Off the Menu: Post-1945 Norms and the End of War Declarations

Abstract

Why do states no longer declare war? In a provocative analysis, Tanisha M. Fazal argues that states stopped declaring war to evade the costs of complying with the growing body of international humanitarian laws. We argue instead that post-1945 normative and legal developments that sought to prohibit war changed the meaning of war declarations in a way that made them at best irrelevant and at worst counterproductive. Although war-making did not end, a once routine feature of warfare came to be seen as a signal of extreme aims that could complicate escalation management and coalition building. Moreover, the United Nations (UN) system provided more desirable ways for states to justify military operations, particularly through self-defense claims. We support this argument through a reassessment of the empirical pattern of war declarations, an analysis of self-defense claims made under Article 51 of the UN Charter, and case studies of undeclared wars in the post-1945 period.