Peter Maurer is the president of the International Committee of the Red Cross. In early March he came to Watson, and Sarah talked with him about the challenges of humanitarian aid in the 21st century. Shortly after they spoke, Coronavirus travelled the globe, and everything seemed to change. But surprisingly, for all that's different now, so much of what Peter had to say still resonates -- maybe now more than ever.

It's not a light conversation, but but Peter's wisdom, kindness, and clarity of purpose might actually leave you feeling a little more hopeful about this scary, uncertain time.

You can learn more about Maurer's recent talk at Watson here.

You can learn more about Watson’s other podcasts here.

[MUSIC PLAYING] SARAH BALDWIN: From the Watson Institute at Brown University, this is Trending Globally. I'm Sarah Baldwin. In early March, I sat down for an interview at Watson with Peter Maurer, President of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Since then, it feels like the whole world has changed. I'm sure you're all feeling it. We're now facing a public health and economic crisis like we've never seen before. And we have no idea how they'll end, which is kind of what made listening back to this interview so surprising. Because for all that's changed in the last few weeks, so much of what Peter has to say still resonates maybe now more than ever.

It's heavy stuff. But for all the challenges Peter enumerates, his wisdom, kindness, and clarity of purpose actually left me with more hope after we talked. I hope this conversation has a similar effect on you.

We started by talking about something that's super important to foreign aid and often overlooked-- the relationship between short-term emergency relief and long-term development aid. The two are often viewed as separate projects. But increasingly, they're blurring into each other and need to be treated that way. Here's Peter.

PETER MAURER: When emergencies become 15, 20, 25, 30 years, when they touch systems and not only individuals, when it's not short term, but long term, when disruptions are not provisional, temporary, but have a long life, then different tools are necessary. And humanitarians started to respond to those long-term systemic crises. And here there was a convergence then with development actors who have for a long time tried to get out of these conflictual situations.

And I think we have seen this gray zone or this space between classical emergency short-term humanitarian actor and the long-term transformational development cooperation increasingly being transformed. And I think that needs a different type of cooperation between the two actors. I'm actually here in the United States because we started engaging in a much more systematic way with the World Bank.

SARAH BALDWIN: Can you say more about that?

PETER MAURER: I have just concluded yesterday a memorandum of understanding and operational framework agreement with the World Bank, which allows us exactly to work together in these in-between places where humanitarian and development actors have to work much more closely together.

We have piloted some projects in Somalia and South Sudan in the last two years. We have started to exchange experts. We have studied our frameworks under which we operate, our priorities, our practices.

And we started over the last 12 months to negotiate this operational framework which allows us to have a common reading and a common understanding on how we work together in those contexts. And I think this is something which is a big challenge. The rhetoric is very well developed on the so-called nexus. The practice to bring those actors together is difficult.

Can I maybe also make a very concrete example where for a long time already as humanitarian actors, we have moved into long-term systemic work? And this is physical rehabilitation. We started 30 years ago to build physical rehabilitation centers in conflict region in which we operated because of obvious reasons, because people have been shot, amputated in conflicts.

And so we tried to help them and build physical rehabilitation centers. But when you build physical rehabilitation center, by the nature of disability, you stay with the disabled. You don't walk away. So already in parts of what was humanitarian work in the past, we had built in this longevity of engagement. And I think this is what is probably what preoccupies us today.

SARAH BALDWIN: I appreciate that example. That's a great way to illustrate your point. Have you noticed that humanitarian aid has become politicized?

PETER MAURER: I think it's important to maybe be clear what politicization would mean. My definition of politicization is basically everything which is an obstacle or tries to influence neutral and impartial humanitarian assistance and protection services based on needs analysis exclusively.

In that sense, I do believe that politicization in terms of manipulation of needs assessment, of infringement on principles of neutrality and impartiality and independence in particularly in conflict regions, look only at some of the counter-terrorism legislation with which we are confronted where counter-terrorism legislation would prohibit you to assist in any way those who are engaged in terrorist action.

But what would you do then when somebody who unlawfully engages in terrorist action is wounded? Do you let him die? Or do you have to assist him? And if you assist him, are you assisting a terrorist and violating counter-terrorism legislation?

It's just an example to say how many tensions we have. It goes from this visible political perspective, which comes into humanitarian work, to very down-to-earth health and other regulation, which prohibits you in certain moments to deliver humanitarian assistance.

