Why did the Armenian genocide erupt in Turkey in 1915, only seven years after the Armenian minority achieved civil equality for the first time in the history of the Ottoman Empire? How can we explain the Rwandan genocide occurring in 1994, after decades of relative peace and even cooperation between the Hutu majority and the Tutsi minority? Addressing the question of how the risk of genocide develops over time, On the Path to Genocide contributes to a better understand why genocide occurs when it does. It provides a comprehensive and comparative historical analysis of the factors that led to the 1915 Armenian genocide and the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, using fresh sources and perspectives that yield new insights into the history of the Armenian and Rwandan peoples. Finally, it also presents new research into constraints that inhibit genocide, and how they can be utilized to attempt the prevention of genocide in the future.

This collection of essays by Indonesian and foreign contributors offers new and highly original analyses of the mass violence in Indonesia which began in 1965 and its aftermath. Fifty years on from one the largest genocides of the twentieth century, they probe the causes, dynamics and legacies of this violence through the use of a wide range of sources and different scholarly lenses. Chapter 12 of this book is available open access under a CC BY 4.0 license at link.springer.com.

Drawing on the expertise of scholars from a variety of backgrounds, this anthology specifically seeks to shed light on this genocide from a multidisciplinary perspective and serve as a step for developing the future scholarship about the Sayfo.

How does ideology in some states radicalise to such an extent as to become genocidal? Can the causes of radicalisation be seen as internal or external? Examining the ideological evolution in the Armenian genocide, the Holocaust and during the break up of Yugoslavia, Elisabeth Hope Murray seeks to answer these questions in this comparative work.

In July 1995, the Bosnian Serb Army commanded by General Ratko Mladic attacked the enclave of Srebrenica, a UN "safe area" since 1993, and massacred about 8,000 Bosniac men. While the responsibility for the massacre itself lays clearly with the Serb political and military leadership, the question of the responsibility of various international organizations and national authorities for the fall of the enclave is still passionately discussed, and has given rise to various rumors and conspiracy theories. Follow-up investigations by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and by several commissions have dissipated most of these rumors and contributed to a better knowledge of the Srebrenica events and the part played by the main local and international actors. This volume represents the first systematic, comparative analysis of those investigations. It brings together analyses from both the external standpoint of academics and the inside perspective of various professionals who participated directly in the inquiries, including police officers, members of parliament, high-ranking civil servants, and other experts. Evaluating how institutions establish facts and ascribe responsibilities, this volume presents a historiographical and epistemological reflection on the very possibility of writing a history of the present time.

The diversity of Kurdish communities across the Middle East is now recognized as central to understanding both the challenges and opportunities for their representation and politics. Yet little scholarship has focused on the complexities within these different groups and the range of their experiences. This book diversifies the literature on Kurdish Studies by offering close analyses of subjects which have not been adequately researched, and in particular, by highlighting the Kurds' relationship to the Yazidis. Case studies include: the political ideas of Ehmede Xani, "the father of Kurdish nationalism"; Kurdish refugees in camps in Iraq; the perception of the Kurds by Armenians in the late Ottoman Empire and the Turks in modern Western Turkey; and the important connections and shared heritage of the Kurds and the Yazidis, especially in the aftermath of the 2014 ISIS attacks. The book comprises the leading voices in Kurdish Studies and combines in-depth empirical work with theoretical and conceptual discussions to take the debates in the field in new directions. The study is divided into three thematic sections to capture new insights into the heterogeneous aspects of Kurdish history and identity. In doing so, contributors explain why we need to pay close attention to the shifting identities and the diversity of the Kurds, and what implications this has for Middle East Studies and Minority Studies more generally.

This volume focuses on the impact of the Armenian Genocide on different academic disciplines at the crossroads of the centennial commemorations of the Genocide. Its interdisciplinary nature offers the opportunity to analyze the Genocide from different angles using the lens of several fields of study.

