The Purposes of Starvation

Abstract

Mass starvation has throughout history been mis-categorized as a natural phenomenon, or an unfortunate side-effect of conflict and political oppression. The numbers and names of the victims fade into the background, blurred traces of the horrors of history. Yet, this is both an inaccurate understanding of starvation crimes and an injustice to victims. Mass starvation is a process of deprivation that occurs when actors impede the capacity of targeted persons to access the means of sustaining life. In this article, we introduce key features of starvation and note that many of the acts that create conditions of mass starvation are already prohibited under different provisions of international law. We introduce the term ‘starvation crimes’ to capture how these separately criminalized acts, when perpetrated over a long duration can create mass starvation. Implicit in ‘starvation crimes’ is that starvation is produced by leaders’ decisions and serves political, military or economic goals. We discuss nine objectives that can be furthered through mass starvation, offering historical examples to illustrate each. They include: (i) extermination or genocide; (ii) control through weakening a population; (iii) gaining territorial control; (iv) flushing out a population; (v) punishment; (vi) material extraction or theft; (vii) extreme exploitation; (viii) war provisioning; and (ix) comprehensive societal transformation.