And where the obstacle to deliver humanitarian assistance is comes in technical disguise but has a strong political meaning. Legislation, import legislations, sanitary legislations, health regulations, obstacles to whatever humanitarians are delivering are put forward.

And when you dig in, you see that there is a much more complex environment of political influencing, of commercial interests intruding into the basics of humanitarian assistance and protection work.

SARAH BALDWIN: Well, I think somewhat related to that, maybe you can talk about how states use fighting terrorism as a way to circumvent laws that protect civilians.

PETER MAURER: Well, in today's world-- and I do understand counter-terrorism branches and counter-terrorism directors in many countries, I do understand that their concern is to have a license to engage with terrorist fighters and that rules of restraint may seem being an obstacle to fight terrorism.

And I think that's the whole debate in which we are today that international humanitarian law, the law of war as we know it, has been designed for interstate and intrastate conflict as we have known it in the nineteen-fifties, '60s, and '70s. And I do recognize that some of the counter-terrorism units today find this a obstacle to fight terrorism.

Our point of view, though, is that unrestrained use of force with the argument of fighting terrorism is just leaving too many people as collateral damage on the road. One of the famous example from the past-- and you know it as well-- have been the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

And when terrorists go to a funeral, can you just bomb the funeral when 100 civilians die in the funeral? That's not a good formula for the protection of civilians, I think. We are much aware today-- and many countries are much more aware-- that the use of force needs diligent regulation so that rules of restraints are in place which protect civilians.

SARAH BALDWIN: You made the point that it's not Nineteen-Fifty anymore. And you've been talking about how the landscape has changed in so many ways in both in terms of assistance and violence. And I wondered if you could talk about how the ICRC is facing things like cyber attacks or thinking about things like cyber attacks and new technologies on the battlefield, which are leaving people wounded in new ways or destroying homes in new ways.

PETER MAURER: I do recognize-- we recognize as an institution that today there is almost no kinetic war or armed conflict or use of force which is not somehow connected to the cyber space as well and to use of cyber capacities combined with kinetic warfare.

And in this context, our thinking is still relatively clear that whenever you have a combination of kinetic and cyber capabilities that the rules of international humanitarian law, the basic rules, are applicable as well to the cyber space as they are to kinetic warfare.

I think where it becomes a little bit more complicated is when outside the context of war when basically international humanitarian law is not necessarily applicable, there are humanitarian impact of cyber attacks.

SARAH BALDWIN: Like what's an example?

PETER MAURER: Like knocking out the cyber system of a hospital or of a power station which has huge humanitarian impacts or attacking a water distribution system so that water is not flowing anymore in the pipes.

So these are examples, real-life examples which happen outside warfare either directed by states or by criminal groups which, of course, challenge a legal framework but then also challenge a humanitarian organization. Is this an issue of concern to a humanitarian organization? How do you prepare for these types of situations?

I also think that one of the challenges is that law making is changing through the character of these new weapons. Because if you want to understand how to frame the law, the technicity of the situation of autonomous weapons is much higher. You can't regulate on autonomous weapons without knowing what autonomy exactly means.

And so you need to associate to a legislative process other actors who know tech companies, new developers of technology in order to have a better sense on the digital space, which is so difficult to frame within a legal traditional framework.

SARAH BALDWIN: And that is happening?

PETER MAURER: That is happening. But it is happening for the time being only in terms of exploratory and quite closed-door and small group talks.

And I think one of the challenges is just that as always in international humanitarian law development and law development overall that those who have today a capacity to produce such weapons are not particularly interested to regulate. And those who are interested to regulate don't know exactly what the reality is and where to frame the law in a way that it is correspondent to the problem you want to solve.

SARAH BALDWIN: It's very troubling.

PETER MAURER: And I think that's really the big challenge. The ICRC has worked quite a lot over the last couple of years to try at least to frame how the basic concepts of the Geneva Conventions of '49 and additional protocols of '77, how this basic concept can be adequate and can be related to problems in the cyber space.

So we have done quite a lot of work, by the way, also together with tech companies to understand or to give at least to states a basic grammar which can eventually be used if political will is here.

SARAH BALDWIN: You made this point about the distancing between an autonomous weapon and the person operating it. And it made me think of something else that you've written. You've spoken of this widening distance between the front line and those calling the shots. And I don't think you were referring to operating autonomous weapons. But I wondered if you could give some examples of what you mean and explain why that widening distance is a threat to people's security.

