Opinions

Les côtes dévastées par le tsunami à Banda Aceh Sebastian Bolesch Opinion

Long live the (humanitarian) crisis!

06/22/2009 Rony Brauman

According to Wikipedia, "a humanitarian crisis is an event or series of events which carry with them a critical threat to the health, safety or wellbeing of a collectivity, usually over a wide area.

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Des travailleurs préparent des kits pour les équipes de vaccination Olivier Asselin Opinion

Kit Culture

05/25/2009 Jean-Hervé Jézéquel

Analyzing the same event from different perspectives is a favourite trick of historians to spice up their narratives. It also works pretty well to describe humanitarian interventions.

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Opinion

Zones to Protect

03/01/2009 Rony Brauman

Humanitarian law was designed as a normative framework, not as an indictment. With this in mind, Rony Brauman tries to define what constitutes a human shield.

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Opinion

Genocide, a word with many meanings

09/01/2004 Rony Brauman

Rony Brauman analyses the de-politicization and criminalisation process of the conflict in Darfur, resulting from an exclusively ethnic reading of this crisis and by the inappropriate use of the concept of "genocide".

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A group of refugees move on as they are told they can cross the border. Borja Ruiz Rodriguez Opinion

Codes of conduct: whose interests do they serve?

01/01/2003 Fiona Terry

As the USA announces its decision to suspend food aid to North Korea - one of the largest beneficiaries of global food aid - Fiona Terry reveals the true political issues behind the decision, and reminds us of how "humanitarian" assistance is used to bolster one of the planet's most oppressive regimes. 

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MSF doctor in a west Kabul maternity Amador Gullar Opinion

Humanitarian action victim of its own success

01/01/2003 Fiona Terry

The international aid regime tends to exaggerate changes over the last decade in the nature of so-called humanitarian crises. Neither violence perpetrated against civilian populations nor the dilemmas posed to aid organisations attempting to assist them have worsened since the end of the Cold War. 

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