The limits of the principle of charity: Why Haesebrouck is wrong after all

Abstract

In our article entitled ‘The Responsibility to Protect – An incoherent Doctrine?’ we claimed that R2P in the version proposed by the ICISS is incoherent. We argued that the ICISS-report used the criteria of right intention, proportionality and legitimate authority to determine when a humanitarian intervention is obligatory and we continued by arguing that this cannot be done in a coherent manner. In his reply to our article Tim Haesebrouck refutes our argument by claiming that the ICISS differentiates between criteria governing when a humanitarian intervention is obligatory from criteria governing what is permitted in an obligatory intervention and thereby avoid being incoherent. In this closing reply we show through an analysis of the report that ICISS does indeed differentiate between the criteria, but not in order to determine what is obligatory or permitted. Hence, our conclusion regarding the incoherence is not refuted by Haesebrouck.