By Raymond Apthorpe
As
humanitarian studies gather pace and volume, perhaps to begin with as a
distinct sub-area within international affairs, international relations, and
development studies, some distinctive concepts and methods of analysis will be
required, not least to determine the morality – and immorality – of material
and immaterial action proposed or actually taken across borders in the name of
humanity, brought up now for evaluation. First, obviously, a conceptual elaboration is
needed of what we might call ‘morality-in-practice’. Second, a dimensioning of humanitarian praxis
which among other things can facilitate a consequentialist approach to be taken
towards judging the morality-in-practice of an intervention with attention paid
to its outcomes as well as its aims and methods.
What
humanitarian is, may not be completely
reducible to what humanitarian does, but
for humanitarian praxis concerns that surely is a core mantra regarding for
example the delivery and distribution of emergency goods and services to an
afflicted population, particularly as these are experienced by the intended
receivers and those equally in need but not served. Absolutely, what humanitarian does is what overwhelmingly matters when
it comes to inquiring as to what difference such assistance makes, or fails to
make, with negatives as well as positives to appraise. What in other regards it might ‘mean’, say
normatively, is another thing altogether in abstract theory unrelated to
praxis.
In four lectures
given during my visit to Bjørknes University College, and particularly the lecture
that was hosted at PRIO (jointly also with Bjørknes University College and the
Norwegian Centre for Humanitarian Studies), what (perhaps provisionally) I term
‘The humanitarian triad’ was pleased to make its first public appearance. I
conceive of that as a step on the way towards, so to say, getting a handle on
the morality-in-practice of humanitarian intervention. What is it? In short, a tripartite proposition,
expressed in Just War language, that humanitarian intervention can possibly be
moral-in-practice only if what is involved is three fold: a just cause, addressed by a just method, ending in a just outcome.
Fail any one of these tests, but arguably (in consequentialist terms) the
third above all, and there could even be a case for the interveners to have a
criminal charge to face in the Hague, as well as a burden of immorality to
bear. It is not enough simply to have a just
cause to take up, perhaps even
by force of arms and despite all the head- and heart-searching that always goes
along with decisions to be made about the risks and use of lethal weapons. It
is no validation of civil action simply to eschew – when it does - armed
intervention. If you can’t with reasonable confidence forecast the consequences
of an intervention where is the morality-in-practice, but instead just go on
(however wittily) about ‘stuff happens’ especially when evidently things are
not turning out to your liking, where is the
morality-in-practice of going to war, or going to aid, in the first
place? ‘Nowhere’ says the humanitarian triad, ‘nowhere at all’.
In these four lectures the focus is particularly on what I term ‘civil
humanitarian intervention’ – such as an emergency relief aid programme across
borders, invited normally though such is after a negotiation process in which
conditions are imposed and other special provision made, to be delivered by an
INGO primarily on behalf of itself and its donors. Normally the ‘humanitarian
intervention’ expression tout court
connotes not an INGO doing or attempting doing something, but a military body acting
forcibly as directed by a government (and normally without an invitation so to
say to trespass). So here already comes one problem for humanitarian studies.
Compared with what is known about just
causes across borders and the governments that take them up or not, other
than in a few cases practically nothing is known, publicly that is, about INGOs
and which just causes they take up or
not, when and why, and so forth.
Clearly the
sooner that is researched the better. Why not check that out with any friendly
INGO near you and report back.
Another conundrum
(to be researched) is that while as a rule (but definitely not always) INGOs
abhor having any relationship with a military, the means to intervene which INGO’s
consider to be just are seldom
spelled out. Usually in this respect there will be very little for humanitarian
studies to go by other than claims that today’s absolutely urgent humanitarian
emergency is even worse than yesterday’s, that the principal thing is simply ‘to
help’ where possible with the resources available, and to get on with that job
without further delay. Admittedly along with such ‘helping’ as is well known goes
‘triage’ and ‘targeting’, and affirmations about the codes of ethics required for
impartial and neutral practice and the
importance of the ‘partnership’ to which they have signed up. But little else.
And unless I am mistaken (check that
out) not even either of those two features has been seriously researched other
than in a case or two whether cross-culturally or otherwise as to their
morality-in-practice.
Here then
come two further areas for urgent research: one, to determine just exactly what
is such ‘helping’, as it is actually approached and undertaken what it can
achieve as an intervention; two, to establish to what extent the codes of
practice to which INGOs have signed up are necessary and sufficient to be effective
‘on the ground’ either for emergency relief assistance that is meant to
succour, or for human rights protection meant to show solidarity, or both, or
neither.
Of our
triad of graces for humanitarian studies it is, however, just outcome that currently is the most difficult even to talk
about with any authority, not outcomes during or after an intervention, but what
in advance can be reasoned to be its most likely outcomes and impacts. For
carrying out ex post factum
evaluation, guidance abounds, for ex ante
there is practically none. Until this lacuna is remedied ‘stuff happens’
escapology will only continue to be able to rule unopposed. Stop that!
Finally, about
the justice of international justice at large and what can be learned from the
workings of the ICJ and its outcomes, arguably there are morality-in-practice
questions to ask of those too given as has been reported what it has to work as
it goes its business is not an unproblematic integration of ‘anglo-saxon’
common law with ‘roman law’ ideas and procedures, but something closer in some
regards to an unstable, and unreliable, fractured conjuncture.
In short,
friends, a sea of humanitarian studies dissertation topics awaits you, all of
which you will find to be remarkably doable provided only that first you define
them down to one or two essentials, then rise confidently to their challenges!
Best wishes and good luck.
About Raymond Apthorpe
Dr. Apthorpe is Vice President of Council
at the Royal Anthropological Institute, London; Honorary Professorial Research
Associate at SOAS, University of London;
Advisory Associate at the Institute of Social Studies at the Hague
Erasmus University, and is taking up a visiting professorship at the London
School of Economics next month. In his former capacity at the Australian
National University (ANU) where he held classes on international humanitarian
assistance in an ANU – Bjørknes – PRIO graduate programme in international
affairs. Raymond has long been one of the leading scholars examining the
policies and practices of humanitarian and development assistance, including
extensive involvement with evaluations of a large humanitarian programmes.
Previous affiliations with different UN agencies in Geneva, Taiwan and the Philippines,
and extensive fieldwork in East and West Africa (11 years) doing research and
university teaching.
