{"id":1807,"date":"2009-06-01T09:03:41","date_gmt":"2009-06-01T13:03:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/site\/?p=1807"},"modified":"2010-09-17T11:50:58","modified_gmt":"2010-09-17T15:50:58","slug":"issue_50-2_watts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/2009\/06\/issue_50-2_watts\/","title":{"rendered":"Reciprocity and the Law of War"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Abstract<\/span><\/p>\n<p><em>This Article examines how the principle of reciprocity  operates within the international law of war. Tracing the historical  development and application of the law, the Article demonstrates that  the existing law of war derives from a set of rules that are contingent  on reciprocity. Contrary to common\u00a0 understanding, reciprocity strongly  influences states\u2019 interpretation and application of the law of war. The  Article first identifies an obligational component of reciprocity that  restricts operation of the law to contests between parties with parallel  legal commitments. Second, the Article identifies an observational  component of the principle of reciprocity that permits parties to  suspend or terminate observance when confronted with breach. Although  the principle of reciprocity was softened by late twentieth century  legal instruments, it continues to form a critical component of the law  of war and guides both pragmatic and theoretical discourse. Regardless  of normative conclusions about reciprocity as a precondition to  application of the law, the Article\u2019s reciprocity-cognizant framework  for understanding the law of war provides a useful platform for reform  efforts.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This Article examines how the principle of reciprocity operates within the international law of war. Tracing the historical development and application of the law, the Article demonstrates that the existing law of war derives from a set of rules that are contingent on reciprocity. Contrary to common  understanding, reciprocity strongly influences states\u2019 interpretation and application of the law of war.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_FSMCFIC_featured_image_caption":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_nocaption":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_hide":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[123],"tags":[47],"class_list":["post-1807","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-print-archives","tag-laws-of-war"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/peZu3S-t9","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1807","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1807"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1807\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1807"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1807"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.harvard.edu\/ilj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1807"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}