Human Shields - A History of People in the Line of Fire

"In this amazing book, Neve Gordon and Nicola Perugini excavate the forms of human shielding, including as a pacifist tactic, in a diverse range of locales around the world and over a century and a half. With its insights into the politics of who counts as human, Human Shields is one of the most important interventions ever in the critical history of the laws of war."—Samuel Moyn, author of Not Enough: Human Rights in an Unequal World

"Compellingly important and thoroughly absorbing, this very readable book will fast become the standard reference in our understanding of human shields."—Laleh Khalili, author of Sinews of War and Trade: Shipping and Capitalism in the Arabian Peninsula

Inhaltsverzeichnis

List of Illustrations
Introduction 

1 • Civil War 
Humane Warfare in the United States

2 • Irregulars
The Franco-German War and the Legal Use of Human Shields

3 • Settlers
The Second Boer War and the Limits of Liberal Humanitarianism

4 • Reports
World War I and the German use of Human Screens

5 • Peace Army
International Pacifism and Voluntary Shielding during the Sino-Japanese War

6 • Emblem
The Italo-Ethiopian War and Red Cross Medical Facilities

7 • Nuremberg
Nazi Human Shielding and the Lack of Civilian Protections

8 • Codification
The Geneva Conventions and the Passive Civilian

9 • People’s War
Casting Vietnamese Resistance as Human Shielding

10 • Environment
Green Human Shielding

11 • Resistance 
Antimilitary Activism in Iraq and Palestine

12 • Humanitarian Crimes
The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia

13 • Manuals 
Military Handbooks as Lawmaking Tools

14 • Scale 
Human Shielding in Sri Lanka and the Principle of Proportionality

15 • Hospitals
The Use of Medical Facilities as Shields

16 • Proximity
Civilians Trapped in the Midst of the War on ISIS

17 • Info-War
The Gaza Wars and Social Media

18 • Posthuman Shielding
Drone Warfare and New Surveillance Technologies

19 • Women and Children
Gender, Passivity, and Human Shields

20 • Spectacle 
Viral Images That Dehumanize or Humanize Shields

21 • Computer Games
Human Shields in Virtual Wars

22 • Protest
Civil Disobedience as an Act of War

Acknowledgments
Notes
References
Index

Über den Autor / die Autorin

Neve Gordon is Professor of Human Rights and the Politics of Humanitarian Law at Queen Mary University of London. He is the author of Israel’s Occupation and coauthor of The Human Right to Dominate.
 
Nicola Perugini is Senior Lecturer in International Relations at the University of Edinburgh. He is the coauthor of The Human Right to Dominate.

Zusammenfassung

A chilling global history of the human shield phenomenon.

From Syrian civilians locked in iron cages to veterans joining peaceful indigenous water protectors at the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, from Sri Lanka to Iraq and from Yemen to the United States, human beings have been used as shields for protection, coercion, or deterrence. Over the past decade, human shields have also appeared with increasing frequency in antinuclear struggles, civil and environmental protests, and even computer games. The phenomenon, however, is by no means a new one.
 
Describing the use of human shields in key historical and contemporary moments across the globe, Neve Gordon and Nicola Perugini demonstrate how the increasing weaponization of human beings has made the position of civilians trapped in theaters of violence more precarious and their lives more expendable. They show how the law facilitates the use of lethal violence against vulnerable people while portraying it as humane, but they also reveal how people can and do use their own vulnerability to resist violence and denounce forms of dehumanization. Ultimately, Human Shields unsettles our common ethical assumptions about violence and the law and urges us to imagine entirely new forms of humane politics.

 

Zusatztext

"Outstanding and thought-provoking. . . .  Exposes, at times hauntingly, the frailty of the human condition and the precarity of life."

Produktdetails

• Autoren: Dr. Neve Gordon, Dr. Neve Perugini Gordon, Neve Gordon, Nicola Perugini
• Verlag: University Of California Press
• Sprache: Englisch
• Produktform: Fester Einband
• Erschienen: 31.08.2020
• EAN: 9780520301849
• ISBN: 978-0-520-30184-9
• Seiten: 312
• Themen: Geisteswissenschaften, Kunst, Musik > Geschichte > Allgemeines, Lexika; Sachbuch > Geschichte > Sonstiges