The Politicization Of Humanitarian Aid And Its Effect On The Principles Of Humanity Impartiality And Neutrality
Download The Politicization Of Humanitarian Aid And Its Effect On The Principles Of Humanity Impartiality And Neutrality full books in PDF, epub, and Kindle. Read online free The Politicization Of Humanitarian Aid And Its Effect On The Principles Of Humanity Impartiality And Neutrality ebook anywhere anytime directly on your device. Fast Download speed and no annoying ads. We cannot guarantee that every ebooks is available!
| Author | : Thorsten Volberg |
| Publisher | : diplom.de |
| Total Pages | : 91 |
| Release | : 2007-02-22 |
| Genre | : Political Science |
| ISBN | : 395636192X |
Inhaltsangabe:Abstract: The past two decades have seen a significant increase in frequency and intensity of complex emergencies and natural disasters, leading to a rapid transformation in the policy and the institutional context of humanitarianism. Humanitarian assistance, which once covered a very narrow set of basic relief activities carried out by a small group of relatively independent actors, has expanded significantly to an ever-widening and much more complex range of rehabilitation work. This includes the definition of aid as being a starting-point for addressing poverty or being a tool for peace-building in internal conflicts. A growing diversity of non-humanitarian actors in the field, such as various profit agencies, governmental and non-governmental armed forces, also changed the picture of humanitarian aid and the perception of its character. This transformation has created a broad variety of standards for performance in the field, and led to increasing uncertainties on the quality of humanitarian responses and its accountability. Humanitarian catastrophes, like the Rwandan genocide, finally forced humanitarian agencies to think beyond traditional relief assistance based on the delivery of food, shelter or basic health care, and take a deeper reflection on how they actually perceive their own role and accountability in the humanitarian sphere. In 1997, the Sphere project was launched to develop inter alia a so-called Humanitarian Charter , which tries to put relief aid on a legal basis provided by international law. It emphasizes humanitarian principles of humanity, neutrality and impartiality and expresses agencies commitment to act in accordance with them. These principles provide an ethical framework, which defines and delineates the humanitarian space within which NGOs are supposed to operate. Sphere and its commitment to these traditional principles have both supporters and critics within the humanitarian system, especially when it comes to its usefulness in addressing the complexity of political factors surrounding an emergency situation. Humanitarian assistance has always been a highly political activity, as it involves engaging authorities in conflict-affected countries or relying on financial support that can be driven by a donor s political considerations. Nowadays, relief organizations seem to remain even less in control of their working environment due to expanding peacekeeping and military-led missions of the [...]
| Author | : Hugo Slim |
| Publisher | : Oxford University Press |
| Total Pages | : 374 |
| Release | : 2015-01-09 |
| Genre | : Social Science |
| ISBN | : 0190613327 |
Humanitarians are required to be impartial, independent, professionally competent and focused only on preventing and alleviating human suffering. It can be hard living up to these principles when others do not share them, while persuading political and military authorities and non-state actors to let an agency assist on the ground requires savvy ethical skills. Getting first to a conflict or natural catastrophe is only the beginning, as aid workers are usually and immediately presented with practical and moral questions about what to do next. For example, when does working closely with a warring party or an immoral regime move from practical cooperation to complicity in human rights violations? Should one operate in camps for displaced people and refugees if they are effectively places of internment? Do humanitarian agencies inadvertently encourage ethnic cleansing by always being ready to 'mop-up' the consequences of scorched earth warfare? This book has been written to help humanitarians assess and respond to these and other ethical dilemmas.
| Author | : Antonio De Lauri |
| Publisher | : |
| Total Pages | : 234 |
| Release | : 2020 |
| Genre | : Social Science |
| ISBN | : 9789004431133 |
Humanitarianism: Keywords is a comprehensive dictionary designed as a compass for navigating the conceptual universe of humanitarianism.
