Los nuevos modelos literarios. Propuestas para trabajar en el aula

In order to analyse the role of ethic adjectives in SCRIraq1, it is worth to make a brief digression on some ethic issues and historic background facts related to the events of the Second Gulf War.

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The war in Iraq has raised significant ethic questions related the U.S. jus ad bellum, both for the use of force itself and for the modalities that have been used. There are four main justifications that have been indicated as the casus belli: pre-emption against a potential Iraqi threat, Iraq‘s alleged links to terrorism, material breach of precedent resolutions, and humanitarian intervention.

According to the UN Charter, states are only allowed to use force against another state for reasons of self-defense or if authorised by the Security Council as necessary ―to maintain or restore international peace and security‖ (Chapter VII). The notion of ―international peace and security‖ is flexible enough to allow for a broad range of interpretations and the Iraqi issue the Security Council has invoked it as a justification for actions that seemed primarily humanitarian in character.

As a matter of fact, of the four justifications described above, only the material breach of precedent resolutions and humanitarian intervention are mentioned in UN resolutions relating to the Second Gulf War. Throughout SCRIraq1, many occurrences of adjectives related to the field of ethics have been found. As other categories of adjectives previously described, also ethic adjectives are characterised by subjectivity, because they are related to an ethical standard (Fjeld 2005: 165).

A first adjective which is worth of note is the term ‗humanitarian‘ in itself. The use of humanitarian reasons to justify interventions, together with the fact that the governments involved in these military operations are usually also the main financiers of the humanitarian system, has led to ongoing debates among international humanitarian organisations on the ethical principles of humanitarian action. Table 35 below contains the collocates of ‗humanitarian‘ in the Iraq corpus:

Collocates of „Humanitarian‟ in SCRIraq1

Rank Frequency Cluster

1 8 humanitarian relief

2 6 humanitarian programme

3 6 humanitarian supplies

4 5 humanitarian situation

5 4 humanitarian and

6 4 humanitarian assistance 7 4 humanitarian organizations

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8 3 humanitarian needs

9 1 humanitarian appeal

10 1 humanitarian appeals

11 1 humanitarian law

Table 35: Collocates of ‗humanitarian‘ in SCRIraq1

The most frequent collocate of ‗humanitarian‘ is ‗relief‘, which according to the OCHA Glossary of Humanitarian Terms In relation to the Protection of Civilians in Armed Conflict is ―aid that seeks to save lives and alleviate suffering of a crisis-affected population.‖⁷⁵ Specific relief activities include distribution of food and other essential non-food items, provision of basic services such as health, water, sanitation and hygiene, education, agricultural support, and protection activities.

Although ‗humanitarian‘ action in Iraq has played an important role in saving Iraqis during the war, there is criticism against the justification of this war as a ‗humanitarian intervention‘, which is the most debated issue in the UN resolutions on Iraq. According to NGOs such as ‗Human Rights Watch‘, which is one of the world‘s leading independent organisations in the defense and protection of human rights, and ‗Doctors without Borders‘, the use of the adjective ‗humanitarian‘ which recalls the field of ethics and morality, is misleading⁷⁶. The former president of Doctors without Borders Rony Brauman⁷⁷ has noticed:

The term ‗humanitarian‘, when employed in such conditions, is purely propaganda. Under the laws of armed conflict, it is the responsibility of the occupying power to meet the vital needs of the population and treat prisoners properly. These are legal obligations, not humanitarian gestures:

calling the provision of water and food to Iraqi civilians a ‗humanitarian act‘ is equivalent to claiming that sparing the life of prisoners of war is a ‗humanitarian act‘.

75 Source:

http://ochaonline.un.org/HumanitarianIssues/ProtectionofCiviliansinArmedConflict/DocumentsLibrary/tabid/

1142/language/en-US/Default.aspx (Last accessed: June 2011).

76 Source: http://www.unhcr.org/refworld/pdfid/402ba99f4.pdf (Last accessed: June 2011).

77 Source: http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/publications/article.cfm?id=1385&cat=ideas-opinions (Last accessed: June 2011).

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Referring to military action as for humanitarian purposes could be seen as an intent to create a positive international opinion to justify war.

