Theory and practice of responsibility within the international arms trade : a case study of United Kingdom arms transfers to Saudi Arabia

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Theory and practice of responsibility within the

international arms trade: A case study of United

Kingdom arms transfers to Saudi Arabia

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Title: Theory and practice of responsibility within the international arms trade: A case study of United Kingdom arms transfers to Saudi Arabia

Author: D.J. Bos

E-mail: diederikjacobbos@gmail.com Student no.: 10791698

Thesis in Political Science: International Relations Graduate School of Social Sciences

University of Amsterdam

Supervisor: Dr G.R. (Gordon) Arlen Second reader: Dr P. (Philip) Schleifer Word count: 21.993

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Acknowledgements

I want to thank my supervisor, Dr Gordon Arlen, for his helpful comments and constructive feedback during the writing of this paper. Thanks are also due to all of the students who were part of this year’s thesis project on human rights and norms of global governance. In particular, I want to thank my sister, Marly Bos, who was part of this thesis project, for her encouragement and helpful comments during the past few months, and for always taking the time to answer my questions in regard to this paper.

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Abbreviations

AOAV – Action on Armed Violence ASR – Articles on State Responsibility ATT – Arms Trade Treaty

CAAT – Campaign Against Arms Trade CSP – Conference of States Parties

DfID – UK Department for International Development

ECCHR – European Centre for Constitutional and Human Rights ESM – European Single Market

FAC – House of Commons Foreign Affairs Commission FCO – UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office

HRC – United Nations Human Rights Council ILC – International Law Commission

MIC – Military-industrial complex MP – Minister of Parliament

NGO – Non-governmental organization

OHCHR – Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights OIEL – Open Individual Export License

SALW – Small Arms and Light Weapons

SIPRI – Stockholm International Peace Research Institute UNSC – United Nations Security Council

WILPF – Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom WTO – World Trade Organization

“Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children (Dunlap, 2011, p. 140; see Eisenhower, 1953).”

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1. Introduction

Since March 2015, a Saudi-led coalition of nine Arab states has been involved in a military-campaign in Yemen, aiming to reinstate Yemen’s rightful president Abd Rabbuh Mansour Al-Hadi, who was ousted when Iran-backed Houthi rebels took over the capital Sana’a in 2014 (Esfandiary & Tabatabai, 2016). Although the military campaign has been widely supported, evidence is found that the Saudi-led coalition is carrying out indiscriminate attacks on civilians and therefore is in violation of international law. A vigorous example of such an indiscriminate attack is described in a recent CNN new article, of which the first sentences read:

“For a group of boys in northern Yemen, Thursday [August 9, 2018] was supposed to be a celebration – a much-anticipated field trip marking their graduation from summer school.A video taken by one of the boys shows the classmates jostling and yelling on a packed school bus, clearly excited for the day ahead. . . . A parent outside the window waves goodbye to their child. Within hours the boy who took the video, along with most of his classmates, would be dead – killed after a Saudi-led coalition airstrike hit their school bus (Elbagir, Abdelaziz, McKenzie, & Munayyer, 2019, p. 1).”

The airstrike, known as the Dahyan airstrike, killed 51 people including 40 children (Elbagir et al., 2019). And although this particular airstrike was especially severe, it represents one of many indiscriminate coalition airstrikes targeting civilians in Yemen since March 2015 (Human Rights Watch, 2019).

Despite the Saudi-led coalition’s violations of both international humanitarian law and human rights law, the UK government continues to support the Saudi regime both politically and materially, and has recently reaffirmed the importance of their partnership with Saudi Arabia (FCO, 2018). The UK’s material support for Saudi Arabia is likely to be inconsistent with the many laws and regulations on the international arms trade. Indeed, evidence suggests that the crimes Saudi Arabia has committed in Yemen amount to war crimes (Amnesty International UK, 2017, 2018b). Yet despite the evidence, much of it provided by non-governmental organizations (NGOs), that the arms export is in violation of the applicable laws for arms control, the UK continues to adopt a business-as-usual attitude. This behaviour is remarkable

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considering the UK’s self-professed image as a champion of human rights worldwide and its efforts in establishing the most substantive treaty regulating the arms trade, the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT). Despite its material support for Saudi Arabia, the UK claims to have taken on a leading role in working towards a political solution in Yemen (FCO & Hunt, 2019). Yet there seems to be little to no critique to the conduct of the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen. The UK has even praised the humanitarian work done by Saudi Arabia in Yemen (UK Mission to the United Nations Geneva, 2018), and has welcomed the coalition’s commitment to humanitarian law (FCO, 2018).

In this context, NGOs working on the issue of the international arms trade have come to play an increasingly important role in the past few decades (Whall & Pytlak, 2014). NGOs have worked alongside governments and international governmental organizations, such as the UN, to help establish new regulations in the area of arms control, mainly concerning the international trade in conventional arms and weapons. On the national level, many NGOs have critiqued the business-as-usual attitude adopted by the UK, and have provided evidence to substantiate their criticisms. However, while NGOs have been very effective in transnational governance processes by helping to establish new laws and regulations on the international arms trade, the effectiveness of NGOs on the national level seems less clear. A reason for this might be that the work of NGOs on the national level is merely about criticizing violations of these laws and regulations. NGOs have no official role in enforcing them. This makes changing government behaviour a difficult task.

This paper then seeks to answer the question of how state actors that are complicit in causing human rights violations can bypass existing laws and regulations on the international arms trade, and how NGOs can help to enforce accountability over these state actors. To answer the latter part of this question, I will use the case of the UK arms trade relationship with Saudi Arabia and relate this to the Saudi-led military campaign in Yemen. This case is highly relevant, especially considering the role played by the UK in advocating for the ATT in the first place. The case study allows me to go beyond a general and abstract discussion by focusing on a particular example in which the actual humanitarian impact of the international arms trade takes a central place.

The paper begins with a theoretical framework. Here I will discuss the academic literature regarding the concepts of norm evasion, state responsibility and accountability, and NGOs. In the next section I will explain the methods used to conduct this research. This section will, for example, explain which NGOs I have chosen for my sample and why I have chosen these particular ones. The next section, which I named ‘Theoretical Analysis’, consists

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of three parts and elaborates on the human rights implications inherent to the international arms trade; the laws and regulations on the international arms trade that have been established over the past two to three decades, and the role of NGOs in helping establish these regulations. This latter part also outlines some of the challenges that remain within the field of arms control. I then build towards the case study of UK arms exports to Saudi Arabia, which provides a stark example of how regulations on the international arms trade are bypassed. The case study elaborates on the critiques and actions of five UK-based NGOs and concludes by considering whether UK government behaviour has changed as a result of these (NGO) critiques. Before concluding the research, I will first have a discussion in which I will, among other things, address the implications of a prospective Brexit on the future of the UK arms trade.

