Humanitarianism Research Papers - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

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- Anthropology, Development Studies, Ethnography, Humanitarianism
- by Joseph M Watson
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- Architecture, Humanitarian Design (Architecture), Human Rights, Humanitarianism

Programme and participants for the Dún Laoghaire Roger Casement Summer School 2022

- by Angus S C Mitchell
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- Humanitarianism, Public Art, Irish History, Roger Casement

The contemporary notion of global citizenship, in its contested and multiple manifestations, has developed out of the idea of cosmopolitanism, which dates back to the Stoics, and more recent formulations of world citizenship and the ideal of world governance. In the past decade, the concept of global citizenship, as a concept which signifies the way in which one’s identity and ethical responsibility is not limited to their “local” community (i.e. family, nation), has increasingly become a conceptual mantra for international development and humanitarian agencies, and a primary mandate of the institution of the North American university. In this article I argue that theories of global ethics, such as that presented by Dower, echo in their rhetoric the imperial project of civilization, and, more importantly, the discourse of global citizenship, while it represents the idea of universal inclusivity, produces insiders and outsiders: not everyone is a global citizen. In contrast, cultural theorists and philosophers such as Butler (2004), Mohanty (2003), and Appiah (2005, 2006) have sought to interrogate the ethical framework for a global community or transnational solidarity. The work of these critics, however, is informed by specifically feminist and/or postcolonial approaches to understanding global relations of power. In this essay I critically examine the discourse of global citizenship specifically as theorized by Dower (2003) and Appiah (2006), and I draw upon the example of the university where I teach, the University of British Columbia (UBC) Okanagan, for which fostering global citizenship has become a primary mandate of the academic plan. While I am sympathetic to the desire for a way of imagining community that transcends the legacy of European colonialism and hence transcends the material and symbolic borders of nation, race, religion, etc., I believe that the unselfconsciously celebratory appeals to global citizenship that currently circulate in OECD (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development) states are indebted to earlier European, and specifically Eurocentric, formulations of humanity, civilization, and peace. While global citizenship purports simply to identify an ethical philosophy and a politics of identity, the discourse produces the global citizen as a specifically positioned subject that is constituted by the ability to act, and specifically to “make a better world” for, rather than with, Others.

Introduction to Allegra themed section on vernacular humanitarianism

Today, Africa is in the grip of an unprecedented crisis, heightened by the inability of homegrown African organisations to engage readily in the search for solutions to the continent's problems. Across the continent, people are forcibly displaced from their homes and countries for several reasons, the most common being conflict and/or natural disaster related. Neither international aid nor international interventions on their own have significantly reduced vulnerability nor brought enduring solutions. An enhanced involvement of well-resourced and well-equipped African actors could improve both the effectiveness of interventions and the sustainability of subsequent recovery programmes On a positive note, millions of displaced persons have been able to experience a voluntary, safe and dignified return home. However, with an estimated 22 million people remaining forcibly displaced across the continent, significant challenges remain. African in spirit, concept and composition, AHA is a pan-African non-governmental organisation providing effective humanitarian assistance to alleviate human suffering building on the strength of African people to solve African problems. Hence, the paper outlines a transformational change in indigenous humanitarian capacity development directions towards addressing the root causes of forced displacement and human migration. The directional change entails addressing issues of human security that seeks to protect people against a broad range of threats to individuals and communities and, further, to empower them to act on their own behalf and to forge a global alliance against forced displacement.
Key words: transformational change, indigenous humanitarian capacity development

- by Costantinos Berhutesfa Costantinos
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- Humanitarianism, Capacity Building

This guidance is intended for Volunteer and Technical Communities (V&TCs) and tech groups that have a desire to collaborate with Formal Humanitarian Organizations. We hope that it best fits the needs of V&TCs and tech groups that currently seek practical advice on how to develop projects with formal humanitarian organizations or how to further strengthen pre-existing collaborative relationships. We hope that this Guidance helps V&TCs better understand the modus operandi of humanitarian organizations so that they may better formulate requests for partnerships and maximize the benefits of collaborative relationships.

