Article

Atrocity Prevention – Existing Literature

Academic and policy literature on atrocity prevention is both well-grounded in research and of high quality, but the vast amount of content makes diving into it quite intimidating. In the following section you can instead find a selected discussion of recent works on R2P, explored by various common topics discussed within the atrocity prevention field.

Author: Dr. Ellen Emilie Stensrud and Andrea Cocciarelli

Published: September 2025 (republished with permission from Mass Atrocity Responses) 

“The size of this literature is all the more remarkable given the relatively short time period that the doctrine has been in existence, and the relatively limited number of potentially successful cases that exist.” (Christopher Hobson, 2022, 370-371)  

Academic and policy literature on atrocity prevention is both well-grounded in research and of high quality, but the vast amount of content makes diving into it quite intimidating.

For an extensive literature review on atrocity prevention and the Responsibility to Protect, Gallagher, Lawrinson, and McKay (2022) have compiled a helpful and comprehensive bibliography of key R2P resources.

In the following section you can instead find a more selected discussion of recent works on R2P, explored by various common topics discussed within the atrocity prevention field:

  • Limited implementation,

  • Current crises and atrocity prevention,

  • Regional organizations and powers,

  • Role of civil society and mass atrocity resistance,

  • Solutions and suggestions,

  • Critical discussions of R2P,

  • Good practices and lessons learned.

Limited implementation

The limited implementation of the Responsibility to Protect is undoubtedly the most widely discussed topic in its academic literature. Issues concerning its implementation efforts, the norm’s conceptualization, global and national circumstances, UN infrastructure and bodies, and sovereignty are often included in articles, reports, and policies.

For instance, Barber (2023) highlights the insufficient articulation of the R2P norm at conceptual, national, and international levels, arguing for its structural improvement and implementation. Positive outlooks within R2P’s limited application still persist, however, as expressed at the 11th Meeting of the Global Network of R2P Focal Points (Centre for the Responsibility to Protect, 2025b), due to the calling out of atrocity situations and the development of early warning systems and legal frameworks.

Still, many recognize that the deeply-rooted limitations and inherent structure of the UN, in particular the UN Security Council (UNSC) and the Office on Genocide Prevention and the Responsibility to Protect (UNOSAPG), is to be blamed for much of the limited implementation of R2P (Irvin-Erickson and Verdeja, 2025; Smith, 2023; Verdeja, 2025).

Despite its unanimous endorsement at the UN General Assembly, R2P is only a political commitment and is not codified in an international law. Yet, Whidden (2024) shows that alternative measures have been taken by other bodies beyond the UNSC to promote justice and accountability, such as by the UN General Assembly (UNGA), the Human Rights Council (HCR), and International Court of Justice (ICJ).

Current crises and atrocity prevention

Since the advent of the R2P norm and especially in recent years, the world has seen an increasing number of crises and mass atrocity crimes. The reasons for this rise in violent acts and rhetoric are both complex and intersecting and have led to a decrease in trust for justice and accountability frameworks (Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect, 2025a).

In light of this, Jacob (2023) explains that recent crises such as global inflation and the cost of military conflict (as for Ukraine and Gaza) have made it harder to justify and commit to preventive efforts where conflict has yet to happen, further echoing the already widespread fear of a military overreach through R2P’s intervention pillar.

Israel’s genocidal violence in the Gaza Strip has also particularly affected the atrocity prevention field and proponents of R2P, since the norm has barely been invoked, if at all, to respond to such mass atrocities. Even more so, as explained by Gilman, Mampilly, and Moses (2025), post-genocide “survivor states” such as Israel and Rwanda have been justifying their expansionism and atrocity crimes through surface-level humanitarian concerns and interventions to protect “allied” minority groups beyond their own territories.

Moses (2024) and Verdeja (2025) in particular explore how the foundations of international law and justice and accountability bodies are affected by western powers’ hypocrisy, purposeful lack of preemptive or responsive action, and support for mass atrocities when it benefits them. The “failure” of international law is thus directly caused by the behaviors of liberal states, especially when their interests do not align with international regulations.

Regional organizations and powers

In spite of the recent crisis in multilateralism, states can and often do influence each other both regionally and internationally. Such influence and its potential has already been proven and recognized, as expressed during the 11th Meeting of the Global Network of R2P Focal Points (Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect, 2025b).

The UN in particular is an arena where states’ power is limited, if they are not part of the permanent Security Council members, so small states must find alternative ways to promote or carry out atrocity prevention. For instance, as discussed by Mennecke and Stensrud (2024), small states have the opportunity to focus on particular humanitarian agendas and act with slightly more freedom to promote them. Denmark is considered a central proponent of the R2P norm, while other small states like Norway (Stensrud, 2024) have been less focused on AP due to conflicting policy interests such as peacebuilding and diplomacy.

