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4 Hague J. on Rule L. 1 (2012)

handle is hein.journals/hagjuote4 and id is 1 raw text is: 



1


      Rule of Law Promotion and Security Sector

                  Reform: Partners or Rivals?

                     Julio Faundez* 6  Ronald  Janse**


The articles in this issue were originally presented at a Workshop held in The Hague
on 28-29 April 2011. The Workshop was organised by HiiL, Warwick Law School
and the Folke Bernadotte Academy   (Sweden). Participants included academics
and development  practitioners who were invited to reflect upon the similarities
and differences between rule of law promotion and security sector reform (SSR).
   Rule of law promotion has been on the development agenda for nearly three
decades. During this period it has evolved from a modest and mainly technical set
of legal activities into an ambitious interdisciplinary enterprise that embraces broad
issues of governance and institutional reform. This comprehensive approach to
rule of law promotion has been prompted  partly by a greater awareness among
development  agencies that legal technical assistance needs to take into account
wider social, political and economic issues. Today, the focus of rule of law promo-
tion also includes non-state institutions and community organizations that play
a role in delivering justice in developing countries.
   By the end of the 1990s, as the rule of law promotion agenda expanded, the
international community became  aware that effective poverty reduction and sus-
tained economic growth require well-trained and accountable security institutions.
Improvements  in the quality of security institutions is critical since poorly trained
or badly managed security forces are often responsible for the worst human rights
violations. Moreover, bad policing and weak justice and penal systems result in
vulnerable groups suffering disproportionately from the effects of crime and inse-
curity. As a consequence, the United Nations, through the Secretary General, has
unequivocally confirmed  that the commitment  to promoting  the rule of law
throughout the world entails a commitment to assisting in the establishment of
effective and accountable security institutions (United Nations Secretary General,
Securing peace and development: the role of the United Nations in supporting
security sector reform, UN Doc. A/62/659-S/2008/39,   January 2008). Today,
the United Nations is a major player in security sector reform.

    * Warwick University.
    ** Utrecht University and Hague Institute for the Internationalisation of Law.

Hague Journal on the Rule of Law, 4: 1-3, 2012
© 2012 TM-CASSER PRESS and Contributors         doi:10.1017/S 1876404512000012

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