| Publication |
2006.
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| Summary/Abstract |
According to the conventional wisdom of the current debate on peacekeeping, the failures of the UN Security Council in general and in Rwanda in particular can be attributed to an absence, not of early warning systems, but of political will on the part of member states. This article argues against the assertion, advanced in much of the existing literature, that political will outweighed early warning in importance. These two factors were interlinked and cannot therefore be compared as if they existed separately. Instead, a more advanced early warning mechanism would have changed the political context so as to facilitate political will to intervene. At a minimal level, such a positive causal relationship would have enabled non-permanent Council members to acknowledge the genocide prior to UNAMIR's (United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda) withdrawal and thus to create a political atmosphere of urgency to rescue Rwandans instead of withdrawing troops.
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