The interface between humanitarian action and human rights

1999 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 32-39
Author(s):  
G Magazzeni
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Humanitarian Action

scholarly journals Comparative Study of the Roles of ASEAN and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation in Responding to the Rohingya Crisis

2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 17
Author(s):  
Irawan Jati
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
Comparative Study ◽  
Southeast Asia ◽  
Andaman Sea ◽  
Regional Organization ◽  
Humanitarian Action ◽  
Target Community

Since 2012, Southeast Asia has witnessed the human rights tragedy of the Rohingya people of Myanmar. Hundreds of thousands of Rohingya have been displaced from their homes and traveled to refugee facilities in Myanmar and Bangladesh, while others have been stranded on the Andaman Sea. The Rohingya crisis is perhaps the most horrific human rights tragedy after the crisis in Vietnam in the 1970s. As the crisis has developed, international communities, including ASEAN and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), have responded to the crisis. As the main regional organization, ASEAN has been hoped to elucidate the crisis tactically through peaceful means. OIC, meanwhile, has been expected to join humanitarian action using a diplomatic approach to other international humanitarian bodies, including the UNHCR. However, it is obvious that ASEAN's response to the crisis has been limited to diplomatic oration and failed to prevent a wider crisis. For OIC, its humanitarian solidarity has lacked access to the target community. Therefore, this paper would like to attempt a comparative analysis to describe the central inquiry; how have ASEAN and OIC responded to the Rohingya crisis? This analysis involves studying ASEAN and OIC publications and related references. The initial argument of this paper is that both organizations have given reasonable responses to the crisis, but have been unable to halt its advance.

scholarly journals Digital Dead Body Management (DDBM): Time to Think it Through

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 428-443 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kristin Bergtora Sandvik
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Criminal Justice ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
Structural Difference ◽  
International Criminal Justice ◽  
Dead Body ◽  
Technology Sector ◽  
Humanitarian Action ◽  
And Control ◽  
Digital Identities

Abstract Effective, safe and dignified dead body management (DBM) in the context of disasters, atrocities and wars has long been an important task—primarily for the humanitarian sector, but also for the human rights and international criminal justice community. How will the digitization of the human rights field and the adjacent spheres of humanitarian action and international criminal justice reshape ideas about death and the practices of care and control of the dead in the international space? To approach that question, the article coins the term ‘digital dead body management’ (DDBM) and offers an initial framing of this concept and some tentative pointers for a human rights research agenda. It focuses on the concept of ‘digital bodies’. Noting that the management of digital identities after death is becoming a significant governance challenge for the global technology sector, with thousands of ghost-accounts appearing every day, the article discusses the structural difference between how ‘digital deaths’ are dealt with in emergencies and in the marketplace, with a focus on DDBM as a problem of global equality. The article contributes to the critical conceptualization of DDBM by mapping a set of the tensions existing between the norms, objectives and operational approaches of humanitarian, human rights and international criminal justice practices and reflecting on where normative perils might arise in the context of digitization.

Humanitarian Actors and International Political Theory

2018 ◽  
pp. 315-329
Author(s):  
Jennifer M. Welsh
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Political Theory ◽  
Armed Conflict ◽  
Humanitarian Action ◽  
The Core ◽  
Specific Subset ◽  
International Political Theory ◽  
Underlying Causes ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Individual Human

This chapter examines how contemporary humanitarian institutions interpret and implement their normative responsibilities in international society. It analyses a specific subset of actors—the United Nations and humanitarian NGOs—and the impact of their attempts to privilege a more “individualist,” or cosmopolitan, approach to the mitigation and regulation of armed conflict. The chapter sets out the core values of humanitarian action, including humanity and impartiality, and then illustrates how the process of “individualization”—which challenges the primacy of collective entities such as warring parties or sovereign states —has created both normative and operational dilemmas for humanitarian actors. In the case of the UN, the imperative to protect individual human rights has transformed the practice of peacekeeping, through a robust interpretation of impartiality, while for humanitarian NGOs it has spawned efforts to address not only the immediate suffering produced by armed conflict but also the underlying causes of vulnerability.

scholarly journals Romancing principles and human rights: Are humanitarian principles salvageable?

