The Foreign Service Journal, October 2005

or another. It is still too soon to say for sure whether the Bush Doctrine will ultimately be judged a success or failure. Indeed, the interpretation of his- tory being what it is, there are sure to be differences of opinion. But while the president main- tains, on the basis of largely cir- cumstantial evidence, that the war waged to remove Saddam Hussein from power was instru- mental in convincing Libya’s Muammar Qadhafi to abandon his nuclear schemes, he cannot account for why the leaders in two other rogue states — Iran and North Korea — have failed to respond as the Bush Doctrine suggests that they would: by capit- ulating. And that raises questions about the efficacy of the Bush Doctrine toward all rogue states. Knowing the Rules The problem of rogues in the international system is not new, even if the terms “rogue state,” “pariah state” and “outlaw state” might be. From the assassins and bandits that patrolled the outer reaches of the Roman Empire, to the Barbary pirates of the early 19th century, there have always been outlaws. They thrived through much of human history not so much because they were strong, but rather because the institutions which existed to enforce certain norms were relatively weak. Even today, however, when states are strong relative to their predecessors, and acceptable norms of behavior are generally embraced around the world, the non-state outlaw is still with us. When these men and women com- bine their efforts they can be very dangerous. International criminal enterprises exist, and not just in movies. The sky-high profits created by the criminaliza- tion of certain narcotics feed internal corruption from Colombia and Mexico to Afghanistan and Russia. Al- Qaida and other terrorist organizations demonstrate that the emergence of the nation-state as the dominant form of political organization around the world does not ensure secu- rity, even in places where the state is very strong: the United Kingdom, Germany, Spain and even the United States, just to name a few. Meanwhile, even as more and more states have come together in the interest of stopping inter- national terrorism, there remain rogue states that flout estab- lished rules and norms. The tra- ditional definition of a rogue state pertains to violations of state sovereignty. Article 2 of the United Nations charter stipulates that all member nations shall “refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political inde- pendence of any state.” Iraq clearly acted as a rogue state when it invaded Kuwait in 1990, and the interna- tional community responded with near-unanimity; Saddam was expelled from Kuwait by a group of nations acting with the official sanction of the United Nations. In recent years, however, the definition has become increasingly muddled. It now takes account not simply of how states interact with other states, but also of how particular regimes treat their own people. As a result, the number of potential rogue states has expanded dra- matically. Article 2 has been largely superceded by a particular interpretation of international relations based on a nebulous “responsibility to protect.” Indeed, U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan recently reaffirmed the world body’s right to circumvent state sovereignty in certain circumstances. “Governments must assume their responsibility to protect their citi- zens,” Annan explained at a meeting of the Council on Foreign Relations in December 2004. “Where they fail to do so, the Security Council must assume its responsi- bility to protect.” The Secretary General’s High-Level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change expanded on this theme in its 2004 report, A More Secure World: Our Shared Responsibility . The Security Council, the panelists explained, could authorize “military intervention as a last resort, in the event of genocide and other large-scale killing, ethnic cleansing or serious violations of humani- F O C U S 26 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / O C T O B E R 2 0 0 5 The traditional definition of a rogue state pertains to violations of state sovereignty. … In recent years, however, the definition has become increasingly muddled. Christopher Preble is director of foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute (www.cato.org) an d a founding member of the Coalition for a Realistic Foreign Policy (www.realisticforeignpolicy.org).