Against Massacre

Abstract

This book looks at the rise of humanitarian intervention in the nineteenth century, from the fall of Napoleon to World War I. Examining the concept from a historical perspective, the book explores the understudied cases of European interventions and noninterventions in the Ottoman Empire and brings a new view to this international practice for the contemporary era. While it is commonly believed that humanitarian interventions are a fairly recent development, the book demonstrates that almost two centuries ago an international community, under the aegis of certain European powers, claimed a moral and political right to intervene in other states' affairs to save strangers from massacre, atrocity, or extermination. On some occasions, these powers acted to protect fellow Christians when allegedly “uncivilized” states, like the Ottoman Empire, violated a “right to life.” Exploring the political, legal, and moral status, as well as European perceptions, of the Ottoman Empire, the book investigates the reasons that were put forward to exclude the Ottomans from the so-called Family of Nations. It considers the claims and mixed motives of intervening states for aiding humanity, the relationship between public outcry and state action or inaction, and the bias and selectiveness of governments and campaigners. An original account of humanitarian interventions some two centuries ago, the book investigates the varied consequences of European involvement in the Ottoman Empire and the lessons that can be learned for similar actions today.

Historicising the Normative Boundaries of Diversity: The Minority Treaties of 1919 in a Longue Durée Perspective

“…The space these diverse but certainly related (at the very least by the fact that the agents intervening on behalf of the Jews formed a well-identifiable distinct group involved in all these cases) stories share, however, was a well-defined one, by and large corresponding to the 'Eastern Question' and its fringes. This shows not only its 'centrality […] for understanding the history of humanitarian intervention', as Davide Rodogno has argued, 58 but also how it acted as a nexus for the articulation of discourses centred on a common humanity, geared at the protection of 'strangers', with those seeking to define the boundaries of the -national and imperial -body politic. The status of the Jews in Romania after 1878, as subjects but not citizens, with none of the benefits and many of the obligations associated with citizenship, complete with an individual naturalisation law that opened a door to 'deserving' or 'useful' Jews, finds an interesting parallel further afield, beyond the borders of the 'Eastern Question', in the similar status of the indigenous subjects in the French West African Federation, where such a law was proposed in 1907 and passed in 1912 by the Dakar administration.…”

Intervention in the Greek War of Independence, 1821–32

“…Navarino is retrospectively regarded as the first instance of use of force for humanitarian purposes as we understand it today, 136 but a sound case could be made that its humanitarian rationale is unconvincing. 137 Retrospective or not, convincing or not, as early as the end of the 1820s the intervention of Navarino was labelled 'd'humanité ' in several official documents. 138 Undoubtedly the battle had come about 'by accident rather than design' 139 but it 'strengthened enormously the position of the Greeks'.…”

Eurocentrism, ‘civilization’ and the ‘barbarians’

“…However, the 1875-78 Balkan crisis and the Bulgarian atrocities were decisive in convincing most of the elite in Europe that the Ottoman Empire was perhaps 'unreformable'. 132 Stratford Canning, the long-serving British ambassador to the Porte, is the first to have used the expression about driving the Sultan 'bags and baggage into the heart of Asia'. 133 Guizot maintained that the 'Turks will go out of Europe' and that that day 'would be a triumph for humanity'.…”