Unauthorized Humanitarian Intervention in World Politics

Abstract

This essay aims to address the question of whether there is sufficient state practice to justify humanitarian intervention in the absence of a United Nations Security Council mandate, as re-quired by international law. In the first portion, this essay presents the concept of humanitarian intervention, mapping its origins with reference to the views of Hugo Grotius, Emer de Vattel, and Alberico Gentili until the emergence of Article 2(4) of the Charter of the United Nations. In the second portion, this essay deals with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) military intervention in 1999. Pointing to Kosovo, this essay concludes that there is sufficient state prac-tice to justify the practice of humanitarian intervention in world politics since state practice sets a precedent for customary norms of international law.