The Lessons of Darfur for the Future of Humanitarian Intervention.

The emergence of post-September 11 military operations in the context of the global fight against terrorism in general and the Iraq war in particular has overshadowed humanitarian interventions conducted by multilateral institutions. However, the threat posed by genocidal governments deserves the continuing attention of global governance because their draconian policies and mobilization capacities constitute the actual weapons of mass destruction against civilian populations. The tardy response of the international community to atrocities in Darfur has been widely regarded as a backlash of the emerging norm in international society which attributes a responsibility to protect civilians targeted by genocidaires. This article, however, will argue that the United Nations, the African Union, the European Union, and NATO have in fact devised and implemented two innovative peacekeeping strategies in Darfur that have set more optimistic precedents for humanitarian intervention, namely, a new division of labor between regional and international organizations and a pragmatic turn in peacekeeping. By dint of these new strategies, intervening organizations have an opportunity to counterbalance the deep-seated problems that routinely affect peacekeeping operations, namely, the body-bag syndrome and the rigidity of bureaucratic norms that regulate PKOs. KEYWORDS: conflict management, Darfur, humanitarian intervention, peacekeeping, United Nations. **********