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This article considers the recent literature concerned with establishing an international prohibition on autonomous weapon systems. It seeks to address concerns expressed by some scholars that such a ban might be problematic for various reasons. It argues in favor of a theoretical foundation for such a ban based on human rights and humanitarian principles that are not only moral but also legal ones. In particular, an implicit requirement for human judgment can be found in the international humanitarian law governing armed conflict. Indeed, this requirement is implicit in the principles of distinction, proportionality, and military necessity that are found in international treaties, such as the 1949 Geneva Conventions, and firmly established in international customary law. Similar principles are also implicit in international human rights law, which ensures certain human rights for all people, regardless of national origins or local laws, at all times. I argue that the human rights to life and due process, and the limited conditions under which they can be overridden, imply a specific duty with respect to a broad range of automated and autonomous technologies. In particular, there is a duty upon individuals and states in peacetime, as well as combatants, military organizations, and states in armed conflict situations, not to delegate to a machine or automated process the authority or capability to initiate the use of lethal force independently of human determinations of its moral and legal legitimacy in each and every case. I argue that it would be beneficial to establish this duty as an international norm, and express this with a treaty, before the emergence of a broad range of automated and autonomous weapons systems begin to appear that are likely to pose grave threats to the basic rights of individuals.

Public international law governs the relations between States or international organizations. Its purpose is to achieve good international relations based on the rules of law and above all justice. One of the integral parts of public international law is the law of armed conflict constituting a significant part of international criminal law. Armed conflicts are generally of two forms. One is the jus ad bellum or regulations concerning the prohibition of armed use of force which is also embodied in the Charter of the United Nations. The other concerns the legitimate use of force. Within customary and conventional international law, the concept of legitimate use of force consists of two categories. These are individual and collective self-defence. They are dealt with under the law of jus in bello or the law governing armed conflict. Regardless of the forms of force which are used, the conflicting parties are obliged to follow the law of jus in bello. This law deals with humanitarian law of armed conflict.

This chapter provides an overview of international humanitarian aid work and distinguishes it from other forms of assistance. It defines the four key humanitarian principles: impartiality, neutrality, humanity, and independence. It outlines the current status of humanitarian aid, provides a review of some major trends, and information on changes that may have implications for the current and future job markets in humanitarian aid. The exercise at the end of the chapter is a review of the chapter and designed to help the reader become more conversant with humanitarian principles.

This chapter is an attempt to critically analyse Tagore’s engagement with nationalism, cosmopolitanism and gender in the novel Ghare Baire by bringing Tagore and Levinas into a conversation. Levinas’ ethics, his articulation of ‘the other’ and its inclusion have resonances and differences with Tagore’s articulations of nationalism and cosmopolitanism. Tagore’s cosmopolitanism in the novel Ghare Baire is as problematic as the nationalism he critiques. While Tagore’s Ghare Baire provides little possibility of a cosmopolitanism based on Levinas’ ethics and articulation of the ‘other’, his novel Chaar Adhyaya is more progressive in its vision of humanitarian principles and critique of violence.

The humanitarian sector has grown enormously over the past two decades. Some fear that professionalisation comes at the expense of altruistic volunteering. This may be a valid concern if altruism is the product of organisational culture and individual experiences rather than an innate trait. This paper examines advances in evolutionary biology and neurology that provide evidence in support of both the nature and nurture arguments, echoing earlier insights from social sciences. It then questions to what extent humanitarian principles build on altruistic impulses or instead seek to constrain them, and reviews recruitment profiles of selected humanitarian organisations and applicants' letters accordingly. This initial investigation warrants further research to identify how altruism as a personal trait and an organisational principle has influenced diverse humanitarian actors and traditions. This paper outlines how training curricula and organisational reward systems can build on-rather than stifle-natural altruism to nurture critical, reflexive practitioners.

Scholars assume that transnational terrorism has culminated in policy securitization with expansive restrictions on migration. I evaluate the impact of transnational terrorism on asylum recognition among European Union and Schengen member-states from 1980 until 2007. I unpack the impact of terrorism according to the location of incidents. The article illustrates that policy tightening is more pronounced when recipient states experience terrorism on their own soil or against their citizens. In contrast, measuring transnational terrorism as attacks worldwide mutes the impact of security concerns. The findings show that policy stringency is not directed against particular sources of terrorism and demonstrates that the humanitarian principles underpinning asylum recognition have not been eroded by terrorism. The article thus represents an important step in differentiating between channels of impact whereby transnational terror shapes policy outcomes.

In his 2012 report on the implementation of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) principle, ᴜɴ Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon observed that: ‘As paragraph 139 of the World Summit Outcome highlighted, humanitarian action plays a critical role in protecting populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity’. He continued, ‘Humanitarian agencies can help to protect populations and shield them from some of the worst effects of displacement. As such, humanitarian action is a critically important part of any “timely and decisive” response’. The contribution of humanitarian action to the protection of populations from genocide and other atrocity crimes was not, however, without its challenges and problems. The Secretary-General insisted that ‘humanitarian action must never be used as a substitute for political action’ and implored that ‘it must also be understood that humanitarian action depends upon humanitarian space. To defend humanitarian space, the United Nations and the international community must respect the humanitarian principles of neutrality, independence, humanity and impartiality’. This Special Issue of Global Responsibility to Protect takes these observations as its starting point – that humanitarian action contributes to the protection of populations from genocide and mass atrocities but that the nature of this relationship is complex and fraught with practical, ethical and strategic problems and challenges...

