Paper details

Paper authors	Antonio Donini
In panel on	Tackling Inhumanity
Paper presenter(s) will be presenting	In-Person / Online

Abstract

The Banality of Inhumanity and Humanitarian Responsibility

By Antonio Donini

What is the responsibility of humanitarian actors – organizations, aid workers, researchers – when confronted with egregious human rights and IHL violations, deliberate harm against civilians, the erosion of the asylum regime, and the general demise of a rule-based international order? Outrage and indignation about the suffering of civilians caught up or trying to flee from wars are widespread in humanitarian circles and beyond, but so are impotence, indifference and a great deal of hand-wringing. This tension between outrage and inurement is not new but the crisis of multilateralism and its impact on narratives around humanitarianism adds new complexities to the policies and practice of aid agencies engaged in the provision of assistance and protection in conflict situations. The paper will explore how the contemporary humanitarian landscape is changing with the putative demise of western humanitarianism “as we know it” and the emergence of a multi-polar world where (a) old certainties are replaced by new challenges, but where (b) new opportunities may arise for humanitarian approaches that could be more locally grounded, de-linked from liberal order power relations or harbingers of new forms of solidarity. The paper will reflect on the extent to which humanitarians – in their diversities and tensions - are duty-bound to engage with the politics of evil and what strategies for challenging and changing the behaviour of perpetrators of crimes against humanity might be developed from a humanitarian perspective. It will also build on the experience of United Against Inhumanity, an emerging global civil society initiative concerned with the inhumanity of contemporary wars and diminishing asylum space throughout the world.

Back