Accountability for Human Rights Atrocities in International Law: Beyond the Nuremberg Legacy

"More than a half century after the Nuremberg and Tokyo trials, nations around the world are increasingly grappling with the need to hold individuals accountable for human rights atrocities. In this innovative book, now in its second edition, Steven R. Ratner and Jason S. Abrams offer a comprehensive study of the promises and limitations of individual accountability as a means of enforcing international human rights and humanitarian law. They provide a searching analysis of the principal crimes under the law of nations, such as genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes, and go on to appraise the range of prosecutorial and other mechanisms for holding abusers responsible. The authors conclude with a series of compelling conclusions about the future of accountability. The second edition includes developments since 1997, including new domestic prosecutions and truth commissions, the work of the UN's Yugoslavia and Rwanda tribunals, and the International Criminal Court"--Unedited summary from book cover.