How to get away with genocide in the 21st century: contesting and hollowing out the anti-genocide norm cluster

Despite the emergence of an “anti-genocide norm cluster” in the 21st century, comprising the norm on the prevention and punishment of genocide and the supplementary norms of non-impunity and of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P), impunity for genocide is still widespread. The thesis therefore asks how impunity for genocide is rendered possible in the 21st century, despite the development of the anti-genocide norm cluster. To answer this research question, it analyzes the atrocities in Darfur in Sudan and the Rohingya crisis in Myanmar, which have raised international genocide accusations, albeit to different extents. The thesis argues that impunity for genocide and international collective inaction have been made possible primarily because alleged genocide perpetrators contest the applicability and/or validity of the constituent norms of the anti-genocide norm cluster. Their discursive arguments of contestation have then been replicated by some of the major actors in the international community. These two discursive contestations combine to block an international consensus on the nature of the crisis and the action and punishment to be undertaken from being reached. Through a qualitative discourse analysis of the alleged genocide perpetrators and key actors in the international community, the thesis sheds light on the discursive agency of the accused, which has brought about the breakdown of an international consensus on the nature of the crime and rendered impunity for genocide and collective inaction possible. It contributes to the norm contestation literature by showing that even small states in the Global South possess the agency to contest international norms and that their agency will be augmented if their contestation discourses are echoed by key actors in the international community. It also calls on a critical analysis of the strengths and limitations of norm clusters and points to the risk of hollowing out the anti-genocide norm cluster through recurrent contestation.