A Framework for Survival: Health, Human Rights, and Humanitarian Assistance in Conflicts and Disasters.

A Framework for Survival: Health, Human Rights, and Humanitarian Assistance in Conflicts and Disasters. Kevin M. Cahill, ed. (New York New York, state, United StatesNew York,Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of : Basic Books and the Council onForeign Relations The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) is an influential and independent, nonpartisan foreign policy membership organization founded in 1921 and based at 58 East 68th Street (corner Park Avenue) in New York City, with an additional office in Washington, D.C. , 1993) 340 pp. For many CNN CNNor Cable News NetworkSubsidiary company of Turner Broadcasting Systems. It was created by Ted Turner in 1980 to present 24-hour live news broadcasts, using satellites to transmit reports from news bureaus around the world. viewers humanitarian assistance is defined by imagesof American GIs landing on the strobe-lit beaches of Mogadishu andforeign relief workers cradling starving children. Such imagesundoubtedly created genuine public concern in the West, and perhapshelped stimulate U.S. intervention in Somalia. Nevertheless, thequestion arises as to whether or not the media is providing the publicwith a comprehensive understanding of humanitarian disasters or simplypromoting a superficial justification to support the humanitarian cause.Indeed, the mainstream media rarely attempts to analyze and deconstruct de��con��struct?tr.v. de��con��struct��ed, de��con��struct��ing, de��con��structs1. To break down into components; dismantle.2. crucial issues such as the role of international relief organizations,the relationship between political diplomacy and health initiatives andconfrontations between rich and poor countries. A picture may be worth athousand words, but a picture can also be seen and understood from manydifferent angles, whereas good usage of prose will argue one or twosubstantive points. Invariably in��var��i��a��ble?adj.Not changing or subject to change; constant.in��vari��a��bil , the unsophisticated supporter of humanrights will see and consume images of poverty and assistance from apurely emotional standpoint rather than analyze them from a geopolitical ge��o��pol��i��tics?n. (used with a sing. verb)1. The study of the relationship among politics and geography, demography, and economics, especially with respect to the foreign policy of a nation.2. a. or socioeconomic angle. What the CNN generation really needs is an informative book thatdiscusses the major issues related to humanitarian assistance. Dr. KevinM. Cahill, a renowned physician and a senior consultant to the UnitedNations, has edited such a book appropriately entitled A Framework forSurvival: Health, Human Rights, and Humanitarian Assistance in Conflictsand Disasters. The book is a compilation of papers presented at asymposium held in September 1992 in New York City New York City:see New York, city. New York CityCity (pop., 2000: 8,008,278), southeastern New York, at the mouth of the Hudson River. The largest city in the U.S. . Twenty knowledgeableand well respected individuals bring diverse views and backgrounds toconfront a wide range of issues, from the plight of refugees to theconsequences of mine warfare The strategic, operational, and tactical use of mines and mine countermeasures. Mine warfare is divided into two basic subdivisions: the laying of mines to degrade the enemy's capabilities to wage land, air, and maritime warfare; and the countering of enemy-laid mines to permit friendly on civilian populations. Cyrus Vance,former U. S. Secretary of State, sets the tone of the entire book in theforeword when he suggests how to meet the challenges posed by the humanand geopolitical consequences of famine and disease, ethnic conflictsand military aggression. Although his prescriptions are not original,Mr. Vance's convincing pleas for fostering democracy and humanrights along with his international stature make him a credible,although didactic, spokesperson for the cause of humanitarian assistanceand human rights. The other authors address various technical and practical quagmiresthat arise when providing humanitarian assistance. Tensions that canoccur between different policy suggestions for ameliorating the sameproblem are also discussed. Some of the other issues presented inclued:the roles that the United Nations, donor and recipient governments andnon-governmental organizations should play; whether intervention forhumanitarian reasons should prevail over traditional notions of nationalsovereignty; and the competition and conflicts between various groupsthat can retard relief efforts. On a deeper level, A Framework for Survival is a battleground:North vs. South, poor vs. rich, donors vs. recipients. Several authorsanalyze identical issues from different perspectives, historical pointsof reference and fundamental philosophical outlooks. Overall, Dr.Cahill, to his credit, has included a balanced selection of writingswith Western and third world perceptions of humanitarian assistance. The book is divided into four sections: Legal and Economic Issues,Health Issues, Private Voluntary Response and United Nations Response.The first section, which is the most far- reaching and illuminating interms of content and scope, addresses the limited potential ofinternational law to confront human rights violations. Next, ParthaDasgupta, in "The Economics of Neglect" shows, throughextensive data and research, the possible economic consequences ofgovernments' failure to provide for the basic needs of theirpeople. The juxtaposition of two different perspectives -- those ofDavid Owen For other people named David Owen, see David Owen (disambiguation). David Anthony Llewellyn Owen, Baron Owen, CH, PC (born July 2, 1938) is a British politician, Chancellor of the University of Liverpool and one of the founders of the British , a former British Foreign Minister, and Kofi Awoonor Kofi Awoonor (born March 13 1935 in Wheta) is a Ghanaian poet and author, whose work combines the poetic traditions of his native Ewe people and contemporary and religious symbolism to depict Africa during decolonization. ,Ghana's Ambassador to the United Nations -- on the relationshipbetween developed and developing nations best exemplifies tensionsbetween the West and the third world. Owen argues for moreresponsibility on the part of recipient nations to confrontinternational problems such as pollution. In contrast, Awoonorconvincingly calls for donor nations to stop being the "merchantsof charity." One complaint voiced by Awoonor and others in this book perhapsbest represents third world views of Western donors: The emphasis ofcurrent international policy is on