David Rieff

Humanitarian groups have sought not only to help the needy, but to shed light on the atrocities of war. But as the conflict in Kosovo illustrates, argues one author, relief agencies have lost the power and influence they once wielded on the international stage since the end of the Cold War.

David Rieff joined us online from New York City on May 12, 1999 to argue his premise that humanitarianism as a movement is dead, and to answer your questions about relief efforts since 1991.

Rieff is a frequent contributor to the Washington Post and Newsweek magazine and the author of "Slaughterhouse: Bosnia and the Failure of the West." He is currently writing a book on humanitarianism.

A transcript of the discussion follows below:

Washingtonpost.com: First David, can you tell us a little bit about how you came to do research on the subject of humanitarianism? What sparked your interest?

David Rieff: Well, it happened mostly because I covered a large part of the war in Bosnia and spent a great deal of time in Sarajevo. And to a very large extent what was going on in Bosnia was a humanitarian crisis although it was a political crisis as well. I ended up spending a great deal of time with humanitarian and U.N. agencies. And so, from a project on Bosnia which turned into my book, I segued into problems of humanitarian action around the world.

No. Virginia: Let's look at Ethiopia and Congo. Do you think humanitarian groups have succeeded or failed in their efforts there ... or perhaps they've done a bit of both?

David Rieff: I think that the first thing you have to realize about humanitarian aid is that it's an emblem of failure, not of success. I mean something very simple by this. If the political and social structures of a country hadn't collapsed, you wouldn't need humanitarian aid in the first place. So even when a humanitarian operation goes perfectly, in some sense its a failure. Having said that, I think in the example you mentioned, it's a bit of both. Humanitarian relief saved a lot of lives. Children got vaccinated and people got shelter who otherwise wouldn't have. But at the same time it would be naive not to realize that humanitarianism doesn't have a downside. By giving aid, you can sometimes prolong wars or allow one or another party to conflict not to worry about their own people but focus on their war efforts. These are some of issues that any humanitarian worker faces from day-to-day.

Alexandria, VA: You decry the fact that aid groups can't handle a disaster like Kosovo, but aren't you missing the point? It isn't a humanitarian problem; it's a military problem. Can't the aid agencies resume their role when the shooting stops?

David Rieff: I don't think I mentioned the point at all. In fact, I'm the first to insist that at its root, the Kosovo crisis is political and moral, not strictly humanitarian. But even in the most optimistic scenario, the war and the negotiation are going to take a long time. The needs of refugees can't just be put on hold. There are babies being born in those camps. People who are coming down with diseases and who've been wounded in the course of Serb ethnic cleansing. The humanitarians can't just stand around and say, "We'll clean all this stuff up later." That's exactly the dilemma in trying to balance humanitarian and political imperatives.

St Louis, MO: I will take this opportunity to pose the total violation of human rights in Afghanistan. Women are living as animals and are in constant fear under the Taliban rule. Why the west is keeping its eyes closed to such a pathetic state in Afghanistan and singling out only certain countries for action?

Washingtonpost.com: David, in terms of relief agencies and humanitarian aid, does this reader have a point---i.e. Are relief agencies focusing too much time on Kosovo and not enough on areas where they might be able to make a bigger difference?

David Rieff: Afghanistan is a perfect example of a humanitarian dilemma. There can be very few regimes on earth more despicable than the Taliban. But that still doesn't answer the humanitarian problem. If humanitarian agencies get up on their soap boxes and say, "The Taliban are bad. We're leaving." Where does that leave ordinary people in Afghanistan who depend on the agencies for help? On the other hand, if they stay, which means cooperating with the Taliban, aren't they just making that evil regime stronger. In Afghanistan, as in many other places, there are no easy solutions.

For the second question: I don't think that what's going on in Kosovo has to be compared to what's going on anywhere else. What the Serbs have done is a terrible crime. Having said that, humanitarian emergencies are no different than ones that happen at home. Some crimes in the UNited States get a lot of attention, some get ignored. It's absolutely unfair, but it's hard to see how it can be otherwise. Perhaps, if we had a world government we might be able to deal with not just Kosovo, but Afghanistan, Sierra Leone and many other countries that have either fallen apart, or are ravaged by internal war. But, the U.N. is barely functional, so the idea of world government for the foreseeable future is a non-starter. We're going to have to live with the complexity of the fact that we can't save everybody. That's a terrible thing. But it may be simply a reality that we can be sorry about, but that's hard to change. There is also the question of feasibility from a military point of view, Kosovo is at least possible. A crisis in Afghanistan or Tibet is one that we're not really even in a position to solve. Certainly not by military means.