- by Andrej Verity
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- Information Technology, Technology, Digital Humanities, Humanitarianism

This article uses the example of the Mogadishu International Airport zone and takes a spatio-temporal lens to explore how (sovereign) power unfolds in international interventions that aim at building a sovereign state. I show that the Mogadishu International Airport zone emerges as an elastic frontier zone that contradicts the sovereign imaginary intervenors aim to project and undermines many of the taken-for-granted boundaries that states tend to produce. The Mogadishu International Airport and similar zones emphasize the centrality of logistics and circulation in interventions, but also point towards their temporal and liminal character. Modularity became the material answer to the demand to secure circulation while adapting to the rapid rhythm and short timeframes of statebuilding. Modular designs enable the constant adaptation of the intervention terrain, allow intervenors to deny their power and imprint and facilitate the commercialization of supply chains and intervention materials. Sovereign power that operates through such zones becomes modular itself. It is exercised as an adaptable, in parts exchangeable, and highly mobile form of power that operates through crises and emergencies. The spaces and materials created by modular forms of sovereign power remain elusive, but nonetheless stratify experiences of power and security.

- by Jutta Bakonyi
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- Humanitarianism, Sovereignty, Modular Systems (Architecture), Infrastructure
- by Dedy Kristanto
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- Cultural Studies, Marxism, Humanitarianism, Migrant Domestic Workers

Many countries face cycles of repeated violence. Attacks on health workers and facilities exact a toll on civilian access to care and, in aggregate, population health status. A variety of humanitarian organizations provide essential services to augment limited state capacity. Yet, humanitarian organizations often work in parallel even in the same conflict-affected contexts. We use a high reliability organization lens to examine violent attacks on the health care programs that humanitarian organizations operate in fragile states. More specifically, we examine Perrow’s (1984) construct of coupling through qualitative evidence of collaborative relationships and creative problem solving under stressful conditions, respectively. We found three salient features from qualitative data: Trade-off between security and field access; transfer of risk to local actors; and marketization of aid. We find that these three features drive humanitarian organizations to act nimbly within countries in order to prioritize their organizational reliability across countries. While stabilizing the individual organization, these features create disincentives to interorganizational coordination at the Cluster level and are agnostic to output (i.e., healthcare provision) reliability. Our study hopes to sensitize readers to several issues facing high reliability healthcare in times of war.

- by Gordon C Shen and +1
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- Humanitarianism, Crisis Management, Humanitarian Intervention, Risk Management

This baseline builds on the previous localisation baselining work in Vanuatu. The international humanitarian sector is currently developing ways to measure progress on localisation following the commitments made at the World Humanitarian Summit in 2016. This has also been a key issue for humanitarian actors in the Pacific region. Generating an evidence base on localisation is important in order to demonstrate what change is happening and the impact it is having. This report provides a baseline snapshot of localisation in Tonga.

A Reader in Medical Anthropology: Theoretical Trajectories, Emergent Realities brings together articles from the key theoretical approaches in the field of medical anthropology as well as related science and technology studies. The editors' comprehensive introductions evaluate the historical lineages of these approaches and their value in addressing critical problems associated with contemporary forms of illness experience and health care. Presents a key selection of both classic and new agenda-setting articles in medical ...

The informal refugee camp in Calais, dubbed the ‘new Jungle’, reached an approximate population of ten thousand people in 2016. The settlement, despite these high numbers, did not receive aid from the French government or international aid agencies. As a response to the lack of institutional support, and given the squalid conditions of the camp, hundreds of volunteers and grassroots organisations took on the burden of delivering humanitarian aid and basic services in the Jungle. This grassroots humanitarian aid, which I call ‘volunteer humanitarianism’, has particular characteristics that will be explored. The article argues that volunteer humanitarianism can be interpreted as a symbol against the violent border practices across Europe and, because of its informality, provides an alternative to formal humanitarian aid. The article also shows that volunteer humanitarianism formed a connection between humanitarianism and activism that stands in tension with neoliberal governmentality. As the Jungle was demolished in October 2016, this article is a contribution to the history of the camp as well as a testimony of the volunteers’ work there.

