Conclusion

This book has examined the legal and theoretical bases for the often-cited claim that international criminal law addresses crimes of such gravity that they “shock the conscience of humanity.” It has argued that gravity as a justifying rationale is undertheorized and that the lack of consensus about the meaning of gravity undermines the legitimacy of the international criminal law regime. Addressing each of the decision-making contexts in which gravity plays an important role, the book has set forth proposals to operationalize the concept in ways that promise to better promote the regime's legitimacy. The book has suggested that for global institutions such as the international criminal court, gravity should be a function of global community values and goals, in particular, the value of promoting and protecting human dignity. It has advocated an inclusive dialogic process for identifying the particular values and goals associated with human dignity that ought to be given priority in each decision-making context in order to ensure that international criminal law serves as an effective tool of global crime prevention.