Arlington, VA: Your Newsweek column seems to illuminate and almost heretical notion in this country: Some people are going to be killed; some people are going to go hungry, and humanitarian groups may do more to further the agendas of warmongers than aid the onset of peace. Is this indeed your point, or am I misconstruing your words?

David Rieff: It's not that I'm critical of the humanitarian agencies. I think most of them do the best they can under amazingly difficult and dangerous circumstances. My point though, is that you can't use humanitarian action to solve major political problems and that in making humanitarian groups stand in for diplomats and soldiers we are neither giving diplomacy and war or humanitarianism its due.

No. Virginia: Maybe it would be a good thing for humanitarian work to go into the hands of the private sector, and of governments? Perhaps they would do a better job. What's the down side?

David Rieff: From a practical point of view, it may well be a good idea. But humanitarianism is more than just putting up tents or vaccinating children. At its best, it's also about creating a different environment, trying to heal the wounds that war has caused. It's hard to see how a business could take that over. The point of a business is to maximize profit. And where something like human rights is concerned, it's hard to imagine most businesses either knowing how to do that or wanting to do it.

Seattle Washington: Mr. Rieff--From your perspective,what do we need to know about today's Balkan crisis, and the recent history of Serbian slaughter at the hands of Albanians, while -we're told- no one came to THEIR aid? Why is the US reticent to more generously fund humanitarian aid in this specific case--japan has donated more, I understand?

David Rieff: I don't agree with this at all. Obviously, no one's hands are clean in war or politics. That was true in WWII, which was probably the most decent war ever fought and it's true in Kosovo. And there are many things to be said about what happened in Kosovo over the past 30 years. But nothing, absolutely nothing, justifies or excuses the mass slaughter of Albanians by the Serbs and what has amounted to an effort to ethnically cleanse (which is a polite way of saying expel) 2 million people, which is the entire population of the province. This is a world historical crime for which there can never be an excuse or forgiveness.

Germantown, MD: Mr. Rieff,
I remember back in high school (5 years ago) that Amnesty International seemed kind of pointless. Volunteers wrote letters with no results. What is their purpose today? Do organizations like Amnesty serve any real purpose in the Post-Cold War era?

David Rieff: Honestly, I don't know the answer to that question. Speaking strictly in practical terms, it's probably possible to make the argument either way. But, there's a virtue in telling the truth, in unmasking things that tyrants like Slobodan Milosevic or Mobutu want to keep covered up. You can't quantify it, but it's essential.

Tel Aviv, Israel: I'm afraid that the politicization and militarization of refugee crises as seen by the NATO bombing campaign, spells out a weakening of the humanitarian issues in the long run, as relief agencies become marginalized. Issues now only seem solvable by brute force. Do you agree?

David Rieff: I think such issues were always only solvable by brute force. I think that's the lesson of history. Unfortunately, my view is that we've overestimated the capacity of humanitarian agencies to deal with a crisis like Kosovo, or Bosnia. It was a noble dream, but I'm afraid it was a dream all the same.

Solomons, Md.: In Newsweek, you said aid agencies need to find "a different paradigm, both operationally and morally." You didn't suggest any. No ideas or no space?

David Rieff: Maybe a little bit of both. Seriously, I don't think anybody knows what that new paradigm could look like. As usual, it's far easier to be a critic than to come up with viable solutions. Having said that, let me try to offer two suggestions:

The first is that human rights either have to become an indispensable part of humanitarian action or humanitarians have to get out of the human rights and advocacy business. The tension here is getting too acute. My hunch is the new paradigm will involve a much greater emphasis on human rights. That's the value-added that a humanitarian agency can bring, that a government or private corporation can not. The other suggestion is that humanitarians are going to have to be willing to pick and choose where they go and to say that certain operations simply have to be left to national governments, armies, etc.

