Political an litical and d huma humanit nitarian pe rian - - PDF document

Political an litical and d huma humanit nitarian pe rian perspectiv rspectives on es on the the prote protection o

• n of civ

civilians lians James Darcy Prepared for the HPG Geneva Roundtable on Protection, 22 January 2007 Su Summary mmary: Given the increasing prominence of civilian protection in political as well as in humanitarian discourse, and the debate over the implications of the new Responsibility to Protect doctrine, it is essential for humanitarians to relate their discussion of protection to this wider policy debate. Likewise, it is essential to engage on this issue with political-military planners at policy and field levels, while maintaining the distinctiveness of humanitarian action. A focus on the issue of civilian security and its determinants would help in engaging effectively on protection at both levels. Just as importantly, it would serve to give more coherence to current humanitarian and human rights approaches to protection. While the protection agenda extends beyond a concern with physical security, such an approach would assist in establishing a common core agenda based on international humanitarian law (IHL) principles. The core protection agenda in situations of armed conflict might be described in terms of defined threats of violence, coercion and denial of basic subsistence – including access to relief. An approach focused on reducing known risk factors (threats, vulnerabilities) in a given context would help to highlight alternative policy and programme options. Understanding civilians’ own responses to violence and facilitating their avoidance of risk – through safe flight options or otherwise – is one essential component of this. More generally, it may be helpful to think in terms of establishing a protection regime in the context in question, while recognising the limits of third party action (military, humanitarian or other) and stressing the primary role and responsibility of the state and warring parties. Convergent or Convergent or divergen vergent agendas t agendas? The protection of civilians in situations of violent conflict has risen up the international agenda, in political, humanitarian and human rights spheres. But are we all talking about the same thing? There remains high degree of uncertainty not just about how to protect civilians, but quite what the protection agenda consists of: protection of whom or what, against what kinds of threat, by whom? The answer to these questions depends on the sphere of policy in which they are addressed. The protection agenda appears slightly different depending on whether it is seen from a human rights or a humanitarian perspective; and often very different again when seen from a political or foreign policy

• perspective. Evidence from Darfur and elsewhere suggests that confusion over the scope and meaning
• f protection and over related priority agendas bedevils current protection efforts almost as much as

does the problem of how to achieve it. Politics Politics, pr , protection and

• tection and th

the use e use of

• f force

force Political discourse about protection intensified in the wake of post-Cold War interventions and some conspicuous failures to protect civilian populations (Rwanda, Bosnia etc). Bhoutros Ghali’s Agenda for Peace (1992) had laid the policy bedrock for a more interventionist UN approach, and by the late 1990s a new doctrine of humanitarian intervention based on just war principles was forged by the US and UK in particular to justify interventions to protect with force in Kosovo, Sierra Leone, East Timor etc. The 2001 ICISS report proposed a reformulation of this doctrine in the form of the Responsibility to Protect, stressing the sovereign responsibility of the state to protect those within its borders, and the responsibility of the international community to intervene in the event of a catastrophic failure of protection by the state. Events subsequent to the 9/11 attacks and the ‘global war on terror’ saw intervention with force (in Afghanistan, Iraq) justified on hybrid grounds that included state security and counter-terrorism as well as ‘protection’; though in practice these resulted in very high (if indeterminate) levels of civilian casualties. To the extent that these interventions were rationalised as protective, they appeared to rest on a broader concept of political protection – through the deposing of abusive regimes, creation of newly accountable political structures and reconstruction of national law enforcement and security mechanisms.

In the UN, the protection of civilians has been the subject of annual reports by the Secretary General since 1999, has become firmly established on the UNSC agenda and has increasingly featured as an explicit component of peace-keeping mandates. The RtoP doctrine finally became ‘mainstream’ through its adoption in the World Summit declaration in late 2005, and the new SG has stated it as his top priority. But the discussion around the application of the RtoP doctrine has tended to focus on the use of force and ‘hard’ rather than ‘soft’ power options for intervention, and to under-play the sovereign responsibility dimension of the doctrine. It is remarkable that asylum policy does not feature in discussions of RtoP, since asylum and temporary refuge have proved by far the most important mechanism for providing international protection to civilians threatened with violence. Trends in domestic, foreign and security policy have led to increasingly restrictive asylum practice and a general move towards ‘containment’. But providing protection in situ raises major problems of sovereignty, will and capacity to protect, as the Darfur case

