The Anthropology Of Genocide - WNLibrary

confronting genocide of indigenous peoples 79
vention and prevention work. The efforts of Amnesty International, the international
human rights organization that was the recipient of the Nobel Prize for Peace
in 1977, to involve students in human rights work is both admirable and something
that could be emulated by other organizations working to protect indigenous peoples
and other victims of discrimination and genocidal acts. The strength of such
programs is that they provide students with an outstanding reason for studying human
rights issues. It helps them appreciate the fact that human rights are not givens
but something that must be protected. Likewise, it informs them about why and
how human rights infractions are committed across the globe, and how individuals
can work together to ameliorate these situations.
International Alert Against Genocide and Mass Killing (which has its headquarters
in London) was established as a response to the realization that groups
were not being protected against genocide and that there seemed to be an increasing
incidence of the crime. It seeks “to promote awareness and a commitment
to preventive action through teaching and research and by sounding international
alerts on threatening crises in inter-group relations” (Leo Kuper, personal communication,
August 10, 1990). Put another way, “it is the action component complementing
the educational work” (Kuper, personal communication, May 29, 1991).
This organization makes representations in the conventional channels (such as aid
agencies, governments, and international organizations), but it also tries to explore
new channels for effective action.
History demonstrates that encounters between indigenous peoples or ethnic minorities
and other groups, states, and development agencies often culminate in indigenous
peoples or minorities being stripped of their culture, physically decimated,
or both. In light of that, the following comment by Irving Horowitz is worthy of
considerable thought: “Genocide is always a conscious choice and policy. It is never
just an accident of history or a necessity imposed by unseen economic growth requirements.
Genocide is always and everywhere an essentially political decision”
(Horowitz 1980:38). To some extent, the lack of awareness by the “average person”
about the conditions of indigenous peoples is reminiscent of many of the conclusions
reached by Michael Harrington (1963) in his book The Other America, which
helped to bring the issue of poverty in the United States to the forefront of many
peoples’ minds. In his opening chapter, Harrington puts forth his main theme when
he states: “The millions who are poor in the United States tend to become increasingly
invisible. Here is a great mass of people, yet it takes an effort of the intellect
and will even to see them” (ibid.:10). Like the poor that make up the “other
America,” the indigenous peoples of the world today are generally invisible, isolated,
“off the beaten track,” powerless, and “slipping out” of our “very experience
and consciousness” (ibid.:11–13).
Anthropologists have worked extensively on marginalized groups and segments
of society. They have examined poverty and underdevelopment; the causes and
consequences of conflict, warfare, and genocide; and policies of separate development
and differential treatment of groups on the basis of ethnicity, class, or back