Crises of self-determination and the origins of international governance, 1919-1956

Abstract

Focusing on the use of international commissions and plebiscites, the thesis examines how international society – the Great Powers and later international organisations such as the League of Nations and United Nations – responded to the destabilising crises caused by the self-determination of peoples. Examining the statesmen, officials, and thinkers involved, the thesis traces the interconnected history of these techniques during the critical but overlooked period of their institutionalisation, and argues that they have become embedded within the broader techniques of peacekeeping familiar today.

Beginning with the Paris Peace Conference of 1919, the thesis traces this process through the institutional mediums of the League of Nations, the post-Second World War planning process, and the early years of the United Nations. While it was the collapse of empires and emergence of new successor nation-states which provided the conditions for the emergence of these techniques, the thesis also elaborates on the importance of both individuals and institutions, which had the power to influence the development and direction of the techniques in question. One central thread running within the thesis is the thought of Sarah Wambaugh, the foremost interwar expert on plebiscites, whose normative ideals proved enormously influential, even if they resulted in unforseen outcomes. At the same time, the thesis also traces the important, if subtle, ways in which institutions worked to imbed these techniques into their operations.