One of the areas I felt I improved over the first semester
studying at Waseda is presenting. In War and Peace, a major component of the
class was the case studies, and every week a different group of four students
would present a case study. We were assigned our groups and case at the
beginning of the semester, and I was to present the 1994 Rwanda genocide from a
humanitarian perspective, assessing whether it was a successful intervention or
not based on the framework identified by Nicholas Wheeler.
It was a really interesting project for two reasons. One of
them was working with a diverse group to put together a presentation that would
be informative as well as interesting, and the other was the opportunity to
understand in detail what happened in Rwanda in 1994 and analyse the
intervention using the language I had gained from this class.
Between us, my group represented the UK, Thailand, Sweden
and Japan. I think I was very lucky as everyone was willing to get involved, and
although we were given guidance with how to proceed with the group work, it was
interesting to see how we could quickly work out each other’s strengths and
assign tasks. For example, we found that one member of our group didn’t think
he was a strong presenter, so we made sure to practise and help him feel at
ease.
As the main objective of the class was to assess whether or
not there is an emerging norm of humanitarian intervention and how this affects
sovereignty, we had this question in mind when we were thinking about what to
talk about in the presentation. My particular role was to talk about the action
taken by the international community and the key tipping points with regard to
the humanitarian intervention. Using the UN Resolutions, and some historical
context, as well as the Wheeler text, I agreed with a lot of the literature
written about the Rwanda genocide that the action taken by the international
community did not suffice, and that there could have been a lot more done to
prevent such a terrible massacre from occurring. A point that particularly
stood out to me was Operation Turquoise (the French humanitarian mission in
June 1994), and the controversy surrounding it, as it really enforced the point
that no matter how humanitarian the motives for an intervention seem, it is
impossible not to have subjectivity.
Presenting in front of 150 people was tough but I enjoyed
being able to take part in the discussion at the end having done a fair bit of
research and being able to answer the questions of my peers.
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