Westphalian system

TheWestphalian system,also known asWestphalian sovereignty,is a principle ininternational lawthat eachstatehas exclusivesovereigntyover itsterritory.The principle developed in Europe after thePeace of Westphaliain 1648, based on the state theory ofJean Bodinand thenatural lawteachings ofHugo Grotius.It underlies the moderninternational systemofsovereign statesand is enshrined in theUnited Nations Charter,which states that "nothing... shall authorize the United Nations to intervene in matters which are essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of any state."^[1]

According to the principle, every state, no matter how large or small, has an equal right to sovereignty.^[2]Political scientists have traced the concept to the eponymous peace treaties which ended theThirty Years' War(1618–1648) andEighty Years' War(1568–1648). The principle of non-interference was then further developed in the 18th century. The Westphalian system reached its peak in the 19th and 20th centuries, but it has faced recent challenges from advocates ofhumanitarian intervention.^[3]

Principles and criticism

A series of treaties made up thePeace of Westphalia,which has been considered by political scientists to be the beginning of the modern international system,^[4]^[5]^[6]^[7]in which external powers should avoid interfering in another country's domestic affairs.^[8]The backdrop of this was the previously held idea that Europe was supposed to be under the umbrella of a single Christian protectorate or empire; governed spiritually by the Pope, and temporally by one rightful emperor, such as that of theHoly Roman Empire.The then-emergingReformationhad undermined this as Protestant-controlled states were less willing to respect the "supra authority" of both the Catholic Church and the CatholicHabsburg-led Emperor.

Recent scholarship has argued that the titular Westphalian treaties in 1648 actually had little to do with the principles with which they are often associated: sovereignty, non-intervention, and the legal equality of states. For example, Andreas Osiander writes that "the treaties confirm neither [France's or Sweden's] 'sovereignty' nor anybody else's; least of all do they contain anything about sovereignty as a principle."^[9]Political scientists likeHall Gardnerhave challenged the titular applicability of these historical treaties towards the political principle on such grounds as well.^[10]^[a]Others, such asChristoph KampannandJohannes Paulmann,argue that the 1648 treaties, in fact, limited the sovereignty of numerous states within the Holy Roman Empire and that the Westphalian treaties did not present a coherent new state-system, although they were part of an ongoing change. Yet others, often post-colonialist scholars, point out the limited relevance of the 1648 system to the histories and state systems in the non-Western world.^[12]Nonetheless, "Westphalian sovereignty" continues to be used as a shorthand for the basic legal principles underlying the modern state system. The applicability and relevance of these principles have been questioned since the mid-20th century onward from a variety of viewpoints. Much of the debate has turned on the ideas ofinternationalismandglobalization,which some say conflicts with theDoctrine of the two swordsideal of self-sovereignty.^[13]^[14]^[15]

History

The ratification of theTreaty of Münster,part of thePeace of Westphaliathat ended theThirty Years' War

The origins of Westphalian sovereignty have been traced in the scholarly literature to the eponymousPeace of Westphalia(1648). The peace treaties put an end to theThirty Years' War,awar of religionthat devastated Germany and killed 30% of its population. Since neither the Catholics nor the Protestants had won a clear victory, the peace settlement established astatus quoorder in which states would refrain from interfering in each other's religious practices.^[8]Henry Kissingerwrote:

The Westphalian peace reflected a practical accommodation to reality, not a unique moral insight. It relied on a system of independent states refraining from interference in each other's domestic affairs and checking each other's ambitions through a general equilibrium of power. No single claim to truth or universal rule had prevailed in Europe's contests. Instead, each state was assigned the attribute of sovereign power over its territory. Each would acknowledge the domestic structures and religious vocations of its fellow states and refrain from challenging their existence.^[8]

The principle of non-interference in other countries' domestic affairs was laid out in the mid-18th century by Swiss juristEmer de Vattel.^[16]States became the primary institutional agents in aninterstate systemof relations. The Peace of Westphalia is said to have ended attempts to impose supranational authority on European states. The "Westphalian" doctrine of states as independent agents was bolstered by the rise in 19th-century thoughts of "classical"nationalism,under which legitimatestateswere assumed to correspond tonations,defined as groups of people united by language and culture.^[17]

In the Westphalian system, cities are subsumed within states.^[18]Before the Westphalian system, cities were not necessarily seen as internal to states.^[18]

Before the Westphalian system, the closest geopolitical system was the "Chanyuan system" established in East Asia in 1005 through theTreaty of Chanyuan,which, like the Westphalian peace treaties, designated national borders between the states of theSongandLiaodynasties in 11th century China.^[19]This system was thereafter copied and further developed in East Asia in the following centuries until the establishment of the pan-EurasianMongol Empirein the 13th century.^[20]

The Westphalian system reached its peak in the late 19th century. Although practical considerations still led powerful states to seek to influence the affairs of others, forcible intervention by one country in the domestic affairs of another was less frequent between 1850 and 1900 than in most previous and subsequent periods (i.e.Napoleonic,theGreat War,theSecond World War).^[21]

Chapter I of the United Nations Charterasserted a version of Westphalian sovereignty. Article 2, Clause 4 reads:

All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.

