Eyewitness to a Genocide: The United Nations and Rwanda - Hardcover

Barnett, Michael

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9780801438837: Eyewitness to a Genocide: The United Nations and Rwanda

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0801438837 ISBN 13: 9780801438837

Publisher: Cornell University Press, 2002

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Why was the UN a bystander during the Rwandan genocide? Do its sins of omission leave it morally responsible for the hundreds of thousands of dead? Michael Barnett, who worked at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations from 1993 to 1994, covered Rwanda for much of the genocide. Based on his first-hand experiences, archival work, and interviews with many key participants, he reconstructs the history of the UN's involvement in Rwanda.

In the weeks leading up to the genocide, the author documents, the UN was increasingly aware or had good reason to suspect that Rwanda was a site of crimes against humanity. Yet it failed to act. Barnett argues that its indifference was driven not by incompetence or cynicism but rather by reasoned choices cradled by moral considerations. Employing a novel approach to ethics in practice and in relationship to international organizations, Barnett offers an unsettling possibility: the UN culture recast the ethical commitments of well-intentioned individuals, arresting any duty to aid at the outset of the genocide.

Barnett argues that the UN bears some moral responsibility for the genocide. Particularly disturbing is his observation that not only did the UN violate its moral responsibilities, but also that many in New York believed that they were "doing the right thing" as they did so. Barnett addresses the ways in which the Rwandan genocide raises a warning about this age of humanitarianism and concludes by asking whether it is possible to build moral institutions.

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From the Inside Flap:

"Michael Barnett provides insight into the problematic character of humanitarian diplomacy under current world conditions. Eyewitness to a Genocide is a highly sophisticated book that makes us rethink the role of the United Nations, enabling us to understand the operational ethics and geopolitical constraints that control this global organization supposedly dedicated to peace and justice."--Richard Falk, Princeton University

"Eyewitness to a Genocide is an important book on international ethics. Michael Barnett provides a superb analysis of bureaucratic decision making, of evil and how 'good' people contribute to its destructive force."--Howard Adelman, York University

About the Author:

Michael Barnett is Harold Stassen Chair at the Hubert H. Humphrey School and Adjunct Professor of Political Science at the University of Minnesota. He is coeditor most recently of Rules for the World: International Organizations in Global Politics, from Cornell, and Power and Global Governance.

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