Health professionals and their Role as a bridge for Peace: Overcoming the Securitization of Health

The securitization of health has clearly diverged from the conceptof Health as a Bridge for Peace (HBP), which has somewhatdisappeared after having played a prominent role in the 1990s.WHO integrated the HBP concept in its strategy on health for allin the twenty first century (from 1998). Through projects in postconflictstates in the former Yugoslavia, e.g. by establishing intercommunitymedical facilities so as to enable previously hostilegroups to work together at the professional level, WHO pilotedthis concept in the 90s. The appropriateness and effectiveness ofthe HPB approach have always been put in doubt, however. Theconcept was formally never abandoned but was not retained in theMDG peace-building objectives. There is a certain belief thathealth assistance programs are vital for humanitarian anddevelopment objectives and should not be diverted by broaderpolitical concerns. The peace –building objectives bring the riskfor health professionals to be involved into political conflicts thatthey rather avoid.In 2012 an initiative was taken by the network Medical PeaceWork (MPW) to revive the Health and Peace concept. It exploredquestions like whether health and peace is a universal concept andapplicable in all phases of conflicts Based on analysis fromMPW programs in Southern-Thailand, Myanmar, Syria andNorthern Iraq it concluded that in all the four areas ‘peace’possessed a highly charged political connection. For healthworkers whether or not to engage in peace work very muchdepended on the context. In all contexts, the primary concern wassecurity for families and patients. Of equal concern was copingwith the potential impact of military operations on health services. Health and peace might be universal concepts but theirapplication in the field is certainly not given the different politicalcontexts and sensitivity. Documenting existing activities ofnational health professionals in their efforts preventing andmitigating impact of violent conflict is needed.Given this complex, political and even dangerous, space of peaceand health work it is hence not surprisingly that health and aidworkers feel more compelled to function in a, constructed,humanitarian space. Humanitarians base their work on fourprinciples that enable them to follow their values and not theinterest of others. These principles are humanity, impartiality,neutrality and independence. Like weak states cling to theirsovereignty, aid agencies clutch to the principle of a‘humanitarian space’, as this space and its principles allowagencies to be innocent by association. Humanitarian’s perceivedapolitical character is part confidence trick and part self-delusionbut it helps aid agencies to do the impossible. Nevertheless,Humanitarians do practice politics. It’s a particular brand ofpolitics, operating in Foucault’s famous aphorism that themisfortunes of men must never become the silent left-over frompolitics . Humanitarians practice a politics of resistance, ofhumanity, of protest against an international sacrificial order thatscarifies so many in the name of justice, of life. Emergencyagencies work to maintain the appearance of being apoliticalbecause it helps them practice their kind of politics. Humanitarianorganizations have been tirelessly lobbying, pleading, cajolingand shaming states as to respond to tragedies around the worldand opt for more progressive foreign policies. Advocacy ispolitics by another name. So, if health and aid workersfunctioning is intrinsically political, it would be relevant todeconstruct its understanding over time. Michel Foucault’sphilosophy is a major source in this.