From Kosovo to Kabul and Beyond

This new and updated edition of David Chandler's acclaimed book takes a critical look at the way in which human rights issues have been brought to the fore in international affairs. The UN and Nato's new policy of interventionism--as shown in Iraq, Somalia, Bosnia, Kosovo and East Timor--has been hailed as part of a new 'ethical' approach to foreign policy. David Chandler offers a rigorous critique of this apparently benign shift in international relations to reveal the worrying political implications of a new human rights discourse. He asks why the West can now prioritise the rights of individuals over the traditional rights of state sovereignty, and why this shift has happened so quickly. Charting the development of a human rights-based foreign policy, he considers the theoretical problems of defining human rights and sets this within the changing framework of international law. Meticulous and compelling, From Kosovo to Kabul and Beyond offers a disturbing insight into the political implications of a human rights-led foreign policy, and the covert agenda that it conceals.