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The defences available to an agent accused of wrongdoing can be considered as justifications (which render acts lawful) or excuses (which shield the agent from the legal consequences of the wrongful act). This distinction is familiar to many domestic legal systems, and tracks analogous notions in moral philosophy and ordinary language. Nevertheless, it remains contested in some domestic jurisdictions where it is often argued that the distinction is purely theoretical and has no consequences in practice. In international law too the distinction has been fraught with controversy, though there are increasing calls for its recognition. This book is the first to comprehensively and thoroughly examine the distinction and its relevance to the international legal order. Combining an analysis of state practice, and historical, doctrinal and theoretical developments, the book shows that the distinction is not only possible in international law but that it is also one that would have important practical implications.

The emergence of new states and independence movements after the Cold War has intensified the long-standing disagreement among international lawyers over the right of self-determination, especially the right of secession. Knop shifts the discussion from the articulation of the right to its interpretation. She argues that the practice of interpretation involves and illuminates a problem of diversity raised by the exclusion of many of the groups that self-determination most affects. Distinguishing different types of exclusion and the relationships between them reveals the deep structures, biases and stakes in the decisions and scholarship on self-determination. Knop's analysis also reveals that the leading cases have grappled with these embedded inequalities. Challenges by colonies, ethnic nations, indigenous peoples, women and others to the gender and cultural biases of international law emerge as integral to the interpretation of self-determination historically, as do attempts by judges and other institutional interpreters to meet these challenges

The concepts of necessity, imminence, and proportionality play a central part in Daniel Bethlehem's sixteen proposed principles regulating a state's use of force against an imminent or actual attack by nonstate actors. While all three are requirements that must be considered in the law of self-defense, their exact content remains somewhat unclear. In this comment, we examine how each one is conceived in Bethlehem's principles and review the questions that remain unanswered.

The first article of a roundtable discussion on evaluating the preemptive use of force examines distinctions between preemptive & preventive war. Preemption has traditionally been based on perceptions of immediate threat, making the right to preempt an extension of the right of self-defense. Preventive war is considered illegal because it is based on perceptions of future threats that could be responded to in other ways. Historical examples of the difference between preemption & prevention are described to point out difficulties that arise from the distinction. President George W. Bush's assumption that possession of weapons of mass destruction by potential enemies is justification for a preventive war is discussed, along with the implications of not having an international political framework capable of restraining states; the illusion of absolute security; & the notion of humanitarian intervention. The fact that sanctions against Iraq have unintentionally imposed suffering on innocent citizens that the regime has made no attempt to alleviate is seen as possible justification for a more active policy. J. Lindroth

"This book examines to what extent the right of self-defence, as laid down in Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, permits States to launch military operations against other States. In particular, it focuses on the occurrence of an 'armed attack' - the crucial trigger for the activation of this right. In light of the developments since 9/11, the author analyses relevant physical and verbal customary practice, ranging from the 1974 Definition of Aggression to recent incidents such as the 2001 US intervention in Afghanistan and the 2006 Israeli intervention in Lebanon. The notion of 'armed attack' is examined from a threefold perspective. What acts can be regarded as an 'armed attack'? When can an 'armed attack' be considered to take place? And from whom must an 'armed attack' emanate? By way of conclusion, the different findings are brought together in a draft 'Definition of Armed Attack'"--