short-term emergency actions ratherthan on long-term assistance and development programs that can preventmajor disasters in the first place. Awoonor writes, "development isthe only instrument that will remove the stigma of charity thataccompanies all humanitarian relief efforts." Such attitudes arerarely expressed in the Western media and arguably never enter the mindsof the average Westerner who likely sees foreign aid, whether inemergency situations or the long-term, as a panacea for all therecipient country's problems. For this reason alone, this bookshould enlighten the unsophisticated advocate of humanitarian assistanceand intervention. The second and third sections -- Health Issues and PrivateVoluntary Response -- present eyewitness accounts by medical personnelof the suffering in countries such as Somalia; the consequences of minewarfare on refugee and civilian populations; a highly critical analysisof the American medical establishment's weak response to theinternational health crisis; and the challenges faced bynon-governmental organizations. In most of the articles, the authorsgive recommendations for improving the distribution of humanitarian aid Humanitarian aid is material or logistical assistance provided for humanitarian purposes, typically in response to humanitarian crises. The primary objective of humanitarian aid is to save lives, alleviate suffering, and maintain human dignity. .Many also express the fear that an inability to adapt to the demands ofcurrent and emerging humanitarian concerns on the parts of all theactors involved -- governments, United Nations, NGOs, the western public-- could exacerbate already dismal human conditions around the globe.Indeed, a major theme of this section, which weaves through the entirebook, is that health workers and NGOs need to be completely independentof governments in order to adequately perform their duties. Without thisindependence, NGOs could become "the tools or simply thecontractors of donor governments." The last section -- United Nations Response -- analyzes theeffectiveness of the United Nations in coping with the increasingnumbers of humanitarian problems around the globe. The central questionis: Does the United Nations have a comprehensive response mechanism todeal adequately with disasters and conflicts? Although all the authorsare U.N. officials, the articles are extremely candid analyses of theproblems facing the United Nations in its relief efforts. AbdulrahimFarah, consultant director of the Center for International Health andCooperation and a former U.N. under-secretary general, criticizes thedelayed reaction of donor countries and the United Nations towards thecrisis in Somalia. In a similar fashion, Sadako Ogata, the UnitedNations High Commissioner for Refugees Headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) (established December 14, 1950) protects and supports refugees at the request of a government or the United Nations and assists in their return or resettlement. , makes an appeal for a moreconcerted and coordinated effort by the "United Nationsfamily" as a whole to address the "political, humanitarian andeconomic dimensions of current emergencies." Perhaps the most controversial issue in this section, alluded to inother parts of the book, is the debate about national sovereignty in thecontext of humanitarian intervention. Farah, a Somali national, notesthat most developing nations think sovereign rights should not beviolated "even in the name of the noblest gestures." Vance,and several other authors, not surprisingly argue that human rightsviolations within a nations boundaries are sufficient grounds forintervention or assistance on humanitarian grounds. One important North-South issue -- the perception by developingnations that the issue of human rights is used as a political andforeign policy tool by their developed counterparts, despite the end ofthe Cold War, and that a double standard exists -- could have been morethoroughly explored in a separate article, although Richard Falk ofPrinceton University does a good job in presenting this view. He writes,"the overwhelming number of instances will involve the flow offorce from North to South, and the strong states in the North aredefinitely off-limits. (Can anyone imagine a U.N. humanitarianintervention in the United States to protect Native Americans againstallegations of ethnocide Ethnocide is a concept related to genocide. Primarily, the term, close to cultural genocide, is used to describe the destruction of a culture of a people, as opposed to the people themselves. It may involve a linguicide, phenomenons of acculturation, etc. ?)" Most of the twenty articles are well-written and edited, andprovide extensive yet manageable amounts of information. A Framework forSurvival is a good resource for academics and journalists, but canprovide even the lay reader with a better understanding of currenthumanitarian and human rights concerns around the world. The ability toenlighten the average CNN viewer, or for that matter, any other citizen,on humanitarian issues is important: simply put, these viewers are theones who vote for Presidents and Prime Ministers, who lobby forCongressional spending on humanitarian aid and who demonstrate for humanrights in the urban capitals of the world. Images of poverty andsuffering, combined with substantive arguments and analysis, such asthose presented in this book, can only create a more sophisticated andinfluential citizen of the world. Yancy Ruben Garrido received his J.D. from Columbia Law School Columbia Law School, located in the New York City borough of Manhattan, is one of the professional schools of Columbia University, a member of the Ivy League, and one of the leading law schools in the United States. in1993, and will receive a Master of International Affairs The Master of International Affairs is a Professional Master's degree. Through study of the diverse forces that have shaped modern institutions and the ways in which diverse forces project themselves into the international sphere, the Master of International Affairs degree attempts (MIA) degreefrom Columbia University's School of International and PublicAffairs (SIPA) in 1994; he is a Ford Foundation Fellow in PublicInternational Law. Scott Johnson will graduate from Columbia College inMay 1994. Anton Farrel Katz holds B.S. and LL.B. degrees from theUniversity of Capetown and is an LL.M LL.M Legum Magister (Master of Laws). degree candidate at Columbia LawSchool, with a focus on international human rights. Kellee Tsai is adoctoral candidate in political science at Columbia University. ElieSinger will receive his MIA from SIPA in May 1994. Sudarsan V. Raghavanis a May 1993 graduate of Columbia Journalism School and is currently astudent at SIPA.