Managing the Undesirables

Managing the Undesirables PDF Author: Michel Agier
Publisher: Polity
ISBN: 0745649017
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 287

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Book Description
Official figures classify some fifty million of the world’s people as 'victims of forced displacement'. Refugees, asylum seekers, disaster victims, the internally displaced and the temporarily tolerated - categories of the excluded proliferate, but many more are left out of count. In the face of this tragedy, humanitarian action increasingly seems the only possible response. On the ground, however, the 'facilities' put in place are more reminiscent of the logic of totalitarianism. In a situation of permanent catastrophe and endless emergency, 'undesirables' are kept apart and out of sight, while the care dispensed is designed to control, filter and confine. How should we interpret the disturbing symbiosis between the hand that cares and the hand that strikes? After seven years of study in the refugee camps, Michel Agier reveals their 'disquieting ambiguity' and stresses the imperative need to take into account forms of improvisation and challenge that are currently transforming the camps, sometimes making them into towns and heralding the emergence of political subjects. A radical critique of the foundations, contexts, and political effects of humanitarian action.

Managing the Undesirables

Managing the Undesirables PDF Author: Michel Agier
Publisher: Polity
ISBN: 0745649017
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 287

Get Book Here

Book Description
Official figures classify some fifty million of the world’s people as 'victims of forced displacement'. Refugees, asylum seekers, disaster victims, the internally displaced and the temporarily tolerated - categories of the excluded proliferate, but many more are left out of count. In the face of this tragedy, humanitarian action increasingly seems the only possible response. On the ground, however, the 'facilities' put in place are more reminiscent of the logic of totalitarianism. In a situation of permanent catastrophe and endless emergency, 'undesirables' are kept apart and out of sight, while the care dispensed is designed to control, filter and confine. How should we interpret the disturbing symbiosis between the hand that cares and the hand that strikes? After seven years of study in the refugee camps, Michel Agier reveals their 'disquieting ambiguity' and stresses the imperative need to take into account forms of improvisation and challenge that are currently transforming the camps, sometimes making them into towns and heralding the emergence of political subjects. A radical critique of the foundations, contexts, and political effects of humanitarian action.

Contemporary States of Emergency

Contemporary States of Emergency PDF Author: Didier Fassin
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781935408017
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
The new form of "humanitarian government" emerging from natural disasters and military occupations that reduces people to mere lives to be rescued. From natural disaster areas to zones of political conflict around the world, a new logic of intervention combines military action and humanitarian aid, conflates moral imperatives and political arguments, and confuses the concepts of legitimacy and legality. The mandate to protect human lives--however and wherever endangered--has given rise to a new form of humanitarian government that moves from one crisis to the next, applying the same battery of technical expertise (from military logistics to epidemiological risk management to the latest social scientific tools for "good governance") and reducing people with particular histories and hopes to mere lives to be rescued. This book explores these contemporary states of emergency. Drawing on the critical insights of anthropologists, legal scholars, political scientists, and practitioners from the field, Contemporary States of Emergency examines historical antecedents as well as the moral, juridical, ideological, and economic conditions that have made military and humanitarian interventions common today. It addresses the practical process of intervention in global situations on five continents, describing both differences and similarities, and examines the moral and political consequences of these generalized states of emergency and the new form of government associated with them.

The Good American

The Good American PDF Author: Robert D. Kaplan
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
ISBN: 0525512314
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 545

