Democratic Governance and Post-conflict Reconstruction

Leiden Journal of International Law

Volumn 20, Issue 3, 2007, Pages 669-693

  Cogen, Marc ^a   de Brabandere, Eric ^a  

^a GHENT UNIVERSITY   (Belgium)

Author keywords

democracy; free and fair elections; freedom of association; freedom of expression; human rights; international administration; state building; United Nations

Indexed keywords

EID: 85009638297     PISSN: 09221565     EISSN: 14789698     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S0922156507004311     Document Type: Article

References (55)

1. E. Root, ‘The Effect of Democracy on International Law’, (1917) 4 International Conciliation 153, at 156.
2. L. Diamond, ‘Promoting Democracy in the 1990s: Actors and Instruments, Issues and Imperatives’, Report to the Carnegie Commission on Preventing Deadly Conflict, Carnegie Corporation of New York (1995), available at http://wwics.si.edu/subsites/ccpdc/pubs/di/fr.htm.
3. See for example the speech delivered by the former EU External Relations Commissioner Chris Patten at a plenary session in Brussels: ‘Free societies tend not to fight one another or to be bad neighbours. That is why, over the last twenty years, we have made human rights and democratization in other countries a matter of European concern’. (SPEECH/99/193 (30 November 1999), available at http://ec.europa.eu/ comm/external_relations/news/patten/speech_99_193.htm). See also the declaration made by the ASEAN spokesman to the BBC following the adoption of the Bali Concord II: ‘Through the Bali Concord II, ASEAN has subscribed to the notion of democratic peace, which means all member countries believe democratic processeswill promote regional peace and stability’. (T. Luard, ‘Asean: Changing, But Only Slowly’, BBCNews Online, 8 Oct. 2003, available at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/3173458.stm).
4. R. Rich, ‘Bringing Democracy into International Law’, (2001) 12 Journal of Democracy 20, at 22.
5. On the question of legitimacy of governments in international law, see recently J. d'Aspremont, ‘Legitimacy of Governments in the Age of Democracy’, (2006) 38 NYU Journal of International Law and Politics 877.
6. T. Franck, ‘The Emerging Right to Democratic Governance’, (1992) 86 AJIL 46, at 61.
7. See Human Rights Committee General Comment 25 (57), The right to participate in public affairs, voting rights and the right of equal access to public service (Art. 25), UN Doc. CCPR/C/21/Rev.1/Add.7 (1996). In its General Comment 25, the Human Rights Committee confirms, in order to ensure the full enjoyment of rights protected by Article 25, the importance of ‘free communication of information and ideas about public and political issues between citizens, candidates and elected representatives, (which) implies a free press and othermedia able to comment on public issues without censorship or restraint and to inform public opinion’ (§ 26). The Human Rights Committee equally considered the ‘right to freedom of association, including the right to form and join organizations and associations concerned with political and public affairs, [as] an essential adjunct to the rights protected by article 25’ (§ 27). The 1993 Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action adopted at the World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna, 14-25 June 1993, equally confirmed the interdependence of democracy and human rights (Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action, UN Doc. A/CONF.157/23 (12 July 1993). See also A. J. Langlois, ‘Human Rights without Democracy? A Critique of the Separationist Thesis’, (2003) 25 Human Rights Quarterly 990, at 1008.
8. H. Hannum, ‘The Status of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in National and International Law’, (1995-6) 25 Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law 287, at 322. See also Franck, note 15, at
