Voices Between Conflict and Care: The (De)politicization of the Kunduz Hospital Attack

Kejwan, Daiana Micaela

4. semester

International Relations, MSc.

2025

2025-05-27

This thesis examines how the 2015 U.S. airstrike on Médecins Sans Frontières’ (MSF) trauma hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan, has been represented and accounted for, with a particular focus on the (de)politicization of humanitarian aid. Through a discourse-oriented political analysis, the study critically analyzes United Nations Security Council Resolution 2286 and MSF’s internal report on the attack using Carol Bacchi’s “What is the Problem Represented to Be?” (WPR) approach and Critical Discourse Analysis. Drawing on theories of politicization, anti-aid rhetoric, and depoliticization, the thesis demonstrates how legalistic discourses tend to frame such attacks as isolated violations of international humanitarian law (IHL), thereby depoliticizing the structural and political conditions that enable violence against humanitarian actors. In contrast, MSF’s discourse proclaims operational neutrality and calls for independent accountability, highlighting the limits of fundamental legal frameworks. The analysis shows that politicization, through the erosion of neutrality and the rise of anti-aid narratives, contributes to the targeting of humanitarian aid personnel, while depoliticization obscures the political responsibility of state and non-state actors. By juxtaposing institutional and humanitarian narratives, this research reveals how opposite discourses shape accountability, legitimacy, and the perception of the humanitarian space. Lastly, the thesis suggests reconsidering protection beyond legal compliance, stating that it is a political condition dependent on the credibility and perceived neutrality of humanitarian actors.

Humanitarian aid ; Humanitarian aid personnel ; Politicization ; Depolitization ; MSF ; Afghanistan ; Resolution 2286

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