A presentation by Kelebogile Zvobgo (William & Mary and International Justice Lab). This event is part of the Fundamental Rights Research Colloquium hosted by the Centre for Fundamental Rights.
Do Americans support war crimes prosecutions? Historically, the United States has touted itself as a torchbearer of international criminal justice, leading the establishment of multiple international tribunals, from Germany and Japan to the Balkans and Rwanda. The United States even participated in the drafting of the governing treaty of the International Criminal Court (ICC). Yet the nation has never itself been the subject of an international criminal tribunal – until now. In 2020, the ICC's chief prosecutor opened a formal investigation into alleged U.S. atrocity crimes relating to the war in Afghanistan. Prior research shows that Americans support the ICC and U.S. membership. However, this work precedes the Afghanistan investigation, leaving open two important questions: (1) is the public's support conditional on the ICC not investigating and prosecuting U.S. personnel and (2) what discursive frames support or undermine the ICC's efforts? Building on the literature on U.S. foreign policy public opinion, Kelebogile Zvobgo and her team theorise that human rights frames increase and national interest frames decrease support for the ICC's work in Afghanistan. They administer an online survey experiment to test these expectations and also explore Americans' preferred venue for war crimes prosecutions: the ICC, U.S. domestic courts, or foreign domestic courts.
This presentation is part of the Fundamental Rights Research Colloquium's cluster on 'Effectiveness of Human Rights'. This series of the Centre for Fundamental Rights colloquium brings together scholars across disciplines at various career stages to present important new scholarship on the effectiveness of human rights norms and institutions, examining a variety of international human rights and international criminal law norms, their public support and institutional impact across diverse sites and levels.
Kelebogile Zvobgo, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor of Government at William & Mary and Founder and Director of the International Justice Lab. Dr. Zvobgo’s research engages questions in human rights, transitional justice, and international law and courts, and has been published in a number of peer-reviewed journals, including International Studies Quarterly and the Journal of Human Rights, and popular-press outlets like Foreign Policy and The Washington Post. She has won multiple awards for her work, including the award for best paper from the Human Rights Section of the International Studies Association and the Human Rights Section of the American Political Science Association. In 2021, she received the Lawrence S. Finkelstein Prize from the International Studies Association’s International Organization Section. Dr. Zvobgo’s work has been generously supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation. She holds a Ph.D. in Political Science and International Relations from the University of Southern California and a B.A. in International Relations and French Language and Literature from Pomona College.
Prior registration is required. Registered attendees will receive the dial-in details as well as a draft paper, on which the presentation is based, via e-mail prior to the event.