- by Elisa Sandri
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- Humanitarianism, Neoliberalism, Refugees, Calais

This workshop has two aims: first, to bring considerations of gender into international history; second, to reconceptualise international Jewish history as having a gendered dimension. This focus on the experience of a particular group of actors will allow for a more systematic engagement with the conceptual issues involved in gendering internationalism.

- by Abigail Green
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- Women's History, Humanitarianism, Pacifism, Internationalism

The important questions in politics are of probability, not possibility. What would the plausible and probable consequences of a particular intervention have been? What would have had to differ in order for successful intervention to result? Only an anti-political ethical framework – a kind of crude deontology – could find overriding significance in the mere possibility that lives could have been saved.

- by Stephen Wertheim
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- Military History, Military Ethics, Human Rights, Humanitarianism
- by Keith David Watenpaugh
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- History, Humanities, Ottoman History, Human Rights
- by Simon Hill
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- Humanitarianism, Humanitarian Intervention, Humanitarian Engineering

Nonstate transnational actors have long played a central role in Sahelian economic structures and
geopolitical arrangements because of their capacity to constitute sources of authority and sustenance
outside and across state structures. Recently, subversive battalions (qatiba) have resorted to
kidnapping, raiding, and ransoming as a means to social justice with a redistributive dimension.
Parallels can be drawn with authority structures associated with nineteenth-century privateers and
buccaneers, and more recently with pirates operating in the Indian Ocean. The parallel economy of
ransoming emerges in a context of critical disruptions of traditional economic and mobility frameworks
in the Sahel, the aggressive scramble for resources, and the displacement of the global war
on terror in the Sahel. This article examines the legitimation processes used by subversive groups,
both ideological and religious; the ethics of ransoming as a form of prosperity endeavor without
morality; and an oscillation between cooperation and subversion in the parallel economy of
smuggling understood as two aspects of the same strategy of engagement between formal
authorities and insubordinate groups in a context of scarcity. It argues that nonconventional forms of
ransoming and criminal predation in the Sahel have similarities with practices of states and multinational
corporations insofar as these divest ordinary citizens of their ability to become subjects
outside the colluding forces of capital, state power, and external interventions.

This issue of Limn examines the recent profusion of micro-technologies in the worlds of humanitarianism and development, some focused on fostering forms of social improvement, others claiming to alleviate suffering, and many seeking to accomplish both. From water meters, micro-insurance and cash transfers, to solar lanterns, water filtration systems, and sanitation devices, examples proliferate across the early 21st century landscapes of international aid. Although small-scale endeavors are far from novel, today these devices are animated by different intellectual and moral energy, drawing on novel financial and organizational resources. Many blur distinctions between public and private interests, along with divisions between obligations, gifts and commodities. At the same time, they entail novel configurations of expertise, political obligation and forms of care. The articles in this issue explore these new convergences of developmental and humanitarian projects, alongside reworked relationships between experts, governments, and purported beneficiaries, focused on fostering “participation” and “partnerships” rather than nation-building.

The dominant paradigm of international relations theory has long seen influence over nuclear arsenals as the preserve of presidents, premiers and generals of the world's great powers, not underfunded activists, feminist campaigners, radical nuns or even diplomats of small states. The approach of this special section could not be more different. In fact, we have intentionally curated a collection of articles that try to ‘de-center’ the academic conversation about nuclear weapons. The inspiration for our approach comes from the Humanitarian Initiative on Nuclear Weapons, which since its emergence after the 2010 Review Conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, has dramatically reshaped the diplomatic discussions on nuclear disarmament, led by small states and middle powers. The shift in discourse has been accelerated by revitalized civil society action, represented by the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, a global NGO coalition, as well as renewed calls for disarmament from religious leaders – most notably Pope Francis. This special section, written from the perspective of scholars and practitioners associated with the Humanitarian Initiative, examines its dimensions and its potential impact on global policy making.

- by Matthew Breay Bolton and +1
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- Critical Theory, Discourse Analysis, International Relations, Critical Discourse Studies

In Bread from Stones: The Middle East and the Making of Modern Humanitarianism, Keith Watenpaugh tells us that modern humanitarianism began in the Eastern Mediterranean, in the interwar period. This is the moment, in other words, that religiously-inspired charity shifts to what he calls “organized compassion,” enacted in bureaucratic, professionalized form.

