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Taking the Responsibility to Protect
What is to be done when a government is unwilling or unable to stop mass atrocities being committed within its borders? That question has been asked far too many times in Africa - from Rwanda to Eastern Congo, from Somalia to Darfur.
The horrors of conflict in Africa continue today, but there is also a sign of how rapid response, with support from neighbors and the international community, can save lives and bring hope. In contrast to the crises in Rwanda in 1994 and Darfur in 2003, we see today in Kenya the formation of an international consensus that it is unacceptable to ignore violence of the kind that has occurred in recent months or to consider the crisis as purely an internal matter of the state.
What has brought about this change in attitude? We can't underestimate the importance of the leadership and people of Kenya committing themselves to finding a just and equitable way forward. But it should also be acknowledged that the international community has moved far faster in addressing this conflict than it has in similar situations elsewhere. The United Nations has engaged at the highest political levels, the Security Council has issued a statement deploring the violence, and the secretary general and the leadership of human rights offices have been mobilized. African leaders have provided invaluable mediation. This now centers on the work being done by Kofi Annan, Graça Machel and Benjamin M'Kapa, at the request of the African Union.
I believe what we are seeing in Kenya is action on a fundamental principle - the Responsibility to Protect. At the UN World Summit in September 2005, government leaders pledged that states must protect their populations from mass atrocities and, if they fail, the international community must take action.
Unfortunately, the Responsibility to Protect is frequently misunderstood. It is not a justification of military intervention. It simply requires states to protect their own people and help other states to build the capacity to do the same. It means that international organizations like the UN have a responsibility to warn, to generate effective preventive strategies, and when necessary, to mobilize effective responses. The crisis in Kenya illustrates this: The primary role for outside actors is to protect civilians - not least by helping governments to improve security and protect human rights.
Nevertheless, despite some encouraging signs, little progress has been made towards implementing R2P, as it is often called, at the UN or at the national level. One response that I particularly welcome took place in November when women leaders from around the world convened a summit on global security and pledged to promote international support for the Responsibility to Protect and ensure that women's views and involvement are included in peace and security initiatives. Think how different the situations in the Eastern Congo or Darfur could be if women were fully involved in seeking solutions.
More must be done to bring R2P to life. Last week in New York, a Global Center on the Responsibility to Protect was launched. Its aims are to build greater acceptance of the R2P norm and to work with others to call attention to how it must be applied in real-world crises. The Elders, the group of leaders brought together last year by Nelson Mandela and Graça Machel, have declared February as responsibility to Protect month as part of our Every Human Has Rights campaign to mark the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The Universal Declaration was adopted in the aftermath of World War II, the Holocaust and the use of nuclear weapons. World opinion came together then to say, "never again." Yet in the past six decades, we have witnessed mass atrocities committed against others across the globe. We all share a responsibility to do whatever we can to help prevent and protect one another from such violence.
The place to start is with prevention: through measures aimed in particular at building state capacity, remedying grievances, and ensuring the rule of law. My hope is that in the future, the Responsibility to Protect will be exercised not after the murder and rape of innocent people, but when community tensions and political unrest begin. It is by preventing, rather than reacting, that we can truly fulfill our shared responsibility to end the worst forms of human rights abuses.
Desmond Tutu is Anglican archbishop emeritus of Cape Town and chairman of The Elders.
Copyright © 2008 The International Herald Tribune
6 Comments so far
Show AllHeartVirtueâ„¢:"I am committed to Oneness through Justice and Transformation"
I posted this comment on another thread in cm, and thought it appropriate here. I have not edited it, as it stand alone.
What is the experience we desire from war? Is it Freedom? Peace? Joy? Happiness? Security/Safety? How does war/violence committed against anyone, be they armed combatants, their children, their surrogates or their political leaders, result in the opposite experience? If someone attacks you, physically, verbally or in print, is your natural reaction to embrace their point of view, their philosophy, their way of life? Or, is it to react either in kind or in fearful submission?
What seems so obvious to me does not apparently make sense to others who see military action and coercion as the way to achieve their goals of security and prosperity. The real question I ask is: how do I(or we)persuade people who practice violence as a strategy to achieve their purposes that there are more effective means to the end of security and prosperity? By listening to another's deepest desire, I may learn more about her/him and what motivates them. There is a great deal of information, and there are experiential tools to create the experience of understanding and transformation. One may choose another way when one reaches the conclusion that what they have been doing is not producing the experience they say they desire.
It is an Inside-Out process; not Outside-In. Explore the heart before concluding that change is possible from the Outside-In.
peace,
st john
¿ What can we individually do to reverse the increasing levels of societal violence and to take the responsibility to protect and revere all life ?
st john -- provides the same answer as I have:" It is an Inside-Out process; not Outside-In. Explore the heart before concluding that change is possible from the Outside-In.".
Consider that the USA leads the world in so many ways, and regrettably foremost is our proclivity for violence both against each other and then the exporting of that violence through war and production of massive quantities of weapons. We harm ourselves in the pursuit of profit at the cost of lives, and de-sensitize our moral compass to what are principled actions
I believe that this violence may be symptomatic of an increasingly perceived erosion of our morality – which is insubstantially supported at the core of our organized religions – likely due to subtle co-option into the corporate power structure.
This violence is but the outward sign of our global society having reached a crucial tipping point.
¿ Why is there so much Violence ?
There is a long established tradition within Western civilization that has been the double-edged source of both our technological advancement and continual moral turmoil:
_ (1.) This under-structure was created with Descartes' (400 years ago) dichotomy of splitting the spirit/soul away from man/nature – to create the thinker's brain – which fueled the technological expansionism that has propelled today's society both forward and toward the limits of growth.
