Between negotiation and legitimation: The international criminal court and the political use of sovereignty challenges

Abstract In contemporary international politics, states face numerous challenges to their sovereignty, especially in the realm of human rights. We argue that rather than simply fight back when sovereignty is challenged, states sometimes instrumentalize sovereignty challenges in pursuit of their own domestic and international political agendas. We identify two key ways that governments frame sovereignty challenges to use in these pursuits, what we call negotiation and legitimation strategies, and outline the conditions under which states may choose to employ these strategies. In order to evaluate our argument, we present a case study of Colombia’s interactions with the International Criminal Court over the course of the ICC’s seventeen-year preliminary examination. Drawing on evidence gathered from ICC records and media archives from the Colombian executive, we show first that the ICC continually challenged Colombian sovereignty by threatening to intervene, especially during the peace negotiations with the FARC. Rather than fight back against the sovereignty challenge or instrumentalize the Court to punish enemies, we also show that three successive Colombian administrations used this challenge to frame debates around contentious domestic human rights policies.