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What is “The Conscience of the Civilized World”: Nineteenth-Century International Law and the Decline of Notions of Universal Crime about?

This chapter assesses the role of universal crime in nineteenth-century European arguments on the legitimacy of imperial rule. British abolitionist arguments redeployed the concept by overlaying “humanity” with the discourse of civilizationalism. Abolitionist uses of universal crime hence targeted imperial Britain rather than colonized societies. Refracting “humanity” through the lens of civilizational distinction indicates nineteenth-century changes in European international thought that lessened the popularity of the concept of universal crime. Overall, the chapter argues that a turn from an “inclusionary Eurocentrism” to an “exclusionary Eurocentrism” subtends these changes. Analyzing John Stuart Mill’s and Tocqueville’s evaluations of European imperialism shows that they discussed the legitimate conduct of colonial rule not in terms of humanity’s laws, but in terms of national identity and reputation. The chapter further assesses in detail those features of nineteenth-century international theory that engendered a normatively fractured vision of humanity that was inimical to its imagination as universally injured.

Author

Sinja Graf

Publisher

Oxford University Press

Published

2021

Language

EN