'The devilish thing': The Commonwealth and Zimbabwe's dénouement

One of the abiding ironies of the Commonwealth is that one of the organization's key statements on democracy and human rights is known as the Harare Declaration. This called for the liberty of the individual under the law and the individual's inalienable right to participate by means of free and democratic political processes in framing the society in which he or she lives. Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe (and other African leaders) signed up to this normative commitment voluntarily, with its emphasis on democracy, human rights and the rule of law. Yet in the case of Zimbabwe such norms were actively and consciously undermined by a number of the Commonwealth's own members.