Humanitarian Intervention

In our fourth and final episode, we explore the multifaceted issue of humanitarian intervention. Every day, we seem to hear about ongoing atrocities, including but not limited to the persecution of the Rohingya and Uighur populations, the perpetuation of war crimes in Ethiopia’s Tigray region, and the humanitarian crises in Syria and Yemen. In a twenty-four-hour news cycle, we are also often vulnerable to feeling a sense of hopelessness about our own inability to act, which gives way to a heightened lack of faith in systems of global governance and the international community’s ability to punish crimes against humanity. One way to mitigate this lack of faith-induced paralysis is by curating a better understanding of the roles of local and international actors and the mechanisms through which a more just world can be constructed. To provide insight into these issues, we interview two experts on humanitarian aid, including Dr. Peter Uvin, who offers his perspective on international aid in Rwanda, and Dr. Adam Jones, who speaks to the implications of Covid-19 on structures of violence. Our podcast episode seeks not only to educate our listeners on the responsibilities of the international community in preventing mass atrocities but also looks to urge our audience to consider their own culpability in systems of violence and mass human rights violations.