As I mentioned in my first post, I’m particularly interested in how social movements create norms and move them into legal institutions. I recently wrote a piece on blood diamonds which describes the coalition between human rights activists, corporations and states and how that coalition created a new international institution to regulate the diamond trade.
This institution, the Kimberley Process, is self-consciously weakly legal on many dimensions. States and corporations deliberately acted outside the international treaty system. Over time, however, the Kimberley Process has grown increasingly law-like with a deepening administrative structure and a constant commitment to implementation through domestic law. Even so, given the consensus voting structure, norms against diamond smuggling and human rights related abuses must contend with strong political interests that often run counter to the effective enforcement of the Kimberley Process’ prohibitions.
For instance, the Zimbabwe government encouraged serious military abuses in the Marange diamond fields. Many activists and states consider stones from these fields to be blood diamonds. They contend that states involved in the Kimberley Process should have suspended Zimbabwe ‘s membership and thus its ability to lawfully trade diamonds. In contrast, some states suggested that an all or nothing sanction was not needed and exercised veto power over the only formal sanction the institution allows.
I suggest in my article that this episode is an important test cases for the possible success of the Kimberley Process. I think it can help tell us something about how firmly entrenched anti blood diamond norms are and the ability of a weakly legal institution to enforce them. A quick search of this week’s news suggests a mixed story. The Zimbabwe supreme court and other government agencies have recently acted to limit the international transport of blood diamonds from the state approved mining firm Mbada. The court forbid their online auction and ordered the diamonds’ safekeeping at the Reserve Bank. Yet the government has been slow to appoint a monitor for the contested mines which in turn caused the World Diamond Council to announce that it may push for Zimbabwe’s suspension unless the situation is quickly remedied.
For a lengthier discussion of the Kimberley Process’s role in the regulation of resource curses as well as the possibilities and limits of such an institution in other settings, please check out the full article at http://ssrn.com/abstract=1511767.
Posted by Lesley Wexler on February 9, 2010 at 02:00 PM