2015 ◽  
Vol 97 (897-898) ◽  
pp. 77-109 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stuart Gordon ◽  
Antonio Donini
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Operating Environment ◽  
Humanitarian Action ◽  
The Core ◽  
Ethical Content ◽  
Formal Principle ◽  
Humanitarian Values

Abstract“Classical” or “Dunantist” humanitarianism has traditionally been constructed around the core principles of neutrality (not taking sides) and impartiality (provision of assistance with no regard to ethnicity, religion, race or any other consideration, and proportional to need), plus the operational imperative (rather than a formal principle) to seek the consent of the belligerent parties. These principles, whilst never unchallenged, have dominated the contemporary discourse of humanitarianism and have been synonymous with or at least reflections of a presumed essential, enduring and universal set of humanitarian values. This paper offers a more dynamic and changing vision of the content of humanitarian action. It maps the origins and content of the “new humanitarian” critique of the humanitarian sector and principles and argues that this has both misrepresented the ethical content of neutrality and obscured what amount to significant operational adaptations that leave traditional humanitarianism well prepared for the contemporary operating environment.

scholarly journals Promoting digital humanitarian action in protecting human rights: hope or hype

2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Dzhennet-Mari Akhmatova ◽  
Malika-Sofi Akhmatova
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Humanitarian Action

scholarly journals Integration and coherence: is there a future for independent humanitarian action? A legal inquiry into the provision of humanitarian assistance and protection during armed conflict today

2017 ◽  
pp. 105
Author(s):  
Luz Gómez-Saavedra
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Armed Conflict ◽  
Humanitarian Assistance ◽  
International Human Rights Law ◽  
Legal Principles ◽  
Humanitarian Action ◽  
General Law ◽  
Legal Perspective ◽  
The Face ◽  
Global Peace

<p>This article challenges, from a legal perspective, the validity of independent humanitarian action (HA) during armed conflict in the face of the United Nations integration and coherence doctrine. The traditional legal foundations of humanitarian action in war are reviewed. In the last decades the modus operandi of actors in armed conflict and their interpretation of international law has evolved and in this framework International Human Rights Law (IHRL) has become the main legal resort to legitimise humanitarian intervention. Confusion between military, political and humanitarian involvement in conflicts has eroded the legal principles of independent HA in favour of opportunities for general law enforcement and IHRL protection and promotion. This paper concludes that there are legal grounds to advocate for independent HA, in order to maintain the humanitarian imperative and the interests of the victims of war, as a valid action in itself without attaching HA to objectives of global peace, security and human rights.</p><p><strong>Published online</strong>: 11 December 2017</p>

scholarly journals The inclusion of Human Rights in humanitarian assistance. The difficult but necessary way between theory and practice

2017 ◽  
pp. 41-84
Author(s):  
Daniela Santos Nascimento
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Humanitarian Assistance ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Negative Consequences ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
Humanitarian Action ◽  
Conflict Situations ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Humanitarian Work ◽  
Clear Objective

With the end of the Cold War, one of the most important developments has clearly been the recognition of the universal value of human rights and of the need to effectively respect and promote them at all levels of international relations. Among the priority areas, humanitarian action in conflict situations was then to be considered particularly important, with a clear objective of contributing for peace. However, observing the scenario of humanitarian assistance especially in the second half of the 90s, these aspirations seem to have been contradicted by some concerning and challenging realities, such as the trends suggesting a proliferation of man-made disasters in many parts of the world and consequently an also continuing need for humanitarian assistance in the future and the fact that the main obstacles in providing it tend to arise from an increasing and general disregard for the applicable international humanitarian and human rights law. Showing concern for these facts, this thesis analyses the negative consequences of the attempts to bring human rights concerns to the centre of humanitarian assistance through the practice of conditionality and defends the need for the inclusion of a more transversal human rights dimension in humanitarian assistance and in particular, of specific human rights oriented projects. Recognising the intrinsic link between both dimensions and their increasing importance, and touching the difficulties implied by such approach, it is suggested that this would be a more appropriate way to effectively promote human rights within humanitarian work, simultaneously contributing for enhanced and less controversial humanitarian assistance.Published online: 11 December 2017

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