which ignites the powder, the line of force for all its action. If the Red Cross
were to have only one principle, it would be this one.^55Tony Vaux sees it as “the fundamental moral value of humanitarianism”, taking
precedence over all the others, and defining it more concisely as “concern for the
person in need”.^56 However one looks at it, the principle of humanity clearly
represents a potentially open-ended solidaristic commitment. Its scope goes far
beyond the traditional activities of professional humanitarianism, and in defining it,
we are constantly faced with slippage across the three senses of humanity evoked
in the introduction of this chapter. One way of reading the following principles is
simply as a way to describe how best to honour the principle of humanity. Another,
not necessarily opposed one, is as a way of closing down that open-ended scope
through specification. Many of the tensions professional humanitarians face, I will
argue, emerge from the need to justify their specific principles, which takes them
back to the principle of humanity with the uncontrollability of its open-endedness.
Furthermore, as I will argue in Chapter 2, how to make sense of “human suffering”
is by no means straightforward.
Ramsbotham and Woodhouse see the principle of humanity as recognising
“the common humanity that lies beneath political divisions even in war”.^57 This idea
of an essential underlying humanity is also the focus of many of the critiques of
humanitarian action, which caution that in stripping away all politics, all that is left
is a depoliticised “bare life”.^58 Another common theme of critiques is how slippery
appeals to common humanity can be, and how the claim of acting “in the name of
humanity” can rapidly become an alibi for unaccountable acts and abuses of power.
Humanity is the ultimate legitimising principle. To quote Henry Kissinger (perhaps
an unlikely source of humanitarian wisdom): “[legitimizing] principles triumph by
55
56 Pictet, The Fundamental Principles of the Red Cross , unpaginated text.
57 Vaux, The Selfish Altruist , 5.
58 Ramsbotham and Woodhouse, Humanitarian Intervention in Contemporary Conflict , 15.
Jenny Edkins, Whose Hunger? Concepts of Famine, Practices of Aid (Minneapolis:
University of Minnesota Press, 2000). For the original discussion of “bare life”, see Giorgio
Agamben, Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life , trans. Daniel Heller-Roazen
(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998).