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1. In the Middle East, Biden Is on the Razor’s Edge

Author:
Riccardo Alcaro
Publication Date:
10-2023
Content Type:
Commentary and Analysis
Institution:
Istituto Affari Internazionali
Abstract:
US President Joe Biden is walking on thin ice while he attempts to deal with the most serious crisis in the Middle East since the ill-conceived US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003. Biden has orientated his administration’s action along three tracks: supporting Israel; protecting as many Palestinian civilians as possible while also resuscitating the defunct Middle East peace process; and preventing the conflict from extending to the wider region.[1] The problem is, reconciling these three priorities may be impossible.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Civilians, Hamas, Protection, and October 7
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, Palestine, Gaza, North America, and United States of America

2. DO NO HARM: US AID TO AFRICA AND CIVILIAN SECURITY

Author:
Patricia L. Sullivan
Publication Date:
05-2023
Content Type:
Commentary and Analysis
Institution:
Political Violence @ A Glance
Abstract:
During her recent trip to Africa, US Vice President Kamala Harris announced a $100 million commitment over ten years to West African Nations to fend off the increasing threat of extremist groups. The announcement followed President Biden’s pledge of $55 billion to the continent for the next three years. While these promises reveal a US commitment to greater engagement with African states, the often-dodged question is whether citizens of these states will benefit. Will US security aid improve human security in fragile and conflict-affected African states? How is US security assistance likely to affect governance and state repression for citizens that often suffer at the hands of both extremist groups and their own security forces?
Topic:
Security, Development, Human Rights, War on Terror, Civilians, Armed Conflict, Military Aid, and Protection
Political Geography:
Africa, West Africa, and United States of America

3. The politicized pandemic: Ideological polarization and the behavioral response to COVID-19*

Author:
Gianluca Grimalda, David Pipke, Fabrice Murtin, and Louis Putterman
Publication Date:
01-2022
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW)
Abstract:
We investigate the relationship between political attitudes and prosociality in a survey of a representative sample of the U.S. population during the first summer of the COVID-19 pandemic. We find that an experimental measure of prosociality correlates positively with adherence to protective behaviors. Liberal political ideology predicts higher levels of protective behavior than conservative ideology, independently of the differences in prosociality across the two groups. Differences between liberals and conservatives are up to 4.4 times smaller in their behavior than in judging the government’s crisis management. This result suggests that U.S. Americans are more polarized on ideological than behavioral grounds.
Topic:
Politics, Ideology, Pandemic, COVID-19, and Protection
Political Geography:
North America and United States of America

4. Protecting Stateless Refugees in the United States

Author:
David Baluarte
Publication Date:
03-2020
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Institution:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:
Miliyon is a stateless, failed asylum seeker residing in the United States. He initially sought refugee protection after he fled Ethiopia, where he had faced serious abuse because of his Eritrean ethnicity. Immigration authorities denied him asylum after concluding that the Ethiopian government’s deportation of his Eritrean father, the seizure of his family’s land and business, and the detention and torture of Miliyon himself constituted a property dispute not protected under U.S. refugee law. Miliyon fought this denial of protection over the next decade through various appeals processes but ultimately failed. At that point, he applied for a passport at the Ethiopian embassy in Washington, D.C. and resigned himself to return home and face whatever fate awaited him. Consular officials, however, refused to issue him a passport. Despite never having set foot in Eritrea or having any other connection to the country, Miliyon was told that he was Eritrean, not Ethiopian. He was informed that he had no right to return to Ethiopia, his country of birth and the only place he had ever lived. This led the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to declare Miliyon stateless. As a victim of discriminatory denationalization, Miliyon tried to renew his application for refugee protection. Notwithstanding the fact that Miliyon had endured this persecutory treatment, U.S. authorities once again denied his claim.
Topic:
Migration, Refugees, Stateless Population, and Protection
Political Geography:
North America and United States of America

5. Fighting Fire with Fire: The Growing Nexus between Atrocity Prevention and Counterterrorism and Its Implications for the Use of Force to Protect Civilians

