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Holding Soldiers Responsible for Abusive Conduct and the Dilemma of the Superior Orders Defense Living Up to Rules: Holding Soldiers Responsible for Abusive Conduct and the Dilemma of the Superior Orders Defense The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters Citation Martha L. Minow, Living Up to Rules: Holding Soldiers Responsible for Abusive Conduct and the Dilemma of the Superior Orders Defense, 52 McGill L. J. 1 (2007). Published Version http://lawjournal.mcgill.ca/userfiles/ other/2172095-1219617374_Minow.pdf Citable link http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:12341082 Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#LAA Living Up to Rules: Holding Soldiers Responsible for Abusive Conduct and the Dilemma of the Superior Orders Defence Martha Minow* Recent world events underscore the importance of the dilemma of Les événements internationaux récents mettent en évidence the superior orders defence and the question of how to prevent soldiers l’importance le dilemme posé par la défense des «ordres supérieurs», ainsi from undertaking abusive conduct or committing atrocities. This article que la question de comment prévenir la conduite abusive des militaires et examines the degree to which holding individual soldiers legally dissuader ces derniers à commettre des actes d’atrocités. Cet article analyse à responsible for their actions can be seen to be an effective strategy for the quel point le fait d’imposer une responsabilité légale aux militaires peut prevention of atrocities and explores complementary strategies aimed at the s’avérer une stratégie efficace afin d’empêcher que des actes d’atrocités ne prevention of abusive conduct by soldiers. soient commis. L’auteure examine également la force de stratégies The article surveys historical and legal materials to illustrate the complémentaires ayant pour but de prévenir la conduite abusive des ongoing debate over the scope of the superior orders defence in U.S. and militaires. international law. The author then surveys a range of social science L’auteure se penche sur des sources historiques et juridiques pour literature that suggests why some people participate in atrocities, and démontrer la portée du débat sur la défense des ordres supérieurs au niveau illuminates how difficult it would be for individuals to understand and du droit américain et du droit international. L’auteure passe en revue un comply with a rule expecting compliance with all superior orders except ensemble de recherches académiques émanant du domaine des sciences those that are illegal. The author concludes that the evidence undermines sociales qui illustre comment des individus peuvent être amenés à commettre the likelihood that a norm establishing individual responsibility would des actes d’atrocités. L’auteure explique à quel point il serait difficile de succeed in changing conduct. comprendre et de respecter une règle générale qui imposerait une conformité The author argues that it is important to restrict the application of the aux ordres supérieurs pour autant que ceux-ci soient légaux. L’auteure conclu superior orders defence in order to uphold a symbolic ideal of individual qu’une politique axée sur l’instauration d’une norme de responsabilité responsibility, but that real prospects for preventing atrocities by soldiers individuelle aurait peu d’effet sur le comportement des militaries. depend on changing the organizational design and resources surrounding the L’auteure soutient qu’il est important de restreindre la portée de la soldier and specifying new obligations for those in command. The author défense des ordres supérieurs afin de maintenir l’idéal symbolique que recommends changes to military incentives, culture, and practices. Proposed représente la responsabilité individuelle. Néanmoins, certains changements strategies include the provision of meaningful and effective training programs doivent être apportés à la structure organisationnelle qui entoure les militaires for both soldiers and officers, the establishment of a military culture in which et aux ressources qui leur sont allouées. Les obligations incombant aux soldiers understand their superiors to care about violations of law and dirigeants militaires doivent également être redéfinies. Les réformes morality, and the integration of legal analysis into the daily operations of all proposées par l’auteure touchent aux primes de service, à la culture et à la levels of the military hierarchy so that the burden of understanding lawfulness pratique militaire. Elles comprennent la mise en place de programmes de does not rest solely on the shoulders of the ordinary soldier. formation pour les militaires et les