International Law on Peacekeeping: A Study of Article 40 of the UN Charter.

• Author: Lee, Annabel
• Position: Book review

Hitoshi Nasu, International Law on Peacekeeping: A Study of Article 40 of the UN Charter (Martinus Nijhoff, Leiden, 2009) ISBN 978-90-04-17226-5, 322 pages

With the increased activism of the UN Security Council over the past two decades, this book presents a timely and valuable study of article 40 of the Charter of the United Nations (1945) as the legal 'centre' of international peacekeeping. It examines the legal authority of, obligations and constraints upon, and accountability of the Council in regulating peacekeeping, in a world where an unreformed Council has become simultaneously hyperactive and inactive in the security field. The book is methodical, even forensic, in its treatment of the legal issues and makes a significant and thorough contribution to understanding the legal bases of peacekeeping.

Chapter 1 critically reviews peacekeeping practice and doctrine in light of UN conflict prevention policy. It discusses the tripartite doctrines of peacekeeping--consent, neutrality and the limited use of armed force--and concludes that they emerged from a pragmatic approach to conflict management which lacked critical legal and theoretical review, embodied in the ambiguity and elasticity of the definition of 'peacekeeping' itself. It argues that such legal uncertainty has overemphasised the role that the principle of consent should play, to the detriment of effective initiatives that the Security Council may lawfully take for conflict prevention. It argues that by placing Article 40 at the centre of the legal regime governing peacekeeping measures, a more flexible approach to conflict management will be facilitated. Based on the functional approach taken to Article 40, the book uses the term 'peacekeeping' to describe the functions that the Security Council performs that prevent the aggravation of armed conflict before adopting enforcement action.

Chapters 2 and 3 examine the proposition that Article 40 of the Charter provides the legal basis for peacekeeping. Chapter 2 looks at the origins of peacekeeping in the experience of the League of Nations in its efforts to prevent war and the peacekeeping measures available, under Article 11 of the Covenant of the League of Nations (1919). The chapter argues that the League's experience played an important role in the inclusion of Article 40 in the Charter and reinforces the view that provisional measures under the Charter are designed to be flexible.

Chapter 3 confirms the observation that the...