Earlier this year, in his annual report to the United Nations (UN) Security Council on the protection of civilians in armed conflict, the UN Secretary-General called for a new approach to protecting civilians. For Guterres, it was time to work towards the “full protection of civilians”:  to continue to strengthen compliance with international humanitarian law (IHL), which has been the principal focus of the Council’s protection of civilians agenda of the last 25 years, but to complement this with concerted efforts to better understand the complexity of harm experienced by civilians in armed conflict and the legal, policy and operational responses that are required to address it. To this end, he called on states, parties to conflict, UN actors and international and civil society organizations “…to reflect on the full protection of civilians approach and how they could contribute to its further development and implementation.”

Article 36 has worked for a number of years, and continues to work, to develop and promote a “full protection of civilians” approach, similar to that called for by the Secretary-General. In our view, working towards the full protection of civilians would allow us to overcome the narrow focus on IHL compliance and the limited view of harm as short-term direct physical effects. It would ensure that wider patterns of harm are acknowledged and taken into account in the consideration and development of policies aimed at shaping behaviour.

In practical terms, it means:

• Constantly working to reduce harm.
• Taking a public health approach to developing strategies to reduce harm. This includes starting with the widest view of civilian harm from conflict; and identifying and recognising the fundamental importance of patterns of harm that are produced over time – rather than only being concerned with individual cases.
• Working to strengthen the gathering of data on harms from conflict, and on the determinants of harm.
• Recognising that IHL provides a baseline of obligations for combatants towards civilian protection, but that it should not limit efforts to promote stronger protection through policy initiatives.
• Recognising that full protection of civilians relies upon norms and standards that value civilians.
• Recognising that work for the full protection of civilians should be a collaborative endeavour.

This policy briefing presents a synthesis of Article 36’s work on this theme and begins to sketch an agenda for future work that responds to the Secretary-General’s call.

Read the policy briefing: Towards the Full Protection of Civilians

Featured image: Children in Bardarash refugee camp, Northern Iraq, November 2019 © Emily Garthwaite/Article 36