Speech to Chatham House, London by Professor Michael Ignatieff, Professor of Practice, Harvard University; Centennial Chair, Carnegie Council on Ethics and International Affairs; Chair: Lindsey Hilsum, International Editor, Ch. 4 News. Professor Ignatieff also assisted in the writing of the ICISS Report The Responsibility to Protect.

This question has increasingly been doing the rounds these last few months. In this talk, Professor Michael Ignatieff from Harvard University asks the question “Is the age of intervention over?” In a wide ranging speech that surveys current territorial crises in Ukraine and Syria, as well as the UN Doctrine the Responsibility to Protect, Professor Ignatieff concludes by stating:

“It’s very good that the economic logic of globalisation is restraining hotter heads …. but let’s understand that the economic logic of globalisation and the political logic of great power confrontation are in a collision mode.”

“We do want to live in a world where great powers and combinations of powers,  use military force to keep civilians from dying, I don’t care how unpopular the thought is, I think we do want that world, and if we don’t get that world, the world will be ever more at the mercy of the bad faith of dictators.”

What do you think, has the era of humanitarian interventions ended? And what lessons can we take away from recent events in Syria and Ukraine ? Do stronger states need to come to the aid of weaker states?