ABSTRACT

Chapter 5 discusses how humanitarians have responded to this complex mix of actors that selectively transgress the official humanitarian frameworks. Rather than solely acting as the intermediaries of the previous chapter, transporting meaning without transformation, humanitarians also act as brokers or active mediators. These brokers translate the official discourse of the protection frameworks in a way that makes them relevant to the multitude of actors that occupy the humanitarian arena. They do this by turning to comparative reasoned, moral and cultural arguments that represent both the foundations of the normative frameworks and the motivations and belief systems of actors who are not historically part of this Western, legal tradition. They are in essence an unofficial humanitarian fix to the challenges of transferring these official frameworks to contemporary wars where the traditional institutions of power these frameworks rely on are weak.