The Ethics of Humanitarian Intervention and African Sovereignty: Analysing the AU’s Normative Framework Through Philosophical Ethics

This study provides a philosophical analysis of the ethics of humanitarian intervention within the African Union normative framework, examining whether the AU's principle of non-indifference and Responsibility to Protect commitments are philosophically coherent and morally justified, with particular attention to cases in West and Central Africa. The ethics of humanitarian intervention represents one of the most contested domains in contemporary political philosophy, where the imperative to prevent mass atrocities conflicts with the principle of state sovereignty. A mixed-methods philosophical design is employed, combining systematic philosophical analysis of humanitarian intervention ethics from Michael Walzer, Allen Buchanan, and African political philosophy with qualitative analysis of AU intervention decision-making records from 2019 to 2024. Forty structured interviews with political philosophers, African Union officials, and international relations scholars across the North Central and South West geopolitical zones supplement the documentary analysis. Findings establish that the AU normative framework embodies a philosophically unstable compromise between sovereignty-based and cosmopolitan ethics that generates inconsistent intervention decisions, and that this instability has preventable human rights consequences. The study contributes an original philosophical critique of the AU normative framework grounded in a revised cosmopolitan ethics that incorporates African sovereignty concerns. Keywords: humanitarian intervention, African sovereignty, AU normative framework, cosmopolitan ethics, political philosophy.