| Author | : Michael Barnett |
| Publisher | : Cornell University Press |
| Total Pages | : 324 |
| Release | : 2012-05-15 |
| Genre | : Political Science |
| ISBN | : 0801465087 |
Years of tremendous growth in response to complex emergencies have left a mark on the humanitarian sector. Various matters that once seemed settled are now subjects of intense debate. What is humanitarianism? Is it limited to the provision of relief to victims of conflict, or does it include broader objectives such as human rights, democracy promotion, development, and peacebuilding? For much of the last century, the principles of humanitarianism were guided by neutrality, impartiality, and independence. More recently, some humanitarian organizations have begun to relax these tenets. The recognition that humanitarian action can lead to negative consequences has forced humanitarian organizations to measure their effectiveness, to reflect on their ethical positions, and to consider not only the values that motivate their actions but also the consequences of those actions. In the indispensable Humanitarianism in Question, Michael Barnett and Thomas G. Weiss bring together scholars from a variety of disciplines to address the humanitarian identity crisis, including humanitarianism's relationship to accountability, great powers, privatization and corporate philanthropy, warlords, and the ethical evaluations that inform life-and-death decision making during and after emergencies.
| Author | : Carsten Wieland |
| Publisher | : Bloomsbury Publishing |
| Total Pages | : 201 |
| Release | : 2021-05-20 |
| Genre | : Political Science |
| ISBN | : 0755641418 |
The Syrian war has been an example of the abuse and insufficient delivery of humanitarian assistance. According to international practice, humanitarian aid should be channelled through a state government that bears a particular responsibility for its population. Yet in Syria, the bulk of relief went through Damascus while the regime caused the vast majority of civilian deaths. Should the UN have severed its cooperation with the government and neglected its humanitarian duty to help all people in need? Decision-makers face these tough policy dilemmas, and often the “neutrality trap” snaps shut. This book discusses the political and moral considerations of how to respond to a brutal and complex crisis while adhering to international law and practice. The author, a scholar and senior diplomat involved in the UN peace talks in Geneva, draws from first-hand diplomatic, practitioner and UN sources. He sheds light on the UN's credibility crisis and the wider implications for the development of international humanitarian and human rights law. This includes covering the key questions asked by Western diplomats, NGOs and international organizations, such as: Why did the UN not confront the Syrian government more boldly? Was it not only legally correct but also morally justifiable to deliver humanitarian aid to regime areas where rockets were launched and warplanes started? Why was it so difficult to render cross-border aid possible where it was badly needed? The meticulous account of current international practice is both insightful and disturbing. It tackles the painful lessons learnt and provides recommendations for future challenges where politics fails and humanitarians fill the moral void.
| Author | : John Holmes |
| Publisher | : Bloomsbury Publishing |
| Total Pages | : 255 |
| Release | : 2013-03-01 |
| Genre | : Political Science |
| ISBN | : 1781852081 |
John Holmes was the UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs from 2007 until 2010. His work took him to some of the most troubled areas of the world: to Sri Lanka, Darfur, Somalia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, among other places, and exposed him to the harsh realities of humanitarian aid. Frequently he found that the UN's humanitarian programmes in these hotspots were tolerated but consistently undermined and mistrusted by both sides in any conflict, and its efforts to protect civilians and provide humanitarian relief frustrated by people working for purely political ends. Clear-eyed about the realities of development aid, Holmes realised early on that his role was to be a voice to the voiceless. THE POLITICS OF HUMANITY exposes, in often depressing detail, how difficult this job is, as well as analysing and exploring in great depth the wider policy questions of his role.