Author:
Colin Thomas-Jensen
Publication Date:
02-2018
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Abstract:
By the fall of 2014, before the United States and its partners began the military campaign to erode the territory held by the self-proclaimed Islamic State (IS) in Iraq and Syria, the international community understood the horrors endured by civilians living under IS control. While IS leadership plotted politically motivated attacks against its enemies in the region and in the West, reports trickling out from areas under the group’s merciless grip and IS’s own online propaganda clearly indicated a grave pattern of war crimes and crimes against humanity, including violence targeted at ethnic and religious minorities; women; the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community; and other vulnerable groups. As the United States considered its response to the rise of IS, the duality of the group’s threat—an external one to Americans and American interests and an internal one to civilians living in IS-held areas—animated two communities of US policy makers that had rarely interacted with one another: those focused on counterterrorism and atrocity prevention. The US-led military operation to prevent genocide by IS against the Yazidi community on Mount Sinjar, Iraq, that President Barack Obama announced on August 7, 2014, included the first volley of airstrikes in the more-than-three-year counterterrorism campaign to defeat IS in Iraq and Syria. Important for the atrocity-prevention community, the airstrikes and deployment of Special Operations Forces (alongside humanitarian experts) to help coordinate the evacuation of civilians demonstrated an openness on the part of senior US policy makers to use counterterrorism capabilities to prevent a mass atrocity. In hindsight, however, US-led lethal action against IS fighters who threatened thousands of Yazidis trapped on Mount Sinjar was more the outcome of a unique set of circumstances than a harbinger of a more collaborative relationship between the counterterrorism community and policy makers focused on preventing atrocities committed by state actors, such as the governments of Syria, South Sudan, and Myanmar, and nonstate actors, including militia groups with little to no connection with international terrorist networks. With terrorist groups such as IS, Boko Haram in the Lake Chad Basin, and al-Shabaab in the Horn of Africa almost certain to continue atrocities against local populations in areas in which they operate, a fundamental question for policy makers arises. Did the extreme circumstances under which the United States and its partners decided to intervene on Mount Sinjar necessarily represent a threshold for action, or can a more normalized relationship between the atrocityprevention and counterterrorism communities be advanced—a relationship that would seek to leverage counterterrorism tools and resources to take decisive action to protect non-US citizens from atrocities while improving measures to avoid civilian casualties, including civilians killed during actions taken by US counterterrorism partners? Drawing from interviews with nearly 40 former and current US policy makers and outside experts1 , as well as a convening of 20 experts at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in June 2017, this paper explains the increasing relevance of the counterterrorism–atrocityprevention nexus and defines some of the significant challenges of closer collaboration between those communities, with a specific focus on preventing imminent atrocities. Defining when (including clearly articulated criteria for what constitutes “imminent” in this scenario), how, and under whose authority to use force to prevent atrocities against civilians is only one element of broadening a counterterrorism strategy that also includes diplomacy and countering violent extremism (CVE) efforts. 2 This paper is narrowly focused on the use of force and argues that in some circumstances, the atrocity-prevention agenda can be advanced by using counterterrorism tools—including lethal strikes—to prevent imminent atrocities against civilians in areas where terrorist groups operate.
Topic:
Counter-terrorism, Islamic State, Civilians, Atrocity Prevention, and Protection
Political Geography:
Iraq, Middle East, Global Focus, and United States of America

6. PEACE ENFORCEMENT AND THE GEOGRAPHY OF VIOLENCE AGAINST CIVILIANS

Author:
Jay Benson
Publication Date:
03-2018
Content Type:
Commentary and Analysis
Institution:
Political Violence @ A Glance
Abstract:
UN peacekeeping is facing significant challenges. The peacekeeping budget has taken significant cuts, and there are likely to be more. Yet, while resources are shrinking, peacekeeping missions are being asked to do more, particularly regarding the use of force to protect civilians. Faced with declining resources and a task as difficult as civilian protection, missions will be forced to do more with less. So how can they begin to address this challenge?
Topic:
United Nations, Counterinsurgency, Peacekeeping, Violence, Peace, Civilians, Protection, and Enforcement
Political Geography:
Africa, Democratic Republic of the Congo, and United States of America

7. Protecting Syrian Civilians: The Road Not Taken

Author:
Frederic C. Hof
Publication Date:
12-2017
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Abstract:
During 70 months of chaos in Syria, the United States had protected not one Syrian civilian from the homicidal rampages of Bashar al-Assad and his remorseless regime. Yes, America had come militarily to the aid of Syrian Kurds besieged by ISIS (ISIL, Daesh, Islamic State). Yet the United States had protected no one in Syria from an Iranian client regime’s campaign of civilian mass homicide. The consequences were profoundly negative for Syrians, their neighbors, Western Europe, and the United States. And they were avoidable. The road taken by the Obama administration unintentionally but inevitably facilitated a humanitarian and geopolitical disaster. The road not taken would have required complicating, frustrating, slowing, and perhaps even stopping the mass murder of defenseless civilians. To be sure: it would not have been easy. But its avoidance has been catastrophic. Indeed, nothing about Syria has been easy: no silver bullets to fire, no fairy dust to sprinkle, and no magic potions to ingest. Choices between bad and worse have dominated from the beginning. They have grown starker and uglier over time largely because of the road taken.
Topic:
Islamic State, Syrian War, Civilians, Atrocities, and Protection
Political Geography:
Middle East, Syria, and United States of America

