Ebook: The right of self-determination of peoples: the domestication of an illusion

The right of self-determination of peoples holds out the promise of sovereign statehood for all peoples and a domination-free international order. But it also harbors the danger of state fragmentation that can threaten international stability if claims of self-determination lead to secessions. Covering both the late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century independence movements in the Americas and the twentieth-century decolonization worldwide, this book examines the conceptual and political history of the right of self-determination of peoples. It addresses the political contexts in which the right and concept were formulated and the practices developed to restrain its potentially anarchic character, its inception in anti-colonialism, nationalism, and the labor movement, its instrumentalization at the end of the First World War in a formidable duel that Wilson lost to Lenin, its abuse by Hitler, the path after the Second World War to its recognition as a human right in 1966, and its continuing impact after decolonization.;Prologue: national unity and secession in the symbolism of power -- Introduction : a concept and ideal -- Individual self-determination -- Collective self-determination -- The people -- Self-determination and the right of self-determination -- The early modern period in europe: precursors of a right of self-determination? -- The first decolonization and the right to independence: the Americas 1776-1826 -- The French revolution and the invention of the plebiscite -- From the European restoration to the first world war, 1815-1914 -- The first world war and the peace treaties 1918-1923 -- The interwar period, 1923-1939 -- The second world war: the perversion of a great promise -- The cold war and the second decolonization, 1945-1989 -- After 1989 : the quest for a new equilibrium -- Epilogue : the right of the weak.