Condemned to Repeat?: The Paradox of Humanitarian Action FROM THE CRITICS
Foreign Affairs
An insider's searching critique of the humanitarian aid system. Humanitarian assistance has become a massive global enterprise, involving hundreds of aid agencies and nongovernmental organizations spread around the world's war-torn regions, offering help based on time-honored principles of neutrality and need. Terry argues that the system is deeply flawed, for international aid and refugee regimes unwittingly play into the hands of warring factions and rebel movements. The result is "refugee-warrior" communities: militarized refugee camps that use their protected space to fight against their home state. Indeed, the protections accorded by international law and humanitarian assistance help refugee camp-based guerrilla movements legitimate their control over the civilian population. Palestinian refugees in the Middle East, Tutsi refugees who fled post-independence Rwanda, and anti-Soviet Afghan refugees in Pakistan are just a few examples. The result, Terry concludes, is a deep paradox at the heart of humanitarian action: The international community's good intentions have created structures of aid and protection that, when injected into disintegrating states without authoritative rule, often fuel violence rather than reduce suffering.
Library Journal
The director of research and former head of the French section of M dicins sans Fronti res (Doctors Without Borders), Terry has written a compelling book about the failure of international humanitarian organizations to take into consideration a wider political context before providing aid. This shortsightedness, argues Terry, results in the paradox that humanitarian aid aimed at alleviating suffering instead sustains the oppressive action that caused it. In clear and concise analysis, she begins with the controversial claim that the aid agencies respond in knee-jerk fashion to any conflict without further investigating or even considering the ramifications of their aid. In four documented cases Afghan camps in Pakistan, Salvadoran and Nicaraguan camps in Honduras, Cambodian camps in Thailand, and Rwandan camps in Zaire Terry details how aid given to help people often ends up in the coffers of the combatants. Terry backs up her claim with photocopies of documents that will be of special interest to scholars of the 1996 Rwanda massacres. Recommended for all libraries. Glenn Masuchika, Rockwell Collins Information Ctr., Cedar Rapids, IA Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.
Home