New technology may offer many opportunities for humanitarian action, but it also presents a number of challenges. Currently, most of the critical analysis of these potential challenges takes place in the blogosphere, on tweets and on listservs. There is a strong need for more scholarly engagement on the subject. This article offers an agenda for critical inquiry into the emergent field of humanitarian technology as applied to a broadly defined context of crises, encompassing both natural disasters and conflict zones, by identifying what technology does to the humanitarian enterprise, and by reflecting on the key challenges that emerge.

This article applies organisational sociology to provide an empirical analysis of the roles that two different types of Turkish migrant organisations, headquartered in Germany, played after the 2011 Van earthquake in Turkey, and their different levels of commitment to the traditional humanitarian principles. It shows that the faith-based organisation, Islamic Community Milli Gorus, and the political organisation, Federation of Democratic Workers' Unions, engaged in various activities after the crisis in order to legitimise themselves to their members in Germany. It also demonstrates that their motivations, activities, roles, partners and, most importantly, their commitment to the traditional humanitarian principles diverged due to their different organisational characteristics. Finally, it discusses whether and to what extent humanitarian principles can promote coherence and coordination in the crowded and diverse world of humanitarian actors, especially at a time when the number of humanitarian actors, s...

Recognising increased vulnerabilities because of ongoing urbanisation, the Philippine Red Cross has embarked on a five-year programme to strengthen the resilience of poor settlements in the National Capital city of Valenzuela. The programme expands the organisation’s traditional response orientation to also address underlying causes of structural vulnerability, and as such puts the organisation ahead of many other Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. While this engagement fits the organisation because of its mandate, strategies and reach, the traditional strengths of the organisation increasingly emerge as challenging factors. Applying a ‘resilience approach’, particularly in Manila’s urban humanitarian arena, also puts pressure on how the Philippine Red Cross is able to be guided by its Fundamental Principles, especially in relation to donor obligations, working with non-Red Cross organisations, engaging with communities and taking a more critical role towards the government. The approach requires a transformation in mind set and activities that requires time to achieve. Keywords: urbanisation; resilience; Red Cross; Manila; humanitarian arena; humanitarian principles

The Rohingya crisis in Myanmar has drawn international attention due to gross violations of human rights, which have occurred in the conflict. This condition forces the Rohingya to flee from conflict areas in the attempt to seek protection from neighbouring countries including Indonesia. To deal with the refugees, the Indonesian government, alongside Muslim organizations, have taken immediate steps in tackling the crisis. However, behind the humanitarian solidarity lays a critical problem related to the religious sentiment toward the Buddhist community in Indonesia. The sentiment that tarnished the humanitarian principles and threatened Indonesian multiculturalism showed the versatile side of identity. To provide a better understanding of identity-based conflict, this article explored how a group’s sense of collectivity can easily turn into sentiment. By conducting multiple interviews with the representatives of Muslim Organizations and also collecting secondary data related to the Islam conservative agenda, this paper aimed to outline the paradox of Indonesian Muslim response toward the Rohingya’s refugees crisis. Using Ross’s theories of identity conflict and using Galtung conception of social conflict, the findings concluded that religious sentiment in Indonesia during the Rohingya’s refugee crisis are led by blind fanaticism toward certain religious beliefs that bitterly trample the nation’s sense of solidarity.

In a world where people's increasing mobility coexists with the multiplication of borders, migration for health reasons brings to light the contradiction between humanitarian principles and the tightening of migration policies. In this article, I address contemporary debates on border-making, biopolitics, humanitarianism and migration policies, by focusing on the case of Bissau-Guinean patients who arrive in Portugal under the terms of an international cooperation agreement on health. Drawing on patients' life stories and interviews with health professionals, I explore the ways in which medical bordering devices are exercised on migrants' bodies in hospitals, in order to test the truthfulness of their demands for care and, ultimately, the legitimacy of their stay in Portugal. Finally, I analyse the impact of these practices on the lives of patients and their strategies for dealing with them.

The term “refugee” in international law is characterized, on the one hand, by the principle of State sovereignty and, on another, by competing humanitarian principles deriving from general international laws and treaties. The study of protection of refugee invites a look not only at States’ obligations regarding admission and treatment after entry, but also at the potential responsibility under the international law of the State, whose conduct or omissions cause an outflow. In general sense the community of nations is responsible for finding solutions and providing international protection to refugee. This special mandate was entrusted to United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the agency committed to save and protect human lives, rights and supporting refugees, forcibly displaced communities and stateless people. At the beginning of the 21st century, protecting refugees means maintaining solidarity with the world’s most threatened, while finding answers to the challenges confronting the international system that was created to do just that. The aim of this article is to describe the foundations and the framework of international refugee law, to define refugees and protection of refugees; as well as to provide a brief analysis of the changing migration and asylum dynamics in the region and outline some of the main challenges arising in this context.

Mandates of United Nations (UN) peacekeeping missions increasingly include stabilisation and peace enforcement components, which imply a proactive use of force often carried out by national, regional or multinational non-UN partners, operating either in support of or with the support of the UN, acting as ‘proxies’. This article analyses the legal, policy and perception/security implications of different types of ‘peace operations by proxy’ and the additional challenges that such operations create for humanitarian action. It suggests some mitigating measures, including opportunities offered by the UN Human Rights Due Diligence Policy, for a more coherent approach to the protection of civilians, but also acknowledges some of the limitations to an independent UN-led humanitarian action.

