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Conclusion Making a Difference So many people don’t think that one person can make a difference. But really, it has to start somewhere, so let it start with me. —Patsy Ruth Oliver, environmentalist and activist The lead up to the war in Iraq in early 2003 brought into sharp relief the tension between the human rights politics of international law and multilateral cooperation and the world of great power politics, based on separate calculations of national interests and defense. It seemed to pit two alternative visions of international relations against one another; the crisis over Iraq embroiled virtually the whole world. The weekend of February 14–16, 2003, saw mass global protest movements against the impending U.S. invasion of Iraq under the George W. Bush administration ’s announced preemptive war doctrine. In 600 cities in nearly every region of the world, over six million people joined the large gatherings in public venues. The communications revolution of the Internet synchronized the event; the global media captured it in detail. The size of the demonstrations took even the organizers by surprise. Some journalists began to speak of world public opinion as a ‘‘second superpower’’ arrayed against the first.1 The protests were a grassroots groundswell of public opposition to the war and, arguably, a defense of the values at the heart of human rights advocacy. Those in the crowds ranged from long-term peace activists to human rights defenders to members of antiglobalization coalitions to ordinary people, many of whom had never before participated in demonstrations . That February, public sentiment burst out to defend the role of the United Nations as the arbiter of the grave matter of war and peace. A parallel drama unfolded at the United Nations, shaped in good Conclusion 295 measure by international human rights legal practices. Emboldened partly by public opposition to the war, a majority of the Security Council member-states refused to give the U.S. government the imprimatur it demanded. At stake at the time were Iraq’s alleged arsenal of weapons of mass destruction and the role of the U.N. inspectors in the peaceful disarmament of the country. The Security Council became a court-like setting for the presentation and evaluation of the evidence for a secret, dangerous weapons’ program given by U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell. Expectations about international law, the weight of evidence, and the burden of proof had compelled the particular courtroom style of the confrontation. Even the superpower was forced to play. War broke out precisely thirty-one days after the dramatic February events, also revealing the obvious: state military force and international public opinion are two distinct forms of power in the international arena. Public opinion could not stop an administration already predetermined to go to war, if need be even unilaterally. Shortly after the invasion , the United Nations sanctioned the military action with resolutions that supported the U.S. goals of occupation and regime change in Iraq. A significant crystallizing moment in the early twenty-first century, the war raised the stakes about the catalysts for political change in the international arena. Which actions matter in global politics? Both in the lead up to and in the immediate aftermath of war and occupation, the debate remained focused primarily on the present. It centered on the decisive nature of political change (‘‘democratic’’ or ‘‘regime’’ change) brought from outside through the exercise of military power by the United States. This view highlighted the weakness of the United Nations. Despite all of its repeated resolutions in the 1990s, the Security Council had not been able to force compliance by the government of Saddam Hussein. Only great powers make things happen in the global community. Yet, the focus on the external sources of change overlooked the local and indigenous movements for democratic reform and human rights principles bringing their own understandings, definitions, and sense of timing to the reform effort. The links to foreign occupiers tainted some of the domestic participants in the continuing democratic struggle. The U.S.-led invasion certainly mattered, but it left the interregional relationships among states in enormous uncertainty. It exacerbated and created sectarian divisions, challenged existing alliances, produced complicating electoral victories, and led to a refugee crisis of tragic proportions that also has threatened to destabilize at least several neighbors of Iraq. Arguments about change from the immediate present are always inconclusive. Informed public debate requires historical perspective that would bring more critical questioning to the political decisions...

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