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Book Description
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Revenge of Geography comes a sweeping yet intimate story of the most influential humanitarian you’ve never heard of—Bob Gersony, who spent four decades in crisis zones around the world. “One of the best accounts examining American humanitarian pursuits over the past fifty years . . . With still greater challenges on the horizon, we will need to find and empower more people like Bob Gersony—both idealistic and pragmatic—who can help make the world a more secure place.”—The Washington Post In his long career as an acclaimed journalist covering the “hot” moments of the Cold War and its aftermath, bestselling author Robert D. Kaplan often found himself crossing paths with Bob Gersony, a consultant for the U.S. State Department whose quiet dedication and consequential work made a deep impression on Kaplan. Gersony, a high school dropout later awarded a Bronze Star for his service in Vietnam, conducted on-the-ground research for the U.S. government in virtually every war and natural-disaster zone in the world. In Thailand, Central and South America, Sudan, Chad, Mozambique, Rwanda, Gaza, Bosnia, North Korea, Iraq, and beyond, Gersony never flinched from entering dangerous areas that diplomats could not reach, sometimes risking his own life. Gersony’s behind-the scenes fact-finding, which included interviews with hundreds of refugees and displaced persons from each war zone and natural-disaster area, often challenged the assumptions and received wisdom of the powers that be, on both the left and the right. In nearly every case, his advice and recommendations made American policy at once smarter and more humane—often dramatically so. In Gersony, Kaplan saw a powerful example of how American diplomacy should be conducted. In a work that exhibits Kaplan’s signature talent for combining travel and geography with sharp political analysis, The Good American tells Gersony’s powerful life story. Set during the State Department’s golden age, this is a story about the loneliness, sweat, and tears and the genuine courage that characterized Gersony’s work in far-flung places. It is also a celebration of ground-level reporting: a page-turning demonstration, by one of our finest geopolitical thinkers, of how getting an up-close, worm’s-eye view of crises and applying sound reason can elicit world-changing results.

Humanitarian Reason

Humanitarian Reason PDF Author: Didier Fassin
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520271165
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 352

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Book Description
Studies primarily France with shorter sections on South Africa, Venezuela, and Palestine.

Doing Bad by Doing Good

Doing Bad by Doing Good PDF Author: Christopher J Coyne
Publisher: Stanford University Press
ISBN: 0804786119
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 273

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Book Description
An economics-focused analysis of why humanitarian relief efforts fail and how they can be remedied. In 2010, Haiti was ravaged by a brutal earthquake that affected the lives of millions. The call to assist those in need was heard around the globe. Yet two years later humanitarian efforts led by governments and NGOs have largely failed. Resources are not reaching the needy due to bureaucratic red tape, and many assets have been squandered. How can efforts intended to help the suffering fail so badly? In this timely and provocative book, Christopher J. Coyne uses the economic way of thinking to explain why this and other humanitarian efforts that intend to do good end up doing nothing or causing harm. In addition to Haiti, Coyne considers a wide range of interventions. He explains why the US government was ineffective following Hurricane Katrina, why the international humanitarian push to remove Muammar Gaddafi in Libya may very well end up causing more problems than prosperity, and why decades of efforts to respond to crises and foster development around the world have resulted in repeated failures. In place of the dominant approach to state-led humanitarian action, this book offers a bold alternative, focused on establishing an environment of economic freedom. If we are willing to experiment with aid—asking questions about how to foster development as a process of societal discovery, or how else we might engage the private sector, for instance—we increase the range of alternatives to help people and empower them to improve their communities. Anyone concerned with and dedicated to alleviating human suffering in the short term or for the long haul, from policymakers and activists to scholars, will find this book to be an insightful and provocative reframing of humanitarian action. Praise for Doing Bad by Doing Good “Coyne is to be congratulated for a book that strongly calls into question the conventional wisdom that we must look first to government to accomplish humanitarian ends.” —George Leef, Regulation Magazine “Coyne attempts to explain why conventional approaches to humanitarian aid and longer-term economic development have failed miserably . . . . Recommended.” —M. Q. Dao, Choice “Coyne offers a classic neo-liberal economic analysis to explain why the humanitarian project in its current state is doomed.” —Zoe Cormack, Times Literary Supplement

Humanitarian Military Intervention

Humanitarian Military Intervention PDF Author: Taylor B. Seybolt
Publisher: SIPRI Publication
ISBN: 9780199551057
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 294

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Book Description
The author describes the reasons why humanitarian military interventions succeed or fail, basing his analysis on the interventions carried out in the 1990s in Iraq, Somalia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Rwanda, Kosovo, and East Timor.

Condemned to Repeat?

