Edkins, Campbel and Malkki All

Edkins, Campbel and Malkki all discuss issues of humanitarian principle, contrasting the ideal of humanitarianism with the reality of real affirmation of the human in the humanitarian aid experience. Each in his or her own way argues that the only real way to provide humanitarian intervention is by separating such from the idea of the political, or in one case mapping the political so as not to reaffirm the issues of political conflict that are associated often with historical race and ethnic subjugation and discrimination (Campbell). (Edkins) (Campbell) (Malkki) Campbell probably offers one of the most logical discussions with regard to his desire for humanitarian aid organizations to take a sort of Hippocratic Oath where they first propose to "Do No Harm" (1998, p.500)

An example Campbell provides is the common need to provide security in humanitarian crisis, where many people, often of an ethnic minority or disenfranchised political identity (therefore commonly discriminated against and harmed by others around them) must move in mass to areas of relative safety, to receive assistance. Campbell uses the example of the need for humanitarian workers to "hire" local security forces, such as members of local militias to ensure safe passage as well as safety, food and shelter on arrival, but in doing so they legitimize a local militia and give it power it might not have otherwise gained, thus making the situation harmful in the short- and long-term of it. Campbell then goes on to use an example where mediation with the locals resolved the conflict without hiring guards, yet he also points out that there were unquestioned pitfalls in this tactic as well, given that the alternative proposal legitimized the sovereignty and authority of the local tribal leaders. Campbell stresses that short of humanitarian efforts arriving with "neutral" security forces, a difficult scenario for most, as it goes against their principle and the logistical speed with which they can respond to need but most importantly is not offered by any outside "force" as this would require additional accountability and responsibility on the part of some "neutral" state entity. (1998) Edkins offers a critique of a larger work that goes through the history of humanitarian response through several crisis and evolves into what it is currently, i.e. highly polticalized and state sponsored humanitarian relief agencies, where Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) end up acting as "state sponsored" or contracted organizations.

The changes in humanitarian practices and discourse from then onwards can be seen as a succession of radicalizing critiques and moderating or reactionary responses (Edkins 2000). A series of boundary debates -- about the relief-development continuum, about the degree of political involvement or 'human rights advocacy' that humanitarians should engage in, about questions of 'coordination' of humanitarian and military action -- marked stages in the movement from the relatively independent, poorly resourced and fairly marginal humanitarian groups of the cold war period to today's hugely well-resourced state humanitarianism, where the 'non-governmental' sector is more central but as a subcontractor to state agencies. (Edkins, June 2003, p. 254)

In this argument Edkins surmises that the state of being a refugee and the situation of humanitarian intervention from Biafra to Afghanistan have fundamentally evolved into a highly political area of relief, where NGOs rarely if ever act without some guidance from a state authority and do not do so simply as an outpouring of humanitarian ideals.

On the converse, Malkki argues that the current "ideal" of humanitarian organizations and individuals that populate them, likely trying to reassert its altruistic ideal in the face of the real "political" situations are attempting to dehistoricize or remove the refugee from the very real and individual political/ethnic/human popualtion that has been wronged in numerous ways, simply attempting to make them "universal" man or "universal" woman.

Refugees stop being specific persons and be-come pure victims in general: universal man, universal woman, universal child, and, taken together, universal family (Barthes 1980).3 of course, refugee popu-lations usually consist of people in urgent need who have been victimized in nu-merous ways. The problem is that the necessary delivery of relief and also long-term assistance is accompanied by a host of other, unannounced social processes and practices that are dehistoricizing. This dehistoricizing universalism creates a context in which it is difficult for people in the refugee category to be ap-proached as historical actors rather than simply as mute victims. (Malkki, August 1996, p. 378)

No matter how well intentioned it is to see refugees as "human" above all else and therefore deserving of universal assistance, and in the Malkki example this seems to be the "on the ground" players in the humanitarian efforts, the reality is that it separates the human' from their causes and their rightful ownership of the wrongs that have been done to them through the political will of others. (1996) This separation of individuals and groups from the wrongs that have been perpetrated against them in the rhetoric and reality dehumanizes them to a degree and allows discourse on redress and resolution to falter.

Having discussed the main premises of these three, for lack of a better word, philosophers one must now look to Nyers, who discusses the political nature of the status of "refugee" and how in the modern, post 9-11 atmosphere many states have opted to lay a veil of security across international border crossing and refugee status. In the post 9-11 atmosphere it has become common place to "detain" and "deport" those who are seeking political asylum when they come from places of security risk. In short the current situation, cumulative of the highly political and state sponsored international humanitarian body that seeks to divorce individuals and groups from the wrongs that have been done to them, creates an almost universal ability of a nation and particularly a developed nation, to refuse asylum to individuals who they might see as a threat to security. In addition the situation of cross-border movement and militarism that seems to be spreading around the world is creating a potential nightmare for asylum seekers and for those who seek to get those individuals to safety. The course of challenges that Nyers discuss have the potential for even longer term harm than do the relief and refugee camps that dot the landscape in many areas of the world and can often exists for decades in temporary and squalor states. The real goal of many individuals in these places is to seek asylum, and in the past this has been the goal of many aid workers, to assist in this asylum seeking behavior. In the past many refugees from almost all the conflicts discussed by the writers in the core three documents (Campbell, Edkin & Malkki) have successfully sought and achieved asylum status in developed nations, or even in bordering nations and integrated into these societies instead of seeking to return to their native nation, as in doing so they would likely risk freedom, life and limb. What Nyers argues is that resolution for the long-term condition of refugee populations has become far more limited as developed (and even some less developed nations) nations have for all intents and purposes used security as an excuse to close their doors to incoming asylum seekers. In so doing these nations are using the old adage, Not in My Back Yard, to reject claims of asylum, detain individuals in a very long-term way, in places that strongly resemble federal prisons, for years and years, while their inhabitants look out the fences and pray for a day when they are no longer considered subhuman and when their lives, cut short by the political will of others, can actually begin. In the face of the fact that many nations, the U.S. included have developed a whole new set of tools for exclusion, even in the face of globalization and border blurring.