- by Keith David Watenpaugh and +1
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- History, Anthropology, Middle East Studies, Human Rights
- by Cédric Cotter
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- History of Medicine, Humanitarianism, Resilience, First World War
- by Katie Whipkey and +1
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- Information Technology, Informatics, Knowledge Management, Information Management

The final chapter of this book concludes by reflecting on the various ways in which new civic actors and practices invite us to rethink protection, with a focus on how they challenge traditional understandings of the subjects and objects of the refugee protection regime. Indeed, the urgent question these non-state led initiatives bring to the fore is: “who is now able and willing to grant protection, and how does this affect whom can access protection?” The second point developed in this conclusion may be labelled rethinking humanitarianism and solidarity. The intensive involvement of a range of new actors, including people with activist background and political biographies, in providing support of a humanitarian nature to refugees has important implications both for the humanitarian field, which boundaries are being contested and redrawn, and for pro-refugee activism which is being reshaped through its involvement in practices traditionally looked down upon. Finally, the conclusion would
like to offer further reflection on a theme that traverses most if not all chapters of this volume, namely the relation between volunteer work, institutional structures and state responsibility. The link with a broader process of neoliberal, and in certain cases illiberal, reconfiguration of the state is thus a final point we comment on.

- by Margit Feischmidt and +1
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- Humanitarianism, European Union, Refugees, Civil Society

Women are under-represented in leadership globally and across sectors. In 2016 in Australia one quarter of organisations reported that they still have no women (none!) in key management positions. Analysis of gender equality in the humanitarian world tells a similar story. As of January 2016, there are 29 UN Humanitarian Coordinators globally and only 9 of these are women. As the professional humanitarian workforce worldwide consists largely of women – up to 75% – this disparity is absurdly at odds with the rhetoric about empowerment and equality within the sector. Why is it important? Why hasn’t it been done already? What can and must be done?

- by Humanitarian Advisory Group
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- Gender Studies, Humanitarianism, Leadership, Gender
- by Catherine Besteman
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- Humanitarianism, Refugee Studies, Race and Racism, Immigration
- by Omar Jabary Salamanca
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- Violence, Humanitarianism, International Humanitarian Law
- by Jacob Zlotnitsky
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- Political Philosophy, Plato, Humanitarianism, Totalitarianism

U.S. humanitarian activity in Jerusalem, and Palestine as a whole, from the early nineteenth century onward challenges the traditional view that the United States played a relatively marginal role in the region until the end of World War II. This article argues that American aid, initially understood as a religious duty of individuals, was transformed into an organized form of aid that served as a form of soft power in the region. The agency of U.S. consul Otis Glazebrook is under scrutiny in this article and its analysis shows the fundamental role he played in this shift. Individual aid was superseded by institutional help and the shift was embodied in the aid and relief sent to the Jews. Eventually U.S. institutional aid during the war paved the way for formal support for Zionism and the notion that only Jews (and especially American Jews, who thought of themselves as agents of innovation) could lead Palestine into modernity. While Glazebrook was arguably not a supporter of political Zionism, his agency led America and Zionism to meet each other and initiate a lasting relationship.

- by Roberto Mazza
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- Humanitarianism, Israel/Palestine, Palestine, First World War

Women on all sides of the US war in Vietnam pushed for an end to the conflict. At a time of renewed feminist fervor, women stepped outside conventional gender roles by publicly speaking out, traveling to a war zone, and entering the male-dominated realm of foreign affairs. Even so, some claimed to stand squarely within the boundaries of womanhood as they undertook such unusual activities. Some American women argued that, as mothers or sisters of soldiers and draft-age men, they held special insight into the war. They spoke of their duty to their families, communities, and nation to act in untraditional, but never theless feminine, ways. But women did not act uniformly. Some joined the military as nurses or service personnel to help in the war effort, while others protested the war and served as draft counselors. By the end of the war, some anti-war protestors developed feminist critiques of US involvement in Vietnam that pointed to the war as a symptom of an unjust society that prioritized military dominance over social welfare. As in wars past, the US war in Vietnam created upheavals in gender roles, and as nurses, mothers, lovers, officers, entertainers, and activists, women created new spaces in a changing society.

