Armed Conflict

Oxford Institute for

Ethics, Law and Armed Conflict

This research programme ran from 2008-2013 and the following page is an archived resource. Although the programme no longer receives funding from the Oxford Martin School, former members of the team are active in other programmes.

Project Description

We are reassessing how the world governs armed conflict, aiming to determine how it can be better managed, regulated, reduced, and ultimately whether it can be eliminated.

In an age of weapons with the potential to destroy all life on earth, going to war is becoming increasingly hard to justify. The 20th century was by far the bloodiest in human history and we must reconsider the ways we manage conflict.

ELAC is the first research institute in the world to unite leading experts in international law, moral philosophy and political science in a major study of conflict.

We aim to strengthen law, norms and institutions to restrain, regulate and prevent armed conflict. ELAC seeks to develop a more sophisticated framework of rules and stronger forms of international authority relating to armed conflict. Research addresses all aspects of armed conflict, including the recourse to war, the conduct of war, and post-conflict governance, transition and reconstruction.

videos

"Sudden justice: America's secret drone wars" with Chris Woods

Can the use of autonomous weapons ever be ethically sound?

Dr Alex Leveringhaus on autonomous weapons

"Drone strikes: ethics and laws of 21st century warfare" by Prof Dapo Akande and Dr Alex Leveringhaus

"Killing with computers – the ethics of autonomous and remote controlled weapons" by Dr Alex Leveringhaus and Dapo Akande

Protecting populations from mass atrocity crimes

What is the responsibility to protect (R2P)?

Can we eliminate the prospect of cyber attack?

"Catastrophic dehumanization: the psychological dynamics of severe conflict" with Tad Homer-Dixon

International crisis and the failure of global ethics

The responsibility to protect in modern international relations

How we can effectively reduce or even eliminate armed conflict

publications

The Responsibility to Prevent

Robo-Wars: The Regulation of Robotic Weapons

Global Responsibility to Protect

Killing in War

What Libya teaches us about Responsibility to Protect

Conflict, climate and enviromental change workshop

The United Nations Security Council and War: The Evolution of Thought and Practice since 1945

Clearing the Fog of War? The ICRC'S Interpretive Guidance on Direct Participation in Hostilities

The Imperative to Rebuild: Assessing the Normative Case for Postconflict Reconstruction

The Legal Nature of Security Council Referrals to the ICC and its Impact on Al Bashir's Immunities

Just and Unjust Warriors: The Moral and Legal Status of Soldiers

War, Torture and Terrorism: Ethics and War in the 21st Century

At Home in the World

War and Self-Defense

Humanitarian Intervention and International Relations