_ (2.) _ It is this that has reached now around to undercut the primacy of spirit, which after its separation from wholeness (holiness) has increasingly been reduced - relative to the priority of the external physical world.
_ (3.) _ As SIOUXROSE describes, this is the Mars ruling (male dominating) tendency gaining ascendancy over sacred feminine and nature (aka the beast). This tendency has been building over some 4000 years, since the mostly forgotten first golden age of Greece.
_ (4.) _ Whereas I know that I am a spiritual being who has an associated physical form and existence that is enmeshed into this common reality we share, most people today are starkly identified with the materialism and coarse reductionism that holds scant place to even have a soul to cherish. The non-physical spiritual-centered world means less and less, and no longer fits into our "modern" world view.
_ (5.) _ With the unrelenting consumerism, and total engagement with the appearances of everything material, the substantive rewards of the human identification with spirit (and nature) are being stripped away.
_ (6.) _ Natural Balance is thereby lost, especially as nature is lost, as in the dangers of forthcoming climatic changes. Along with the end of the "Cheap Oil Age", technology appears to soon be as empty as our gas tanks to tame and control nature, which is with a certainty impossible in the long run.
_ (7.) _ With the gradually failing of organized religions, to stand against the dying of the LIGHT, most of Amerikind is overcome with a devastating emptiness that no amount of material possessiveness could ever fill.
_ (8.) _ The anger and violence that increasingly emanate from all of us, is the "pain indicator" that should be telling us that we need to change whatever it is that we're doing (that is causing this).
Of course, if we shortsightedly believe that the external factors like terrorists are causing us other political, oil, and financial upheaval – then why not also collectivize the underlying moral angst – and resort to violence as well as blame "them" implicitly for our lack of spiritual connection with nature and woman too? We now unseeingly condone (as a country) terror, torture, and the emaciation of humankind's inalienable civil rights.
¿ What could possibly justify this sustained violence ?
¿ Perhaps the fear, loathing, and hatred of others (outside of us in the world) is really just the externalized expression of the our own erosion of what was left of our spiritual center?
¿ Perhaps we feel powerless to act, and project the pent up anger of our misplaced perceptions upon everything else but ourselves.
¿ Perhaps POGO was an optimist (we are our own enemy), and we truly think that we hate our enemy, which is fundamentally just our misplaced selves ? Love and forgiveness is the cure for fear and hatred.
¿ Perhaps Dorothy was always able to get back to Kansas, as she always had the power within her -- as we all do. That spirit trumps matter, things, and thought in everything.
¿ Perhaps we again allow our souls and hearts to rule us, or otherwise we become fools - listlessly chasing after mere physical things in an essentially a non-physical and soulful reality ?
TAT SWAM ASI = "That we are that" = LIGHT =
Namaste … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … Mahatma Gandhi … … … … … … … … … …
« We must be the change we wish to see in the world »
« There is a sufficiency in the world for man's need but not for man's greed »
« We adopt the means of nonviolence because our end is a community at peace with itself » — ML King
Tutu should be Secretary General of the UN. Even more than the Dalai Lama who weighs his comments against the backdrop of Tibetan exile politics and appears at times to be politically naive, Tutu speaks truth to power.
The Clintons do not believe in the Responsibility to Protect. Bill pulled out of Somalia, dithered in the former Yugoslavia and failed to act in Rwanda. He, along with Reagan and both Bushes, knowingly allowed Pakistan to violate US law and develop nuclear weapons, sharing the technology with Iraq, Iran, North Korea and Libya. Hillary voted no on a bill to require countries importing US cluster bombs to certify that they would not use them in civilian areas, Bill refused to sign the conventions against landmines and child soldiers, and had his diplomats vitiate the International Criminal Court Statute by holding out hopes that he would sign, only to reject the finished and fatally weakened product. Hillary's supporters should consider this.
ST JOHN and NAMASTE: Good comments (thanks for the mention, Namaste. I appreciate that someone "gets it" as per the "as above, so below" connection with raging war on this plane!)
The idea of being one's protector is powerful as it accords with Venus, the planetary principle of a balanced and just society where negotiation, compromise and law stem any tendencies towards war and brutal uses of force first. Every step mankind takes in the direction of caring for other is a vote for Venus, who operates at a crippling deficit so long as powerful societies instead invest in weapons, armed conflict and those tributes to Mars that ratify the human ego over its collective heart and soul. The ravages to our world reverberate even down to the elemental kingdoms as we see Mother Nature absolutely convulsing in paroxysms of over-kill everywhere. (Need I explain the connections between resource depletion and the rabid capitalist model of over-consumption?)
" … the journey of ten thousand miles, begins with but a single step"
Please, be attentive to being the creators of this wonderful world, and join in a possibility parade along with SIOUXROSE, as with "Every step mankind takes in the direction of caring for other", we all move toward our goals.
The world of our dreams is the world.
¿ Is this current world, the one that we now really want ?
Results do show that this is the world that we have, so let's be aligned to invoke a real and ever lasting CHANGE, to create an unprecedented future.
To make it so, we may chose to dream profoundly, attentively, and with caring, love, and the commitment to peace and our children's blessed future.
Like so many things, it may be simple but it is not easy to grab our responsibility, and individually transform our lives -- from the INSIDE to the OUTSIDE.
May the blessings of love and empowerment fuel our interdependent (linked) existences into harmony and PEACE. We all make it so.
Namaste … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … Mahatma Gandhi … … … … … … … … … …
« We must be the change we wish to see in the world »
« There is a sufficiency in the world for man's need but not for man's greed »
« We adopt the means of nonviolence because our end is a community at peace with itself » — ML King