The tools of reason offer the best hope for the international community to confront the increasing incidents of hate throughout the world. A historically informed, normative examination of the elements of the crime of genocide provides an excellent case study of how the law, reason's handmaiden, enhances understanding and improves practical ways of dealing with global injustices. How should we confront hate? As political activists, we could resort to fighting hate with hate. As concerned citizens, we could consciously ignore or actively protest hate. As committed educators, we could put the implements and survivors of hate on display. As committed scholars, we could resuscitate the idea of evil. As humanitarian jurists, we could put individual hate-mongers on trial. Part I of this book makes a case for making the maximum use of reason to deal with hate. This means that we should actively debate those who promote hate. Further, as a close look at the history of applying law to incidents of hate and violence illustrates, the courtroom proves to be an excellent place to demonstrate the virtues of applying the tools of reason, not to global evils, but to the grave injustices of the world. In Part II, Simon demonstrates the power of legal analysis in enhancing our understanding of genocide, probably the worst injustice imaginable. A close examination of each purported element of the crime of genocide redirects misguided turns taken by international jurists. Contrary to a more realistic perspective adopted at the Nuremberg trials, jurists have mistakenly modeled international criminal law on national criminal law, which focuses on individual responsibility. However, the cases of grave injustices throughout the 20th century amply demonstrate the primary collective responsibility underlying incidences of genocide. The failure to prosecute criminal organizations for genocide has and will continue to have disastrous results. While the Nuremberg tribunal at least disbanded the responsible Nazi organizations, current war crimes tribunals have allowed organizations responsible for the Rwandan genocide to continue to wreak havoc throughout Central Africa. If the international community cannot forge a common understanding of genocide, then it has little hope of establishing an international legal order or a global ethics.

This book is the first comprehensive biography of Lemkin based on his papers. It highlights the role of culture in Lemkin's campaign for a Genocide convention and his use of the concept in historical research. It throws fresh light on the attempt by the British government to block the convention. This book is the first complete biography of Raphael Lemkin, the father of the United Nations Genocide Convention, based on his papers; and shows how his campaign for an international treaty succeeded. In addition, the book covers Lemkin's inauguration of the historical study of past genocides.

In July 1995, the Bosnian Serb Army commanded by General Ratko Mladic attacked the enclave of Srebrenica, a UN "safe area" since 1993, and massacred about 8,000 Bosniac men. While the responsibility for the massacre itself lays clearly with the Serb political and military leadership, the question of the responsibility of various international organizations and national authorities for the fall of the enclave is still passionately discussed, and has given rise to various rumors and conspiracy theories. Follow-up investigations by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and by several commissions have dissipated most of these rumors and contributed to a better knowledge of the Srebrenica events and the part played by the main local and international actors. This volume represents the first systematic, comparative analysis of those investigations. It brings together analyses from both the external standpoint of academics and the inside perspective of various professionals who participated directly in the inquiries, including police officers, members of parliament, high-ranking civil servants, and other experts. Evaluating how institutions establish facts and ascribe responsibilities, this volume presents a historiographical and epistemological reflection on the very possibility of writing a history of the present time.

Isabelle Delpla is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at the University Montpellier III. Her research focuses on international ethics and justice and the relationships between philosophy and anthropology. She has conducted fieldwork in Bosnia with victim associations, Hague witnesses, and convicted war criminals.

Xavier Bougarel is Researcher at the French Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique in Paris. He is currently researching the wars of the 1990s and their aftermath in the former Yugoslavia and the transformations of Islam in the post-Communist Balkans.

Jean-Louis Fournel is Professor at the University of Paris VIII. His research focuses on the history of warfare, political thought, and the rhetoric of the Italian Renaissance. Between 1997 and 2001, he directed several European cooperation programs with universities in Bosnia- Herzegovina. In 1994, while the city was under siege, he co-organized the initiative for a sister relationship between his university and that of Sarajevo.

In 1947 German Field Marshal Albert Kesselring was tried and convicted of war crimes committed during World War II. He was held responsible for his troops having executed nearly 9,000 Italian citizens--women, children, elderly men--in retaliation for partisan attacks. His conviction, however, created a real dilemma for the United States and western Europe. While some sought the harshest punishments available for anyone who had participated in the war crimes of the Nazi regime, others believed that the repatriation of alleged war criminals would help secure the allegiance of a rearmed West Germany in the dangerous new Cold War against the Soviet Union.

Kerstin von Lingen's close analysis of the Kesselring case reveals for the first time how a network of veterans, lawyers, and German sympathizers in Britain and America achieved the commutation of Kesselring's death sentence and his eventual release--reinforcing German popular conceptions that he had been innocent all along and that the Wehrmacht had fought a "clean war" in Italy. Synthesizing the work of contemporary German and Italian historians with her own exhaustive archival research, she shows that Kesselring bore much greater guilt for civilian deaths than had been proven in court--and that the war on the southern front had been far from clean.