Many aid agencies and commentators suggest that humanitarian principles are of little value to the humanitarian crises of today. However, through profiling the experience of the Lebanese Red Cross, this article highlights the enduring value and impact of the application of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Fundamental Principles as effective operational tools for acceptance, access and safety. Having suffered a series of security incidents during the civil war and subsequent disturbances and tensions, this National Society deliberately sought to increase its acceptance amongst different groups. One of the approaches used was the systematic operational application of the Fundamental Principles. Today, the Lebanese Red Cross is the only public service and Lebanese humanitarian actor with access throughout the country. This article seeks to address the relative absence of attention to how humanitarian organisations apply humanitarian principles in practice – and their responsibility and accountability to do so – by describing the systematic approach of the Lebanese Red Cross.

This article applies the term ‘migrant humanitarianism’ for the hitherto neglected humanitarian activities of migrant organisations (MOs). First, it assesses the state-of-the-art on MOs in migration research and recognises common shortcomings within the existing literature. Second, it reviews humanitarian studies literature on aid actors and shows that local or non-Western forms of aid, as well as MOs have so far received only limited attention. Third, it presents the development studies on MOs’ role in their members’ country of origin, which focus mainly on remittances and the migration-development nexus. Fourth, it examines organisational studies which offer frameworks for analysing MOs in multiple countries and crises. Fifth, it discusses how neo-institutional and associational theory, as well as the transnational approach, can help fill gaps in research on MOs in humanitarian action. It then applies these theories to the Islamic Community Milli Gorus (IGMG) as a case study of MOs in humanitarian action. It shows that IGMG is a strong, autonomous actor, despite the fact that it does not fully adhere to the traditional humanitarian principles. Finally, it indicates themes for further research.

Rony Brauman Rony Brauman, born in 1950, is a medical doctor with degrees in epidemiology and tropical medicine. After working as a physician in the field for several years, he became president of Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) in 1982 and held that post until 1994. He is now Director of Studies at the Fondation Medecins Sans Frontieres, associate professor at the Institute of Political Studies in Paris, and director of the Humanitarian and Conflict Response Institute at the University of Manchester, United Kingdom. He is a columnist for the quarterly magazine Alternatives Internationales.

The current humanitarian crisis in Yemen is unprecedented in many ways. The Yemeni War tragedy is symptomatic of gross failures to recognize, by combatants, existing humanitarian law and the Geneva Convention that have become the new norm in unconventional armed conflicts and are increasingly replicated in Africa, Afghanistan, and other areas of the Middle East with dire consequences on aid workers and the noncombatant population. The health and humanitarian professions must take collective responsibility in calling for all belligerent parties to cease the massacre and commit to guaranteed medical assistance, humanitarian aid, and the free flow of information and respect for the humanitarian principles that protect the neutrality and impartiality of the humanitarian workforce. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2016;page 1 of 3)

Outcomes of the World Humanitarian Summit were mixed with some refreshing new directions being endorsed and a lack of systemic reform. The selective agenda and OCHAs lack of success in engaging pre-meeting political participation not only hampered the Summit’s ability to deal with global issues and institutional reform, but also alienated it from leading aid agencies and governments. The UN’s failure to commit to humanitarian principles and global disarray of the humanitarian system indicates the need for extensive reform or a new global humanitarian body. This agency needs to employ a decentralized model to manage aid funds, assume coordination of international responses, resolve civil-military coordination, cater for people affected by both conflict and disasters, and professionalize the humanitarian career.

This chapter introduces disaster risk reduction (DRR) with an emphasis on the socio-economic sources of human exposure and vulnerability to environmental hazards, the institutional nature of responses, and why DRR is, or should be, aligned with precautionary, prudential, and preventive fields. Internationally, such views have been promoted through the 2005 UN Hyogo Framework for Action and updated in the 2015 Sendai Framework (SFDRR). However, the future of these initiatives turns on whether various emerging contradictions can be resolved. First, as is widely reported, environmental disaster numbers and losses continue to grow—despite several decades of concerted international action and large increases in disaster-related funding and institutions. Second, if DRR has support in the international arena, other approaches receive much larger shares of funding, official promotion, and media coverage. In North America and some other jurisdictions, Homeland Security has integrated disaster management into broad national security complexes, and subordinates it to agencies focused on counter-terrorism and concerns ranging from trafficking to border security. Expanded environmental and social surveillance are involved. Emergency suspensions of civil rights and safety laws are common and a boost to militarized crisis response, which is already predominant in most countries. These form the basis of the so-called Security-Industrial Complex (SIC). It is associated with the aggressive treatment of threats or “securitization”. A politics of crisis places disaster risk within broad, centrally controlled, state and transnational priorities. The consequences were evident in New Orleans after Hurricane “Katrina”, in Haiti since 2010, and in Fukushima, Japan, among others. The SIC reinstates a threat-based or agent-specific “physicalist” view of disasters, and a civil defense or “state-of-war” approach, aimed at damage control. It serves to boost disaster opportunism. By contrast, DRR requires a non-aggressive, open, and conciliatory approach focused on those most at risk. As a result, the disasters community and plans to revise or replace the Hyogo Framework for Action by 2015 face an up-hill struggle. The need to reinforce and extend risk-reducing and humanitarian principles is stressed. Similar, “securitized” dilemmas link DRR with climate change, global migration, and sustainability issues.

