WHY International Law Fails to Prevent Genocide: the Civilization MYTH and Legal Evasion

Abstract

Based on this expanded idea offered by Raphael Lemkin 1 this paper will critically discuss the failure of the international law in the prevention of the modern genocide. This discussion shows how applying a limited legal understanding of the definition of genocidal intent legitimizes state accountability across three case studies of U.S. racial policies, Indigenous erasure in Brazil, and existing persistence of violence in Gaza. This paper holds the view that genocide is systematically camouflaged in the terms of development, civilization, and security. Applying critical legal and postcolonial theoretical approaches, this paper suggests an enlargement of the legal meaning of genocide identifiers to those of predictable destruction, structural oppression, and colonial continuities. The study finds that unless there is a reform of such definitions, the international law is going to remain on impunity-making mandate other than justice delivery.