- by Jessica Frazier
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- Social Movements, Nursing, Journalism, Peace and Conflict Studies

By bringing together two sets of qualitative fieldwork conducted in 2016 and 2017 with humanitarian organizations and migrant women on the two sides of the Eastern Moroccan-Spanish border, this article examines the ways in which women humanitarians exercise power over women's lives, bodies and mobility. Though humanitarianism in the border context has been researched at European and United States-Mexico borders, the specifically gendered implications of humanitarian governance at borders needs further investigation. Drawing on interviews and participant observation with a religious humanitarian organization on the Moroccan side of the border and with medical humanitarians and social workers on the Spanish side, we researched women humanitarians' interventions toward migrant women from West African, North African and Middle Eastern countries. Beyond the differences that characterize these religious and socio-medical humanitarian settings and the different migration regimes in which they are inscribed, we argue that the power exerted by women humanitarians reproduces a form of maternalism underpinned by gendered moral beliefs regarding women's bodies, mobility and family life. We foreground that such maternalism represents a cornerstone of women's humanitarian engagement across time and we identify continuities between colonial maternalism, contemporary forms of humanitarian care carried out by women and maternalist integration politics in Western postcolonial societies. Rooted in colonial maternalism, racialized beliefs justified women's (religious, medical, social) prominent role in intervening in the intimate spaces of women casted as radically Other. Our contemporary case studies demonstrate how the practices of women humanitarians impact on racialized migrant women's daily lives, intruding on their intimacy, imposing controls over their bodies and impacting on their possibilities for mobility. The article explores how the racialization of migrant women, articulated with moral ideas around women's reproductive health and mothering responsibilities, produce varied forms of disciplining and control on both sides of the border Moroccan-Spanish border.

- by Nina Sahraoui and +1
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- Gender Studies, Humanitarianism, Border Studies, Critical Race Theory

East Africa and Pakistan are currently suffering from the worst invasion of desert locusts in decades. Threatening agricultural production in East Africa, the assault increases the danger of famine in a region where 19 million people already face food insecurity. When locust invasions such as the current ones occur, journalists like to refer to them as "biblical" implying that these disasters are analogous to the ones described in the Bible or by classical writers. However, as this article will illustrate, locust invasions are neither acts of providence nor ancient disasters. In fact, they result from the interplay between natural and human factors and they have been of great concern to western governments in the 19th and 20th centuries, first within the scope of colonial empires, then as a consideration of international development policies.

- by Lukas Schemper
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- History, Humanitarianism, Disaster Studies, International organizations
- by Eric Morier-Genoud
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- History, Photography, Humanitarianism, History of Science

This guide concentrates on Sphere’s four technical
chapters covering water supply, sanitation
and hygiene promotion (WASH); Food security
and nutrition; Shelter and settlement; and
Health. Additional tools and approaches for
urban response are included: Context analysis,
Assessments, Profiling and Targeting; Area-based
approaches and Cash and markets.

- by David Sanderson
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- Humanitarianism, Urban Studies, Natural Disasters

Grassroots refugee hospitality is an innovative, if still little investigated field of practices, which illuminates and reshapes the native/immigrant divide. It also sheds light on ‘domestic humanitarianism’, as a range of everyday modes of helping that take place even in the domestic space. Drawing on a case study in Northern Italy, this article develops a framework on the societal implications of refugee hospitality, based on a multi-scalar view of home . From the inside, the lived experience of hospitality involves profound re-definitions of domesticity and meaningful personal changes for hosts and guests alike. From the outside, the connective function of local actors is crucial in shaping the lived experience of domestic reception. From the bottom up, hosting refugees is tantamount to opening, hence questioning, the most intimate threshold of the ‘national we’. Overall, and despite its limitations, domestic hospitality enables refugees to enter ‘home’ on different scales, from the micro-literal to the macro-metaphorical, thereby providing a potential counter-narrative to anti-immigrant discourses, emotions and politics.

- by Daniela Giudici
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- Humanitarianism, Refugee Studies, Hospitality, Solidarity