Description
This paper advances a new ethical framework for understanding atrocity prevention through the lens of cosmopolitan harm theory. Existing approaches to the ethics of mass atrocity – from just war reasoning to the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) – overwhelmingly frame prevention in terms of positive duties: the moral obligation to act. Yet this emphasis obscures how states’ own foreign policy practices may themselves produce or legitimise atrocity harm. Drawing on cosmopolitan harm theory, the paper develops a normative account centred on negative duties – the obligation not to contribute to harm – as a basis for re-evaluating state responsibility. It identifies three mechanisms through which international complicity in atrocity unfolds: diplomatic, economic, and military. The paper considers the implications of these mechanisms for the moral design of preventive policy. In doing so, it shifts attention from intervention to the ethics of everyday foreign policy practice, offering a framework for rethinking global responsibility that is both normatively grounded and policy-relevant.