In his acceptance speech in 2006 as the eighth Secretary-General of the United Nations, Ban Ki-moon committed to the advancement of human dignity through strengthening of inter-State systems, governance structures, human rights and humanitarian principles. Set against the backdrop of a rapidly changing humanitarian landscape, it was a call to arms for a robust UN system, a system in which “the three pillars of the UN are advanced together with equal vigour”.

This chapter examines the central place of the protection of the individual in international relations and compares the approach of two areas of international practice that seek to protect the individual in armed conflict: the responsibility to protect (R2P) and humanitarian action. The chapter explores three main aspects of the relationship between humanitarian action and R2P. First, it examines the individualization of armed conflict that is essential to the premise of both these international practices of protection. Second, it sets out briefly the respective histories, ethical goals, and key tenets of each approach. Finally, the main part of the chapter identifies areas of complementarity and conflict between these two approaches to the protection of the individual in times of extreme violence. It notes significant overlap and differences between the essentially apolitical emergency approach of humanitarian action and the more constructivist political and state-building approach of R2P.

This special issue of Refugee Survey Quarterly presents the experiences of frontline staff in Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) as they grapple with the implications of the global refugee crisis. Over the past eighteen months hundreds of thousands of people have moved from Africa and the Middle East to Europe, generating widespread media attention and considerable political wrangling. But for aid workers, this situation raises questions that get to the very heart of humanitarianism and its purpose in the contemporary world. How does an organisation like MSF, the pioneer of ‘sans-frontierism’, engage with the shifting politics of borders and migration? What, practically, does it mean to be a ‘borderless’ organisation in a world where migration controls are such a big political issue? What are the implications of the refugee crisis for humanitarian principles and medical care? This introduction to the special issue brings some humanitarian dilemmas into focus, arguing that, in reaction to the migration crisis, aid agencies may have no option but to take a more robustly political approach.

Lethal autonomous weapons — machines that might one day target and kill people without human intervention or oversight — are gaining attention on the world stage. While their development, deployment and perceived superiority over human soldiers are presumed to be inevitable, this book chapter challenges the received view, arguing that the adoption of these technologies are indeed evitable. After canvassing the state of the art in robotic warfare and the military advantages that autonomous weapons confer, the authors aim to scratch below the surface level success of robotic warfare and consider the drastic effects its implementation can have on international humanitarian law, adherence to humanitarian principles, and notions of technological neutrality. International humanitarian law governs the use of particular weapons and advancing technologies to ensure that the imperative of humanity modulates how war is waged. Based on the interest of protecting civilians, military actions are therefore restricted through compliance with humanitarian principles, including proportionality between collateral injuries and military advantages, discrimination between combatants and non-combatants, and military necessity for reaching concrete objectives. This chapter suggests that serious and catastrophic consequences become foreseeable when robots are given full autonomy to pull the trigger in complicated and context-dependent situations, and that technological neutrality is not a safe presumption. The authors also argue that when a disruptive technology changes the nature of what is possible, there is a corresponding expansion in the scope of inclusion for what can prospectively be perceived of as “necessary,” allowing lethal autonomous robots to become a force multiplier of military necessity. Ultimately, the authors ask their readers to consider the full and real consequences of a future with lethal autonomous robots, when the power to implement them lies in the hands of those who have not fully come to terms with their implications.

International migration should be a core subject for global governance, given its transnational nature, and yet it is its “ugly duckling” and the global community has shied away from taking any concrete action to regulate cross-border flows of people, at least until 2015, when the refugee crisis in the Mediterranean prompted Turkey to include migration in the Antalya agenda. It is unlikely that the international community will move beyond the current consensus based on humanitarian principles and recognize that the free flow of people is a right, on the same level as trade and capital liberalization. At the same time, much of the criticism of migration policies is misplaced: efforts should be focused on improving the implementation of existing policies and fine-tune these policies in relation to entrance and integration, preferably in cooperation with the country of origin. The G20 should play a leading role in facilitating such coordination, also taking into account the increasing importance of South–South migration (such as the migration of Chinese citizens to Africa).

Since the end of the cold war humanitarian aid has become increasingly openly instrumentalised in western foreign policy. This stands in sharp contrast to the commitments made by western states, including the Federal Republic of Germany, to respect the humanitarian principles of impartiality, independence and neutrality as set out in the European Consensus and other regulations based on the Geneva Conventions. The article examines the negative repercussions on independent humanitarian action when its principles and practices are used as part of broader political and military strategies, followed by a critique of the tendency of German foreign policy to justify military intervention on humanitarian grounds, looking specifically at the public justification of Germany’s support for the African-led International Support Mission to Mali (AFISMA).

