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Abstract
How do contemporary secessionist movements gain international recognition of their claims to self-determination? I argue that international recognition is forthcoming when a sufficient number of states believe a claim to self-determination ought to be accepted. That is, states recognize claims to self-determination when they perceive them to be legitimate. To convince outsiders of the legitimacy of their claims, separatist movements invoke resonant norms and symbols in a moral economy that structures decision-making. I contrast this argument with prevailing explanations of recognition dynamics. To illustrate the argument, I examine the diplomacy surrounding Kosovo’s independence bid and unilateral secession.
Notes
1. Crawford, The Creation of States.
2. Gellner, Nations and Nationalism, 44.
3. Seymour, Pathways to Secession.
4. See Coggins, Power Politics and State Formation.
5. Toft and Saideman, “Self-determination Movements.”
6. Miller, States, Nations and the Great Powers; and Wimmer, Waves of War.
7. See Hurd, After Anarchy, 7.
8. Hurd, “The Strategic Use of Liberal Internationalism,” 523.
9. Abkhazia and South Ossetia have been recognized by Russia, Nicaragua, Venezuela and Nauru. Tuvalu withdrew its recognition. Vanuatu has recognized Abkhazia, but this has been contested. See Ellen Barry, “Vanuatu Recognizes Abkhazia. Or Maybe Not,” New York Times, June 3, 2011.
10. See Florea, “De Facto States.”
11. Cunningham, Inside the Politics of Self-determination.
12. Fabry, Recognizing States, 7.
13. Fowler and Bunck, Law, Power and the Sovereign State, 12.
14. Franck, The Power of Legitimacy.
15. On the role of great powers, see Coggins, Power Politics and State Formation, 9.
16. Max Weber in Gerth and Mills, From Max Weber, 280.
17. Cronin and Hurd, The UN Security Council.
18. Tyler, Why People Obey the Law.
19. Paris, “International Peacebuilding.”
20. Barnett, “Bringing in the New World Order.”
21. Kurtulus, “Sovereign Rights,” 777.
22. Cassese, Self-determination, 319.
23. Independent International Commission on Kosovo, The Kosovo Report.
24. See e.g. Bunce, Subversive Institutions; and Spruyt, Ending Empire.
25. Roeder, Where Nation-states Come From, 10.
26. See, e.g. Herbst, “The Creation and Maintenance of National Boundaries.”
27. Hager and Lake, “Balancing Empires.”
28. Saideman, “Explaining the International Relations of Secessionist Conflicts”; and Saideman, The Ties that Divide.
29. Coggins, Power Politics and State Formation.
30. Krasner, Sovereignty.
31. See e.g. Biersteker and Weber, State Sovereignty; Jackson, The Global Covenant; and Fabry, Recognizing States.
32. Mertus, Kosovo.
33. Sullivan, Be Not Afraid, 34.
34. Bellamy, Kosovo and International Society, 48–56; and Caplan, Europe and the Recognition of New States, 140.
35. Judah, Kosovo, 134.
36. Bellamy, Kosovo and International Society, 72–74.
37. This language would later be used by NATO member states to justify air strikes after the threat of a Russian veto made it impossible to gain a Security Council resolution authorizing the operation.
38. Interview, former UÇK field commander, Pristina, 12 December 2006.
39. Interview, former UÇK field commander, Pristina, 13 December 2006. Also see Report of the Secretary General, 24 December S/1998/1221: 5.
40. Despite the Rambouillet Agreement’s contradictory confirmation of both a referendum on a final settlement to appease Albanian demands, and Yugoslavia’s territorial integrity on the insistence of the Serbs, the Albanian delegation received assurances that the formula did establish a legal right to hold a referendum on Kosovo’s independence (Weller, “The Rambouillet Conference,” 245).
41. Interview, former member of KLA General Staff, Pristina, 15 December 2006.
42. Independent International Commission on Kosovo, The Kosovo Report.
43. A Human Rights Watch report in September 1998, for instance, observed, ‘The vast majority of these abuses were committed by Yugoslav government forces of the Serbian special police (MUP) and the Yugoslav Army (VJ) …’ (in Abrahams and Andersen, Humanitarian law violations in Kosovo, 2).
44. King and Mason, Peace at Any Price, 53–6.
45. King and Mason, Peace at Any Price.
46. See Perritt, The Road to Independence.
47. Franks and Richmond, “Coopting Liberal Peace-building,” 82.
48. Though the extent of elite-manipulation versus spontaneous mass uprising remains debated, interviews with observers and participants in the riots support the notion that the uprising was well-managed and controlled by Albanian radicals, if not necessarily planned in advance. Interviews, Pristina, 12–16 December 2006.
49. Interview, Western diplomat, Vienna, Austria, 27 June 2007. When asked how the US and EU sought to reconcile ‘terrorism and blackmail’ with the western push for the legitimacy of recognizing Kosovo’s unilateral secession, however, he returned to his talking points, stating that ‘Kosovo is a unique case, both because of Resolution 1244 and the genocide that happened there’.
50. Lemay-Hébert, “Everyday Legitimacy and International Administration.”
51. Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores y Culto, “Costa Rica se pronuncia por la independencia de Kósovo,” February 17, 2008. My translation.