OUVRAGE : S. Hutter, Starvation as a Weapon: Domestic Policies of Deliberate Starvation as a Means to an End under International Law

Catherine MAIA

In Starvation as a Weapon Simone Hutter explores, within the framework of international law, the legality of using deliberate starvation as a means to an end. A close look at modern famine shows that, in many cases, food scarcity is not the product of coincidence, but a side effect or result of a deliberate strategy. Starvation is an efficient instrument when used to exert pressure and power, in times of war and peace. Simone Hutter demonstrates how international human rights law and international humanitarian law prevent deliberate starvation as a means of achieving political goals. She focuses on highly divisive and under-discussed instances in which states deploy deliberate starvation domestically, i.e. within the state’s own national territory.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction
1. ‘Starvation as a Weapon’
2. Remarks concerning the Approach and the Structure of this Analysis

Part A. General Standards against Deliberate Starvation:
The Right to Food and to Humanitarian Assistance

Introduction
I. Relevant Normative Frameworks
1. Legal Establishment of the Right to Food
2. Restrictions to the Right to Food
II. Prohibition of Deliberate Starvation
1. Deliberate Starvation Evoked by State Action
2. Deliberate Starvation Evoked by Insufficient State Protection against Interference by Non-State Actors
3. Deliberate Starvation Evoked by Passive Conduct of a State in Vulnerable Situations

Part B. Situations of Armed Conflict:International Humanitarian Law

Introduction
I. Application of International Humanitarian Law
1. Non-International Armed Conflict
2. Use of Starvation as Use of Force?
3. Problematic Classification of Contemporary Armed Conflicts
II. Prohibition of Deliberate Starvation
1. Prohibition of Starvation of Civilians as a Method of Warfare
2. Destruction of Objects Indispensable to the Survival of the Civilian Population
3. Starvation of the Civilian Population by Food Blockade
Part C. Conclusion
I. Two Frameworks as a Starting Position
II. Harmonisation
1. Parallel Application
2. Synergies and Antagonisms
III. Food for Thought
Bibliography
Index

Simone HUTTER, Starvation as a Weapon:  Domestic Policies of Deliberate Starvation as a Means to an End under International Law, Leiden, Brill/Nijhoff, 2015 (306 pp.)

Simone Hutter, Ph.D. (2014), Zurich University, was a visiting research fellow at the British Institute of International and Comparative Law, a fellow for prospective researchers funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation, and a research assistant at the Institute for International Public Law at Zurich University. She is currently working as a human rights consultant for ECOFACT in Zurich.