Laurel Maryland: I believe that humanitarianism
should have started before the
war. That the offer of economic incentives to Serbia
would possibly have enticed them to allow the peace keeping troops into Kosovo without violence. Do you think such an act -economic incentives- could have been useful in avoiding this Balkan tragedy?

David Rieff: No, I don't. You have to see the Kosovo crisis in the context of the wars that have taken place in the former Yugoslavia since it broke up in 1991. And I believe that those wars and the slaughter and mass expulsion that has accompanied them, is the achievement of one man, Slobodan Milosevic. My view is that he didn't want a solution to this crisis that granted Albanians any kind of rights. He preferred to maintain his apartheid state in Kosovo. I don't see any more reason to think about bribing him (which is what you're saying), than one should bribe a mafioso or gang leader to stop their crime.

Washingtonpost.com: We have a half hour remaining in our discussion with David Rieff. Please continue to submit questions using the link below.

Rosslyn, Va. : Why were humanitarian organizations like Amnesty International able to be more effective during the Cold War era than during the current ethnic rivalries era, as you have suggested?

David Rieff: First of all, it's important to distinguish between human rights agencies, like Amnesty International and humanitarian agencies which bring relief to populations in need. But the question is a good one and I think the answer is that during the cold war, the major powers had much more control over places like the Balkans or Central Africa. When Washington or Moscow talked, dictators listened. That's not true today. A Milosevic or a Qaddafi or for that matter, a militia commander in Sierra Leone can't be pressured in the same way. What happened in the cold war was that humanitarian and human rights groups would pressure Washington and Washington would pressure some dictator somewhere. That doesn't work anymore.

Rosslyn, Va.: The title of yr earlier book seems to indicate the West failed in Bosnia. Please explain. The conflict there seems over to me. Thank you.

David Rieff: A conflict that takes a quarter of a million lives, leaves 2 million refugees and leaves a country that would go back to war in a NY minute if NATO troops were withdrawn can hardly be said to be a place where peace has prevailed. All wars end and for the moment, there's no war in Bosnia. But it would be foolish to imagine that the war is ended for good. What we're seeing is one long war that followed the break up of Yugoslavia There was a Slovenian chapter, a Croatian chapter, a Bosnian chapter and now Kosovo. But I think that as long as Milosevic is in Belgrade, I think that the concept of enduring peace in the Balkans is wishful thinking.

Alexandria, VA: I can't recall a time when humanitarian relief organizations did wield a lot of power on the international stage, as you suggest. Can you give us an example of a period and specifically, what kind of power they did wield, if any?

David Rieff: It depends on what you mean by power. Obviously humanitarian organizations don't have armies or independent budgets and when a powerful state gets involved, they seem powerless by comparison. But I would argue that that doesn't mean they are powerless, particularly because in a great number of the crisis they are involved in in WEst AFrica, in Southern Asia and other parts of the world. They are the only consistent representatives of what we slightly hyperbolically like to call the international community. If the U.N. High Commission for Refugees is the only agency with a big budget ina place like Sierra Leone, that's power. It's the views of the agencies on the ground that are going to be listened to in Washington or London Brussels. The international relief agencies that have been put in the position being the public face for these governments. That's power that has more responsibility than privileges and does not allow those that wield it any real independence.

Arlington, VA: Arlington again. I realize you can't solve major political problems solely with humanitarian aid. However, when people see image after image of sad-eyed refugees and hear tales of terrible atrocities--bottom line, they want to act. What I'm wondering is...are you suggesting that we may do more harm than good when we do offer aid?

David Rieff: No, I'm suggesting that each crisis has to be taken in its own terms. And that while we shouldn't end humanitarian action, we shouldn't just blindly agree that it's the right thing to do. Speaking as a journalist, I feel in the position to say that the media can never tell the complete story and that when you're talking about sad-eyed refugees your talking about a reality--most refugees do have sad eyes-- but also of a certain manipulation because its not always clear that a humanitarian effort is the right way to help those refugees, So, no we shouldn't give up on humanitarian aid, we should just think about it more critically and in a more complicated way.

Bethesda, MD: What is the scale of the humanitarian effort that is currently underway in Kosovo crisis in terms of the gap between those refugees who are getting attention and those need it?