2. Theoretical Framework

This theoretical framework sets out the existing literature on norm evasion, accountability, and (state) responsibility within the international arms trade, before elaborating on the role and effectiveness of NGOs in enforcing responsible state behaviour.

2.1 Norm evasion, accountability and responsibility

Both the number of norms and regulations and the diffusion of these norms and regulations on the international arms trade have strongly increased in the past two to three decades. Although new norms and treaties are meant to further regulate the international arms trade, there is usually some designed flexibility in the eventual treaty to widen the support and cooperation among states without being too constraining (Búsáz, 2017). Hansen (2016) states that this holds true for both homogeneous and heterogeneous groups of states, although in the latter case the focus is usually on the lowest common denominator in order to reach an agreement, often making use of vague or ambiguous wording and therefore weakening the objective of the treaty and catering to the participating states’ national interests. Hansen (2016) links this trend to Henry Kissinger’s use of the term ‘constructive ambiguity’, which can be defined as “the deliberate use of ambiguous language in a sensitive issue in order to advance some political purpose” (Hansen, 2016, p. 196; and see Berridge and James, 2003, p. 51). Referring to arms trade regulations, Yanik (2006) explains that the use of ambiguous wording can be attributed to states’ underlying material interests. In other words, less clear regulations means

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that states can export more arms and weapons, or a more diversified set of arms and weapons, which is economically beneficial. Erickson (2013) argues that less restrictive states benefit from less harmonization in order to retain their competitive position in the arms trade. He insists that “ an ethical arms trade is better described as rhetorical pleasantry than fact of reality” (Erickson, 2013, p. 215). Hansen (2016, pp. 195-196) explains that the ambiguous wording inherent in arms trade treaties is problematic but often difficult to tackle due to the heterogeneity of state actors involved in the drafting of the treaty.

Since the established norms and treaties are to be implemented in national jurisdictions, legal enforcement remains the responsibility of the state. As a logical consequence, states or domestic actors can either comply or not comply with these norms, depending on prevailing interests. Compliance occurs “. . . when the actual behaviour of an given subject conforms to prescribed behaviour, and non-compliance or violation occurs when actual behaviour departs significantly from prescribed behaviour” (Young, 1979, p. 104). According to the neo-realist perspective, there is always an incentive for states to go beyond the established norms due to the anarchic nature of the international state system, prioritizing one’s material and/or strategic interests over humanitarian principles (Helfer, 2013; Wisotzki, 2009).

But this dichotomy of compliance or non-compliance leaves no room for other possibilities, such as: rhetorical adaptation and norm evasion (Búsáz, 2017; Dixon, 2017). The most relevant form of rhetorical adaptation is norm signalling, which can be defined as rhetorically and actively promoting the values behind existing norms, while not adjusting one’s behaviour in a consistent manner (Dixon, 2017). This practice is used to avoid or resist accusations of ongoing abuses (Dixon, 2017). However, states can also become unforeseen advocates of certain norms and regulations in order to ‘level the playing field’ (Erickson, 2015, p. 326). In other words, states may adopt a position as leader in the norm diffusion process to make sure every state is bound by the same rules. There can be multiple reasons why states would adopt such a leading position. First, promoting norm diffusion reduces unfair competition (Erickson, 2015). Second, being a leader in the norm diffusion process means that one can help create new norms and anticipate to them early on in the process, which reduces adaptation costs (Erickson, 2015). Third, being a leader increases a state’s legitimacy, both on the national and global level (Erickson, 2015).

Although evasion is commonly referred to in legal terms as violating the law, it is meant here as a form of bad-faith compliance, which is an important difference. Búsáz (2017) defines this bad-faith compliance as the violation of the objective of the law, while adhering

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to its written text. This strategy is used to reduce any inconvenient obligations, while still allowing actors to technically abide by the law. This is often possible through existing loopholes, be they designed or coincidental, and usually result from a gap between the purpose and the letter of the law in place (Búsáz, 2017). Taken together, evasion is defined as “the intentional compliance with the letter of the law but not its purpose in order to minimize inconvenient legal obligations in an arguably legal fashion” (Búsáz, 2017, p. 862).

As mentioned above, designed flexibility within treaties can give states some leeway when it comes to the legal enforcement of inherent norms. However, flexibility can also be non-designed, in that individual state actors find creative ways to go beyond the purpose of the law, as well as beyond the drafters’ intentions (Búsáz, 2017). Both forms of designed and non-designed flexibility qualify as evasion, although in my own judgement, there is a clear distinction between the two. Designed flexibility is systemic and structural, applying to all participating states in the treaty, while non-designed flexibility is case-specific and showcases an individual state’s lack of responsibility. The difficulty here is differentiating between these two forms in practice.

Norm evasion is problematic in that it impedes accountability (Búsáz, 2017). According to Grant and Keohane (2005) accountability is defined as “the right of some actors to hold other actors to a set of standards, to judge whether they have fulfilled their responsibilities in light of these standards, and to impose sanctions if they determine that these responsibilities have not been met” (p. 29). Taking this definition into account, a number of scholars add that, in order to hold actors accountable, transparency is of the utmost importance (Hale, 2008; Dunworth, 2016; Schroeder, 2005). Schroeder (2005, p. 33) even states that: “. . . without the scrutinizing eye of the public, parochial interests of government power brokers and bureaucracies would dominate defence trade policy objectives”. Accountability mechanisms are backward looking and find their justification in national jurisdictions. Since norm evasion and legal compliance are not mutually exclusive, holding violators legally accountable can be a difficult, if not impossible, task (Búsáz, 2017). However, in democratic states the public can also play a role in democratically holding norm violators accountable (Grant & Keohane, 2005). Moreover, NGOs play an important role in normatively holding norm violators accountable, using their powers and expertise to disseminate information and help increase transparency (Dunworth, 2016; Schroeder, 2005). This point will be elaborated on in the next section.

