With the Federal Government shrugging off breaches of international law by its support for the United States’ bombing of Iran, and the Federal Opposition mocking the defenders of international law as misty-eyed nostalgics, we should all be alarmed. International law is the foundation of 80 years of relative post-war peace and prosperity, and Australia undermines it at our own peril.
Australia played a leading role in the creation of many parts of international law, including the United Nations. Indeed the Australian, Doc Evatt, served as an early President of the UN General Assembly and helped draft the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. And, incidentally, another Australian, John Burton (the grandfather of my former wife), is widely regarded as the father of conflict resolution theory.
Being there at the start was as much in Australia’s national interest as it was about high-minded ideals. The UN Charter contextualises this through the determination “to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind, and to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small.”
And that last part is important to us because Australia was, and remains, a relatively small nation easily caught in the wake of great power conflicts. While it certainly isn’t perfect, international law works to constrain the worst excesses of power politics and geopolitical competition. It also attempts to elevate and equalise the rights and voices of all nations, and indeed of all people.
So Australia set about engaging in the new international arena, reinforcing the rules-based order and building for ourselves a role as a responsible middle power which was engaged in the world. We’ve had an influential role and voice in critical matters from the peaceful scientific settlement in the Antarctic, to the end of apartheid in South Africa and the independence of East Timor.
We can’t be in any doubt that the rules-based order has worked for our benefit too. The rules-based order saw the international community deal with the ozone crisis which has led to a steady repair in the hole in the ozone layer over our heads. Adherence to international law has severely limited the testing and proliferation of nuclear weapons and ensured they have not been used by nations in any conflict since WW2. And it has elevated the importance of fundamental human rights in Australia and across the globe.
On the more day-to-day level, international law guides international trade and telecommunications, which have made us one of the wealthiest nations on earth, and ensured we remain connected and engaged to friends and family across the globe.
And if you listen to the Federal Government most days, they still make much of the importance of a rules-based order. But more and more recently, it seems like our Government thinks international law and a rules-based order should apply only to our enemies. And when it comes to our friends, they argue that might makes right. We see this most starkly in the reaction to Israel’s campaign against Palestinians and war with Iran, and in the approval of the US bombing of Iran.
The Government will rightly call for international law to apply to China in Tibet, the South China Sea and Taiwan, to Russia in Ukraine, to Iran in their nuclear program; but it doesn’t seem to have the guts to also apply it to the US and Israel.
In exhibiting this double standard, and in deriding those who call it out as naïve idealists or nostalgic relics, not only do the Government and the Opposition provide a stick to our enemies with which to beat us for our hypocrisy, they also contribute to the erosion of the foundations of peace and security which have served Australia so well for so long.
Now I’m clear-eyed about the issues with the international rules-based order, and the criticism it faces for things like an ineffective UN Security Council and problems with enforcement. However those are not reasons to abandon our support for international law, but rather to demonstrate consistency in the ethical standards we hold and to work harder together to improve its principles and its application.
Because in the end, international law is based on cooperation around the fundamental principles of justice and accountability that protect us here in Australia, and indeed billions of people right around the world.
Our national government’s lack of clarity on these principles should concern us all. The result may not be felt immediately, but the potential long-term implications could be catastrophic.