After the end of theCold War,the United States and Western Europe began talking of a post-Westphalian order in which countries could intervene against other countries under the context of human rights abuses. Critics of the post-Westphalian policy have argued that such intervention would be and has been used to continue processes similar to standard Euro-American colonialism, and that the colonial powers always used ideas similar to "humanitarian intervention" to justify colonialism, slavery, and similar practices.^[22]China and Russia have used theirUnited Nations Security Council veto powerto block what they see as American attempts to violate the sovereignty of other nations, perceiving it as imperialistic expansion under the guise of humanitarian intervention.^[23]

Challenges to Westphalia

The end of theCold Warsaw increased international integration and, arguably, the erosion of Westphalian sovereignty. Much of the literature was primarily concerned with criticizingrealistmodels of international politics in which the notion of the state as a unitary agent is taken asaxiomatic.^[24]

In 1998, at a Symposium on the Continuing Political Relevance of the Peace of Westphalia,NATOSecretary-GeneralJavier Solanasaid that "humanity and democracy [were] two principles essentially irrelevant to the original Westphalian order" and levelled a criticism that "the Westphalian system had its limits. For one, the principle of sovereignty it relied on also produced the basis for rivalry, not community of states; exclusion, not integration."^[25]

In 1999, British Prime MinisterTony Blairgave a speech inChicagowhere he "set out a new, post-Westphalian, 'doctrine of the international community.'"Blair argued thatglobalizationhad made the Westphalian approach anachronistic.^[26]Blair was later referred to byThe Daily Telegraphas "the man who ushered in the post-Westphalian era".^[27]Others have also asserted that globalization has superseded the Westphalian system.^[28]

In 2000, Germany'sForeign Minister Joschka Fischerreferred to the Peace of Westphalia in hisHumboldtSpeech, which argued that the system of European politics set up by Westphalia was obsolete: "The core of the concept of Europe after 1945 was and still is a rejection of the European balance-of-power principle and the hegemonic ambitions of individual states that had emerged following the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, a rejection which took the form of closer meshing of vital interests and the transfer of nation-state sovereign rights to supranational European institutions."^[29]

TheEuropean Union's concept of shared sovereignty is also somewhat contrary to historical views of Westphalian sovereignty, as it provides for external agents to influence and interfere in the internal affairs of its member countries.^[30]In a 2008 article, Phil Williams links the rise ofterrorismand violentnon-state actors(VNSAs), which pose a threat to the Westphalian sovereignty of thestate,toglobalization.^[31]

Military intervention

Interventions such as inCambodiabyVietnam(theCambodian–Vietnamese War) or inBangladesh(then a part ofPakistan) byIndia(theBangladesh Liberation Warand theIndo-Pakistani War of 1971) were seen by some as examples of humanitarian intervention, although their basis in international law is debatable.^[32]Other more recent interventions, and their attendant infringements of state sovereignty, also have prompted debates about their legality and motivations.

A new notion ofcontingent sovereigntyseems to be emerging, but it has not yet reached the point of international legitimacy.Neoconservatismin particular has developed this line of thinking further, asserting that a lack of democracy may foreshadow future humanitarian crises, or that democracy itself constitutes a human right, and therefore states not respecting democratic principles open themselves up tojust warby other countries.^[33]However, proponents of this theory have been accused of being concerned about democracy, human rights and humanitarian crises only in countries where American global dominance is challenged, while ignoring the same issues in other countries friendlier to the United States.^[34]^[35]

Further criticism of Westphalian sovereignty arises regarding allegedlyfailed states,of whichAfghanistan(before the2001 US-led invasion) has been often considered an example.^[36]By this view, it has been argued that no sovereignty exists and that international intervention is justified on humanitarian grounds and by the threats posed by failed states to neighboring countries and the world as a whole.^{[citation needed]}

Defenders of Westphalia

Although the Westphalian system developed inearly modern Europe,its staunchest defenders can now be found in the non-Western world. The presidents of China and Russia issued a joint statement in 2001 vowing to "counter attempts to undermine the fundamental norms of the international law with the help of concepts such as 'humanitarian intervention' and 'limited sovereignty'".^[37]China and Russia have used theirUnited Nations Security Council veto powerto block what they see as American violations of state sovereignty in Syria.^[23]^[38]Russia was left out of the original Westphalian system in 1648,^[8]but post-Soviet Russia has seen Westphalian sovereignty as a means to balance American power by encouraging amultipolar world order.^[39]

Some in the West also speak favourably of Westphalian sovereignty. American political scientistStephen Walturged U.S. PresidentDonald Trumpto return to Westphalian principles, calling it a "sensible course" for American foreign policy.^[40]

Notes

^Reviewer Sarang Shidore summarizes Gardner's argument:
Westphalian sovereignty, Gardner argues, is substantially a myth... Rather than a strict enshrining of the principle of noninterference, Westphalia legitimized "power sharing and joint sovereignty" by giving the new powers France and Sweden the right to interfere in the affairs of the German Protestant princes (p. 117).^[11]

References

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^Bankas, Ernest K (2005).The State Immunity Controversy in International Law: Private Suits Against Sovereign States in Domestic Courts.Springer.ISBN 9783540256953.Retrieved13 February2023.
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^Ercan, Pinar Gözen (2016).Debating the Future of the 'Responsibility to Protect': The Evolution of a Moral Norm.Springer. p. 109.ISBN 9781137524270.For instance, in the recent example of Syria, countries like Russia and China vetoed draft resolutions arguing on the basis of system values. Explaining the reasons for Russia's veto on October 2011 Vitaly Churkin stated... Of vital importance is the fact that at the heart of the Russian and Chinese draft was the logic of respect for the national sovereignty and territorial integrity of Syria... Four months later, another resolution on Syria was yet again vetoed, and on behalf of China, Li Baodong emphasised that Syria's 'sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity [as well as] the purposes and principles of the United Nations Charter must be respected'.
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