Before turning to the role of NGOs in holding norm violators accountable, I first look at the concept of responsibility. Article 16 of the International Law Commission’s (ILC)

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Articles on State Responsibility (ASR) says that “a State which aids or assists another State in the commission of an internationally wrongful act by the latter is internationally responsible for doing so if: (a) that State does so with knowledge of the circumstances of the internationally wrongful act; and (b) the act would be internationally wrongful if committed by that State (United Nations, 2001, p. 5).” However, there still remain questions about the legal enforceability of this article due to its imprecise wording (Aust, 2011). Going beyond the legal approach to responsibility in case of an internationally wrongful act, responsibility is also a moral concept. Responsibility as a moral concept applies to actors within the confines of the state, such as its citizens or corporations. Walzer (1977; see also Erskine & Booth, 2016) argues that citizens in a democratic state have a responsibility to actively engage with, and sometimes object to, the state’s domestic and foreign policy decisions. Walzer (1977) takes moral responsibility even further and explains that if one can do something to further responsible behaviour, one has to do it. In her article, Young (2010) introduces a political model of responsibility, which is a collective responsibility of the wider political community within the state. According to Young (2010), taking responsibility “involves joining with others in a public discourse where one tries to persuade one another about courses of collective action that will contribute to ameliorating the problem” (p. 380). In this sense, it is not only the government that bears responsibility for its foreign policy, but also the state’s wider population.

Among scholars there is also a debate on the concept of corporate responsibility. McBarnet (2004) has analysed a corporation’s social responsibility. Reflecting on the work of Milton Friedman, who argued that corporations foremost have a responsibility in increasing their profits. By contrast, McBarnet (2004) shows that there can also be an ethical or moral responsibility within corporations. Considering corporations’ responsibility, Byrne (2007) goes one step further, suggesting that corporate responsibility should go beyond the legal framework that defines responsible behaviour and should move towards decision-making based on internal moral reflections. This vision is shared by Wettstein (2010), who explains that some actions which might not be legally regarded as irresponsible behaviour can still be ethically irresponsible. An example of this is when corporations indirectly contribute to an international wrongful act. The relationship between corporations and the government is also important, due to the former’s lobbying powers and involvement in (domestic) policy-making (Wettstein, 2010). This raises questions about many corporations’ moral conceptions in practice, where, according to Maitland (1998), strategic and material interests tend to take the upper hand.

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To summarise, the information provided in this section suggests that the international arms trade is primarily driven by strategic or economic interests instead of humanitarian norms and values. The laws and regulations in place only seem to make for a “rhetorical pleasantry” (Erickson, 2013, p. 215). In the drafting process of new treaties on the international arms trade, there seems to be a trade-off between the comprehensiveness of the treaty and treaty universalisation. Due to the heterogeneity of states that are either involved in the drafting process or that are considered important for a treaty to gain international legitimacy, treaties are usually tailored to the lowest common denominator (Hansen, 2016). This then weakens their overall objectives and increases their ambiguity (Hansen, 2016). This ambiguity, in combination with the state’s exclusive responsibility to implement and enforce arms trade treaties, increases the risk of norm evasion, which is defined here as bad-faith compliance (Búsáz, 2017). This bad-faith compliance complicates the process of holding states legally accountable for their misconduct (Búsáz, 2017). In the next section I will elaborate on the role of NGOs in trying to hold states accountable for their actions.

2.2 NGO functioning and accountability

Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are defined as “self-governing, private, not-for-profit organizations that are geared towards improving the quality of life of disadvantaged people” (Vakil, 1997: 2060). As Eleanor Roosevelt predicted some sixty years ago, non-governmental organizations nowadays are highly relevant in disclosing, and conducting further research on, human rights abuses and in enforcing compliance to the established norms (Murdie, 2014). According to Wisotzki (2009, p. 15), “. . . their moral rhetoric enables them to direct the attention of the world public and of their national clientele to normative regulatory gaps”. Due to their rhetoric and expertise, NGOs are often considered moral authorities within the wider literature (Hansen, 2016). From a liberal perspective, NGOs, being the most important actors within civil society, are believed to take a position within the global sphere as distinct from the state and market (Stavrianakis, 2012). Stavrianakis (2012) states that NGOs “claim to pursue progressive social change” (p. 231). She also explains that NGOs are often regarded as “agents of an emancipatory politics, motivated by shared values such as altruism and a commitment to human rights” (p.231-232). In line with this, Waisbord (2011) refers to NGOs as “agents of change” (p. 143; see also Risse, Ropp, & Sikkink, 1999). According to Jordan and Van Tuijl (2000), NGOs represent the voice of the people, both nationally and internationally, and this is emblematic of their role in civil society. NGOs play

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a key role in protecting human rights where states may still favour strategic or material interests. Through the independent functioning of NGOs, they are able to raise their voice and criticize states and other actors that are involved in human rights violations (Wouters & Rossi, 2001). Interestingly, more practically oriented research on the topic of the arms trade indicates that the ‘emancipatory potential’ of NGOs has been exaggerated (Stavrianakis, 2012, p. 234). Moreover, the independence of NGOs is sometimes questioned (Bell & Carens, 2004). One reason for this is that NGOs need funds to continue their work and are therefore accountable to numerous, usually private, actors. Moreover, some NGOs are also funded by governments, which may also threaten their independence (Bell & Carens, 2004).

Regarding the international arms trade, NGOs try to raise awareness and contribute to new understandings of the arms trade as a problem in international relations (Stavrianakis, 2013). Although NGOs have worked on the problems that arise within the international arms trade for a number of decades now, is was not until the late 1990s that they became more prominent and secured the ability to join in transnational governance processes (Hansen, 2016). According to Stavrianakis (2012; 2013), NGOs that deal with arms trade issues have taken a critical stance towards many government policies, and have contributed to a number of treaties, such as the European Union (EU) Common Position on the international arms trade in 2008 and the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) in 2014. Despite the role of NGOs in exerting pressure on governments, their relation is often not one of complete opposition but rather one of interaction and dialogue (Stavrianakis, 2012). Many states have also recognized the importance of NGOs in informing governments on human rights issues and in increasing transparency (Stavrianakis, 2013).

Using the work of Scholte (2002), Stavrianakis (2013) argues that NGOs that work on the international arms trade are either reformist or transformist. Stavrianakis (2013) states that reformist NGOs strive to strengthen regulations on the arms trade but leave its underlying structure intact. She argues that many NGOs working on the arms trade “ . . accept the parameters of the world military order as unproblematic, and assume violations and excesses to be accidental rather than intrinsic” (Stavrianakis, 2012, p. 240). In contrast, transformist NGOs critique the underlying structure of the arms trade as being primarily based on material and strategic interests. Beyond the dichotomy of reformist and transformist NGOs, NGOs can also have different mandates, being either focused on human rights or a certain set of human rights, on developmental issues, on conflict prevention, or on a more inclusive set of different issue areas (Wouters & Rossi, 2001).