officiers, la création d’une culture militaire au sein de laquelle les militaires sont conscients que leurs officiers portent grande attention aux enfreintes à la loi et à la moralité, et l’intégration d’une culture d’analyse juridique pour les opérations quotidiennes à tous les niveaux afin que le fardeau de déterminer ce qui est conforme au droit ne repose pas uniquement sur les épaules du militaire ordinaire. * Jeremiah Smith, Jr. Professor, Harvard Law School. This was presented as the Raoul Wallenberg Human Rights Lecture, a lecture organized by the Centre for Human Rights and Legal Pluralism of McGill University Faculty of Law, 9 March 2006, and as the “chair lecture” when I was receiving the Jeremiah Smith, Jr. Professorship, Harvard Law School, 22 February 2006. I am very grateful to Dean Nicholas Kasirer, Professor Colleen Sheppard, and to the students and community of McGill Faculty of Law who offered such an engaging discussion about the topics raised in this lecture. An earlier elaboration of some of these arguments and ideas was presented as the Laurence Kohlberg Lecture to the Association of Moral Education and Facing History and Ourselves / Harvard Facing History Conference, 4 November 2005, and published as “What the Rule of Law Should Mean for Civics Education: From the ‘Following Orders’ Defence to the Classroom” (2006) 35 Journal of Moral Education 137. I am deeply grateful for comments from Arthur Applbaum, Gabby Blum, Larry Blum, Mary Casey, Rebecca Cohen, Dick Fallon, Lani Guinier, Lt. Col. Patrick Gawkins, Amos Guiora, Dean Elena Kagan, Pnina Lahav, Daryl Levinson, Dana Savoray, Oded Savoray, Sarah Sewell, Joe Singer, Mira Singer, Adam Strom, Margot Strom, Cass Sunstein, and Richard Weissbourd, and participants in presentations at the Boston College Law School, Harvard Law School, and Harvard J.F.K. School of Government Intervention Seminar. For research help, special thanks go to Yael Aridor Bar-Ilan, Ryan Budish, Caleb Donaldson, Christine Monta, David Oliwenstein, and Noah Weisbord. © Martha Minow 2007 To be cited as: (2007) 52 McGill L.J. 1 Mode de référence : (2007) 52 R.D. McGill 1 2 MCGILL LAW JOURNAL / REVUE DE DROIT DE MCGILL [Vol. 52 Introduction 3 I. Why Talk About This Now? 7 II. Superior Orders: From the Nuremberg Trials to Today 17 III. Moral Development and Psychological Theories: Why Resistance to Orders is Difficult 25 A. Insights from Psychological Research 26 1. Cognitive Dissonance 26 2. Heuristics and Baseline References 26 3. Kohlberg’s Stages of Moral Development 27 4. Milgram’s Studies of Obedience 30 5. Studies of Conformity 33 B. Learning from Psychology: Ordinary Soldiers Are Not Well Placed to Prevent Atrocity 35 IV. What Should We Do to Prevent Atrocities? 35 A. Limited Prevention from Restricting the Superior Orders Defence 36 B. Small Gains Through Training Programs 40 C. Aligning Commands with Law and Morality 47 1. Try to Eliminate Bad Orders 47 2. Promote a Constraining and Aspirational Culture 49 3. Address Command and Organizational Structure 49 4. Integrate Legal Analysis into Platoon Command 50 5. Allocate Resources for Translation and Consultation 53 Conclusion 54 2007] M. MINOW –THE DILEMMA OF THE SUPERIOR ORDERS DEFENCE 3 Introduction In 1945, Raoul Wallenberg sent a message to SS Commander General August Schmidthuber to the effect that “I will see that you will be charged and hanged as a war criminal if you follow Adolf Eichmann’s order and direct the massacre of the over 60,000 Jews remaining in the Budapest Central Ghetto.”1 His message to General Schmidthuber, remarkably, worked: the Jews in the Budapest Ghetto survived. We remember and honour Raoul Wallenberg for this and countless other acts of courage that directly saved thousands of lives during the Holocaust. A man then in his early thirties, Wallenberg used delay, persuasion, threats, bribes, and his invented “protective passes” to save a large remnant of Hungarian Jewry. As Irwin Cotler observed in his address marking the opening of an exhibit on the life and work of Wallenberg, his example and his memory teach us that “[n]eutrality and indifference by individuals or neutrality and indifference by state[s] must be rejected.”2 Wallenberg disappeared and died, probably murdered, in Soviet custody. His personal sacrifice was extraordinary. It is unlikely that many of us would give our lives to save strangers in a strange land. Perhaps even more pressing, though, is discovering not what it takes to engage in such extraordinary heroism and sacrifice, but what it takes to resist committing abusive, illegal acts when ordered to commit them. Consider the soldier3 directed to shoot a civilian or the guard pushing people
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