The Myth of International Protection

Book excerpt: In this viscerally intense, ethnographically-based work, Claudia Seymour, a former child protection advisor and human rights investigator for the United Nations, chronicles the heart-wrenching stories of young people in the Democratic Republic of Congo—young people who live on the front lines of conflict, in neighborhoods and villages destroyed by war, and on the streets in conditions of poverty and destitution. Seymour shares her personal journey, one that begins with the will to do good yet ends with the realization of how international aid can contribute to greater harm than good. The idea of protection and universalized human rights is turned on its head as Seymour uncovers the complicities and hypocrisies of the aid world—that in its promotion of “inalienable human rights”, the complex historical and socio-economic dynamics that lead to the violations of such rights are ignored. The Myth of International Protection offers a new perspective to reframe how the world sees the DRC, and urges global audiences to consider their own roles in fueling the DRC’s seemingly endless violence.