Haiti Case Study Outline

CHOLERA IN HAITI

INTRODUCTION:

At first glance, the case as it reads implies that the ethical blame for the outbreak in Haiti goes on either the Nepal soldiers acting as peacekeepers, or the Haitian people for being ungrateful for the humanitarian aid provided to them from Nepal, through the UN. Our team would like to redirect the case in a different direction and point to the UN as the major player which acts unethically. While both initially implied parties may share blame with the UN, the UN should be held as responsible for the cholera outbreak and should give the Haitian people damages.

SUMMARY AND BACKGROUND:

Minustah was organized in Haiti in 2004 after the political cue, goal was to maintain order, restore a stable environment, promote political process, strengthen the government institutions and rule-of-law structures, and to promote and protect human rights.

                -Minustah was already there, peacekeepers.

                -Nepal were sending peacekeepers, not humanitarian aid workers.

-The group sent in from Nepal were sent six months after the earthquake, so not in emergency situation. The particular wave that was sent had been training in the affected area in Nepal for three months before their deployment

START OF ARGUMENTATION:

The UN was negligent and has a duty to give damages to Haiti.

The UN had a duty: Their stated objectives include maintaining international peace and security, promoting human rights, fostering social and economic development, protecting the environment, and providing humanitarian aid in cases of famine, natural disaster, and armed conflict.

 -They had a duty to follow their objectives as the UN is a world-wide authority, with no checks. They must follow their objectives, as there is no other authority the UN must answer to.

-The UN breached that duty, as their actions violate their own objectives:

àIrresponsibility:::: (First part, before the cholera outbreak)

failed to screen Nepalese peacekeepers, when there was an epidemic outbreak in Napal

Testing: they only test people with symptoms.

failed to maintain its camps in a way that prevented a negative effect on HaitiàThe sewage facilities set up by the UN was reported by Haitians to be flooding and running off into Haiti’s major water source, Artibonite River

failed to conduct water quality tests in the camp, and maintaining unsanitary and highly infectious conditions.

VIOLATION OF REASONABLE EXPECTATION:

àTHE UN ACTED IN A WAY THAT THE HAITIANS COULD NOT GIVE CONSENT. No rational person would consent to take these kind of risks of exposure to cholera, had they been properly informed The UN’s conduct violates a reasonable expectation that the people coming to help them would act on accordance with their stated objectives, rather than creating conditions under which a cholera outbreak was likely.

USING HAITIANS AS A MEANS

àThe United Nations used the Haitian people to accomplish its own ends, and those ends were to be a “relief agency,” doing what relief agencies are supposed to do.  It appears the UN did not care what the proper procedures should be for providing that aid (such as, checking the Nepalese peacekeepers for cholera, inspecting the camps, and so forth); the UN’s primary concern was “providing assistance” no matter how it was done.  But Kant would insist that “how” a project is carried out is more important than what you actually achieve – if you use a bad means to achieve a good end, then the whole project is bad (no matter how good, or laudable, or “humanitarian” the end result is supposed to be).  And it looks like Kant would argue that the United Nations employed a bad means (or at least a negligent and inadequate means) to accomplish a good end (humanitarian aid to Haiti), but for Kant, that would be a moral failure.

àIll intentions:::: (after the cholera outbreak)

failed to take immediate action to correct a problem they caused

Independent Panel. UN appointed. The strain found in Haiti was the exact same strain that was found in Nepal.

It took the UN 15 months to issue a two sentence response saying the thousands of claims are not receivable because of the political consequences

failed to provide a claims commission, which is required by the status of forces agreement

Haiti suffered as a result of this breach à over 8,000 Haitians have died as a result.