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領域II - (1)　平和構築に向けた知の展開

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　　There is a tradition of humanitarianism, expressed in an article by Jon M. Ebersole who played a key role in the "Mohonk Criteria for humanitarian assistance in complex emergencies"(7) . The five criteria, adapted by a broadly based conference(8) , are

　 　[1] Humanity: Human suffering should be addressed wherever it is found. The dignity and rights of all victims must be respected.
　　 [2] Impartiality: Humanitarian assistance should be provided without discriminating as to ethnic origin, gender, nationality, political opinions, race or religion. Relief of the suffering of individuals must be guided solely by their needs, and priority must be given to the most urgent cases of distress.
　　 [3] Neutrality: Humanitarian assistance should be provided without engaging in hostilities or taking sides in controversies of a political, religious or ideological nature.
　　 [4] Independence: The independence of action by humanitarian agencies should not be infringed on or unduly influenced by political, military or other interests.
　　 [5] Empowerment: Humanitarian assistance should strive to revitalize local institutions, enabling them to provide for the needs of the affected community. Humanitarian assistance should provide a solid first step on the continuum of emergency relief, rehabilitation, reconstruction and development.

　　This is the tradition of humanitarianism associated with NGOs such as the Red Cross(9), but also with states, big and small, in nature-made and in man-made disasters. The Mohonk criteria mark a new phase, as did DMTP, the Disaster Management Training Programme of the United Nations Development Programme.

　　But we sense a gendering of the issue: the Mohonk criteria address suffering "wherever it is found". The trigger for action is a basic human need insulted, the need for physical well-being. According to Carol Gilligan(10) this compassion is more frequently found among women. Men tend to be steered by other and more abstract principles, more removed from basic needs.

　　An example: "one prominent American expert questioned some of the basic, time-honored principles which form the basis of humanitarian action", formulating a very male view:(11)

"Impartiality and neutrality, when applied in cases such as Bosnia, can be counterproductive. For example, while giving Serbs humanitarian aid under the principle of neutrality, the United Nations has essentially legitimized the Serbs' claim that they, not the Bosnians, are victims. Furthermore, by providing the humanitarian assistance, they have freed the Serbs' resources, such as fuel and food, to supply their troops in forward areas. In many cases there are clear examples of right and wrong in international conflicts and in those the questions of impartiality and neutrality need to be examined much harder."

　　The abstract principles in this text are well known. "Serbs" enter as a general category, lumped together with no distinction between perpetrators and innocent victims-civilians-bystanders. From this position there is but a small step to a distinction between worthy and unworthy victims, internally displaced person (IDPs), refugees. General human compassion is absent.

　　Then, the tradition of interventionism. It has a bad name, reminiscent of the punitive expeditions by colonial powers in general, and the UK in particular, to punish the colonized and protect the settlers, and of numerous US military interventions (Iraq is No. 69 after the Second world war) to exercise control. Control=stopping violence=ending suffering="humanitarian"? But:

　　If intervention causes more suffering than it eliminates?

　　If intervention=war it is against UN charter 2(4), and must be mandated by the UN Security Council to meet internatinal law.

　　And, from the premise of "intervention to protect people from the violence of its own government" it does not follow that intervention has to be violent/military in general, and by the USA in particular. A very important variable in that connection is the military culture.(12) Consider this:

　　"In essence, US forces are imbued with the spirit of the offensive, characterized by an indomitable will to win and an aggressive determination to carry the battle to the enemy. The aim is to inflict on the enemy an early and decisive defeat. This spirit, while likely to produce battlefield success, is often at odds with instincts of political leaders, who may prefer a more graduated force application with diplomatic and other pressures."

　　"Peace monitoring, peacekeeping, disaster relief--nation assistance, counterdrug support, antiterrorism and noncombatant evacuation operations--while perhaps politically essential or morally desirable-often degrade combatant force readiness to perform their prime mission-warfighting, preparing for war."(13)

The contrast is clear(14) :

The European Approach: "[Peace Operations] are operations among the people. If you're in your shirtsleeve and your weapon is down the side of your leg and you're no looking aggressive, then you have a calming effect...The more you seek to isolate yourself from the people, be it in your helmet and flak jacket, be it in your large four man vehicle patrol, the less you will be able to find the person or people who matter to you, among those people. (General Rupert Smith)

The U.S. Approach: "It's pretty simple. When you're under arms, you wear your combat kit. We insist on helmets in HUMVEES and trucks because it saves lives when there's an accident. The U.S. Army's philosophy on this is, 'Look, if you want us to go to the field and do peace enforcement, under arms, you get an organization with military discipline that's ready to respond to any kind of lethal threat. If you don't like that, send for the U.N'. (General Montgomery Meigs).(15)

　　This opens for the question of "what kind of military intervention". But that does not exhaust the intervention dimension. The TRANSCEND perspective, for instance, identifies a number of other components in an intervention:(16)

--operations could be improved by calling on expertise not only in the means of violence and the military mentality, but also in police skills, nonviolence skills and mediation skills.
　　 Since women would tend to relate more to people than to hardware they could perhaps constitute 50% of the units.
　　 Moreover, the numbers should be vastly increased.
　　 In short, a blue carpet of peace-keepers, not only blue helmets, so dense that there is little space left for fighting. And peacekeeping would then also include the 3 Rs: reconstruction, reconciliation and resolution; not waiting till the violence is "over".

　　If we eliminate military and police skills we come to the nonviolent pole of the dimension, with the US military ethos located at the other extreme. In spite of the many successes of nonviolence from the 1940s onwards(17) these are not skills governments are likely to use for intervention. They have no monopoly on them, and such skills can also be used against any abusive government engaged in direct or structural violence.

　　So we have a right-left spectrum of four modes of intervention: hard military (like USA), soft military (like Europe above), soft nonviolence (like TRANSCEND above), hard nonviolence (like Gandhi).(18) The best would be people's hard nonviolence from the inside. Doing nothing is not an option.

　　But there is a different approach embedded in the paradigm shift from security studies to peace studies. Security studies tend to solve problems of violence with counter-violence or the threat thereof. Nonviolence comes close in solving problems of illegitimate power with nonviolent counter-power. But peace studies tend to see violence as the consequence of untransformed conflict and dehumanization, and solutions in terms of conflict transformation and depolarization before violence gets started:

- by linking peace to conflict and its solution, like in "peace and conflict studies", not only to the absence of violence;
- by insisting on nonviolent and creative approaches to conflict solution, like in "peace by peaceful means";
- by applying this to conflicts at all levels, micro (within and between persons), meso (within societies), macro (between states and nations), and mega (between regions and civilizations); and
- by being an applied diagnosis/prognosis/therapy=peace practice science, using all relevant knowledge from all disciplines.

　　Peace studies would examine the goals of the parties in terms of their legitimacy, in the sense of compatibility with basic needs/rights for all, and try to bridge legitimate goals. With no priority to goals of the state paying the studies.(19)

　　Chamberlain's "peace in our time" is often invoked against peace movements etc. But Chamberlain in Munchen used Nazi-Germany against the worse danger from a Tory point of view: the communist Soviet Union. "Russia, Russia" was the cry heard in Parliament in defense of his policy. Peace studies would have explored the goals of all parties, bridging the legitimate goals, resisting nonviolently the illegitimate. A not easy challenge.　NEXT >>

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