Humanitarian forensic action in East Asia: where are we now? A concise review

TL;DR

This paper reviews the current state and potential of humanitarian forensic action in East Asia, highlighting its cultural foundations and the need for practical development.

Contribution

The paper provides a concise analysis of the ideological basis and feasibility of advancing humanitarian forensic action in East Asia.

Findings

East Asia has cultural and ideological foundations that support humanitarian forensic action.

Natural disasters and wars in the region highlight the need for improved humanitarian forensic applications.

Current research in East Asia focuses on developing forensic applications rather than social surveys or psychological care.

Abstract

Humanitarian forensic action (HFA) is practiced in many parts of the world. In recent years, with the development of forensic humanitarian methods and applications and the increasing inclusion or even prioritization of HFA by organizations and institutions, research in this field has evidenced greater depth and diversity, although perspectives from the humanities and some disciplines remain limited. In-depth inquiries into this topic and an analysis of regional humanitarian data reveal the existence of ideological and cultural foundations for HFA in East Asia. At the same time, given past occurrences of natural disasters and large-scale wars in this region, the need and motivation for advancing this field and developing HFA is considerable. Currently, because of a lack of practical experience of HFA in East Asia, research on this relevant topic in the region focuses on the development of humanitarian forensic applications. Consequently, studies reporting on social surveys, psychological care and other methods are limited. It is to be hoped that East Asian countries will improve their practical HFA applications, while simultaneously carrying out social surveys and social scientific research on all aspects of HFA.

The current development of humanitarian forensic action is described in the field of different scientific disciplines and humanitarian applications in East Asia.

The base of humanism of humanitarian forensic action in East Asia, and the necessity and feasibility of developing humanitarian forensic action are summarized.

Lmitations of improving humanitarian forensic action in East Asia and ways to improve are presented.

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