Genocide: - DIIS

Martin Mennecke and Eric Markusen
crime. 9 Thus George Andreopoulos has remarked that “[n]o crime matches
genocide in the moral opprobrium it generates.” 10
At the same time there is a danger of trivializing the meaning of the
term genocide by using it for overtly political purposes. 11 Thus, the label
of “genocide” has been misapplied when referring to racial integration,
methadone maintenance programs, certain features of the medical
treatment of Irish Catholics, and the closing of synagogues in the Soviet
Union. 12 At the same time, political interests can create incentives leading
to denials of genocide being committed. This situation prevailed in United
States’ policy-making circles both with respect to Bosnia and to Rwanda,
where the decision to avoid a public declaration that the mass killings
were genocide enabled the United States to circumvent active intervention.
13 Therefore, there is an evident need to have a workable, but precise
defi nition of genocide, but also the imminent risk of creating new problems
by applying unsuitable defi nitions.
This survey intends to reiterate the ongoing signifi cance of the UN Genocide
Convention for genocide studies and to invite others to re-assess their
criticism of its genocide defi nition in the light of recent developments.
The main section of the paper examines how the Genocide Convention
defi nition of genocide has been applied and interpreted by the ICTY. As
point of departure we will summarize the most frequent criticisms of the
UN Genocide Convention defi nition which have been put forward by
9 Review of the Indictments Pursuant to Article 61 of the Rules of Procedure and Evidence,
Prosecutor v. Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic, Transcript of 27 June 1996, IT-95-5-R61,
and Akayesu Judgement (supra note 4), para. 470.
10 George J. Andreopoulos (1994), “Introduction: The Calculus of Genocide”, in Andreopoulos
(ed.), Genocide: Conceptual and Historical Dimensions, p. 1.
11 Henry R. Huttenbach (1988), “Locating the Holocaust on the Genocide Spectrum: Toward a
Methodology of Defi nition and Categorization”, Holocaust and Genocide Studies, Vol. 3, No.
3, p. 297; Fein (1990), p. 5.
12 Jack Nusan Porter (1982), “Introduction” in Jack Nusan Porter (ed.), Genocide and Human
Rights. Washington, D.C., p. 9-10.
13 Samantha Power (2002), “A Problem from Hell”: America and the Age of Genocide. New York,
p. 358ff; Mennecke and Markusen (supra note 6).
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