Von Lingen weaves together strands of the story as diverse as Winston Churchill's ability to mobilize support among British elites, Basil Liddell Hart's need to be recognized as an important military thinker, and the Cold War fears of the "Senators' Circle" in the United States. Through this rich narrative, she shows how international politics shaped the trial's proceedings and outcome--as well as the memory and meaning of the war for German citizens--and sheds new light on the complex interplay between the combatants' efforts to "master the past" and the threatening state of international relations in the early Cold War.

In analyzing the efforts to clear Kesselring's name, von Lingen shows that the case was about much more than the fate of one convicted individual; it also underscored the pressure to wrap up the war crimes issue--and German guilt--in order to get on with the business of bringing a rearmed Germany into the Western alliance. Kesselring's Last Battle sheds new light on the "politics of memory" by unraveling a twisted thread in postwar history as it shows how historical truth is sometimes sacrificed on the altar of expediency.

The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide was the first human rights treaty adopted by the United Nations, reflecting the global commitment to 'never again' in the wake of the Holocaust. Seven decades on, The United Nations and Genocide examines how the UN has met, and failed to meet, the commitment to 'prevent and punish' the crime of genocide. It explores why the UN was unable to respond effectively to the genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda, the Balkans and Darfur, and considers new approaches recently adopted by the UN to address genocide. This volume asks the crucial question: can the UN protect peoples from genocide in the modern world?

Genocide results from the culmination of conflicts over identity. A group of people that feels threatened by extinction resorts to genocide as a pathologically defensive reaction. This poses a security dilemma that can only be broken by quelling the feelings of threat and fear that prompt mass violence. In order to prevent genocide, it is essential to understand the internal dynamics of identity conflict. It is also important to intervene at the early stages of identity conflict; the parties involved require external help to ease tensions.
In this volume, noted thinkers and practitioners of conflict management, who hail from ten different countries, present ideas on how to prevent identity issues from causing fear and escalating into genocide. They focus on measures for handling the internal dynamics of parties facing identity conflicts, as well as considerations for arranging external assistance. Contributors address the problem of outbidders, actors whose non-conciliatory attitudes put them in positions of leadership in their identity groups. Since political extremism and violence can signal resolve and commitment to a group cause, moderates give way to hardliners. Spoilers, who believe that peace undermines their interests and power, also play a key role in the dynamics of conflicts. Careful attention is necessary to select appropriate third parties who can pull conflicting parties off the course of conflict. The authors discuss the concepts and practices involved in changing structures and attitudes to ease tensions, as well as the measures interveners must take to work in the midst of conflicting groups.

Cutting-edge in its scope and approach, this unique volume offers first-person accounts of modern genocides to enable readers to more fully examine genocidal experiences and better understand the horror of such events. From the atrocities of the Holocaust to the ongoing horrors in Darfur, genocide has been a gruesome and all-too-prominent fixture of modern history. There is no better way to examine and understand these events than through the accounts of those involved. This unique collection of primary sources features 50 documents, some of which have never before been made public. These firsthand accounts-diary entries, memoirs, oral testimony, original interviews, and more-illuminate 10 genocides of the 20th and 21st centuries as they were experienced by victims, perpetrators, and bystanders. The book begins with the Herero Genocide (1904-1907) and ends with a consideration of the atrocities in Darfur. Each of the 50 documents features a brief introduction that provides basic and essential information such as who created it as well as when, where, and why. The work concludes with an analysis comprised of scholarly commentary, additional contextual information, and a list of questions that will serve as a springboard for student discussion of history and of the nature of survival in the face of evil. Examines 10 modern genocides that occurred between 1904 and 2004 Conveys the story of each genocide through primary source documents that detail historical and contemporary contexts Addresses not only the reality of modern genocides but also the consequences and impact on individuals Challenges the readers to look more carefully into the historic details of the genocide under discussion, fostering critical thinking and research Enables students and other readers to empathize more directly with the reality of massive human rights violations

