Preventive war, a useful tool

One alternative to the Security Council is to turn to regional organizations to authorize preventive interventions. The model here is Kosovo, where the North Atlantic Treaty Organization intervened to prevent a worse humanitarian calamity even though the Security Council failed to authorize the action. Regional organizations are an appealing venue because there is likely to be convergence between those who bear the costs and those who reap the benefits of the action. When all countries in a region agree to the necessity and efficacy of a preventive action, there is a greater chance that the precipitating facts will be valid.

Regional organizations are no panacea, however. Global threats are beyond the purview of any one regional organization to handle. In other cases, there may be no meaningful regional organization to authorize force. Which leaves the alternative of creating a coalition of like-minded states. One such coalition could be composed of democracies, because democracies should have an interest in upholding the norm of state responsibility. Because these governments are elected, their collective decision to use force would carry more legitimacy than a decision of any one of them. And if it proved impossible to convince any or most of the coalition's democratic peers that a state had failed to meet its responsibilities and that intervention was therefore justified, that outcome in and of itself should give pause about proceeding. Iraq was a case in point. Finally, the existence of an alternative decision-making body may prompt the Security Council or a regional organization to act sooner.

Preventive military force has a role in managing today's security challenges. Understanding that role is step one; establishing agreed standards for its use is step two; and implanting these standards in an effective institution is the third step. The Bush administration got the first step right, and the logic of its arguments builds toward the second. But it has gotten step three wrong. Unilateralism is not the only alternative to the Security Council. Regional organizations and a new coalition of democratic states offer ways to legitimize the use of force when the council fails to meet its responsibilities.