Genocide

Abstract

The word "genocide" was created ex novo by the Polish jurist of Jewish origin Rafael Lemkin, understanding by such the destruction of a nation or of an ethnic group. This neologism arises of the Greek word "genos", that means race, tribe and, the Latin word "cide", to kill. However the word genocide is value loaded concept, and often it is used wrongly when it applies to some tragic facts of the history. It is not odd to confuse genocide with calamities, crimes of war or murders in big scale. On the other hand, it is a term whose definitional elements are difficult to ascertain. For that reason it has caused intense controversy. The purpose of this work has been to expose the definitional process during the enactment of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Crime of Genocide (1948), as the elements that more discussion and debate have arised: the victim groups and the characterisation of the intention. The author examines specially the characterisation of the group victims of genocide, the exclusion of the political groups and the two conceptions that lately have offered a different characterisation of intention in genocide: the special intention and the conception based on knowledge. The author has tried to offer some reasons to adhere to the first conception.