There are other ethic adjectives in the corpus, which are strictly related to the concept of

‗loaded or emotive‘ language. In rhetoric, loaded language is wording that attempts to influence the listener or reader by appealing to emotions beyond their literal meaning. Emotive Language plays a dual role, because it is not only used to express personal feelings but it also to arouse feelings in others (Chaffee 2000). Ethic adjectives, which are part of loaded language and express emotive arguments, are particularly persuasive because they prey on human weaknesses for acting immediately based upon an emotional response, without further judgment. They arouse emotions to create empathy. Table 36 below lists the occurrences of ethic adjectives found in SCRIraq1 on the basis of Fjeld‘s (2005:

165) classification:

Ethic Adjectives Used in SCRIraq1 Ethic Adjectives Frequency

Equal 2

Equitable 3

Fair 1

Gravest 1

Innocent 1

Representative 20

Tragic 1

Hostile 1

Transparent 3

Unified 1

Table 36: Ethic adjectives used in SCRIraq1

Most of these adjectives appeal to Iraqi‘s rights to equality, freedom, and to fair elections of a representative government for a unified Iraq, as can be seen in the examples below:

(131) Encouraging efforts by the people of Iraq to form a representative government based on the rule of law that affords equal rights and justice to all Iraqi citizens without regard to ethnicity, religion, or gender, and, in this connection, recalls resolution 1325 (2000) of 31 October 2000 […].

(S/RES/1483 (2003))

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(132) 3. Reaffirms the right of the Iraqi people freely to determine their own political future and to exercise full authority and control over their financial and natural resources […].(S/RES/1546 (2004))

(133) Affirming the importance of the rule of law, national reconciliation, respect for human rights including the rights of women, fundamental freedoms, and democracy including free and fair elections […]. (S/RES/1546 (2004))

(134) Welcoming the commitment of the Interim Government of Iraq to work towards a federal, democratic, pluralist, and unified Iraq, in which there is full respect for political and human rights […]. (S/RES/1546 (2004))

Other adjectives stress that funds and humanitarian aids have to be used in a ‗transparent‘ and

‗equitable‘ way:

(135) 4. Requests the Secretary-General to provide a comprehensive report to the Council, at least one week prior to the end of the 180-day period, on the basis of observations of United Nations personnel in Iraq, and of consultations with the Government of Iraq, on whether Iraq has ensured the equitable distribution of medicine, health supplies, foodstuffs, and materials and supplies for essential civilian needs, financed in accordance with paragraph 8 (a) of resolution 986 (1995), including in his reports any observations which he may have on the adequacy of the revenues to meet Iraq‘s humanitarian needs […]. (S/RES/1447 (2002))

Some other expressions of loaded language indirectly connected to ethics appeal to the emotive sphere, such as can be seen in the examples below. The first example, containing the adjectives

‗tragic‘, ‗deep‘, and ‗innocent‘ create empathy with the people of Iraq, while the other two examples use expressions against the former Iraqi government:

(136) 17. Expresses deep sympathy and condolences for the personal losses suffered by the Iraqi people and by the United Nations and the families of those United Nations personnel and other innocent victims who are killed or injured in these tragic attacks […]. (S/RES/1511(2003))

(137) Noting further the letter dated 8 October 2002 from the Executive Chairman of UNMOVIC and the Director-General of the IAEA to General Al-Saadi of the Government of Iraq laying out the practical arrangements, as a follow-up to their meeting in Vienna, that are prerequisites for the

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resumption of inspections in Iraq by UNMOVIC and the IAEA, and expressing the gravest concern at the continued failure by the Government of Iraq to provide confirmation of the arrangements as laid out in that letter […]. (S/RES/1441 (2002))

(138) 8. Decides further that Iraq shall not take or threaten hostile acts directed against any representative or personnel of the United Nations or the IAEA or of any Member State taking action to uphold any Council resolution […]. (S/RES/1441 (2002))

The use of ethic adjectives and emotive wording in these resolutions can be seen as a means to justify the military intervention as a humanitarian intervention aiming at giving humanitarian relief to the Iraqis and freeing them from a dictatorship. Notwithstanding these two positive purposes, the issue is an ongoing debate, because the UN Charter recognises the territorial integrity and political independence of all States, and the use of military intervention justified as a humanitarian action is ethically and legally questionable. Furthermore, the delicate question of whether humanitarian intervention can ever be purely philanthropic and actually apolitical, even in cases of violations of human rights, remains unanswered.