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I will now turn to the tactics NGOs use to further their individual and collective goals. NGOs often exert pressure on human rights violators through naming and shaming efforts (Murdie, 2014). The goal of naming and shaming is to put pressure on an actor that violates certain norms, usually a state or its leader, in order for this actor to change its behaviour (Peterson, Murdie, & Asal, 2018). Another goal of naming and shaming is for an NGO to involve other actors to join in their efforts and stand strong as a collective (Peterson, Murdie, & Asal, 2018). The result of naming and shaming as a practice also says something about the value the perpetrator attaches to its wrongdoings, considering the costs imposed by it (Peterson, Murdie, & Asal, 2018). But in order for this practice to have effect NGOs need to spread their word to the wider public. According to Schroeder (2005), in order to reach the public as well as government officials, the media turns out to be the most effective conduit. Meriläinen and Vos (2011) suggest that the media is truly essential for NGOs to get their information across and trigger a public debate. They follow the agenda setting theory and explain that public opinion is very much influenced by the mainstream media (Meriläinen & Vos, 2001). Powers (2016) shows that NGOs also make most use of the mainstream media within their campaigns. It should be noted, however, that NGOs do not solely rely on the mainstream media and actually do make use of many digital alternatives. Another tactic is that, although each NGO differentiates itself from others and although their formal mandates may also differ, NGOs often work together and use their standing as a collective to exert greater pressure on norm violators (Murdie, 2014). Some examples of their collective efforts are joint letters and statements, lobbying practices, and legal interventions.

Despite the emancipating and progressive role NGOs seem to fulfil in society, there are also a number of criticisms regarding their functioning. One of these criticisms is in regard to the claim that NGOs are independent actors. Other points of critique are NGOs’ representativeness and their ability to hold states and other actors to account. Many scholars that are critical towards the role of NGOs in society argue that NGOs do not officially represent the public since they are not mandated to do so (Grant & Keohande, 2005; see also Dunworth, 2016). Grant and Keohane (2005) state that the public interest is a very normative concept. They argue that NGOs rather represent an idea of what they think is the public interest (Grant & Keohane, 2015, p. 38). Dunworth (2016) explains that, instead of being representative of the public, NGOs indeed represent an idea or a vision, which is based on their expertise. He also claims that NGOs do not need to have internal accountability themselves in order to be able to hold other actors to account. “NGOs will stand (or fall) on

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the credibility, validity and reliability of their information and analysis (Dunworth, 2016, p. 55).”

To summarise, NGOs are often regarded as emancipatory organizations, being primarily concerned with progressive values such as protecting human rights, and having adopted a position between state and market (Stavrianakis, 2012). NGOs have come to play an increasingly important role in the past few decades, both in transnational governance processes and in disclosing human rights violations and other abuses. NGOs use naming and shaming efforts to exert pressure on norm violators and make use of the media and public campaigns to communicate their ideas to the wider public. Involving the wider public to their cause is crucial since NGOs have no official role in overseeing or enforcing arms trade regulations. As explained in the previous section, implementing and enforcing arms trade regulations is the sole responsibility of the state.

3. Methodology

To conduct this research I will make use of a qualitative research strategy, placing emphasis on words and meanings rather than numbers and statistics (Bryman, 2012). As a research design I will use an interpretative and single case study of the arms trade relationship between the United Kingdom and Saudi Arabia, focusing on the period after 2015, which marked the start of the Saudi-led military campaign in Yemen (Human Rights Watch, 2019). I chose to do a case-study research in order to go beyond a general and abstract analysis of the international arms trade, focusing on the human beings whose rights are violated as a result of the international arms trade. To answer my main question I use secondary data analysis as a research method. Since, in theory, any sort of primary data can be used in a secondary data analysis (Hox & Boeije, 2005), I am able to review a diversified set of documents. This helps me “uncover meaning, develop understanding, and discover insights relevant to the research” (Bowen, 2009, p. 29; and see Merriam, 1988, p. 118). Moreover, it helps me link the phenomenon being studied to the wider context. The data I use in this study include the websites of, and reports from, five UK-based NGOs, as well as UK government reports, news stories, and official press releases. I also incorporate news articles regarding UK arms exports to Saudi Arabia and the consequences of these exports in Yemen. I will mainly refer to news articles in the UK quality press, which is part of the mainstream media and consists of a number of major quality newspapers and their respective websites (e.g. Financial Times, The Guardian, The Independent). A big advantage of secondary data analysis is that it enables me

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to include the most recent reports, press releases, and newspaper articles in this research. This is important given the significance of the many developments within this issue area. Secondary data analysis is quite similar to content analysis, which aims “to provide knowledge and understanding of the phenomenon under study” (Hsieh & Shannon, 2005, p. 1278; and see Downe-Wamboldt, 1992, p. 314). The data gathered for this research has been divided into major themes (e.g. NGO critiques, actions and joint efforts, use of the media, and past and present government behaviour), which helped me to analyse the data in a more systematic manner (Bowen, 2009). There are a number of benefits to doing secondary data analysis. First, it is a very time efficient method in that it “requires data selection instead of data collection” (Bowen, 2009, p. 31). Second, it is an unobtrusive research method, which does not involve people directly. Adding to this, the documents analysed are stable, which means that the researcher does not negatively affect the actual content of these documents (Bowen, 2009). There is also a limitation to doing secondary data analysis, which is that the documents being studied may reflect the institutes’ or the researcher’s preconceptions. This is called “biased selectivity” (Bowen, 2009, p. 32). However, reviewing a diversified set of documents, which include opposing ideas and arguments, helps to balance its negative impact.

The five UK-based NGOs that I use as a sample in this research are: Action on Armed Violence (AOAV), Amnesty International UK, Campaign Against the Arms Trade (CAAT), Oxfam GB, and Saferworld. I chose these five UK-based organizations based on their relative size and their extensive work on the international arms trade. Moreover, these five NGOs are also an interesting set of organizations due to their differences in funding, their different nature, some being more reformist and some being more transformist in their actions (see Stavrianakis, 2013), and their different mandates. This allows both for comparison of their tactics and of their actual effectiveness and contribution to the topic of the international arms trade. However, it should be noted that the main focus of this research is not on mutual comparisons or best practices, but rather on how each of these organizations works on the international arms trade and what effects they have both individually and as a collective. In the next paragraph I will discuss these five NGOs in short, explaining their main activities and their funding.

