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Humanitarian Policy and Pragmatism: Some Case Studies of the Red Cross

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2014

Jacques Freymond
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Extract

EVERY HUMANITARIAN ACTION TAKES PLACE WITHIN A POLITICAL context. This means that all humanitarian organizations, such as those which operate under the sign of the Red Cross, must devise a humanitarian policy which will be valid in the long term, based on a thorough analysis of the political context, the characteristic features of an epoch, the structures of political societies, the interaction of profound forces and the world political system. This humanitarian policy in its turn entails the development of a humanitarian strategy which is distinct from the tactical moves imposed by the diversity of situations and crises. Neglect of this work of reflection results in contradiction and confusion and, worse still, humanitarian activity can be degraded into a tool of politics.

Type
Original Article
Information
Government and Opposition , Volume 11 , Issue 4 , 01 October 1976 , pp. 408 - 425
Copyright
Copyright © Government and Opposition Ltd 1976

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References

1 These Draft Regulations tried to ‘reaffirm and to complete in view of the development of methods of warfare, the rules which ensure the protection of the civilian population during hostilities’. This is how the Report by the ICRC for 1957 defined it (p. 65). The draft had been published in 1956 and subsequently debated at the 19th International Conference of the Red Cross. (See the very brief summary of the debates which is given in the Report for 1957, pp.83–89).

2 Pictet, Jean, Les Principes de la Croix Rouge, Geneva, CICR, 1955, p.5.Google Scholar

3 Ibid., p.7.

4 See in this context the study by Yvonne de Pourtalès and M. R. H. Durand devoted to Dunant and the activity of the International and Permanent Committee (later the International Executive Committee) for the protection of prisoners‐of‐war, under the title: ‘Henry Dunant promoteur de la Conférence internationale de Bruxelles de 1874. Pionnier de la protection diplomatique des prisonniers de guerre’, in Revue internationale de la Croix Rouge, February, 1975, pp. 71–96.

5 Pictet, op. cit., p.6.

6 See Freymond, Jacques, ‘Nigeria‐Biafra: L’aide aux victimes de la guerre civile’, Preuves, Paris, 1970, first quarter, pp.70–83 Google Scholar andIntroduction au Rapport du CICR pour 1968.

7 IVth Convention, Article 23: Each High Contracting Party will allow free passage to every consignment of medical supplies and sanitary material as well as objects needed for religious worship, destined solely for the civilian population of another contracting Party, although hostile. It will authorize in the same way the free passage of any consignment of indispensable food, clothing and tonics reserved for children under fifteen, pregnant or newly‐confined women.

8 Pierre Boissier and André Rochat.

9 Freymond, Jacques and Hentsch, Thierry, On Mediating Violence, Geneva, 1973.Google Scholar