Los ataques sistemáticos a la población civil y a las personas que prestan asistencia sanitaria son una constante en los conflictos armados actuales. Esta realidad se contrasta con los esfuerzos que se realizan para fortalecer los Principios Humanitarios – Humanidad, Imparcialidad, neutralidad Esta contradicción es el objeto de estudio en este trabajo que se estructura en torno a tres apartados: 1. Fundamento de los Principios humanitarios en el Derecho Internacional de los Derechos Humanos, y el Derecho Internacional Humanitario; 2 El proclamado liderazgo del Secretario General de las NNUU en la coordinación de la asistencia humanitaria; 3. La elaboración de un código ético de asistencia humanitaria Systematic attacks on the civilian population and persons providing health care are constant in today's armed conflicts. This reality contrasts with the ongoing efforts to strengthen humanitarian principles - Humanity, Impartiality, Neutrality. This contradiction is the object of study in this work, which is structured according to three sections: 1. Ground of the humanitarian principles in the International Human Rights Law and in the International Humanitarian Law; 2. The proclaimed leadership of the Secretary General of the UN in the coordination of humanitarian assistance; 3. The development of an ethical code of humanitarian assistance

This chapter describes the nature of the international and local civilian presence in peace operations, based among others on fieldwork in Afghanistan and Liberia. It describes the tensions between the classical humanitarian principles vis-a-vis the evolving integrated peace operations and whole-of-government approaches that have become increasingly salient nowadays. Isolationist discussions on civil-military interaction therefore seem to be outdated and all stakeholders therefore need to acknowledge the new dynamics and reflect on the implications for themselves. A more strategic understanding between military and civilian partners should be reached prior to deployment. Such multi-level thinking in advance of the mission could resolve many implementation issues that otherwise would arise in the field. What is also required is a further reflection on the nature and quality of local partners. Are they sufficiently democratic and representative of local audiences? How can opportunistic or protagonist organizations be distinguished from the ‘good’ ones? These issues have acquired an added urgency due to the dysfunctional ‘aid bonanzas’ witnessed in a number of post-conflict situations. The increasing levels and new directions that civil-military interaction is taking necessitates a reconsideration of the original viewpoints, if the future challenges are to be met. A discussion with an open mind is needed beyond the doctrines and dogmas of the past at both sides of the civil-military interface.

Human rights entered the language and practice of humanitarian aid in the mid-1990s, and since then they have worked in parallel, complemented or competed with traditional frameworks ordering humanitarianism, including humanitarian principles, refugee law, and inter-agency standards. This article positions the study of rights within a sociology of praxis. It starts from a premise that interpretation and realisation of international norms depends on actors’ social negotiation. We seek to contribute to the sociology of rights with insights from legal pluralism and to analyse human rights as a semi-autonomous field in a multiplicity of normative frameworks. Based on cumulative research into humanitarian aid in disaster response, refugee care and protracted crises, the article explores how humanitarian agencies evoke different normative frameworks to legitimate their presence and programmes. How aid is shaped through the ‘rights speak’ of aid workers and recipients alike is illuminated by cases of programmes promoting women’s rights against sexual abuse from Kenya and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

IntroductionThe provision of humanitarian aid to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK, or North Korea) has been a challenge to many aid providers, due in large part to the ways in which the country has chosen to interact with the outside world. Despite chronic problems of child malnutrition and mortality,1 aid providers are provided with virtually no humanitarian space to access vulnerable populations and monitor for effective operations.2 While large aid providers such as the World Food Programme (WFP) sticking to a "no access (to monitoring), no food" policy,3 most other organizations have not been able to enjoy the same level of access.This study shows how non-governmental organizations (NGOs) were able to overcome political sensitivity and channel aid to specific targeted groups within the DPRK. NGOs in the Republic of Korea (ROK, or South Korea) were selected as cases in this study, not only because the international aid community knew rather little about them, but also due to their difficult position as a by-product of unstable inter-Korean relations. Despite signs of easing tension during the early 2000s, the fact that the two Koreas were still theoretically at war also meant that South Korean aid providers had faced substantially more scrutiny than their non-Korean counter-parts.4The ROK presented both advantages and disadvantages as an aid provider to North Korea. It enjoyed minimal cultural and linguistic barriers with the North, as well as a relatively low cost of transportation of food and other supplies. Despite these advantages, this study concludes that it was by harnessing their links with partners outside the Korean Peninsula that South Korean NGOs managed to sideline some of the tough restrictions and made DPRK a more workable environment.South Korean NGOs and Their Operating Environment in the NorthThe DPRK government first appealed to the international community for humanitarian assistance in 1995 to alleviate its food crisis. This crisis resulted from decades of misguided development under the juche ideology,5 which required the country to be self-sufficient in food despite environmental limitations such as a mountainous terrain and a short growing season. A decline in food production first resulted from heavily mechanized agriculture, which caused land and water degradation.6 Short of foreign exchange, the loss of partners in barter trade after the collapse of the Soviet Union7 made it difficult to import food into the country. Eventually, floods in 1995 led to a reported damage of 2 million tons of grain and 330,000 hectares of cropland.8 The Public Distribution System (PDS), which used to guarantee access to food by individuals, also broke down as a result of the food shortage.9 According to Lee (2008), North Koreans bought about 70 percent of their food from the market after the food rationing.10South Korean NGOs started supplying the North with relief goods in 1998, when the ROK established an Inter-Korean Exchange and Cooperation Fund as part of the Sunshine Policy of President Kim Dae-jung. About 59 percent of the $720.6 million in aid delivered by the ROK between 1995 and 2001 was routed through NGOs, including the ROK Red Cross.11 After the inter-Korean summit in June 2000, the ROK government took up the responsibility of directly sending food aid to the North, while the focus of NGO efforts in food security shifted to the recovery of the agricultural sector.12 As of 2009, at least fifty-six organizations from the ROK had provided assistance of various amounts to the DPRK, in areas including but not limited to food security.South Korean NGOs had a reputation for putting more emphasis on trust building rather than hewing closely to humanitarian principles,13 so they were subject to questions of effectiveness and transparency. The ways in which they tried to remain accountable might thus present useful learning for members in the international community operating in such difficult environments as the DPRK. …