• shows. This presents an urgent challenge: the need to develop more effective and politically viable

models of political-military protection that combine asylum or temporary refuge with ‘internal’ protective measures, including the creation of protected areas, ‘no fly’ and demilitarised zones. Deployment of ground forces may be essential to this, though we are still some way from having adequate mandates, doctrine, rules of engagement and training for international forces undertaking this role. Clearly, we should not underestimate the difficulty of doing so in the context of a live conflict, particularly where the targeting of civilians itself forms part of the strategy or even the war aims of the

• belligerents. This puts a particular premium on the effective use of diplomatic and soft power options,

and ultimately requires the expenditure of political capital in the name of protecting people before economic or geopolitical interests. Humanitarian Humanitarian and hum and human n righ ghts a approac

• aches to p

es to protection

• tection

The emphasis in RtoP discussions on the use of force sits rather uneasily with the humanitarian emphasis (in IHL) on protection as restraint in the use of force. Yet there remains a crucial overlap of agendas here. For the most part, humanitarians do not have the means actively to protect, though they may have the means to enhance civilian security by reducing vulnerability and exposure to violence. They rightly urge warring parties to respect the IHL principles of distinction, precaution and proportionality in the use of force. But most also recognise the requirement for force to be deployed on

• ccasion in order to protect civilians. Here, the interface and relationship between humanitarian and

military actors and agendas needs to be better defined. The understanding that humanitarians and civil society actors have of relevant social, economic, micro-political and cultural factors – and of the perceptions of the affected communities themselves – can and should be used to inform political and (where necessary) appropriate military action. Protected access for relief assistance is only one component of this. The domain of humanitarian action, governed by principles of impartiality and neutrality, may be distinct and limited in scope – but it nevertheless demands a dialogue with military actors, belligerent or otherwise, about factors that have a bearing on the security of civilian populations. While the civilian protection agenda is not necessarily framed as a rights protection agenda – IHL, for example, is not so much a rights-based code as a duty-based one – there is substantial overlap between humanitarian and human rights concerns with the protection of civilians. That said, the humanitarian and human rights protection agendas may differ both in the priorities they set and the means by which they are pursued. This shows particularly in the relative emphasis attached in rights approaches to the exposing and denunciation of abuse, and with the process of justice; as against the generally more low-profile, pragmatic and locally-engaged humanitarian approach. That distinction is too crude, of course. But the difference of agendas shows, for example, in the different attitudes to the issue of displacement: seen from one angle, an abuse to be condemned, a denial of freedom of movement; seen from another angle, a rational response to the threat of violence and one that should be facilitated. It may be both, of course, but the difference of emphasis is telling.

This divergence matters where the means by which the protection agenda is pursued may be in tension; most obviously, the tension between public denunciation of abuse and maintaining safe access on the ground. This points to a pragmatic division of labour and a search for complementarity of

• action. Perhaps more importantly, divergence matters where it prevents the different actors coming

together around a shared protection agenda – not a combination of their respective agendas, but a common core agenda representing their overlapping concerns. A focus on civilian security, as described earlier, may help in this regard. This requires acceptance that urgent and selective priorities for collective action need to be set in such contexts. Comm Common e elements of ements of protec protection tion The idea of protection, as understood in all of the three spheres described above (humanitarian, human rights, political-military) extends right across the spectrum of cause and effect. It is concerned with actions taken before, during and after the incidence of violence; in other words with prevention, response and remedial action. But there are widely differing interpretations of what each of these means. In the humanitarian and human rights realms, the element of prevention tends to consist in ‘environment building’ measures such as promoting and training people in international humanitarian law (IHL) and human rights concepts. These seek to influence policies and patterns of behaviour rather than specific actions. In the political sphere, it consists more in conflict prevention and peace-building agendas, including notions of preventive diplomacy. The key difference lies in the stress on the prevention of exposure to violence in the humanitarian concept, typically by influencing the way in which conflict is waged; and the stress on conflict prevention in political protection models such as that embodied in the responsibility to protect doctrine. The responsive component in each case is essentially an ‘acute’ version of the prevention agenda: the primary goal being to prevent further incidence of violence in the short and medium term, through influence or direct intervention. Humanitarians and human rights actors tend to emphasise this component, though their approaches may differ. The normal political manifestation relates to the use