Regional organizations and collaborations can follow a similar approach, as Waal (2023) explains happened for the African Union. Even before the creation of R2P, the AU had discussed and implemented various atrocity prevention measures and initiatives, going as far as to consider “non-indifference” as an African solution to African problems. However, NATO’s overstepping its mandate in Libya, following the UNSC adoption of an R2P protection operation, led to the weakening of the legitimacy of R2P in the region and beyond.

Critical discussions of R2P

Despite the widespread support for the R2P norm in academia, valid criticism towards it has been expressed often due to its limited implementation and usefulness, controversial status, and conceptual vagueness.

For instance, the status of the R2P norm as a useful tool and approach has been questioned before, with Evans (2024) pondering whether R2P is at all able to function as it was meant to or whether an alternative is necessary. In light of his trust in the norm, he argues that no R2P alternative is currently possible and advances solutions to improve R2P’s reputation and usefulness at the national level.

A stronger critique of R2P can instead be found in Hobson (2022), where the norm’s status and usefulness are questioned along with its entire conceptualization as a “morally untouchable” humanitarian norm. Hobson further points out that much of the focus on the norm has been on the doctrine itself and its implementation, rather than on the people it is meant to protect, which has sidelined lived experiences in favor of legal and conceptual discussions.

In a similar vein, Moses (2024) and Verdeja (2025) strongly criticize the conceptualization and hypocrisy of R2P in light of Israel’s genocidal violence in Gaza. The partiality with which the norm is applied and upheld by western powers, they argue, exposes R2P’s real nature as a political tool that such powers can use to justify interventions and advance national interests.

Moses also addresses in depth R2P’s third pillar, that of intervention, expressing how a conceptual shift is necessary to reframe the doctrine as an entirely pacifist approach. Echoing R2P’s problematic militarism, Gilman, Mampilly, and Moses (2025) also highlight how the norm can help justify irredentism and mass atrocities with the goal of territorial expansion.

Solutions and suggestions

The broad support for atrocity prevention and the R2P norm have led to many proposed solutions to the challenges to R2P implementation. The AP literature often focuses specific solutions to specific problems.

A common focus is the need to address and improve UN bodies and mechanisms, as is the case for Smith (2023), United Nations General Assembly 78 (2024), and Irvin-Erickson and Verdeja (2025). Criticisms and solutions for the UN are often directed at the UN Office on Genocide Prevention and the Responsibility to Protect, aiming to improve its efficiency, limited resources, vague mandate and implementation measures, and connection between its contrasting internal mandates for Genocide Prevention and the Responsibility to Protect. The appointment of further relevant special advisers and focal points is another potential solution.

Alternative solutions at high-levels to circumvent limitations within the UN (and UNSC in particular) are also common, in light of the continuous inaction by UN bodies which led to the creation of R2P in the first place. Works such as Bellamy (2023), Whidden (2024), Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect (2025b and 2025a), and Verdeja (2025) all promote the interaction and usage of bodies like the General Assembly (UNGA), Human Rights Council (HRC), and International Court of Justice (ICJ) to carry out AP efforts.

Ways to reform the R2P norm are often discussed as well, typically through more concrete measures like National Action Plans and formal implementation strategies (Barber, 2023). Merging the AP agenda with other successful agendas is another supported strategy (Jacob, 2023), especially with the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda and its gender-sensitive focus (Cocciarelli and Stensrud, 2024), as well as the Youth, Peace and Security (YPS) agenda and Freedom of Religion or Belief (FoRB) (Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect, 2025a).

More conceptual reforms to the R2P norm have also been proposed, such as the proposal by Moses (2024) to reframe R2P as entirely pacifist and war abolitionist or by Hobson (2022) to normalize a bottom-up approach to focus on the affected communities R2P is supposed to keep safe.

Good practices and lessons learned

Although implementation of R2P has rarely been invoked through the use of military force, many atrocity prevention initiatives have taken place throughout the years, along with the development of better frameworks and systems.

Improving atrocity prevention through the incorporation of a gender lens has been proposed repeatedly throughout the years, as discussed by Stefan (2021) and Cocciarelli and Stensrud (2024). Allen (2021) shows a concrete implementation of this improvement, with gender-sensitive and gender-specific warning indicators attesting the risk of atrocity crimes that would otherwise have gone unnoticed. The UNSG (2020) also published a report on women and the R2P norm, addressing criticisms of gender-blindness and the way to fix it.

Examining how different countries have behaved in atrocity prevention or protection situations can also grant insight in what ought to change or be emphasized. Ercan’s (2022) edited volume on the 20th anniversary of R2P sheds light on various countries’ situations, particularly from Africa, the Middle East, Eastern Asia, and South America. However, R2P is not necessary to conduct atrocity prevention efforts, as explored by Mbirigi (2022) on the case of Burundi.

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