According to its website (https://aoav.org.uk) AOAV works on reducing “the incidence and impact of armed violence”, with a special focus on the impact of “explosive weapons in populated areas”. AOAV has contributed to the establishment of a number of treaties related to the arms trade, including the Arms Trade Treaty (2014), which I will discuss later in this paper. When it comes to their finances, the AOAV receives funding from

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public donations, governments, and other institutions. The UK department of Amnesty International works to improve human rights globally and does this through “investigating and exposing abuses, educating and mobilising the public, and helping transform societies to create a safer, more just world” (https://www.amnesty.org.uk). Amnesty International (UK) is mostly funded through public donations, receiving no funds from governments or politically affiliated parties in order to maintain their independence. The CAAT is a campaigning organizations that solely focuses on ending the international arms trade in its entirety. Therefore, the CAAT can, in contrast to the other organizations used in this sample, be regarded as a transformist organization (see Stavrianakis, 2013). The CAAT “considers that security needs to be seen in much broader terms that are not dominated by military and arms company interests” (https://www.caat.org.uk). As with Amnesty International, its work is financially independent from government support and the campaign only receives funding from foundations and through public donations. Although Oxfam’s main focus is on poverty

alleviation, it also works actively to promote security from conflict

(https://www.oxfam.org.uk), which includes working on the international arms trade. This is because of the interrelationship between armed violence and poverty, as well as its negative effect on development work (Oxfam, 2015). Just as with Amnesty International, a human

rights-approach lies at the core of this organization. Oxfam receives most of its funding from

public donations, governments, and other institutions. The last NGO I will use in this research is Saferworld. Its work focuses on the people that are affected by conflict and their main aim is to “. . . promote peace and to address the key drivers of conflict” (https://www.saferworld.org.uk). According to the information on its website Saferworld “pushes for commitments that change the direction of national, regional, and global policy and create conditions for lasting peace”. Saferworld is funded by many governments, including the UK government and the United States (US) government. Besides government funding it also receive funds through public donations, trusts and foundations.

Table 1 below shows the most important characteristics of these NGOs in relation to the international arms trade. These characteristics are important to consider for the remainder of this paper since they are at the basis of the choices the NGOs make in critiquing and taking action against the UK’s continuing arms exports. It is also important to be aware of the differences between these NGOs in order to give a clear sense of how they complement each other in their work on the international arms trade. To get back to the point of government funding and its potential threat to independence, as mentioned in the theoretical framework, I argue that this does not impede this research’ objectives. Although the potential threat to

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independence is a valid point, AOAV, Oxfam, and Saferworld all critique the UK government’s business-as-usual attitude in relation the international arms trade. Where Amnesty International UK and the CAAT might be more activist in their approach, it is the collective output of all five NGOs used as a sample in this study that is of the utmost importance. In my opinion, including all five NGOs in this study, irrespective of their funding and specific mandates, is only of added value.

All the organizations in this sample are UK-based and spend a great deal of their work on the (international) arms trade, part of which is exerting pressure on the UK government due to the latter’s arms trade relationship with the Saudi regime. All NGOs except for the CAAT have also joined forces in the Control Arms campaign, an initiative of Amnesty International and Oxfam, established in 2003, to “. . . reduce armed violence and conflict through global controls on the arms trade”, with the main goal of establishing an arms trade treaty (Oxfam, 2015, p. 1; see also https://controlarms.org). Reason for the absence of the CAAT in the Control Arms campaign might be its different nature compared to the other NGOs, being transformist instead of reformist. Before the establishment of the Control Arms campaign, a number of NGOs, among them Amnesty International, Oxfam, and Saferworld, have collaborated to help establish the EU Common Position (Oxfam, 2015: see section 4.2: Laws and regulations). Although the CAAT has a more transformist approach to the international arms trade and is no part of the collaborations referred to above, it did build on and refer to the work of the other organizations included in the sample, as well as issue joint statements or appeals in certain cases (CAAT, 2016a; CAAT, The Corner House, BASIC, & Saferworld, 2006). Moreover, in two recent lawsuits brought to court by the CAAT, both Amnesty

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International and Oxfam acted as intervener, expressing their concerns on the UK-SA arms trade relationship (Debevoise & Plimpton, 2017; Matrix Chambers, 2016). Due to their past and present collaborations in campaigning against the (international) arms trade, as well as their joint issue statements, this paper’s focus on the collective output of these NGOs can be justified. Using their collective output, this research is foremost an analysis of the work these five NGOs are doing to combat human rights violations as a result of the international arms trade instead of a comparison between the NGOs in question. In my opinion, doing a comparative research on the relative effectiveness of different NGOs would take the focus away from the violations and wrongdoings that are inherent to the arms trade between the UK and Saudi Arabia. I want to stress that this does not imply that NGOs’ different characteristics and tactics are irrelevant to this research. On the contrary, NGOs’ different mandates and tactics, and their relative effectiveness, are complementary factors in this research’ objective to capture the collective output of these NGOs in regard to the international arms trade.

4. Theoretical Analysis

Before describing the existing regulations on the international arms trade in section 4.2, and before I explain the role of NGOs in advocating for stricter and legally binding rules when it comes to the international arms trade in section 4.3, I will first elaborate on the past and present human rights violations that can be attributed to the international arms trade. In the next three sections I will mainly focus on the period after the Cold War, which changed the arms trade dynamics, both through the increase in competition within the international arms market as well as through a focus away from nuclear disarmaments and on conventional arms and small arms and light weapons (SALW) instead. Although numerous regulations already existed, and many new regulations have been developed over the past decades, human rights violations were and are still very much present. Section 4.1 strictly focuses on these human rights violations, leaving the regulations and their actual improvements and shortcomings for section 4.2. Section 4.3 will follow the same structure as section 4.2, explaining both the successes of the NGOs as well as their remaining challenges.

4.1 Human rights implications

After the Cold War, the global arms market has become more competitive due to the relative increase in arms produced vis-à-vis producer states’ domestic demands (Yanik, 2006). This

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has often resulted in producer states’ aversion to stricter regulations (Yanik, 2006), making human rights concerns come in second place, after states’ economic interests (Mahmudi-Azer, 2006). A number of UN human rights agencies have acknowledged that the arms trade can have a severe impact on human rights, including one’s civil and political rights, but also one’s social and cultural rights (ECCHR & WILPF, 2018; OHCHR, 2017). In Yemen, coalition airstrikes have hit civilian targets and public facilities, including schools, market places, and healthcare facilities (ECCHR & WILPF, 2018, p. 10). As a result of these attacks, the coalition has violated people’s “right to food and water, … education, and the right to health” (ECCHR & WILPF, 2018, p. 10). As will be elaborated on in the next chapter (see chapter 5.1), more than half of the Yemeni population is food insecure (Austin, 2019; Control Arms, 2019). Moreover, Yemen currently also faces “the world’s worst cholera outbreak” (ECCHR & WILPF, 2018, p. 11).