This opinion note explores some aspects of the relationship between humanitarian non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and extractive industries. Médecins sans Frontières (Doctors without Borders, MSF) has endorsed a policy of non-engagement with the corporate sector of the extractive industries, particularly when it comes to financial donations. This is coherent with MSF being first and foremost a medical organisation, and one that adheres to the humanitarian principles of independence and neutrality. For humanitarian actors, the prospect of future environmental disasters and environmental conflicts calls for the anticipation of novel encounters, not only with environmental organisations but also with the extractive sector. Unlike environmental organisations, extractive industries are prone to generating or perpetuating different forms of violence, often putting extractive companies on a par with the parties to armed conflicts. In situations where a dialogue with extractive companies would be needed to optimise care and access to victims, humanitarian organisations should carefully weigh pragmatic considerations against the risk of being co-opted as medical providers of mitigation measures.

This article considers the recent literature concerned with establishing an international prohibition on autonomous weapon systems. It seeks to address concerns expressed by some scholars that such a ban might be problematic for various reasons. It argues in favour of a theoretical foundation for such a ban based on human rights and humanitarian principles that are not only moral, but also legal ones. In particular, an implicit requirement for human judgement can be found in international humanitarian law governing armed conflict. Indeed, this requirement is implicit in the principles of distinction, proportionality, and military necessity that are found in international treaties, such as the 1949 Geneva Conventions, and firmly established in international customary law. Similar principles are also implicit in international human rights law, which ensures certain human rights for all people, regardless of national origins or local laws, at all times. I argue that the human rights to life and due process, and the limited conditions under which they can be overridden, imply a specific duty with respect to a broad range of automated and autonomous technologies. In particular, there is a duty upon individuals and states in peacetime, as well as combatants, military organizations, and states in armed conflict situations, not to delegate to a machine or automated process the authority or capability to initiate the use of lethal force independently of human determinations of its moral and legal legitimacy in each and every case. I argue that it would be beneficial to establish this duty as an international norm, and express this with a treaty, before the emergence of a broad range of automated and autonomous weapons systems begin to appear that are likely to pose grave threats to the basic rights of individuals.

Introduction: New humanitarians getting old? Zeynep Sezgin & Dennis Dijkzeul Part 1 A brief history of humanitarian actors and the humanitarian principles 1. A brief history of humanitarian actors and principles Wolf-Dieter Eberwein & Bob Reinalda Part 2 New donor humanitarianism 2. India as humanitarian actor: Convergences and divergences with DAC-Donor principles and practices Kristina Roepstorff 3. Turkey as a rising power: An emerging global humanitarian actor Alpaslan Ozerdem Part 3 Multi-Mandate organisations and developmental humanitarianism 4. Multi-Mandate organisations in humanitarian aid Dorethea Hilhorst & Eline Pereboom Part 4 Armed humanitarianism 5. Blurred lines, shrunken space? Offensive peacekeepers, networked humanitarians and the performance of principle in Democratic Republic Congo Ryan O'neill 6. Rebels without borders: Armed groups as humanitarian actors Ryan O'neill 7. The military, the private sector and traditional humanitarian actors: Interaction, interoperability and effectiveness Samuel Carpenter & Randolph Kent Part 5 Private humanitarianism 8. Business in humanitarian crises - For better or for worse? Gilles Carbonnier & Piedra Lightfoot 9. Humanitarian action for sale : Private military and security companies in the humanitarian space Jutta Joachim & Andrea Schneiker Part 6 Diaspora humanitarianism 10. Diaspora humanitarianism: The invisibility of a third humanitarian domain Cindy Horst, Stephen Lubkemann & Robtel Neajai Pailey 11. Diaspora humanitarianism: Implications for the humanitarian action in Syria and neighbouring countries Zeynep Sezgin Part 7 Faith-Based humanitarianism 12. International Muslim NGOs: "Added value" or an echo of Western principles and donor wishes? Marie Juul Petersen 13. Writing the other into humanitarianism: A conversation between "South-South" and "faith-based" humanitarianisms Elene Fiddian-Qasmiyeh & Julia Pacitto Part 8 Regional and local humanitarianism 14. Regional organisations and the humanitarian system: History, trends and implications Lilianne Fan 15. Traditional and non-traditional humanitarian actors in disaster response in India Tony Vaux Conclusion Dennis Dijkzeul, Ryan O'neill & Zeynep Sezgin

For medical humanitarian organizations, making their sources of legitimacy explicit is a useful exercise, in response to: misperceptions, concerns over the ‘humanitarian space’, controversies about specific humanitarian actions, challenges about resources allocation and moral suffering among humanitarian workers. This is also a difficult exercise, where normative criteria such as international law or humanitarian principles are often misrepresented as primary sources of legitimacy. This essay first argues for a morally principled definition of humanitarian medicine, based on the selfless intention of individual humanitarian actors. Taking Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) as a case in point, a common source of moral legitimacy for medical humanitarian organizations is their cosmopolitan appeal to distributive justice and collective responsibility. More informally, their legitimacy is grounded in the rightfulness of specific actions and choices. This implies a constant commitment to publicity and accountability. Legitimacy is also generated by tangible support from the public to individual organizations, by commitments to professional integrity, and by academic alliances to support evidence-based practice and operational research.