9. See, on the role of the ICCPR in the promotion of democracy, A. Mavrommatis, ‘The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and Its Role in Promoting Democracy’, in K. Koufa (ed.), Human Rights and Democracy for the 21st Century (1999), 255.
10. ‘The Charter of Paris for a New Europe’, 1991 SIPRI Yearbook 603.
11. GA Res. 45/150, Enhancing the Effectiveness of the Principle of Periodic and Genuine Elections, UN Doc. A/RES/45/150 (18 Dec. 1990).
12. S. Wheatley, ‘Democracy in International Law: A European Perspective’, (2002) 51 International and Comparative Law Quarterly 225, at 241.
13. T. Carothers, ‘Promoting Democracy and Fighting Terror’, (2003) 83 Foreign Affairs 84;
14. R. Sandbrook, ‘Democratisation and Institutional Reform’, in E. Nafziger and R. Vayrynen (eds.), The Prevention of Humanitarian Emergencies (2002), 151–72.
15. For an overview see B. R. Roth, ‘The Illegality of “Pro-democratic” Invasion Pacts’, in G. H. Fox and B. R. Roth (eds.), Democratic Governance and International Law (2000), 328.
16. Onthe question of the creation of democratic states, see in general J. d'Aspremont, ‘La création internationale d'Etats démocratiques’, (2005) Revue générale de droit international public 889.
17. M. Salamun, Democratic Governance in International Territorial Administration (2005), 59.
18. For an overview of the transitional political processes see A. Sailkal, ‘The UN and Democratisation in Afghanistan’, in E. Newman and R. Rich (eds.), The UN Role in Promoting Democracy: Between Ideals and Reality (2004), 320 at 357.
19. See M. Bothe and T. Marauhn, ‘UN Administration of Kosovo and East Timor: Concept, Legality and Limitations of Security Council-Mandated Trusteeship Administrations’, in C. Tomuschat (ed.), Kosovo and the International Community (2002), 217 at 218 ff.
20. see R. Wilde and B. Delcourt, ‘Le retour des “protectorats”. L'irrésistible attrait de l'administration de territoires étrangers’, in B. Delcourt, D. Duez, and E. Remacle (eds.), La guerre d'Irak. Prélude d'un nouvel ordre international? (2004) 219, and in particular part III, ‘L'irak: nouvel avatar de l'administration étrange” re de territoires’, at 237.
21. For an overview see R. Ludwig, ‘The UN's Electoral Assistance: Challenges, Accomplishments, Prospects’, in Newman and Rich,
22. Enhancing the Effectiveness of the Principle of Periodic and Genuine Elections, GA Res. 46/137, UN Doc. A/RES/137 (17 Dec. 1991).
23. S. Peou, ‘The UN's Modest Impact on Cambodia's Democracy’, in Newman and Rich, note 35, 258 at 264.
24. J. Sanderson, ‘The Cambodia Experience: A Success Story Still?’, in R. Thakur and A. Schnabel (eds.), United Nations Peacekeeping Operations: Ad Hoc Missions, Permanent Engagement (2001), 155 at 267.
25. See J. d'Aspremont, ‘Regulating Statehood: The Kosovo Status Settlement’, in this issue.
26. UNMIK, ‘Standards for Kosovo’, presented by the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on 10 December 2003, available at http://www.unmikonline.org/standards/docs/leaflet_stand_eng.pdf.
27. R. Caplan, International Governance of War-Torn Territories: Rule and Reconstruction (2005), 123.
28. See S. Chesterman, You The People - The United Nations, Transitional Administration, and State-Building (2004), 208–10, and
29. R. Ludwig, ‘The UN's Electoral Assistance: Challenges,Accomplishments, Prospects’, in Newman and Rich,
30. (P. Ashdown, ‘What I Learned in Bosnia’, New York Times, 28 October 2002.
31. See Y. Hysa, ‘Kosovo: A Permanent International Protectorate?’, in Newman and Rich, note 35, 282 at 296; and
32. A. Yannis, ‘The UN as Government in Kosovo’, (2004) 10 Global Governance 67, at 76.
33. UNMIK Regulation 2001/9 on the Constitutional Framework for Provisional Self-Government (UNMIK/ REG/2001/9) (15 May 2001). See C. Stahn, ‘Constitution without a State? Kosovo under the United Nations Constitutional Framework for Self-Government’, (2001) 14 LJIL 531.
34. For a critique see J. Chopra, ‘The UN's Kingdom of East Timor’, (2000) 42 Survival 27.
35. M. Juvenal dos Reis, ‘East Timor and the Role of International Assistance’, in Azimi, Fuller, and Nakayama,
