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The Dilemma of Neutrality

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 June 2012

Jennifer Leaning
Jennifer Leaning*
Affiliation:
Co-Director, Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts USA, Professor of the Practice of International Health, Department of Population and International Health, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
*
Jennifer Leaning, MD, SMH Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, 14 Story Street, 2nd Floor Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138, USA E-mail: jleaning@hsph.harvard.edu
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Abstract

This paper focuses on the dilemma that humanitarian non-governmental organizations (NGOs) face in their efforts to gain access to populations caught up in current wars. Narrow and broad concepts of humanitarian protection are discussed and it is argued that despite high levels of professionalism, the space for humanitarian action has constricted sharply since the events surrounding the attacks of 11 September 2001. Increasingly, aid workers are now being viewed with suspicion as agents of the great powers and assertions of humanitarian neutrality are not heeded or rejected. Non-governmental organizations have evolved a range of options to address this problem, but there is an urgent need to work collectively to find more durable and coherent solutions.

Keywords

dilemmahumanitarianneutralitynon-governmental organization
Type
Special Report
Information
Prehospital and Disaster Medicine , Volume 22 , Issue 5 , October 2007 , pp. 418 - 421
Copyright
Copyright © World Association for Disaster and Emergency Medicine 2007

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