PETER MAURER: Well, I think there are different elements. I was referring to this because of a development which indeed has such nothing to do yet with autonomous weapons. It's just that we don't see only horizontal fragmentation in the battlefields which we are seeing multiple-- an increasing multitude of groups. We also see vertical fragmentation where what is happening in the battle fields in kinetic warfare is often determined, supported, guided by actors who are far away.

And one of the challenges with this situation is that those far away deciding on the way wars are waged and allowing wars to be waged in the way they are today tend to forget about the humanitarian impact because they don't see it. I'm sometimes surprised meeting ministers around the world how little knowledge there is about the reality of the battlefields for which many countries are also responsible that they are unfolding in front of our eyes.

I think with regard to your question then on autonomy, I think the distance between the operator of the weapon and the deployment of the weapon is also troubling because the immediacy of the relationship is not so clear. And it expands de facto the battlefield notion.

And for us, it's a big challenge increasingly in those situations to see what is then a legitimate battlefield when the weapon is operated from somewhere in the United States or in Russia or in other places of the world. And the deployment of the weapon on the ground is happening in the Middle East somewhere.

And I think this challenges the whole notion, again, of a limited battle space which was at the origin of international humanitarian law as much as the definition of actors participating directly in combat operation was at the origin and the basis of the whole construct of international humanitarian law.

SARAH BALDWIN: Peter, one thing I've been wondering about is neutrality is fundamental to your organization, but is that neutrality ever a liability?

PETER MAURER: I wouldn't call it a liability, but it's a limiting factor. Neutrality basically limits your space of activity. It's not that we are neutral because we think it's particularly good to be neutral.

We are neutral because by realism, neutrality is an important guiding principle because it allows us in very difficult circumstances of antagonism between powers and war-torn societies and disruptions to create a space in which you can protect and assist people.

But again, I wouldn't call it a liability. But it is also important that we always recognize the limitations of neutrality. At the end of the day, neutrality is a principle for humanitarian action. But it is not a transformational or transformatory principle which brings societies further. And that's a choice you have to make at a certain moment in your life on what side you want to engage.

I think, again, political action is important in order to change the framework in which societies work. Transformatory action is important because neutrality is also kind of neutral towards some of the injustices and problems with which we are confronted with. Again, it's a necessary and unavoidable principle to do work in difficult circumstances, but it is not a recipe for life.

SARAH BALDWIN: Peter, I'm going to ask you a personal question. I'm thinking about you grappling with these really, really difficult questions that have dire consequences for so many people around the world. And I think about when you're out in the field and seeing really terrible conditions that people are trying to live under. And yet, you have such equanimity. Do you ever despair?

PETER MAURER: The good thing about an organization like the ICRC-- and it includes the president-- is that there is always something you can do. And that's for the good and bad. Probably, it's a good prevention for desperation. Because before you go to desperation, you always try to do the something.

If you take one step back, it is indeed something which many humanitarian workers over time are despairing, are frustrated, and have their moments grappling with this reality that what you are doing may just be a drop in the ocean.

But I think we are constantly navigating between pulling ourselves together and try to do what is still doable, even if it is little, and despairing about the insufficiency of humanitarian work.

I think over the last eight years that I have been president of the ICRC-- and this is probably a natural development when you are for quite some time in an institution-- the realism of how limited humanitarian work is is probably more predominant over time than the hope being able to make a big difference.

And so when I say something sometimes in conversations or when I ask politician to take their responsibilities, also a recognition that humanitarians can't fix these problems, that you need a different type of action outside humanitarianism to give you, again, a hope of doing something. So it's a delicate navigation. But I think ICRC has a consistent history of pulling ourselves together and trying.

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SARAH BALDWIN: Thank you for coming in today and telling us all you've told us. Keep doing such great work. Thank you.

PETER MAURER: Thanks a lot.

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SARAH BALDWIN: This episode of Trending Globally was produced by Dan Richards. Our theme music is by Henry Bloomfield. I'm Sarah Baldwin. You can subscribe to us on iTunes, Stitcher, or your favorite podcast app. If you like what you hear, leave us a rating and review on iTunes. It really helps others find the show. For more information about this and other shows, go to watson.brown.edu.

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