It would be hard to overstate the importance of air power in humanitarian intervention (HI) and the Responsibility to Protect (R2P). Yet, the role of air power in HI and R2P has been understudied. This article seeks to remedy the lack of systematic investigation. It does so by developing a framework for assessing the effectiveness of air power during military operations in HI and R2P and applies it to NATO’s air campaigns in Kosovo (Operation Allied Force) and Libya (Operation Unified Protector). Upon examination NATO is revealed to have fared better in Libya than Kosovo in positively accomplishing its stated humanitarian objectives, minimizing collateral damage and reducing the costs for the interveners, all of which are aspects considered by the model. The relative effectiveness of Operations Unified Protector is generally attributed to geography, diplomacy and technology. It is argued that better ground support, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and burden sharing are needed to enhance the utility of air power in HI and R2P even further.

Determining whether the opposition is benign or malign is central to the security dilemma. In this context, states have to decide whether the military capabilities of others are for defensive or offensive purposes. Despite the importance of this issue, states’ use of intelligence and diplomacy to gauge others’ capabilities and intentions and its implications for exacerbating, ameliorating and escaping the security dilemma have hardly been addressed. The few who have engaged with the topic have only done so superficially. This article engages with the subject matter at length and argues that both intelligence and diplomacy are double-edged swords in the security dilemma. Intelligence is particularly useful in attaining information regarding the capabilities of others and diplomacy is of great value in acquiring information about their intentions. Yet, they are both prone to error. The best prospects of mitigating and escaping the security dilemma are therefore by utilizing intelligence to gauge others’ capabilities and diplomacy to decipher their intentions, even though these efforts may instead end up aggravating the security dilemma dynamics due to mistakes.

The classical realist writings of E.H. Carr and constructivist publications of Alexander Wendt are extraordinarily influential. While they have provoked a great number of reactions within the discipline of International Relations, the ethical dimensions of their works have rarely been studied at length. This article seeks to remedy this lack of examination by engaging in an in-depth scrutiny of the moral concerns of these two mainstream International Relations scholars. On investigation, it is revealed that Carr demonstrates a strong commitment to the ethical principle of fairness and Wendt a moral concern for the prevention of the use of organized violence. These concerns are shared by Rawlsians and cosmopolitans in International Relations, and these findings may thereby encourage closer engagement between these diverse communities that rarely speak to one another and strengthen disciplinary research on morals.

Content analysis has once again come to the forefront of discussions regarding methods in International Relations (IR). The first wave of content analysis in IR lasted from the 1940s to the 1960s and was marked by a commitment to quantitative and manual analyses. The second wave of content analysis appeared around the third millennium and continues to pervade the discipline also proceeds in a predominantly quantitative manner but emphasizes computer-assisted analysis rather than manual analysis. Critics and advocates of the method alike have, highlighted numerous shortcomings with these approaches. In order to address these limitations, the present investigation argues for a fully integrated content analysis that has the potential to ameliorate the identified weaknesses that have hitherto plagued the method. It accomplishes this task by combining all facets of the method: quantitative, qualitative, manual, and computer-assisted content analyses within a single research project.