Genocide is a phenomenon that continues to confound scholars, practitioners, and general readers. Notwithstanding the carnage of the twentieth century, our understanding of genocide remains partial. Disciplinary boundaries have inhibited integrative studies and popular, moralizing accounts have hindered comprehension by advancing simple truths in an area where none are to be had. Genocide: A Reader lays the foundations for an improved understanding of genocide. With the help of 150 essential contributions, Jens Meierhenrich provides a unique introduction to the myriad dimensions of genocide and to the breadth and range of critical thinking that exists concerning it. This innovative anthology offers genre-defining as well as genre-bending selections from diverse disciplines in law, the social sciences, and the humanities as well as from other fields. A wide-ranging introductory chapter on the study and history of genocide accompanies the carefully curated and annotated collection. By revisiting the past of genocide studies and imagining its future, Genocide: A Reader is an indispensable resource for novices and specialists alike.

The Routledge History of Genocide takes an interdisciplinary yet historically focused look at history from the Iron Age to the recent past to examine episodes of extreme violence that could be interpreted as genocidal. Approaching the subject in a sensitive, inclusive and respectful way, each chapter is a newly commissioned piece covering a range of opinions and perspectives. The topics discussed are broad in variety and include: genocide and the end of the Ottoman Empire Stalin and the Soviet Union Iron Age warfare genocide and religion Japanese military brutality during the Second World War heritage and how we remember the past. The volume is global in scope, something of increasing importance in the study of genocide. Presenting genocide as an extremely diverse phenomenon, this book is a wide-ranging and in-depth view of the field that will be valuable for all those interested in the historical context of genocide.

Drawing on previously inaccessible and overlooked archival sources, The Herero Genocide undertakes a groundbreaking investigation into the war between colonizer and colonized in what was formerly German South-West Africa and is today the nation of Namibia. In addition to its eye-opening depictions of the starvation, disease, mass captivity, and other atrocities suffered by the Herero, it reaches surprising conclusions about the nature of imperial dominion, showing how the colonial state's genocidal posture arose from its own inherent weakness and military failures. The result is an indispensable account of a genocide that has been neglected for too long.

This book presents a novel proposal for establishing justice and social harmony in the aftermath of genocide. It argues that justice should be determined by the victims of genocide rather than a detached legal system, since such a form of justice is more consistent with a socially grounded ethics, with a democracy that privileges citizen decision-making, and with human rights. The book covers the Holocaust; genocides in Argentina, South Africa, Rwanda, Latin America, and Australia, as well as crimes against humanity in Italy and France. From show trials to state- enforced forgiveness, the book examines various methods that have been used since 1945 to punish the individuals and groups responsible for genocide and how they have ultimately failed to deliver true justice to the victims. The only way to end this failure, the book points out, is to return justice to the victims. This simple proposition; however, challenges the Enlightenment tradition of Western law which was built on the refusal to allow victims to determine the measure of justice. That would amount, according to Bacon, Hegel, and Kant to a revenge system and bring social chaos. But, as this book points out, forgiveness is only something victims can give, no-one can demand it. In order to establish a lasting peace, it is necessary to re-examine the philosophical and theoretical refusal to return justice to the victims. The engaging argument put forth in this book can help deliver true justice and re-establish international social harmony in the aftermath of genocide. Genocide is ubiquitous in the modern, global world. It's understanding is highly relevant for the understanding of specific and perpetuating challenges in migration. Genocide forces the migration of millions to avoid crimes against humanity. When they flee war zones they bring their fears, hates, and misery with them. So migration research must engage fully with the experience of genocide, its human conseque nces and the ethical dilemmas it poses to all societies. Not to do so, will make it more difficult to understand and live with newcomers and to achieve some sort of harmony in host countries, as well as those which are centers of genocide.

In Rwanda's Genocide , Kingsley Moghalu provides an engrossing account and analysis of the international political brinkmanship embedded in the quest for international justice for Rwanda's genocide. He takes us behind the scenes to the political and strategic factors that shaped a path-breaking war crimes tribunal and demonstrates why the trials at Arusha, like Nuremberg, Tokyo, and the Hague, are more than just prosecutions of culprits, but also politics by other means. This is the first serious book on the politics of justice for Rwanda's genocide. Moghalu tells this gripping story with the authority of an insider, elegant and engaging writing, and intellectual mastery of the subject matter.