8. Allies Against Atrocities: The Imperative for Transatlantic Cooperation to Prevent and Stop Mass Killings

Author:
Lee Feinstein and Tod Lindberg
Publication Date:
03-2017
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Abstract:
A generation after Rwanda and Bosnia, many of the world powers who apologized for their lack of an early and effective response to genocide during the 1990s have yet to organize themselves sufficiently to act early and effectively to prevent or stop mass atrocities. The horror of Syria is Exhibit A. As responses to past atrocity crimes show, averting and halting atrocities requires a coordinated and sustained effort by local, regional, and international actors. This report argues that a multilateral response is necessary and that the transatlantic region has a critical role to play in shaping and leading these efforts. The governments of the transatlantic community—the United States, Canada, and Europe—already devote significant resources and political capital to the prevention and amelioration of crises and conflicts, as well as to the pursuit of international development agendas. Without better cooperation among themselves and their like-minded cousins, efforts to address mass atrocities will continue to be reactive, slow, and devastating to human life and potential. Individual transatlantic countries should be involved in those efforts, each bringing its unique capacities to the table. From the vantage point of the report's authors, the United States has a particularly important role to play in encouraging greater transatlantic cooperation among states on this issue. Principle Recommendations: Devise and implement coordinated transatlantic atrocity prevention efforts Internationalize atrocity prevention efforts Improve coordination of financial sanctions Develop an international legal framework adequate to the challenge of atrocity prevention Prioritize civilian protection in military responses that include peacekeeping
Topic:
International Cooperation, Sanctions, Peacekeeping, Civilians, Atrocities, Transatlantic Relations, Atrocity Prevention, and Protection
Political Geography:
Europe, Canada, North America, and United States of America

9. In search of commitments: The 2016 refugee summits

Author:
Elizabeth Ferris
Publication Date:
11-2016
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Andrew & Renata Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law at UNSW Sydney
Abstract:
An extraordinary series of meetings took place in 2016 to respond to perceptions of an unprecedented global refugee crisis. This policy brief traces the context and the results of these meetings and explores the common themes that emerged over the course of the year. The meetings examined include: the Supporting Syria and the Region Conference, held in London in February; the High-Level Meeting on Global Responsibility Sharing through Pathways for Admission of Syrian Refugees, held in Geneva in March, the World Humanitarian Summit, held in Istanbul in May; the Summit on Refugees and Migrants, held in New York on 19 September; and the United States (US) Leaders’ Summit, held in New York on 20 September. Although not all these meetings were technically ‘summits’, they all sought to mobilise attendance and commitments at the highest political level, and for this reason are referred to in this policy brief as ‘the summits of 2016.’ Four specific contextual factors set the stage for the summits of 2016. First, the United Nations (UN) had scored major successes in summits focused on development, climate change and disaster risk reduction in 2015. Secondly, the growing carnage in Syria and the inability of the international community to address it was a vivid backdrop to all of the summits. A third and related trend was the dramatic increase in requests for humanitarian funding. Donors had tripled their contributions to humanitarian appeals over a decade – and yet it still was not enough. Finally, the summits took place at a time of political change. The United Nations Secretary-General’s term was coming to an end. There were nasty politics in Europe with the rise of right-wing populist parties and the United Kingdom (UK)’s decision to leave the European Union. Xenophobic politics in the United States had led to a vociferous reaction to the resettlement of Syrian refugees. These all contributed to a sense that the system itself was not fit for purpose.
Topic:
Migration, United Nations, Refugee Crisis, Dialogue, and Protection
Political Geography:
Europe, Syria, Global Focus, and United States of America

10. Extraterritorial processing in Europe: Is ‘regional protection’ the answer, and if not, what is?

Author:
Jane McAdam
Publication Date:
05-2015
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Andrew & Renata Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law at UNSW Sydney
Abstract:
The loss of over 700 lives in a single incident in the Mediterranean on 18 April 2015, following a six-day period in which over 10,000 migrants were rescued, has sparked renewed debates about whether extraterritorial processing – sometimes called ‘offshore processing’ – might save lives at sea.1 Despite a plethora of European proposals over the past 20 years, none has ever been sufficiently fleshed out to receive adequate support to be implemented. Legal and practical concerns have proven insurmountable. There is also recognition that while regional or other external processing arrangements may provide a useful complement to other protection mechanisms, they are not a solution in and of themselves. This paper examines European proposals for extraterritorial processing and the establishment of regional protection centres by considering: • their policy rationale; • their history; • legal concerns; • comparisons with Australia and the United States; • the role of host States; • models for regional processing; and • complementary strategies that can provide a protection ‘toolkit’. Cooperative regional approaches can help States to develop more coherent, systematic and predictable responses to refugee movements. But they must acknowledge the concerns and interests of all participating States. And timely solutions for refugees will be central to their success or failure. The paper concludes by offering a flexible range of tools that can help States to provide protection in a safer, and more regular, manner. Unless States create measures to allow people to seek protection lawfully, dangerous journeys will continue.
Topic:
Refugees, Protection, Asylum Seekers, and Extraterritorial Processing
Political Geography:
Europe, Australia, United States of America, and Mediterranean