According to Blanton (2001), states import arms to increase security. Through the build-up of arms, states are able to defend themselves against security threats. In such circumstances the direct use of these arms may lead to severe human rights abuses. Moreover, Blanton (2001) argues that the build-up of arms may well lead to internal insecurity. The availability of arms may lower the threshold of states to use the arms for the purpose of internal repression and often keeps autocratic leaders in power (De Soysa, Jackson, & Ormhaug, 2010; Sidel, 1995). On their website, the Campaign Against Arms Trade adds another concern, which is that the arms exports to abusing states convey a message of political acceptance or endorsement (CAAT, 2018b). Moreover, in a report from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) it is argued that unregulated arms transfers not only have a direct impact through the recipients’ external and internal use of the arms, usually making a conflict far more deadlier and longer in duration (CAAT, 2018a), but also increase the risk of diversion of the material (OHCHR, 2017).

Around two decades ago, close to half of all the international arms transfers were destined for states with poor human rights records (Yanik, 2006). Considering this, Blanton (2001) argues that “neither human rights abuses nor autocratic polity would appear to reduce the likelihood of countries receiving Western arms . . .” (p. 254). Interestingly, she explains that both human rights abusing states as well as autocratic regimes turn out to be more likely to receive arms from certain states, including the United States, France, and the UK (Blanton, 2001). Examples of mostly Western arms transfers to grave human rights abusers and/or to states involved in active conflict are the arms transfers to Iraq in the 1980s (Yanik, 2006), as well as arms transfers to Rwanda in the years before the genocide, when ethnic tensions were

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already severe (Yanik, 2006; Misol, 2004). Furthermore, the ethnic conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), which cost at least three million people their lives, was fuelled by weapons that originated from many Western states such as: Germany, Belgium, France, the UK, and the US (Mahmudi-Azer, 2006). Other examples are UK and US arms transfers to Indonesia, which used these weapons in its military crackdown in East-Timor; to South Africa under apartheid; and to Uganda during Idi Amin’s sanguinary rule (Sidel, 1995).

More recent dubious arms transfers that are linked to human rights violations are China’s weapon transfers to Sudan during the Darfur conflict that started in 2003 (Kotecki, 2008), and many Western states’ arms exports to a number of North-African states during the Arab Spring in 2011 (Hansen & Marsh, 2015; Stop Wapenhandel, 2012). Libya received a large number of weapons despite the international awareness of Gaddafi’s autocratic polity and the already existing human rights concerns (Hansen & Marsh, 2015). Hansen and Marsh (2015) have argued that Libya was able to import these arms and weapons due the competitive nature within the international arms trade at the time, with many European states looking to increase their market shares. The UK approved a significant number of arms to the Libyan regime in the years before and during the people’s revolution, even describing Libya as a “priority area” (Hansen & Marsh, 2015, p. 280). The UK government explained that these arms were exported to “strengthen Libya’s peace support operations” (Hansen & Marsh, 2015, p. 280). Even more interesting, in 2017 alone the UK had approved arms transfers to eighteen out of the thirty states it regarded as having poor human rights records (CAAT, 2018b). One of these states is Saudi Arabia, the biggest importer of UK arms (CAAT, 2018a). Arms transfers to Saudi Arabia contribute to the prolonged violence in Yemen since the Saudi-led coalition started back in 2015 (CAAT, 2018a; Human Rights Watch, 2019). Airstrikes conducted by coalition parties have resulted in thousands of casualties, including many civilians (CAAT, 2018a; Human Rights Watch, 2019). Despite the many direct casualties of these airstrikes, the actual destruction of Yemen’s (social) infrastructure, including the destruction of schools, hospitals, and electricity and water supplies has resulted in an enduring humanitarian crisis and in increased poverty levels (CAAT, 2018a; Human Rights Watch, 2019; see also OHCHR, 2017).

Besides the destruction of (social) infrastructure, and the violation of one’s social and cultural rights, the use of arms also complicates the work of NGOs, as well as obstructs peacekeeping initiatives and the delivery of humanitarian aid (De Soysa, Jackson, & Ormhaug, 2010; Valenti, Mtonga, Gould, & Christ, 2014). Furthermore, the availability and the use of arms also has significant gender dimensions (ECCHR & WILPF, 2018). “The

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ownership and use of arms is closely linked to specific expressions of masculinity related to control, power, domination and strength (ECCHR & WILPF, 2018: p. 2).” The availability of weapons negatively affects women’s bargaining power and obstructs their social, economic, and political participation in society (ECCHR & WILPF, 2018). Besides the direct negative effects of the availability and use of weapons on women’s lives (e.g. gender-based and domestic violence), women are often also confronted with changing responsibilities within the household. As argued in a report from the ECCHR and the WILPF (2018), “. . . when men are killed or injured, women must take on new or additional roles as income providers, often leading to impoverishment, exploitation and discrimination” (p. 2). Besides these gender dimensions, there is also the issue of opportunity costs that is inherent to the arms trade. The build-up of arms diverts money away from often much needed social services and (social) infrastructure (Blanton, 2001; Mahmudi-Azer, 2006; see also Sidel, 1995, p. 1680).

After a gradual decrease since the 1981 peak in arms imports, in the past fifteen or twenty years, arms imports have almost doubled in value to around 30 billion US dollars in 2017 (World Bank, 2017). Although there are numerous regulations in place to try and enforce responsible behaviour in regard to the international arms trade, Suchan (2009) argues that many producer states’ economic interests continue to impede the establishment of advanced, clear, and unambiguous laws and regulations. Although the many existing regulations therefore might not be as effective as often intended, as was already explained in the theoretical framework, this does not mean that these regulations have no effect on increasing responsibility within the international arms trade. In the next section I will discuss a number of relevant regional and international regulations and I will elaborate on both their achievements as well as their shortcomings.

4.2 Laws and regulations

All big exporting states have implemented national laws and regulations regarding international arms transfers (Yanik, 2006). And although many states used to be very reluctant to ratify and implement international codes of conduct, pressure from civil society actors as well as a number of scandals in the 1970s and 1980s have resulted in significant progress in the drafting and signing of new international agreements and regulations (Holtom & Bromley, 2010; Yanik, 2006). This section discusses the most relevant of these regulations, being mostly European and global in reach which makes them applicable to the case study here. The

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focus will be on laws and regulations developed after the Cold War, for the Cold War has resulted in a change in arms export dynamics, away from nuclear weapons and disarmament, and instead focusing on conventional weapons. Conventional weapons are both major weapon systems such as battle tanks and aircraft, as well as light weapons such as small arms and land mines (Smith & Udis, 2001). Moreover, campaigns or agreements that focus on a single set of arms, such as the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (1992) and the resulting Ottawa Treaty or the Oslo Convention on cluster munitions, will not be considered here, although their impact within the control arms regime must not be neglected and often has been quite successful.

