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by Gregory H. Stanton (Genocide Watch - 5/15/2003)
1.
CLASSIFICATION:
All cultures have categories to distinguish people into "us and
them" by ethnicity, race, religion, or nationality: German and
Jew, Hutu and Tutsi. Bipolar societies that lack mixed categories,
such as Rwanda
and Burundi,
are the most likely to have genocide.
The main preventive measure at this early stage is to develop
universalistic institutions that transcend ethnic or racial
divisions, that actively promote tolerance and understanding, and
that promote classifications that transcend the divisions. The
Catholic church could have played this role in Rwanda,
had it not been riven by the same ethnic
cleavages as Rwandan society. Promotion of a common language in
countries like Tanzania
or Cote d'Ivoire
has also promoted transcendent national identity. This search for
common ground is vital to early prevention of genocide.
2. SYMBOLIZATION:
We give names or other symbols to the classifications. We name people
"Jews" or "Gypsies", or distinguish them by
colors or dress; and apply them to members of groups. Classification
and symbolization are universally human and do not necessarily result
in genocide unless they lead to the next stage, dehumanization. When
combined with hatred, symbols may be forced upon unwilling members of
pariah groups: the yellow star for Jews under Nazi rule, the blue
scarf for people from the Eastern Zone in Khmer Rouge Cambodia.
To combat symbolization, hate symbols can be legally forbidden
(swastikas) as can hate speech. Group marking like gang clothing or
tribal scarring can be outlawed, as well. The problem is that legal
limitations will fail if unsupported by popular cultural enforcement.
Though Hutu and Tutsi were forbidden words in Burundi
until the 1980's, code-words replaced them. If widely supported,
however, denial of symbolization can be powerful, as it was in Bulgaria,
when many non-Jews chose to wear the yellow star, depriving it of its
significance as a Nazi symbol for Jews. According to legend in Denmark,
the Nazis did not introduce the yellow star because they knew even
the King would wear it.
3. DEHUMANIZATION:
One group denies the humanity of the other group. Members of it are
equated with animals, vermin, insects or diseases. Dehumanization
overcomes the normal human revulsion against murder.
At this stage, hate propaganda in print and on hate radios is used
to vilify the victim group. In combating this dehumanization,
incitement to genocide should not be confused with protected speech.
Genocidal societies lack constitutional protection for countervailing
speech, and should be treated differently than in democracies. Hate
radio stations should be shut down, and hate propaganda banned. Hate
crimes and atrocities should be promptly punished.
4. ORGANIZATION:
Genocide is always organized, usually by the state, though sometimes
informally (Hindu mobs led by local RSS militants) or by terrorist
groups. Special army units or militias are often trained and armed.
Plans are made for genocidal killings.
To combat this stage, membership in these militias should be
outlawed. Their leaders should be denied visas for foreign travel.
The U.N. should impose arms embargoes on governments and citizens of
countries involved in genocidal massacres, and create commissions to
investigate violations, as was done in post-genocide Rwanda.
5. POLARIZATION:
Extremists drive the groups apart. Hate groups broadcast polarizing
propaganda. Laws may forbid intermarriage or social interaction.
Extremist terrorism targets moderates, intimidating and silencing the
center.
Prevention may mean security protection for moderate leaders or
assistance to human rights groups. Assets of extremists may be
seized, and visas for international travel denied to them. Coups d'¢etat by extremists should be opposed by
international sanctions.
6. PREPARATION:
Victims are identified and separated out because of their ethnic or
religious identity. Death lists are drawn up. Members of victim
groups are forced to wear identifying symbols. They are often
segregated into ghettoes, forced into concentration camps, or
confined to a famine-struck region and starved.
At this stage, a Genocide Alert must be called. If the political
will of the U.S.,
NATO, and the U.N. Security Council can be mobilized, armed
international intervention should be prepared,
or heavy assistance to the victim group in preparing for its
self-defense. Otherwise, at least humanitarian assistance should be
organized by the U.N. and private relief groups for the inevitable
tide of refugees.
7. EXTERMINATION:
Extermination begins, and quickly becomes the mass killing legally
called "genocide." It is "extermination" to the
killers because they do not believe their victims to be fully human.
When it is sponsored by the state, the armed forces often work with
militias to do the killing. Sometimes the genocide results in revenge
killings by groups against each other, creating the downward
whirlpool-like cycle of bilateral genocide (as in Burundi).
At this stage, only rapid and overwhelming armed intervention can
stop genocide. Real safe areas or refugee escape corridors should be
established with heavily armed international protection. The U.N.
needs a Standing High Readiness Brigade or a permanent rapid reaction
force, to intervene quickly when the U.N. Security Council calls it.
For larger interventions, a multilateral force authorized by the
U.N., led by NATO or a regional military power, should intervene. If
the U.N. will not intervene directly, militarily powerful nations
should provide the airlift, equipment, and financial means necessary
for regional states to intervene with U.N. authorization. It is time
to recognize that the law of humanitarian intervention transcends the
interests of nation-states.
8. DENIAL:
Denial is the eighth stage that always follows a
genocide. It is among the surest indicators of further
genocidal massacres. The perpetrators of genocide dig up the mass
graves, burn the bodies, try to cover up the evidence and intimidate
the witnesses. They deny that they committed any crimes, and often
blame what happened on the victims. They block investigations of the
crimes, and continue to govern until driven from power by force, when
they flee into exile. There they remain with impunity, like Pol Pot or Idi Amin, unless they are captured and a tribunal is
established to try them.
The best response to denial is punishment by an international
tribunal or national courts. There the evidence can be heard, and the
perpetrators punished. Tribunals like the Yugoslav, Rwanda,
or Sierra Leone Tribunals, an international tribunal to try the Khmer
Rouge in Cambodia,
and ultimately the International Criminal Court must be created. They
may not deter the worst genocidal killers. But with the political
will to arrest and prosecute them, some mass murderers may be brought
to justice.
© 1998 Gregory H. Stanton
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