Civility, Barbarism and the Evolution of International Humanitarian Law Who do the Laws of War Protect?

Efforts to moderate conflict are as old as conflict itself. Throughout the ages, restraint in warfare has been informed by religious and ethical considerations, chivalry and class, and, increasingly since the mid-19th century, a body of customary and treaty law variously referred to as the laws of war, the law of armed conflict (LOAC) or international humanitarian law (IHL). As they evolved from the mid-19th century, these laws were increasingly underpinned by humanitarianism, then in the mid-20th century, were assumed to be universal. But violations of these restraints are also as old as conflict itself. The history of conflict is replete with examples of exclusions from protections designed to moderate warfare. This edited volume explores the degree to which protections in modern warfare might be informed by notions of 'civility' and 'barbarism', or, to put it another way, asks if only those deemed to be civilised are afforded protections prescribed by the laws of war?

1. Civility, barbarism and the evolution of international humanitarian law: who do the laws of war protect?: introduction Matt Killingsworth and Tim McCormack; 2. Sieges and the laws of war in Europe's long eighteenth century Gavin Daly; 3. All's fair in love and war or the limits of the limitations: juridification of warfare and its revocation by military necessity Miloš Vec; 4. Cultivating humanitarianism: moral sentiment and international humanitarian law in the civilizing process Richard Devetak; 5. Limits to the scope of humanity as a constraint on the conduct of war Tim McCormack, Siobhain Galea and Daniel Westbury; 6. The state, civility and international humanitarian law Matt Killingsworth; 7. Operationalising distinction in South Sudan: humanitarian decision-making about military asset use Rebecca Sutton; 8. Private military and security companies and international humanitarian law: the montreux document Rebecca Shaw; 9. Protecting warfighters from superfluous injury and unnecessary suffering Rain Liivoja; 10. Blurring the lines: how are female child soldiers protected by the laws of war? Rosemary Grey; 11. A step back to take a step forward: the future of justice in conflict Mark Kersten.

Matt Killingsworth is Senior Lecturer in International Relations at the University of Tasmania. He has held visiting fellowships at the University of Oxford's Institute for Ethics and Armed Conflict and the European University Institute, he is the co-editor of Violence and the State (2016), and the former Chair of the Tasmanian Red Cross International Humanitarian Law Committee.
Tim McCormack is Professor of International Law at the University of Tasmania and the Special Adviser on War Crimes to the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court in The Hague. He was the Foundation Australian Red Cross Professor of International Humanitarian Law and Founding Director of the Asia Pacific Centre for Military Law at Melbourne Law School, Charles H Stockton Distinguished Scholar-in-Residence at the US Naval War College and James Barr Ames Visiting Professor at Harvard Law School. He co-edited (with Suzannah Linton and Sandesh Sivakumaran) Asia-Pacific Perspectives on International Humanitarian Law (CUP 2019).