Condemned to Repeat? PDF Author: Fiona Terry
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 0801468647
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 299

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Book Description
Humanitarian groups have failed, Fiona Terry believes, to face up to the core paradox of their activity: humanitarian action aims to alleviate suffering, but by inadvertently sustaining conflict it potentially prolongs suffering. In Condemned to Repeat?, Terry examines the side-effects of intervention by aid organizations and points out the need to acknowledge the political consequences of the choice to give aid. The author makes the controversial claim that aid agencies act as though the initial decision to supply aid satisfies any need for ethical discussion and are often blind to the moral quandaries of aid. Terry focuses on four historically relevant cases: Rwandan camps in Zaire, Afghan camps in Pakistan, Salvadoran and Nicaraguan camps in Honduras, and Cambodian camps in Thailand. Terry was the head of the French section of Medecins sans frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) when it withdrew from the Rwandan refugee camps in Zaire because aid intended for refugees actually strengthened those responsible for perpetrating genocide. This book contains documents from the former Rwandan army and government that were found in the refugee camps after they were attacked in late 1996. This material illustrates how combatants manipulate humanitarian action to their benefit. Condemned to Repeat? makes clear that the paradox of aid demands immediate attention by organizations and governments around the world. The author stresses that, if international agencies are to meet the needs of populations in crisis, their organizational behavior must adjust to the wider political and socioeconomic contexts in which aid occurs.

Handbook of Research on Urban and Humanitarian Logistics

Handbook of Research on Urban and Humanitarian Logistics PDF Author: Gonzalez-Feliu, Jesus
Publisher: IGI Global
ISBN: 1522581618
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 526

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Book Description
City logistics is one of the most popular fields of transportation sciences, dealing with sustainably supplying cities and at the same time reducing congestion and pollution related to goods transport in urban areas. Recently, humanitarian, emergency, and crises logistics has been a subject of increasing interest, often seen from an international viewpoint. However, some of the recent natural crises have shown the importance of resilience and reliability of the current urban logistics systems. The Handbook of Research on Urban and Humanitarian Logistics is a critical scholarly publication that addresses urban logistics and resilience, sustainable urban logistics, humanitarian logistics in urban areas both for crisis or long-term, and planning for resilient urban development. Featuring a broad range of topics that discuss the new and future trends in urban logistics and resilient cities, this publication is ideal for public planners; urban planners; company managers in logistics and transport; consulting agencies; regional, national, and international institutions and organizations; researchers; academicians; and students.

Health in Humanitarian Emergencies

Health in Humanitarian Emergencies PDF Author: David Townes
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107062683
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 509

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Book Description
A comprehensive, best practices resource for public health and healthcare practitioners and students interested in humanitarian emergencies.

Syria and the Neutrality Trap

Syria and the Neutrality Trap PDF Author: Carsten Wieland
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 0755641418
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 201

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Book Description
The Syrian war has been an example of the abuse and insufficient delivery of humanitarian assistance. According to international practice, humanitarian aid should be channelled through a state government that bears a particular responsibility for its population. Yet in Syria, the bulk of relief went through Damascus while the regime caused the vast majority of civilian deaths. Should the UN have severed its cooperation with the government and neglected its humanitarian duty to help all people in need? Decision-makers face these tough policy dilemmas, and often the “neutrality trap” snaps shut. This book discusses the political and moral considerations of how to respond to a brutal and complex crisis while adhering to international law and practice. The author, a scholar and senior diplomat involved in the UN peace talks in Geneva, draws from first-hand diplomatic, practitioner and UN sources. He sheds light on the UN's credibility crisis and the wider implications for the development of international humanitarian and human rights law. This includes covering the key questions asked by Western diplomats, NGOs and international organizations, such as: Why did the UN not confront the Syrian government more boldly? Was it not only legally correct but also morally justifiable to deliver humanitarian aid to regime areas where rockets were launched and warplanes started? Why was it so difficult to render cross-border aid possible where it was badly needed? The meticulous account of current international practice is both insightful and disturbing. It tackles the painful lessons learnt and provides recommendations for future challenges where politics fails and humanitarians fill the moral void.