There is limited binding international law specifically covering the provision of humanitarian assistance in response to natural and human-made disasters. Yet a variety of authoritative soft law texts have been developed in the past 20 years, including the UN Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, the Red Cross Red Crescent Code of Conduct and the Sphere Project’s Humanitarian Charter and Minimum Standards in Disaster Response. While such ‘non-binding normative standards’ do not carry the weight of international law, they play an essential role in the provision of humanitarian assistance albeit subject to their limited enforceability vis-à-vis intended beneficiaries and to their voluntary application by humanitarian actors. Notwithstanding a lack of legal compulsion, certain non-binding normative standards may directly influence the actions of States and non-State actors, and so obtain a strongly persuasive character. Analysis of texts that influence the practice of humanitarian assistance advances our understanding of humanitarian principles and performance standards for disaster response. As the International Law Commission debates draft articles on the Protection of Persons in the Event of Disasters, such non-binding normative standards are crucial to the development of an internationally accepted legal framework to protect victims of disasters.

The traditional law of blockade has several technical requirements that if not met renders a blockade unlawful. These traditional requirements balance the interests of the belligerent and neutrals. A more contemporary view on the law of blockade, however, emphasizes that blockades are also subject to the restrictions and general obligations imposed by treaties and general principles of humanitarian law. Crucially, whether or not the consequences of a breach of humanitarian principles or humanitarian law render a naval blockade unlawful or not is however not at all clear. The recent use of naval blockades during the Israeli military operations has given rise again to the discussion as to what renders a blockade unlawful. The maturation of the law of blockade has seen an increasing willingness to embrace aspects of humanitarian law. However, the diversity of views from the international community as endorsed by the published reports on the flotilla incident demonstrates that there remains a lack of consensus and an active discussion on the state of the law of blockade.

The Syrian civil war has triggered the world’s largest humanitarian disaster since World War II, with Lebanon and Jordan hosting the greatest number of refugees in relation to their local populations. Volunteering for the Syrian refugee cause proved to be an immensely rewarding experience, where medical expertise was acquired, and humanitarian principles were strengthened.

Humanitarian advocacy is emblematic of the relief community's desire to move beyond simply treating the symptoms of suffering, and towards tackling the causes. As such, advocacy is at the front line of debates over where the boundaries between aid and politics should now be drawn and the point where dissension on the subject is most evident. In this paper the challenge that advocacy poses for traditional humanitarian operations in Darfur and the effect of such political engagement on humanitarian identity more generally is assessed. Disagreement among humanitarian organisations is exacerbated by the continued tendency of aid agencies to privilege reaction over reflection. Floundering between unachievable traditional humanitarian principles and the failure of human rights to provide an adequate alternative, humanitarianism is swiftly losing both its identity and its legitimacy. To emerge from the fog of confusion humanitarianism must now take on the professionalism of military science and endeavou...

Development for public interest requires the land for which the procurement is carried out by promoting the principles contained in the 1945 Constitution of the State of the Republic of Indonesia and national land law, including humanitarian principles, justice, benefit, certainty, openness, agreement, participation, welfare, sustainability , and alignment in accordance with the values of nation and state. Land acquisition for Ciawi and Sukamahi Dam Projects implemented by the Government, in fact resulted in compulsion, where the Government was forced to buy the land due to the program and so the landowner had to relinquish the land for the program's interest. However, in principle, the procurement of the land must continue to benefit the community as the owner of the land affected by the development program of public interest by applying the balance principle in the provision of compensation that is economically and socially more profitable to realize a sense of justice, improve the standard of living and welfare of affected people Ciawi and Sukamahi dam in Bogor Regency.

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the branding and communications strategy of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). The ICRC is the world's oldest non‐religious organisation dedicated to humanitarian relief. The ICRC's remit includes civilian and military victims of armed conflicts and internal disturbances, as well as human rights issues that transcend conflict situations, such as disaster response and preparedness, health and care in the community and humanitarian principles and values. The ICRC is the founding body of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement and coordinates the efforts of the National Societies and their International Federation.Design/methodology/approachVarious secondary sources are used to collate the information from which the case study is developed.FindingsThe ICRC's longevity is attributed to its ability to evolve, albeit at times slowly. However, the environment in which the ICRC operates is changing rapidly. Like many international non‐profit organisations, the ICRC faces considerable challenges to ensure it remains relevant by responding to the shifting environment in a flexible and creative manner. Consequently, the ICRC's communication efforts have become increasingly important.Originality/valueThe case study provides the opportunity to examine the branding and communications strategy for a prominent non‐profit organisation.

The changing nature of armed conflict has resulted in increased need to safeguard civilians, including humanitarian personnel, which is reflected in the emerging protection of civilians agenda. This article considers the security of aid workers in Darfur. Specifically, it examines to what extent the traditional principles of humanitarian action provide security for humanitarian personnel. By performing a within-case analysis, this study portrays the humanitarian workers’ own perspective of the micro-dynamics of security in Darfur. It argues that neutrality, impartiality and independence provide protection and are pivotal for humanitarian security in Darfur. However, these principles do not protect against all threats and needs to be supplemented by other strategies such as protective walls, unarmed guards and barbed wire. On the other hand, relying too heavily on such measures may diminish security as aid workers are alienated from the local population. This is because proximity to the population is perceived as the most important measure for security. In addition, this article suggests that mandatory security training for all humanitarian personnel working in the field would greatly increase the security situation and their ability to protect themselves.

