Paradoxically, elements of cruelty are intrinsic to the humanitarian enterprise.(1) This paper focuses on some of these. Escapable cruelties arise from technical failings, but the gradual professionalisation of the field and improvements in relief technologies mean that they have been significantly reduced in comparison to earlier eras. Other cruelties arise from clashes among rights, and the t...

In ‘‘Does Chain-Ganging Cause the Outbreak of War,’’ Dominic Tierney critiques our work on alliance politics in Europe in the first half of the twentieth century. Tierney incorrectly ascribes to us a theory about the outbreak of conflict based on a ‘‘chain-ganging theory’’ in which war occurs because states become so tightly tied to their allies that they lose volition and find themselves in co...