| Author | : Thorsten Volberg |
| Publisher | : GRIN Verlag |
| Total Pages | : 90 |
| Release | : 2007-02-02 |
| Genre | : Social Science |
| ISBN | : 3638039331 |
Master's Thesis from the year 2006 in the subject Politics - Topic: Development Politics, grade: 1,7, Ruhr-University of Bochum (Institute for International Law of Peace and Armed Conflict), course: European Masterprogram on Humanitarian Action (NOHA), language: English, abstract: The humanitarian principles of humanity, neutrality and impartiality provide an ethical framework that defines and delineates the humanitarian space within which relief agencies are supposed to operate. Current experiences, however, show that these traditional principles were not designed to cope with the development underlying the increasing merging of humanitarian aid and politics. To avoid political manipulation, relief organizations must rethink these traditional principles and face the responsibility of getting more involved in the broader political arena to be able to take appropriate action, and to avoid longterm damages on a society. The ‘Sphere’ project, which was launched to improve the quality of humanitarian action and to put relief aid on a legal basis as set forth by international law, acknowledges the dependence of humanitarian aid on external political decisions. Still, it emphasizes traditional principles and expresses agencies’ commitment to act in accordance with them. ‘Sphere’s actual value must therefore be seen in defining a common basis around which agencies, donors and governing authorities can potentially agree on. It provides a basis for defining core humanitarian responsibilities that recognizes the limits of humanitarian action, while setting an agenda for individual and collective action. Even though the attempt to define humanitarian principles that serve as blueprints in every global emergency for all humanitarian organizations does not seem to be achievable, the importance of ethical guidelines and benchmarks still exists. The heterogeneity of relief work is just a phenomenon, which is based in the nature of humanitarianism and this will always put a stamp on attempts to find common standards, principles and codes.
| Author | : Sarah Collinson |
| Publisher | : |
| Total Pages | : 4 |
| Release | : 2012 |
| Genre | : Humanitarian assistance |
| ISBN | : |
| Author | : Larissa Fast |
| Publisher | : University of Pennsylvania Press |
| Total Pages | : 336 |
| Release | : 2014-05-14 |
| Genre | : Business & Economics |
| ISBN | : 0812246039 |
Humanitarian aid workers increasingly remain present in contexts of violence and are injured, kidnapped, and killed as a result. Since 9/11 and in response to these dangers, aid organizations have fortified themselves to shield their staff and programs from outside threats. In Aid in Danger, Larissa Fast critically examines the causes of violence against aid workers and the consequences of the approaches aid agencies use to protect themselves from attack. Based on more than a decade of research, Aid in Danger explores the assumptions underpinning existing explanations of and responses to violence against aid workers. According to Fast, most explanations of attacks locate the causes externally and maintain an image of aid workers as an exceptional category of civilians. The resulting approaches to security rely on separation and fortification and alienate aid workers from those in need, representing both a symptom and a cause of crisis in the humanitarian system. Missing from most analyses are the internal vulnerabilities, exemplified in the everyday decisions and ordinary human frailties and organizational mistakes that sometimes contribute to the conditions leading to violence. This oversight contributes to the normalization of danger in aid work and undermines the humanitarian ethos. As an alternative, Fast proposes a relational framework that captures both external threats and internal vulnerabilities. By uncovering overlooked causes of violence, Aid in Danger offers a unique perspective on the challenges of providing aid in perilous settings and on the prospects of reforming the system in service of core humanitarian values.
| Author | : Elizabeth G. Ferris |
| Publisher | : Brookings Institution Press |
| Total Pages | : 383 |
| Release | : 2011-05-01 |
| Genre | : Political Science |
| ISBN | : 0815721382 |
For the past decade, humanitarian actors have increasingly sought not only to assist people affected by conflicts and natural disasters, but also to protect them. At the same time, protection of civilians has become central to UN peacekeeping operations, and the UN General Assembly has endorsed the principle that the international community has the "responsibility to protect" people when their governments cannot or will not do so. Elizabeth Ferris explores the evolution of the international community's understandings of protection, with a particular emphasis on the humanitarian community. "Protection" is a noble word, with positive connotations, but what does it actually mean in practice? Does providing assistance to vulnerable people protect them, for example? Does monitoring the number of rapes protect women? Does increased engagement in protection activities by humanitarian agencies jeopardize the cornerstone humanitarian principles of neutrality and impartiality? In The Politics of Protection, Ferris examines inconsistent ways in which protection is defined and applied. For example, why do certain groups receive international protection while other equally needy groups do not? Her case studies, ranging from Iraq to Katrina, illustrate the challenges—and limitations—of protecting vulnerable populations from the ravages of war and natural disasters. Ferris argues that the protection paradigms currently in use are inadequate to meet the challenges of the future, such as climate change, protracted displacement, and the changing nature of warfare.
