Basic Human Rights and the Humanitarian Crises in Sub-Saharan Africa: Ethical Reflections

For decades, post-independence Africa has been marked by conflicts, violence, and civil wars leading to a displacement of civilian populations and numerous humanitarian crises. For example, the Somali war, the 1994 Rwandan genocide, and the Darfur conflict in Western Sudan illustrate this phenomenon. In these situations, protecting the basic human rights of security, subsistence, the liberties of social participation, and the physical movement of refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs)--particularly women, children, and young people--has been seen as inadequate. This book offers the following: a systematic presentation of the nature and scope of the crises; an evaluative description of the achievements and failures of governments, organizations, and the international community in responding to the crises; a critical analysis of the rationale for such an inadequate response; and a philosophical and theological study of basic human rights that seeks to redress these failures by envisioning an appropriate response and a lasting solution to the conflicts, displacement, and humanitarian crises in Sub-Saharan Africa.

About the Author :
Gabriel Andrew Msoka was born and raised in Kilimanjaro Region, Tanzania, Africa. He is a Catholic priest and a member of the Religious and Missionary Order of the Apostles of Jesus. Msoka has received two Pontifical degrees: In 1998 he graduated with a Licentiate Degree in Sacred Theology with a specialization in Moral Theology (STL) from the Catholic University of Eastern Africa, Nairobi, Kenya. In 2005 he graduated with a Doctorate in Sacred Theology with a specialization in social ethics (STD) from the Jesuit School of Theology in Berkeley, California. Msoka is the associate pastor at St. John the Baptist Catholic Church in New Freedom, Pennsylvania.