The first regulation I will elaborate on is the 1992 United Nations Register of Conventional Arms. The UN Register has as its main objective the dissemination of information regarding the facts and figures around conventional arms transfers (Yanik, 2006). The Register does not provide guidelines for the approval or denial of arms transfers, neither does it take external factors, such as human rights, into account. Moreover, countries are not required to provide information on a structural basis (Yanik, 2006).

The second relevant set of regulations and guidelines is the Wassenaar Arrangement, which came into existence in 1996 through a joint incentive of a number of big exporting states, and which counts 42 member states at the moment of writing (https://www.wassenaar.org/). The Wassenaar Arrangement promotes transparency, greater responsibility, and cooperation between exporting states in order to prevent a destabilizing build-up of conventional arms, including SALW, by any state (Wassenaar Arrangement Plenary, 2016; Yanik, 2006). Over the years, the Wassenaar Arrangement has been further expanded to encompass more issue areas, such as human rights. Member states should, for example, take into account a state’s human rights situation before exporting their arms and weapons to this state (Wassenaar Arrangement Plenary, 2016). Another important consideration for exporting states, as outlined in the Wassenaar Arrangement’s section on “guidelines for small arms and light weapons” (p. 17), is “the nature and cost of the arms to be transferred in relation to the circumstances of the recipient country” (Wassenaar Arrangement Plenary, 2016: p. 17). However, the Wassenaar Arrangement is a non-binding agreement, which means that the actual arms exports remain under the jurisdiction of its signatories (Wassenaar Arrangement Plenary, 2016). Since the Wassenaar Arrangement is a supplier group, importing states have often critiqued the Arrangement for being mainly concerned with coordinating and setting higher prices for weapons exports (Smith and Udis, 2001).

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Another relevant regulation is the European Union Code of Conduct, implemented in 1998. The Code was the first EU agreement on arms exports (Bauer, 2003). Its main objective is creating greater responsibility and transparency within the international trade of conventional weapons, and it does so by considering the human rights situation in the recipient states on a case-by-case basis before new licenses are issued (Council of the European Union, 1998). In this case-by-case review the nature of the weapons to be exported and the potential use of these weapons in the recipient state are also considered (Council of the European Union, 1998). In criterion 2 of the Code it is further stated that “member states will not issue an export license if there is a clear risk that the proposed export might be used for internal repression” (Council of the European Union, 1998). Moreover, as explained within the EU Code of Conduct, when a license is denied, the state that has denied this license should explain their reasons for this denial (Council of the European Union, 1998). Other states should then take these reasons into account before they issue an arms license themselves (Council of the European Union, 1998). In practice, though, this has not proved very effective (Bauer, 2003). Two other relevant operative provisions of the Code are that member states remain fully responsible for issuing or denying licenses, and that member states’ economic interests may also be considered in the decision-making process (Council of the European Union, 1998). However, it is also stated that these interests will not come at the expense of the licensing criteria as stipulated in the Code (Council of the European Union, 1998). One of the main critiques of the Code of Conduct was that it was not a legally binding provision. However, this changed in 2008 when the EU adopted the Common Position on arms exports, which replaced the Code of Conduct (Council of the European Union, 2008). Nevertheless, the Code did result in greater transparency and an increase in bilateral information exchanges. According to Bauer (2003), in the early 2000s most EU states provided reports on their arms exports, where before the 1990s only one state did so. Furthermore, Holtom and Bromley (2010) explain that the Code of Conduct has led to significantly less arms exports to human rights abusing states and to conflict zones. Yet, as stated by Hansen and Marsh (2015), the provisions in the EU Code of Conduct, which were made legally binding in the EU Common Position, have not resulted in the denial of the arms exports to the Gaddafi regime in Libya in the years before the 2011 revolution (see section 4.1).

Three years after the EU Code of Conduct was implemented, the International Law Commission introduced a legally binding document named the Articles on the Responsibility of States for Internationally Wrongful Acts (International Law Commission, 2001). Article 1

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reads: “Every internationally wrongful act of a State entails the international responsibility of that State” (International Law Commission, 2001). Regarding Article 1, it is not only direct causation of the internationally wrongful act but also a state’s complicity in the act that entails its international responsibility (Bellal, 2014). According to Article 16: “A State which aids or assists another State in the commission of an internationally wrongful act by the latter is internationally responsible for doing so if: (a) that State does so with the knowledge of the circumstances of the internationally wrongful act; and (b) the act would be internationally wrongful if committed by that State” (International Law Commission, 2001). Following Article 16, a case-by-case review must clarify whether or not the exporting state was aware of the potential use of these arms to facilitate the international wrongful act (International Law Commission, 2001).

Before continuing to the latest addition to the set of laws and regulations on the international arms trade, the ATT, I will first briefly discuss the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) arms embargoes. The reason why I discuss them here is because they were, before the establishment of the ATT, the only global, legally binding prohibition to regulate the international arms trade (Holtom & Bromley, 2010). These mandatory UNSC arms embargoes have been around since the 1966 arms embargo on Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). However, the arms embargoes are provisional and ad-hoc prohibitions that are imposed in certain cases and are therefore not fixed or part of the more forward-looking rules and regulations (Brehm, 2007). The same holds true for EU arms embargoes, which prohibit the transfer of European arms to conflict areas and human rights abusing states. In addition to being imposed on an ad-hoc basis and being provisional in nature, these arms embargoes in general have not always been very effective (Oxfam, 2012). Furthermore, Misol (2014) argues that there are no real consequences when a state fails to adhere to such embargoes.

The second-last regulation that I will elaborate on is the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT), established in 2014. This treaty is the first legally binding treaty on the international trade that is global in scope (OHCHR, 2017). According to Article 1 of the ATT, its objective is to “establish the highest possible common international standards for regulating or improving the regulation of the international trade in conventional arms” (United Nations, 2013), with the purpose of “contributing to international and regional peace, security and stability; reducing human suffering; and promoting cooperation, transparency and responsible action by States Parties in the international trade in conventional arms” (United Nations, 2013). Regarding transparency, Article 5 of the Treaty states that “each party shall take measures necessary to implement the provisions of this treaty and shall designate competent national

