Great-power Responsibility,Side-effect Harms and American Drone Strikes in Pakistan

In International Relations (IR), the actions of great powers are usually assessed through their direct effects. Great powers are generally considered to be responsible for the consequences of their actions if they intentionally caused them. Although there is discussion on “double-effects” and “side-effect harms” in the realms of philosophy and political sociology, these largely remain absent from the field of IR. This article bridges that gap by clarifying a set of yardsticks through which side-effect harms of great powers’ actions can be evaluated, including “capacity”, “historical precedent”, “voluntarism” and “unintentional causality”. These yardsticks are deduced through the Theory of Special Responsibilities, which combines elements of Constructivism and the English School. The theoretical framework presented is then applied to the case of American drone strikes in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of Pakistan. A number of terrorists in FATA have relocated elsewhere within Pakistan to escape these strikes, subsequently harming individuals in new locations. The article asks: who bears responsibility for the harm brought to civilians by these dislocated terrorists? Analysis from the perspective of the theoretical framework, constructed and applied here, suggests that even if the US may claim not to have directly intended such an outcome, it still shares some responsibility for the harm to innocent civilians.     

谐波电流的危害及对策研究

随着工业化、自动化程度的普及和提高,对供电质量和安全的要求越来越高,因而谐波电流的危害不容忽视。探讨了谐波电流的产生原因,从影响电力系统正常工作、干扰电子设备、影响电磁设备运行、引起火灾爆炸事故等几个方面分析了谐波电流的危害,提出改善供电系统结构、装设滤波器、增大中性线截面、调整变压器接线方式等对策。