International Law on Peacekeeping ─ A Study of Article 40 of the UN Charter

While the upsurge of incidents in which the UN Security Council has been invoking Chapter VII: Action with Respect to Threats to the Peace, Breaches of the Peace, and Acts of Aggression has been seen as a sign of renewed authority for the Security Council, others have suggested that it is more a symptom of failure to prevent conflict in the first place. One of the latter, Nasu (law, Australian National U. College of Law, Australia) suggests that a renewed attention to Chapter VII's Article 40--allowing the Security Council to call for provisional measures to be undertaken by the conflicting parties before invoking Article 39 measures to maintain or restore international peace and security--as a primary legal basis for dealing with conflict will "help restrain peacekeeping measures, whilst maintaining respect for the sovereignty of states in a balanced and nuanced manner." It will also, he argues, "ensure the normative coherence and integrity of the entire institution less susceptible to state-centric pragmatic doctrines." He conducts a legal analysis of the requirements contained in Article 40 to regulate the way in which peacekeeping measures are to be directed and undertaken and considers their jurisdictional basis, legality, and legitimacy, as well as procedural aspects. Martinus Nijhoff is an imprint of Brill. Annotation c2009 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Hitoshi Nasu is a lecturer in law at the ANU College of Law, The Australian National University. He received his Ph.D. in International Law from the Faculty of Law, The University of Sydney.