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authorities in order to have an effective and transparent national control system regulating the transfer of conventional arms . . .” (United Nations, 2013). Article 6 and 7 form the core of the treaty. Article 6 reads: “A state party shall not authorize any transfer of conventional arms . . . if the transfer would violate its obligations under measures adopted by the United Nations Security Council acting under Chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations, in particular arms embargoes; and a state party shall not authorize any transfer of conventional arms . . . if it has knowledge at the time of authorization that the arms or items would be used in the commission of genocide, crimes against humanity, grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions of 1949, attacks directed against civilian objects or civilians protected as such, or other war crimes as defined by international agreements to which it is a Party” (United Nations, 2013). Article 7 reads: “If the export is not prohibited under Article 6, each exporting state party, prior to authorization of the export of conventional arms . . . shall, in an objective and non-discriminatory manner . . . assess the potential that the conventional arms or items: (a) would contribute to or undermine peace and security; (b) could be used to: (i) commit or facilitate a serious violation of international humanitarian law; (ii) commit or facilitate a serious violation of international human rights law” (United Nations, 2013). Article 7 continues: “If, after conducting this assessment and considering available mitigating measures, the exporting state party determines that there is an overriding risk of any of the negative consequences in paragraph 1, the exporting state party shall not authorize the export” (United Nations, 2013). Other provisions laid out in the ATT include that of detailed record-keeping of the arms, parts, and ammunitions exported to other states (United Nations, 2013).

Despite the comprehensiveness and the scope of the ATT, being ratified by over hundred states (https://thearmstradetreaty.org/), a number of concerns and criticisms remain. One of these concerns is that a number of big exporting and importing states (e.g. China, Russia, India, Saudi Arabia, Egypt) have not ratified nor signed the treaty (Bromley, 2018). Another concern, as stated by a lot of non-member states, is the potential denial of arms licenses attributed to human rights concerns, where there might actually be other (political and/or strategic) reasons for this denial of arms (Acheson, 2013). Besides these concerns there are also some critiques to the ATT, which are mostly on the ambiguous and imprecise wording of the treaty. Two prominent examples are the use of the words ‘serious violation’ and ‘overriding risk’ in Article 7. A ‘serious violation’ is not defined in the treaty and its interpretation is therefore very subjective, whereas the use of the words ‘overriding risk’ may well lead to the approval of any license agreement, especially because the risk assessments remain the full responsibility of the exporting state (Acheson, 2013; Bellal, 2014). One last

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critique of the ATT, as outlined by a number of states, is that the treaty leaves out potential issues as overproduction and overaccumulation of conventional arms and therefore does not contribute to a change in the quantity of arms produced per se (Acheson, 2013).

The last set of laws and regulations I want to discuss here are the consolidated EU and national arms exports criteria that are specific to the UK. These are eight criteria that are established to regulate the licensing process of UK arms exports. Criterion 1 reads: “The Government will not grant a license if to do so would be inconsistent with, inter alia: a) the UK’s obligations and its commitments to enforce . . . arms embargoes; b) the UK’s obligations under the United Nations arms trade treaty (UK government, 2014).” Furthermore, Criterion 1f stipulates that a license will not be issued if this would not be in accordance with the 2008 EU Common Position. However, in keeping with the EU Common Position, the UK is still allowed to consider “the effect of proposed exports on their economic, social, commercial and industrial interests” as long as such exports are not in violation of the established criteria (UK government, 2014, para. ‘other factors’). As stipulated in an amendment to the consolidated arms export criteria, the UK will continue “to give full weight to the UK’s national interests”, which include strategic, economic, and political interests (UK government, 2014, para. ‘other factors’). Criterion 2c of the consolidated criteria reads: “. . . the Government will not grant a license if there is a clear risk that the items might be used in the commission of a serious violation of international humanitarian law” (UK government, 2014). But what is meant by a ‘clear risk’ is not clearly defined. In enforcing the consolidated criteria and assessing license applications, “account will be taken of reliable evidence” (UK government, 2014, para. ‘other factors’). This includes evidence provided by NGOs (UK government, 2014).

To conclude this section, there are several national, regional and global laws and regulations that regulate the international arms trade. Some are legally binding, some are politically binding, and some are mere guidelines for good practice. Although the adoption of these regulations showcases the willingness of many states to further regulate the arms trade and promote responsible state behaviour, the regulations themselves often lack effectiveness. According to Yanik (2006), this lack of effectiveness is due to the ambiguous and imprecise wording used within these laws and regulations, enabling states to derogate from their intended use. This remains a challenge for many states and civil society actors. The next section explains how NGOs have contributed to improving these regulations over the years and how they continue to work on the regulations’ shortcomings.

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4.3 Role of non-governmental organizations

What can be concluded from the first two sections is that besides the regulations, treaty violations and human rights violations as a result of the international arms trade still persist. Although this is not to say that these regulation are not effective, states still find ways to go beyond the intended use of the regulations and continue a business-as-usual attitude. This section explains how NGOs have contributed to the establishment of some of the regulations as explained in section 4.2, and how they have come to take on an increasingly important position in the field of human security and high politics. Furthermore, this section elaborates on the main shortcomings of these treaties and regulations as well as on other challenges inherent to the international arms trade.

After the Cold War, NGOs have become more actively involved in the field of human security (Whall & Pytlak, 2014). The involvement in high politics, and in the issue of arms trade in particular, has therefore been relatively new (Whall & Pytlak, 2014). The first effective contribution of NGOs in the field of arms control has been through their efforts in the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) in the years following 1992 (Knopf, 2012). This led to the establishment of the Ottawa Treaty in 1999. Besides the Ottawa Treaty, NGOs also helped to establish the 2010 Oslo Convention on cluster munitions. Although a number of important states (e.g. the United States, Russia, China, and India) are not party to these conventions, the negative attention this has brought about has resulted in other efforts and improvements by these non-signatory states in the area of arms control (Knopf, 2012).

Besides these two examples above, NGOs have also played an active role in the UN Conference on Small Arms in 2001 (Batchelor, 2002), and have helped to create the EU Code of Conduct on Arms Exports in 1998, the EU Common Position in 2008, and the Arms Trade Treaty in 2014 (Stavrianakis, 2012). NGOs are important through the dissemination of statistical data on the real-life effects of the arms trade (Knopf, 2012), and they often play an important role as advisors within arms control conferences (Batchelor, 2002). After the UN Conference on Small Arms in 2001, Secretary-General Kofi Annan thanked the many NGOs that were involved in the process for their “constructive participation” (Batchelor, 2002, p 39).

In the drafting process of the most comprehensive treaty on the arms trade, the ATT, NGOs played a vital role. To promote the Arms Trade Treaty, Amnesty International, Oxfam, and the International Action Network on Small Arms (IANSA) together initiated the Control Arms campaign in 2003 (Mack & Wood, n.d.). Since only a few states openly supported these

Theory and practice of responsibility within the international arms trade : a case study of United Kingdom arms transfers to Saudi Arabia