On sovereignty

There is widespread agreement that sovereignty is a so-called master noun of international relations. However, there remains disagreement concerning the meaning, role and significance of sovereignty in the twenty-first century. State sovereignty can be invoked to defend a people's right to establish an identity and to protect autonomy and self-determination against external interference. On the other hand, state sovereignty can equally be responsible for enabling bad governments to commit domestic atrocities, and even genocide, with impunity. Phenomena such as liberation movements, nationalism and humanitarian intervention are also related to issues of sovereignty and indirectly paint a picture of modern sovereignty. For example, interventions in Iraq (1991) and Somalia (1993) reveal a general mistrust that state sovereignty does enough to protect state citizens; international failure to later intervene in conflicts in Rwanda and Bosnia in the mid-1990s suggests a revival of the idea of inviolable state sovereignty (perhaps as a consequence of the lack of success of previous interventions); international commitments in Kosovo and East Timor in 1999 expose another crisis of the sovereignty idea, probably following guilt feelings for not intervening in Rwanda, and so forth. The contemporary relevance of sovereignty cannot be underestimated, and consequently to understand the meaning of sovereignty enhances any understanding of international affairs. This chapter will provide an explanation of sovereignty, and will analyse the implications of state sovereignty on international relations. First, the works of Jean Bodin and Thomas Hobbes will be used to explain the definition and purpose of sovereignty. Second, there will be a consideration of eighteenth-, nineteenth- and twentieth-century responses to classical theories of sovereignty, paying particular attention to the views of Immanuel Kant. Third, sovereignty will be considered in terms of three adjective-pairs - external and internal, legal and political, hard and porous.