The Ethics of Forced Interventions

By BJ

A couple of stories today got me thinking about when it would actually be the ethical choice to intervene by force for humanitarian reasons. The idea has most recently gained attention again due to the situation in Burma, but the story that got me thinking is a forced intervention of a far smaller scale.

A young boy suffering from a return of cancer that was once beaten into remission by chemotherapy. When it returned, he and his family refused treatment, but the courts intervened and are forcing him to take the treatments.

"If a doctor says [therapy] is in your best interest and you say you don't want it, within our laws, ethically and legally, that's fully acceptable," said Kerry Bowman of the University of Toronto's Joint Centre for Bioethics.

"And in this case that's kind of turned upside down. Best interests have taken over as opposed to what the family believes, and I think there's a lot of ethical tension here, and I think it's pretty worrisome."

As a child, his views are basically being dismissed as uninformed, and there is more than a little precedent for overruling a families choice in such matters. Having said that, intervening in the �best interests� of the children can be a slippery slope, either here or in a case like that of the polygamous compound raided in Texas last month. When do you overrule the parent�s right to raise their own children? And who do you empower to do so? The same rationale was used to justify things like residential schooling for aboriginals, which hardly worked out as beneficial.

The above chemo case seems simple, but what if the only result of the chemo is to make the kid�s last few months an even more painful ordeal than it would have been otherwise?

The reason I find that story important for a decision on a forced intervention in someplace like Burma, (or Darfur, or Somalia, or Zimbabwe, or New Orleans), is because the rationale and purpose are much the same, to do what�s best for those who can�t help themselves, and where those who are nominally responsible for them are refusing to do what is required.

It seems simple, and we so like simple narratives. I tend to oppose such interventions because the situation is never as simple as it is usually portrayed, and because of those we're forced to trust with the responsibility should an intervention go forward. I trust the child's doctors above understand his medical condition as well as it can be understood. I have significantly less trust in world leaders' understanding of Burma.

The military junta in Burma is evil, and therefore we're likely to say that those who oppose it must be on the side of good. For an idea of why that�s a really bad way of looking at things, remember that bin Laden and his buddies in the Taliban were �freedom fighters� per Reagan back when the US was funding them to fight the �Evil Empire�. The fact that some nasty pieces of work are lording it over their opponents unfortunately doesn�t mean their opponents are on the side of angels. More often they�re almost interchangeable, and occasionally, the reason the current nasties are in charge is because the folks they�re fighting were even worse and lost the population's support.

The situation in Burma is anything but simple, something that Eric Margolis was kind enough to explain last October when the junta was crushing the massive demonstrations occurring at the time.

But extreme caution is advised in dealing with Myanmar. If things go wrong there, it could turn into an Southeast Asian version of Iraq, Yugoslavia or Afghanistan.

Myanmar�s central government has been at war for 50 years with 17 ethnic rebel groups seeking secession from the former 14-state Union of Burma created by Imperial Britain, godfather of many of the world�s worst current problems.

Burmans, of Tibetan ethnic origin, form 68% of the population of 57 million. But there are other important, distinct ethnic groups: Shan, the largely Christian Karen, Kachin, Chin, Mon, Wa, and Rakhine, Anglo-Burmese, Indians and Chinese. The largest, Shan, with their Shan State Army, are ethnically close to neighboring Thailand, and in cahoots with the Thai military. Each major ethnic group has its own army and finances itself through smuggling timber, jewels, arms, and drugs.

The military juntas in Rangoon, and its 500,000-man armed forces, know as `Tatmadaw,� battled these secessionists for decades until the current junta managed to establish uneasy ceasefires with all the major rebel groups.

If the junta were to be replaced by a democratic civilian government led by the gentle Suu Kyi, and military repression ended, it is highly likely Myanmar�s ethnic rebellions would quickly re-ignite. The only force holding Myanmar together is the military and secret police.

Shan, Karen, Kachin, and Mon still demand their own independent nations. Burma�s powerful neighbors � India, China and Thailand � have their eye on this potentially resource-rich nation. They, and neighboring Bangladesh, also fear Burma�s troubles will spill across their borders, as occurred in 2002 when the military junta expelled thousands of Muslims to Bangladesh from the Arakan region.

Now who would you trust to intervene forcefully into that situation?

The decisions are tough ones, as they should be. It's very hard to see people suffer and die when there is way to save them, but how do you ensure that your intervention doesn't end up causing more harm than the situation you intervened to stop would have caused on it's own? And is it ethical to let people die because you think intervening would be worse?