Dictionary of Genocide - D Ank Unlimited

LEAGUE OF NATIONS, AND INTERVENTION
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League of Nations, and Intervention. The League of Nations was formally established in
1919, a direct consequence of World War I (1914–1918) and the failure of international
diplomacy to maintain the peace. In its attempts at creating a new order for the world based
on open diplomacy, fairness, and the rule of law, the League adopted a procedure based on dialogue,
conferencing, and negotiation rather than multilateral intervention in order to reduce
the risk of conflict. The principle of nonintervention was rooted in a preexisting belief in the
inviolability of the state, as guaranteed by the Treaty of Westphalia (1648). The League, so
closely bound up in the post–World War I peace settlements, found itself a prisoner of the very
structures it was attempting to control—realpolitik, a states system, secret diplomacy, and the
impunity of states acting contrary to the common international good. The League was only
ever as powerful as the resolve of its member states, and none were at any stage prepared to
surrender any portion of their sovereignty in favor of an international ideal that had never
before been tried. The key doctrine determining the League’s attitude toward global security
was thus an extension of the old idea of collective security, only now it was on a much bigger
scale than had ever been the case in the past. In this sense, the League was not as revolutionary
as many initially hoped it would be; but its novelty lay in the fact that it was the first
attempt of its kind, and, as such, it did not act as much more than an experimental undertaking
in an untried area of international cooperation. Given this, such notions as multilateral
intervention for the purpose of peace making, peace enforcement, or peacekeeping were neither
suggested nor tried under the League of Nations. It took the failure of that body, a second
world war, and a new international organization—the United Nations—to realize the necessity
of cutting through the structures that had so impeded the League’s ability to act.
Lebensborn (German, “Fountain of Life”). The Nazi program of selective breeding of
its population to produce a superior or “master” race. Without benefit of marriage,
German women who met stringent physical standards were urged to produce children
with SS men who met the same standards of height, weight, blond hair, blue eyes, and
athleticism. Upon conception, these women were sent to special maternity homes where
they were cared for until the birth of their children. The program, however, did not prove
successful, and, in 1942, the term Lebensborn became a code term for the kidnapping of
Polish and other children who met these idealized characteristics and were placed in German
families. After the war, many of the actual records of such births and kidnappings
were lost; thus, no actual numbers in either category can be accurately assessed.
Lebensraum (German, “Living Room,” or “Living Space”). A cornerstone of Nazi
foreign policy was the belief of the inherent “right” of the so-called master race to
appropriate whatever lands needed, primarily to the East, for the settlement, survival,
and growth of its population. Not only the lands themselves but their populations were
viewed as resources to be exploited. The concept itself preceded the rise of Adolf
Hitler (1889–1945) and the Nazis and was already taught in German universities in
the early 1920s, one possible adumbration of the political implications of social Darwinism.
Hitler himself advocated such in his book Mein Kampf, with his argument of
Germany’s “moral right” to acquire such lands and resources. Thus, the annexation of
Austria, the takeover of the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia, Poland, and parts of the
Soviet Union may all be assessed from this understanding.
Lemkin, Raphael (1900–1959). Polish Jewish refugee, lawyer, and legal scholar, Lemkin
was born in rural village of Bezwodene and is best remembered as the individual who coined
the word genocide and who served as the motivating force behind the (1948) United Nations