• f ‘soft’ power and diplomatic instruments, where the objectives may range from brokering a cessation
• f hostilities or ceasefire agreement, to ensuring asylum for those fleeing violence, to the fostering of

comprehensive political settlements. The use of coercive sanctions, and particularly the deployment of armed force, are rarer and more politically contingent examples of political protective responses. The remedial component varies widely across the three spheres. For humanitarians, it concerns helping people deal with the effects of violence and typically takes the form of relief assistance, sanctuary and restoration of lost assets - though arguably this stretches the meaning of ‘protection’ beyond its proper

• limits. For human rights actors, it includes a strong justice component: redress/remedy for victims (e.g.

in the form of restorative measures), trial and punishment for abusers, deterrence of future abuse. For political actors, the remedial component will typically involve not just rebuilding destroyed infrastructure but also reconstructing an effective security apparatus along with effective governance. Restoration of law and order is central to the remedial protection agenda in the political sphere. So too is return and reconciliation – an objective that does not always sit comfortably with the justice-oriented human rights agenda. A n A necess ssar ary r re-focu

• focussi

sing? ? In any given context, civilian protection can only be properly understood in relation to the actual determinants of civilian (in)security in that context. In the majority of cases of violent conflict, the key determinants of civilian security are (i) the actions and motives of warring parties (ii) the capacity and will of the national government and its agents to protect the civilian population, and (iii) the ability of civilians to take steps to protect themselves. The potential protection role of third parties – governmental or other – has to be considered in the light of these factors, whatever other factors (such as the proliferation of arms) may be involved. This is not to imply that civilians should be left to fend for themselves or assumed to be protected by their government; but rather to recognise that in practice, their own ability to avoid risk may be key to their security.

This points to three main lines of approach for third-party attempts to protect: action to reduce the threat posed by belligerents (by persuasion or otherwise); action to increase the protection afforded by the government; and action to reduce civilian vulnerability and exposure to violence. Political-military and humanitarian/human rights actors have the potential, in different ways, to influence all three. People are not passive in the face of threats to their safety or their subsistence. Besides looking to political and military actors for protection, they take action to protect themselves, their families and

• ther community members. In doing so, they assess risk and make choices. The desire to escape

violence and coercion is a powerful determinant of behaviour, but so too is the need to secure basic subsistence (food etc) in the short term, and other vital interests (livelihoods, health care, etc) in the longer term. People often face invidious choices between two or more high-risk options. Avoidance through flight may be achieved at the cost of exposure to threats of other kinds: loss of subsistence, disease, destitution, and so on. There are also a number of social, cultural and psychological factors at work here, including attachment to home and community, all of which may have a bearing on people’s choices and behaviour. Current protection approaches take too little account of these factors. Defining the Defining the ‘metr ‘metrics’ cs’ of

• f c

civilian lian security curity The issue of civilian security is not amenable to quantitative analysis except in the broadest sense (number of violent deaths, numbers displaced, etc). But we need some commonly agreed ways of describing the nature, extent and intensity of civilian insecurity, which we currently do not have. The necessary metrics probably include at least 3 elements:

• Risk factors: threats/vulnerabilities
• Perceptions and behaviours
• Incidence and prevalence of violence etc

This relates to the analytical basis suggested above, based on risk analysis. While some work has been done in the human rights sphere on ways of gauging the incidence and prevalence of abuse, more work is needed to produce a commonly agreed system for analysis. Some c conclusi sion

• ns

s In summary, this short paper argues for:

• More humanitarian engagement with the RtoP agenda, and specifically a closer dialogue with

political-military planners around civilian protection. This should include discussion around the provision of safe flight options (internal or external) and protected areas.

• Agreement on a core (non-exclusive) protection agenda focused on civilian security, understood in

relation to defined threats of violence, coercion and denial of access to subsistence, including

• relief. This should centre on the core protection principles embodied in IHL.
• Better understanding of the actual determinants of civilian (in)security in a given context, based on

strong analysis and a recognition of the centrality of civilians’ own perceptions and behaviours

• The need for some commonly agreed ‘metrics’ for civilian insecurity
• Acknowledging the inevitable limits of third-party protective interventions, the need to work

towards establishing a protection regime in a given context, with more clearly defined roles, while stressing the primary role and responsibility of the state and warring parties.