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Erin Norris
«La barbarie n'appartient pas à la préhistoire de l'humanité. Elle est l'ombre qui l'accompagne à chaque pas». —Alain Finkielkraut
"Barbarism doesn't belong to humanity's prehistory. It is the shadow that accompanies our every step still." —Alain Finkielkraut
Synopsis
At no other time has the post-WWII generation of humanity witnessed orgies of organized violence at the scale that now confronts us. From Africa to Asia, from Eastern Europe to the Middle East, and beyond, there is a harrowing sense of a civilization teetering on the brink of collapse—civilization once propped up by international law and order. The culprits are not only armed operatives directly wreaking violence on the battlefronts (they even
flagrantly pitch in civilian neighborhoods), but also friends and allies seen as remotely located backers and enablers.
The experience (of the actual victims and of distressed persons compelled to bear witness from afar) frequently impels a sense of sinking hope for many who had all along taken it for granted that the lawlessness of WWI and WWII had entailed lessons that prompted the construction of stronger structures of rule of international law, centered around the presumption of universal respect for human rights. Yet, for others, a challenge arises. And it
comes in the form of a realization that more work must be done to shore up those very structures of international rule of law that resulted from precisely those past lessons of lawlessness.
The Right to Peace project is in the order of that challenge. It envisions, optimistically, a return to the drawing board of international law, in the progressive effort to augment it in ways that should deter those violations of human rights that come in the manner of organized violence, by expanding the risk of legal discomfort for those who engage in, or facilitate, it.
The discourse at the Carr-Ryan Center will address that challenge. It will begin with teasing out the ways in which the pursuit of peace motivated the development of international law right from its earliest beginnings. Amongst other things, the discourse will ask whether the continuing elusiveness of lasting peace might be attributed to the fact that peace is yet to receive the focus and attention that it deserves relative to its value. The discourse will explore ways of maximizing the value of peace in ways that should make a real difference to humanity.
Learning Outcomes
This discourse will help to consolidate, supplement and enrich participants’ understanding of international law, especially from the perspectives of international human rights law. The discourse will distill the motivations and crucial elements of the Treaty of Westphalia, which is generally credited with the foundation of international law as we know it. From that perspective, the discourse will review the trajectory of international law through its various
stages of formative turbulence, right up to the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 as well as the Declaration on the Right to Peace in 2016.
It will finally examine the practical ways in which peace can be enhanced as a juristic value, the violation of which will as such attract concrete legal consequences, in hopes of deterring organized violence in future.
Session 4 - November 14th, 2025, Virtual
The Right to Peace Initiative at the United Nations
Select Bibliography:
- UN Declaration on the Right to Peace (2016)
- First session of the open-ended intergovernmental working group on a draft United Nations declaration on the right to peace (18-21 February 2013) https://www.ohchr.org/en/hr-bodies/hrc/right-peace/first-session → 18 February 2013 → States
- United States Mission to International Organisations in Geneva, “US Explanation of Vote: Resolution on Promotion of the Right to Peace Sponsored by Cuba” https://geneva.usmission.gov/2012/07/05/20538