My independent book project, “Destroy Them Gradually”: Displacement Atrocity Crimes and Annihilation Through Movement will appear in early 2023 (under contract, Rutgers University Press). The purpose of my book is to answer the question: why is forced displacement used as a tool to commit atrocity crimes? The phenomenon of annihilatory forced displacement, something I call displacement atrocity crimes, is defined as:
Perpetrators of displacement atrocity crimes create a potent killing combination of bodily degradation through denials of vital daily needs (food, water, clothing, shelter, and medical care) and accelerate this degradation by forcibly displacing populations over vast distances and long periods of time. Displacement atrocities occur when perpetrators decide to commit genocide, crimes against humanity, and/or war crimes by forcibly displacing populations and using movement as a slow killer.
Displacement atrocity crimes aim to destroy populations biologically and are perpetrated indirectly using attrition methods. This identification challenges disciplinary boundaries within studies on political violence by introducing readers to interrelationships among spaces, times, intents, geographies, and mobilities and how they relate to atrocity perpetration. The theory of displacement atrocity crimes I have developed includes (1) a foursquare inductive typology of crucial cases, (2) uncovered causal pathways derived from within-case analyses of crucial cases, and (3) theory testing against counter-cases. Importantly, I situate displacement atrocity crimes within existing human rights and atrocity crime international legal frameworks, arguing that it can be understood as a type of violence already illegal in international law though not conceptualized as a discreet process yet. The eight cases in the book are:
Crucial Cases
Counter-Cases
The identification of displacement atrocity crimes is of significant relevance given the current era of mass forced displacement. There are over 80 million displaced persons in the world and this number continues to grow daily. Current processes of forced displacement are inherently violent, and these present forms of violence carry the risks of further systematization into atrocities. The typology and causal pathways identified in my book can be used as explanatory and predictive models to identify, prevent, halt, and punish atrocity processes in the past, present, and future.
In addition to this book project, I have begun research on displacement atrocity crimes which recently took place against migrant populations in the sands of the North African Sahara Desert. This story is inextricably linked with the asylum-seeker Mediterranean Crossing, the European Union’s nativist responses, and North African state policies that appear to have combined to kill many thousands. The COVID-19 pandemic has completely disrupted this study though once travel and research are again possible, I plan on gathering these stories from displaced persons and aid organizations to bring these crimes to light. This project will take multiple years to complete.
- a type of killing process employed against a targeted population which uniquely fuses forced population displacement with primarily indirect deaths resulting from dislocation and systemic deprivations of vital daily needs. The killing processes exploit various geographies to annihilate populations in whole or in part.
Perpetrators of displacement atrocity crimes create a potent killing combination of bodily degradation through denials of vital daily needs (food, water, clothing, shelter, and medical care) and accelerate this degradation by forcibly displacing populations over vast distances and long periods of time. Displacement atrocities occur when perpetrators decide to commit genocide, crimes against humanity, and/or war crimes by forcibly displacing populations and using movement as a slow killer.
Displacement atrocity crimes aim to destroy populations biologically and are perpetrated indirectly using attrition methods. This identification challenges disciplinary boundaries within studies on political violence by introducing readers to interrelationships among spaces, times, intents, geographies, and mobilities and how they relate to atrocity perpetration. The theory of displacement atrocity crimes I have developed includes (1) a foursquare inductive typology of crucial cases, (2) uncovered causal pathways derived from within-case analyses of crucial cases, and (3) theory testing against counter-cases. Importantly, I situate displacement atrocity crimes within existing human rights and atrocity crime international legal frameworks, arguing that it can be understood as a type of violence already illegal in international law though not conceptualized as a discreet process yet. The eight cases in the book are:
Crucial Cases
- Germany’s Genocide of the Herero (1904-1908) in German South-West Africa
- Ottoman Genocide of Christian Minorities (1914-1925) in the Ottoman Empire
- Expulsion of Germans (1943-1952) in East/Central Europe
- Structural Opportunities for Climate Violence (21st Century)
Counter-Cases
- Germany’s Genocide of the Nama (1905-1908) in German South-West Africa
- Hamidian Massacres (1894-1897) in the Ottoman Empire
- The Holocaust (1938-1945) in Europe
- Disrupting Structural Opportunities for Climate Violence (21st Century)
The identification of displacement atrocity crimes is of significant relevance given the current era of mass forced displacement. There are over 80 million displaced persons in the world and this number continues to grow daily. Current processes of forced displacement are inherently violent, and these present forms of violence carry the risks of further systematization into atrocities. The typology and causal pathways identified in my book can be used as explanatory and predictive models to identify, prevent, halt, and punish atrocity processes in the past, present, and future.
In addition to this book project, I have begun research on displacement atrocity crimes which recently took place against migrant populations in the sands of the North African Sahara Desert. This story is inextricably linked with the asylum-seeker Mediterranean Crossing, the European Union’s nativist responses, and North African state policies that appear to have combined to kill many thousands. The COVID-19 pandemic has completely disrupted this study though once travel and research are again possible, I plan on gathering these stories from displaced persons and aid organizations to bring these crimes to light. This project will take multiple years to complete.
Photo: Sahara Desert, Morocco.
Source: Andrew R. Basso, 2018.
Source: Andrew R. Basso, 2018.
