Faculty Advisor
Chris Kendall
Area of Study
Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences
Publication Date
Summer 2021
Abstract
Recent quantitative scholarship on international human rights law has revealed a trend in which countries will ratify human rights law in order to improve their international standings, but won’t make the policy changes necessary to implement the law because the policy changes would be more expensive than the costs of noncompliance. This raises the question as to in what circumstances will international law enforcement be costly enough to force countries to comply with international human rights law.
Previous quantitative research demonstrates the importance of security concerns in determining US decisions to intervene. Additionally, previous research indicates that economic concerns have long term impacts on the likelihood of intervention, though the exact impacts are unclear. This article will thus treat economic variables as indicators of humanitarian intervention that require further exploration. Further, none of the scholars cited in the literature review focus on political explanations of humanitarian intervention. This is surprising given that political interests have a large impact on state behavior. Therefore, this study will focus on political concerns as a second indicator of humanitarian intervention using UN voting data as an indicator of political alignment.
Award
AHSS Summer Research Scholar
Recommended Citation
Cooper, Jessica Jo, "The Selectivity Gap in United States Responses to Human Rights Violations: Personal Integrity Violations between 1991 and 2001" (2021). Summer Research. 432.
https://soundideas.pugetsound.edu/summer_research/432
Rights
Publisher
University of Puget Sound
The Selectivity Gap in the United States Poster