility.” This has been done ad nauseam elsewhere. See for instance, Roberta Cohen and Francis M Deng, “Exodus within borders: The uprooted who never left home,” Foreign Affairs 77, no.4 (1998), pp. 12-16; Tim Allen and David Stayn, “A right to interfere? Bernard Kouchner and the new humanitarianism,” Journal of International Development 12, no. 6 (2000), pp. 825-842 and Gareth Evans, The Responsibility to Protect: Ending Mass Atrocity Crimes Once and For All (Washington D.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 2008). Since this thesis takes a realist approach, it defines sovereignty, as “Supreme power over a certain territory.” Hans Morgenthau, “The problem of sovereignty reconsidered,” Columbia Law Review 48, no. 3 (1948), pp. 341-365. The point made here is that normative perspectives have tended to view sovereignty as a critical component when analysing state responses to human rights. For realists, sovereignty just “is” and its consideration in foreign policy is based on whether it is relevant at the time. In the case of Timor Leste described below, it was part of Australia’s calculation on when was the right time to intervene, with Prime Minister John Howard stating that it would be an act of war and a violation of Indonesia’s sovereignty if the humanitarian operation went ahead without their consent.

Like the ES, constructivists also source their views on PKOs and intervention from the norms and rules inherent in international society. Where they claim to be different is in the argument that norms governing the use of force, sovereignty and human rights are not necessarily the result of rational progress, but are constituted from the normative context in which they are created. In other words, norms of sovereignty and human rights are part of the same moral discourse. Christian Reus-Smit and Martha Finnemore have been the leading supporters of this perspective, stating that the norm of humanitarian intervention reflects the changing perceptions and beliefs of international society on the legitimacy of the use of force for humanitarian ends.407 Previously, perceptions on the use of force were constructed on the dominant belief that violence is destructive, and therefore needed to be avoided for the preservation of society. The state had a monopoly on the use of violence and its sovereignty afforded it the legitimacy of wielding force to protect the rights and freedoms of its citizens. This changed during the later half of the 20th Century when ideas of self-determination proliferated, and produced a number of new postcolonial states. These societies were not necessarily motived by territory or economic gain, and instead were motived by universal notions of human rights internationalised in the UN Charter. Therefore, for constructivists, sovereignty was constructed on ideas of human rights at both the domestic and international level. The use of force underwent a process of “norm cascading” with each case, from Vietnam’s intervention in Cambodia, to North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in Kosovo, humanitarian intervention gained legitimacy according to international social standards, reinforcing the constitutive structure of sovereignty and justifying the use of violence against others. Sovereignty defined by human rights then combined with the advent of non-traditional security threats after the Cold War, such as the spread of refugees, Transnational Organized Crime (TOC), drug and arms trafficking, as well as transnational terrorism. This demonstrated that it was no longer accurate to tie the legitimate use of force to the supremacy of state sovereignty, especially as the security of the state no longer

407 _{Martha Finnemore, “Constructing norms of humanitarian intervention,” in Peter Katzenstien ed. The Culture} of National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), pp. 153-160 and Finnemore, The Purpose of Intervention: Changing Beliefs About the Use of Force (London: Cornell University Press, 2003). Luke Glanville has also argued that not only does the international society allow for humanitarian intervention, it actually constitutes a set of rules and norms which determine when states should respond to mass instances of human suffering. In this regard, the norm of humanitarian intervention is both permissive and prescriptive. For more see Glanville, “Norms, interests and humanitarian intervention,” Global Change, Peace and Security, 18, no. 3 (2006), pp. 153-171.

guaranteed the security of the individual.408 This added to the legal authority of humanitarian operations by expanding the threshold of threats to international peace and security to include threats to human security.

In each perspective a common thread emerges; that is, the focus on linking the moral dimension of humanitarian operations to perceptions of legitimacy according to accepted rules and standards of international society. There are several problems with this approach. This first and most important is that it overlooks the importance of material interest in motivating states to use their national resources for the benefit of others, which is key to understanding why states include humanitarian missions as part of their foreign policy choices. Instead, normative perspectives prefer to focus on the justification of each act, prioritizing moral obligation over whether any real outcomes were achieved, for both the intervener and recipient. As will be outlined below, a moral realist perspective offers a more powerful account as it prioritizes the expectations, calculations and outcomes of foreign policy, and can therefore shed light on the reasons why states participate in humanitarian missions, and when this is likely to occur.

The reality of intervention: Reciprocity, rational choice and moral and material outcomes

Realist contributions on humanitarian operations have largely been critical and have approached the moral dimension with the view of moral scepticism. This is true of both the structural realists – like John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt – who are only concerned with an international order determined by the balance of power; as well as for those classical realists suspicious of the heavy moralising involved in pursuing interventions based on ideological concerns for spreading democracy, regime change and the promotion of human

408 _{Notions of “human security” were popularised during the mid-1990s and became part of the constructivist} lexicon in arguing that material factors of security are constituted by ideas and norms, which can include ideas of human rights. As the human rights regime took off following the end of the Cold War, international societal perceptions changed to see security as the protection of the individual over the protection of territorial borders. For more see, Gary King and Christopher L. J. Murray, “Rethinking human security,” Political Science

Quarterly 16, no. 4 (2004), pp. 585-600; Dan Henk, “Human security: Relevance and implications,” Parameters 35 no.2, pp. 92-100 and Pauline Ewan, “Deepening the human security debate,” Politics 27 no. 3, (2007), pp.182-189.

rights.409 Yet even Hans Morgenthau did not entirely dismiss the practice. Instead he cautioned against the use of abstract principles to rationalise the act of intervention:

rules [governing intervention] must be deduced not from abstract principles which are incapable of controlling the actions of governments, but from the interests of the nations concerned and from their practice of foreign policy reflecting those interests.410 Expectations of reciprocity

A moral realist understanding of humanitarian intervention thus focuses on the material motivations of the state committing the act and how the action itself will affect the stability of the international system, as well as the resources of the intervener(s). In particular, the moral realist is first concerned with separating the act of humanitarian intervention from attempts at establishing the moral justification for it. This is important as it allows moral realism to identify the moral and material factors present in the expectations of reciprocity seen to motivate a state’s decision to use force for humanitarian purposes.

As detailed above, normative approaches to intervention have overwhelmingly been concerned with establishing the authority of each case, and in doing so have tended to confuse what was the primary motivation, replacing material interests like security and trade, with notions of legal legitimacy. The same error can be found in relation to moral considerations. In their numerous attempts at tying legitimacy to both moral and legal norms, these scholars have also failed to properly consider whether there was in fact any moral