In this article, the moral values underlying humanitarian principles are analysed. What were these original moral values? Have they changed? To what extent are they in danger today? Has humanity itself become an instrumental value? To answer these questions, the author examines the humanitarian discourse: firstly, how these values have been described by humanitarians themselves, and secondly, how they are used by humanitarians in specific contexts.

Health researchers, research trainees, and ethics reviewers should be prepared for the special application of research ethics within complex humanitarian emergencies. This paper argues that as a precursor to published ethical guidelines for conducting research in complex emergencies, researchers and research ethics committees should observe the following primary ethical considerations: (1) the research is not at the expense of humanitarian action; (2) the research is justified in that it is needs-driven and relevant to the affected populations; and (3) the research does not compromise the humanitarian principles of neutrality, impartiality and independence. These primary considerations are in harmony with the humanitarian goals of saving lives, alleviating suffering, and temoignage. Furthermore, there is an important role for research in supporting humanitarian action, and the extreme vulnerability of research participants in complex emergencies demands intense research ethics scrutiny. It is important to discern which ethical considerations are essential, and which are merely desirable, as excessive research ethics requirements may impede life-saving research.

The Darfur armed conflict, which is still ongoing between Sudanese armed forces, their affiliated militia and various rebels (some of whom receive external support), has inflicted unspeakable consequences upon civilians, their villages, towns, homes and other civilian objects—in particular relief assistance. The international community, including Sudan, has made, and is still making, albeit slowly, various efforts to secure peace and to stop violations of humanitarian principles in Darfur, including the controversial referral of some criminal cases to the ICC (which led to the indictment of the president of Sudan and the first head of state to be so) and the deployment of peacekeepers/enforcers which constitute the main features of the responses. Scholarly focus has been on the criminal side of the issue. This article deals with international humanitarian law (IHL) rules relating to the protection of civilians and civilian objects in the conflict. It examines the nature of the conflict, the applicable rules and compliance with those rules and the weakness and strengths, if any, of the responses of the international community in providing physical protection to civilians and their objects. It is argued that while the primary responsibility to stop violating civilian immunity rests on the warring parties there, and the regional approach to prevent widespread IHL violations in Darfur may have some obvious advantages, the erga omnes nature of the concerns at issue necessitates a concerted, adequate and timely global action to prevent further atrocities on the ground. The paper concludes with some suggestions which may help further prevent/mitigate armed violence against civilians.

The international community's response to reconstructing Afghanistan, following the US-led regime change invasion post-11 September 2001 (9/11), brought actors such as the military and private corporations more fully into the humanitarian sphere. As a result, the Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), traditionally charged with taking humanitarian action, face a number of challenges and dilemmas. Their legitimacy and their ability to act impartially, be perceived as neutral and to maintain their independence have become increasingly constrained. How the NGOs adapt when their humanitarian space is constrained affects who, where and what aid gets delivered and on what principles. However, little is known about the dynamics of humanitarian space or how the NGOs have adapted in practice. Filling the gap in empirical knowledge might enable the NGOs to deal better with the constrained environments they are likely to encounter as the ‘war on terror’ continues to unfold. This research, based on field work in Afghanistan during mid-2006, suggests the politicization, developmentalization and securitization of aid, often referred to as ‘new humanitarianism’, has triumphed in the post-9/11 environment. The role of the NGOs as neutral actors has been seriously undermined, not least by the NGOs themselves. Having legitimized regime change intervention, they find themselves prevented from negotiating their space with any group not approved by the architects of the new political dispensation. As the country slips towards a serious humanitarian crisis, there may be no way back from their lost neutrality. The best use that can be made of these findings is to identify what the Afghanistan experience can teach NGOs for operating under constrained humanitarianism.

Between reluctance and necessity : the utility of military force in humanitarian and development operations

One interesting mechanism of Socially Responsible Investment (SRI) is the divestment arrangement for the Norwegian Government Pension Fund (Global). The Norwegian Parliament established a Council on Ethics to advise on the exclusion of certain corporations from the portfolio of the Fund, to prevent complicity with violations of fundamental humanitarian principles, serious violations of human rights, gross corruption or severe environmental damage. The article explores two issues concerning this mechanism, one practical and one normative. The first concerns the exclusion mechanism’s implementation, the second what we are to make of efforts to impose normative constraints on profit-seeking economic activity. Sections 1 and 2 present the ethical guidelines and show how the Council decides on its recommendations. Section 3 considers whether such SRI by large investors can be said to be effective and legitimate responses to the new challenges wrought by economic globalization. Section 4 indicates three of several possible roles the SRI may play, while section 5 draws some conclusions. In particular, the Norwegian government’s divestment efforts – primarily aimed at preventing complicity – may serve to prevent wrong-doing by others under certain conditions.

This article examines the UNHCR operation in Pakistan during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan as a case study for the tension between UNHCR's strictly humanitarian mandate and the diverging interests of states. After situating the Afghan refugee crisis in the broader historical context of the Cold War, it analyses a number of documents from the UNHCR archives with a focus on the humanitarian principles that guide UNHCR's work on the one hand, and the influence of states and their political, economic, or military objectives on the UNHCR's operation on the other. It concludes that UNHCR was aware of the negative impact of states’ policies and actions on the humanitarian nature of its operation. However, due to the power difference between UNHCR and its members states as well as states hosting its operations, UNHCR had to accept these negative effects in order to assure minimum assistance and protection for the Afghan refugees in need.