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U.S. response to genocide dealt with at lectures
Samantha Power addressed pressures that promote and deter U.S. intervention overseas
by Sanjay Shenai | Freelance Reporter |
Offering advice about promoting U.S. government efforts to end genocide in the world, Samantha Power, author of the 2003 Pulitzer Prize-winning book "A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide," closed her lecture Saturday in 182 Lillis by paraphrasing the comments of former U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.
"It's essential that we work with the democracy we have, and not the democracy we wish we had," she said, to the laughter and applause of the overflowing-capacity crowd.
The Oregon Humanities Center opened a three-day symposium Saturday, entitled "Witnessing Genocide: Representation and Responsibility," with the inaugural Tzedek Lecture presented by Power, a former war correspondent and professor of human rights and U.S. foreign policy at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government. Speaking to a crowd of more than 300, nearly 50 of whom watched the lecture on a closed-circuit television in another room on the second floor, Power stated that the American government, despite rhetoric to the contrary, is too often unwilling to intervene in genocidal campaigns for fear of being dragged into a political and military quagmire. Even taking basic steps to prevent rogue regimes from slaughtering civilians, such as jamming radio frequencies to block calls for ethnic violence in Rwanda, for example, puts countries "on the hook" to continue and even escalate their commitments, she said.
"There is something pathetically incommensurate between denouncing genocide on the one hand, and proposing radio jamming on the other, when you are the most powerful country in the history of mankind," she said.
This fear of involvement, according to Power, results in the inaction so often seen in America, as well as nations of western Europe, in the face of known atrocities.
Because of previous military and foreign policy failures in Vietnam and Somalia, American leaders especially have come to believe "that there's no such thing as a small engagement, and that if you are the United States… people are going to look to you to go all the way," she said.
"It's essential that we work with the democracy we have, and not the democracy we wish we had," she said, to the laughter and applause of the overflowing-capacity crowd.
The Oregon Humanities Center opened a three-day symposium Saturday, entitled "Witnessing Genocide: Representation and Responsibility," with the inaugural Tzedek Lecture presented by Power, a former war correspondent and professor of human rights and U.S. foreign policy at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government. Speaking to a crowd of more than 300, nearly 50 of whom watched the lecture on a closed-circuit television in another room on the second floor, Power stated that the American government, despite rhetoric to the contrary, is too often unwilling to intervene in genocidal campaigns for fear of being dragged into a political and military quagmire. Even taking basic steps to prevent rogue regimes from slaughtering civilians, such as jamming radio frequencies to block calls for ethnic violence in Rwanda, for example, puts countries "on the hook" to continue and even escalate their commitments, she said.
"There is something pathetically incommensurate between denouncing genocide on the one hand, and proposing radio jamming on the other, when you are the most powerful country in the history of mankind," she said.
This fear of involvement, according to Power, results in the inaction so often seen in America, as well as nations of western Europe, in the face of known atrocities.
Because of previous military and foreign policy failures in Vietnam and Somalia, American leaders especially have come to believe "that there's no such thing as a small engagement, and that if you are the United States… people are going to look to you to go all the way," she said.
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