How would you rate the response from the US compared to the response from other countries, especially in Europe, in terms of speed and dollars spent?

David Rieff: I think the most important thing to think about when you think about the Kosovo crisis is that the people who are suffering the most are not the refugees who have made it out of Kosovo--although--many of them are suffering a great deal--but the internally displaced Albanians who Milosevic's forces have chased from their homes and into the mountains. Which is why a lot of American agencies are thinking of resorting to the desperate measure of dropping food from the air. I can't quantify the differences between the European and American responses but it seems people are pitching in in a serious way. The one concern that I do have is that people will forget about other crises and funding for places like Angola and Sierra Leone won't be available.

Germantown, MD: Does any one humanitarian agency have more power than the others?

David Rieff: No, I don't think so. There are probably a dozen major humanitarian agencies in western Europe and North America. Groups like; Save the Children, the International Rescue Committee, Doctors without Borders and World Vision. But, those groups are pretty much equal in the humanitarian world.

Washington, D.C. : Mr Rieff,

Is it really fair to claim that relief agencies once had great influence and power to shame leaders into acting better, but now they don't? The point of many relief agencies, it seems to me, has been to help feed and take care of people etc. in times of crisis and emergency. They don't all fall into such political categories as Amnesty International and others. Most depend on having a safe environment to do their work. They don't have it Kosovo, but they are still helping to do positive things. Why imply, as you do, that humanitarianism solutions across the board are dead?

David Rieff: Because the contradictions have become too acute. Ten years ago, it was possible to imagine that if you fed people or gave them shelter, or looked after their medical needs, you were doing something that had no moral or political downside, But after Somalia and Rwanda and Bosnia and Kosovo, people are coming to realize that humanitarianism can do good and its action can also give rise to unintended negative consequences. You may prolong a war. This makes a lot of sense and it's not just a lot of bunch of intellectual theorizing. People can die as well as be healed over a long period of time. This is not just my opinion, but the opinion of the humanitarian workers who have worked bravely in these efforts and thought critically about the consequences of their efforts.

Washington, D.C. : In an earlier answer, you talked about the need for a greater emphasis on human rights. But groups like Amnesty have been pushing human rights in places like China and getting nowhere, aside from raising the issue? Human rights seems to be one of those nebulous terms, no?

David Rieff: Absolutely. We don't really know what we mean by human rights in a practical sense any more than we know what we mean by humanitarianism. But it's always possible to say nothing is possible. The measure of doing something right is not necessarily how effective you're being in the short term. I've been very critical in other work about the moral presumptions of certain kinds of human rights activism. But, that doesn't mean it's right or fair to dismiss human rights. In fact, all the great movements of social reform have looked ridiculously ineffective when they started. Imagine what the people who thought the slave trade should be abolished must have looked like 100 years before the Gettysburg address. Were they wrong? In any case, doing the right thing shouldn't be conditional on whether you'll succeed or not. You do the right thing because it's the right thing.

Arlington, VA: Why are humanitarian efforts inevitably a failure in any crisis, as you seem to suggest? Isn't the point that humanitarian organizations try their best to stem to disasters that are occurring? If problems of prolonging wars occur, it's not the fault of the humanitarian agencies...it's the fault of those dictators, no?

David Rieff: No, I don't see it that way. Of course we should blame the dictators whether its a Charles Taylor in Liberia or a Slobodan Milosevic in Belgrade, first and foremost. But, as the old saying goes, "the road to Hell is paved with good intentions," and the danger for humanitarianism is to become the unwitting accomplice of murderers and warlords. You can't let humanitarianism off the hook just by saying they're not to blame. I'm not offering any blanket condemnation. I count humanitarians as my friends and admire their efforts, but they're not entitled to a moral free pass either. I just think they're harder on themselves than you're being. And if my views don't convince you, you should have a look at what they say to each other about what they do. They're extremely critical and extremely troubled. And it's to their credit that they are.

Washingtonpost.com: Well that's all the time we have. Thanks to all who participated and thanks to David Rieff, who joined us from New York City. Stay tuned for our next discussion on U.S.-China relations at 3 p.m. EDT.

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