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Paul Poast Profile picture
@ProfPaulPoast
May 18 • 17 tweets • 5 min read • Read on X
What's wrong with the word "genocide"?

[THREAD]
To be clear, I think we need to talk more about genocide in my discipline, International Relations.

And there is still much about genocides in the past that we don't understand...

tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.10…
...including whether to recognize past mass killings as genocide.
academic.oup.com/hgs/article-ab…
This 🧵 is about the use of the word in policy debates regarding ongoing instances of mass violence.

Such as the War in Gaza.

bbc.com/news/world-mid…
The term has been used to invoke calls for action to stop the fighting...

press.un.org/en/2024/gapal1…
Image
...and is of course the basis of a case before the International Court of Justice.
bbc.com/news/articles/…
But we are already witnessing the drawback of focusing on whether genocide is taking place in Gaza: genocide is hard to prove.

worldpoliticsreview.com/ukraine-genoci…
Why is that? While the "Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide" offers a fairly broad definition of the ACTS that count as genocide...

un.org/en/genocidepre…
Image
...those acts need to have "intent".

Hence, at the ICJ, Israel has argued that while the killing of civilians in Gaza is tragic, there is no genocidal intent.
timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry…
The point is that if one invokes the word "genocide" during an ongoing war, the focus turns to discerning intent of the accused.

That is both hard to prove in real time and gives that side plausible deniability for actions that lead to the death of civilians.
That was the basis of the claim I made in a recent @WPReview piece on why Israel's conduct in Gaza is pushing the limits of the Biden administration's willingness to support it.

worldpoliticsreview.com/us-israel-rela…
As I wrote, debates over intent distracts from the larger issue: that civilians are dying due to the manner by which Israel is carrying out its military operation. Image
There are further issues with focusing on "genocide".

Shaming an international actor has the possibility of backfiring. It can lead the actor to become entrenched in its position.

amazon.com/Geopolitics-Sh…
Additionally, it may not actually spur support for action. Studies have found: "Labeling a violent event “genocide” or equating it explicitly to the Holocaust does not induce the public to become significantly more supportive of intervention"

tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.108…
Overall, while it is important to identify when genocides occur and to strive to prevent genocides from happening in the first place, using the word "genocide" to describe an ongoing humanitarian crisis can be counter productive at worst...and perhaps irrelevant at best.

[END]
Addendum: A useful 🧵 presenting the counter argument: what is right with the word "genocide". Encourage readers to consider both positions.

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More from @ProfPaulPoast

Paul Poast Profile picture
May 11
Should everyone have nuclear weapons?

That's the core question in the Waltz-Sagan debate

[THREAD] Image
In my latest @WPReview thread, I wrote about another debate: whether nuclear weapons actually deter.
worldpoliticsreview.com/nuclear-weapon…
I pointed out the difficulties in answering that question, namely that we don't actually know when deterrence works (i.e. selection bias)...
tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.108…
Read 22 tweets
Paul Poast Profile picture
May 4
Does the United States have a responsibility to protect the civilians of Gaza?

[THREAD] Image
In my latest @WPReview column, I wrote of the downfall of "Responsibility to Protect" or R2P.

worldpoliticsreview.com/us-foreign-pol…
R2P is "the responsibility to protect its populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity". This means nations can't hide behind the barrier of "sovereignty" to stop interventions.

un.org/en/genocidepre…
Read 22 tweets
Paul Poast Profile picture
Apr 21
The House passed a defense supplement for Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan.

Ukraine aid was the most controversial portion of the supplement and might cost Speaker Johnson his leadership position.

Why did he do it?

[THREAD] Image
As is being reported, Johnson stated “To put it bluntly, I would rather send bullets to Ukraine than American boys. My son is going to begin in the Naval Academy this fall....This is not a game, this is not a joke.”
cnn.com/2024/04/21/pol…
While it's partly personal for Johnson, his remarks emphasize a larger point, one that I raised in a recent @WPReview column: cutting off US aid won't end the war. Instead, it would embolden Russia.
worldpoliticsreview.com/us-ukraine-aid…
Read 19 tweets
Paul Poast Profile picture
Apr 20
Let's do this.

A close reading of Donald Trump's recent description of the Battle of Gettysburg.

TL, DR: there were no pirates.

[THREAD] Image
ICYMI, here is a clip of what Trump said about the Battle of Gettysburg at his recent Pennsylvania rally

Let's start at the beginning:

"The Union was saved by the immortal heroes at Gettysburg"
Read 30 tweets
Paul Poast Profile picture
Apr 14
Are we on the brink of a larger Middle East War?

The risk increased in the past day, but is still low.

[SHORT THREAD]
Many of the points raised in 👇 🧵 from October still apply: larger wars happen because states want to be drawn in.

Is that still the case?
This @goodauth piece from October made related points about the tools states -- specifically Iran and Israel -- can use to control escalation.

goodauthority.org/news/will-the-…
Read 9 tweets
Paul Poast Profile picture
Apr 13
"International law is fake law."

"The only real law is domestic law."

Both statements are wrong. In some sense, the opposite might be true.

[THREAD] Image
As I wrote recently in @WPReview, international law is flawed. But flawed shouldn't be confused with pointless.

worldpoliticsreview.com/war-gaza-inter…
I emphasized how international law is part of a broader diplomatic process where states try to convey their preferences over policy.

In other words, from signing a treaty to filing a ICJ dispute, international law provides information.

journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.117…
Read 20 tweets

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