Crisis Escalation Case Study

1. What is the Utility of Escalation as a Crisis Response Strategy?
As it relates to crises, escalation can be referred to as the state of a crisis situation becoming more volatile, tense and uncertain. This typically comes as a result of more hostile rhetoric or expansion of military actions. As a crisis escalates generally the stakes at risk for the involved states likewise increases and thus escalation is a notion that is avoided when the situation permits it, certainly while on the defensive end of a crisis. Although, during a crisis decision-makers may often choose to employ strategic escalation as a part of the coercive diplomacy process. By carefully and thoughtfully projecting power at an adversary force through increasing the scale …show more content…
Where traditional state interests fit into these developments can often be uncertain as there are often countless factors in play in each individual crisis, for example rather than individual states responding to a crisis, an international body may intervene with the support of a group of states. But again, any crisis that threatens core humanitarian principals that is not of a military nature receives international aid. In western democracies in particular, actions such as these could be perceived as acting in the best interests of the state as it is preserving national integrity and solidifies the notion of unity under an altruistic cause. It is when human security is threatened by military force that responding to a crisis can become highly complex. Although there has been a shift in recent years because of the development of the Responsibility to Protect principle, in the past humanitarian intervention in crises such as that of Rwanda exhibit how states are forced to strike a balance with their traditional concerns and humanitarianism. In Rwanda, international peacekeepers stood by as a genocide took place as they would have been perceived as partisan and infringing on national sovereignty otherwise. Preserving sovereignty is a key concern for any nation state and must be considered when responding to international crises that threaten human security and are of a military nature. In recent years however, this has somewhat changed as seen in the Libyan Crisis, in which there was large scale international intervention which eventually saw the country’s regime