ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that states with unjust basic structures and those engaged in international injustices are not protected by sovereignty. It presents the case for this and looks at the problems with a number of arguments that are critical of the position. The chapter defends three additional necessary conditions for justified intervention. Sovereignty as a concept of international political morality concerns the authority of a state to rule without the intervention of foreign states or regional or global governmental bodies. The statist conception entails an absolutist interpretation of the principle of nonintervention. The statist conception of sovereignty enjoys widespread acceptance by statespersons. The challenge to the cosmopolitan conception of sovereignty in the name of relativism is that because there is no universal standard of justice, an absolutist interpretation of the principle of nonintervention is morally superior to the license that the cosmopolitan conception gives to intervention.