36. S. Cliffe, ‘The East Timorese Reconstruction Programme: Successes, Problems and Tradeoffs’, in N. Azimi and L. L. Chang (eds.), The United Nations Transitional Administration in East Timor (UNTAET):Debriefing and Lessons (2003), 95 at 104.
37. For an overview of the drafting of the constitution, see J. Morrow and R. White, ‘The United Nations in Transitional East Timor: International Standards and the Reality of Governance’, (2002) 22 Australian Yearbook of International Law 1.
38. J. M. Saldanha and M. X. Magno, ‘UNTAET: Mandate, East Timorese Role, and Exit Strategy’, in Azimi and Chang,
39. C. Valenzuela, ‘Towards Elections’, in Azimi and Chang,
40. Cf. C. Johnson, W. Maley, A Their, and A. Wardak, ‘Afghanistan's Political and Constitutional Development’ (Overseas Development Institute, January 2003), 32, available at http://www.odi.org.uk/hpg/ papers/evaluations/afghandfid.pdf.
41. For a critiqueonthe ‘democratic’ nature of the Constitutional Loya Jirgaandthe constitutional developments in Afghanistan, see S. A. Arjomand, ‘Constitutional Developments in Afghanistan: A Comparative and Historical Perspective’, (2004-5) 53 Drake Law Review 943.
42. See for a critique of the election timetable L. Diamond, ‘Building Democracy after Conflict: Lessons from Iraq’, (2005) 16 Journal of Democracy 9.
43. M. K. R. Afshar, ‘The Case of an Afghan Apostate - The Rights to a Fair Trial between Islamic Law and Human Rights in the Afghan Constitution’, (2006) 10 Max Planck Yearbook of United Nations Law 591.
44. AIHRC-UNAMA, ‘Joint Verification of Political Rights, Wolesi Jirga and Provincial Council Elections, First Report’ (19 April-3 June 2005), available at http://www.aihrc.org.af/jvr_on_election.pdf, at 4.
45. UNAMI, Human Rights Report 1 September-31 October 2006, available at http://www.uniraq.org/ documents/HR%20Report%20Sep%20Oct%202006%20EN.pdf, at 23.
46. UNAMI, Human Rights Report 1 March-30 April 2006, available at http://www.uniraq.org/ documents/HR%20Report%20Mar%20Apr%2006%20EN.PDF, at 24.
47. UNMIK Regulation 2001/9 on the Constitutional Framework for Provisional Self-Government, UN Doc. UNMIK/REG/2001/9 (15 May 2001).
48. Ombudsperson Institution in Kosovo Press Release, ‘The Ombudsperson Asks the SRSG to Decriminalize Defamation Cases to Safeguard Freedom of Expression’ (7 March 2005), available at http:// www.ombudspersonkosovo.org.
49. AIHRC-UNAMA Joint Verification of Political Rights, Wolesi Jirga and Provincial Council Elections First Report (19 April-3 June 2005), available at http://www.aihrc.org.af/jvr_on_election.pdf, at 4.
50. AIHRC-UNAMA Joint Verification of Political Rights,Wolesi Jirga and Provincial Council Elections, Second Report (4 June-16 August 2005), available at http://www.aihrc.org.af/jvr_on_election2.pdf, para. 38.
51. United States Commission on International Religious Freedom Press Release, ‘Afghanistan: Freedom and Electoral Democracy Stifled by Supreme Court Chief Justice’ (13 September 2004), available at http://www.uscirf.gov/mediaroom/press/2004/september/09132004_afghanistan.html.
52. Joint press conference by Jean Arnault, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Afghanistan and Dr Seema Samar, Chairperson of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission (23 June 2004), available at http://www.un.org/apps/news/infocusnews.asp?News ID=760&s ID=1.
53. Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) Order No. 19, ‘Freedom of Assembly’ (10 July 2003), available at http://www.cpa-iraq.org/regulations/20030710_CPAORD_19_Freedom_of_Assembly_.pdf, section 1(1).
54. Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) Order No. 59 ‘Protection and Fair Incentives for Government Whistleblowers’ (1 June 2004), available at http://www.cpa-iraq.org/regulations/20040601_ CPAORD59_Protection_and_Fair_Incentives_for_Government_Whistleblowers.pdf.
55. See, e.g. Article 19, ‘Iraqi Laws Threaten Democracy’, press release, 5 February 2004, available at http://www.article19.org