O. Névissas
Olivia Névissas • Anthropologue
In direct contact with beneficiaries, the volunteers of the French Red Cross provide aid despite the risk to their physical and mental health. How did they cope during this unprecedented situation that affected both their capacity to commit and their usual management practices? Based on a study funded by the French Red Cross Foundation, the author attempts to provide answers to this important question. Continue reading
I. Auclair
L. Suelves Ezquerro
Isabelle Auclair • Titulaire de la Chaire Claire-Bonenfant – Femmes, Savoirs et Sociétés et professeure à l’Université Laval (Québec)
Lorena Suelves Ezquerro • Diplômée en travail social des universités de Saragosse (Espagne) et de Toulouse (France), en thèse de doctorat en anthropologie à l’Université Laval (Québec)
On top of the difficulty or distress they experience when leaving, migrants endure all kinds of violence throughout their exile. For the authors, recognising the existence of this “continuum” of violence is an essential step in reducing its prevalence.
Y. Jaffré
Yannick Jaffré • Anthropologist, Emeritus Research Director at the CNRS and Scientific Director of GID-Santé (Inter-Academic Group for Development) at the Académie des Sciences-Institut de France
If there is one lesson to be learned from the Covid-19 pandemic, it is that our health systems, and entire swathes of our scientific knowledge along with them, have been overwhelmed by this eruption of reality. In this article, Yannick Jaffré explains how social sciences researchers and health stakeholders would be well-advised to work together to fill the yawning gaps. In so doing, this contribution heralds our next Focus to be published in July 2021 on the topic of “Research and humanitarian aid: the challenges of a collaboration.” Continue reading
Joint publication by Humanitarian Alternatives and the Centre for Reflection on Humanitarian Action and Knowledge (CRASH) / Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF)
J. Glasman
Joël Glasman • Historian and professor at the University of Bayreuth (Germany)
The principle of impartiality, which is often reduced to a principle of mathematical distribution, was originally coined by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), at that time on a quest for legitimacy. However, reducing impartiality to a resource distribution algorithm strengthens the overarching position held by non-territorial organisations. This is the theory put forward by the author in his latest book.
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J.-F. Mattei
Entretien avec Jean-François Mattei • président de l’Académie nationale de médecine, ancien président de la Croix-Rouge française, membre de l’Institut de France (Académie des sciences morales et politiques), ancien ministre de la Santé
The global health crisis caused by the coronavirus epidemic has confirmed that most modern epidemics are caused by cross-species virus transmission between wildlife and humans. According to Jean-François Mattei, since epidemics are the result of the imbalance caused by humankind to ecosystems which had been preserved until now, there is an urgent need to consider the environment and human health as being inextricably linked. Continue reading
D. Alalouf-Hall
F. Audet
Diane Alalouf-Hall • Doctorante et chercheure à l’Observatoire canadien sur les crises et l’action humanitaires (OCCAH)
François Audet • Directeur scientifique de l’OCCAH et professeur à l’Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM)
Ten years after the earthquake that devastated “the Pearl of the West Indies”, which has become the “NGO Republic” according to some, the authors give us an opportunity to remember, quite simply. But also, and perhaps above all, not to forget the necessary critical analysis of international aid that remains to be done. Continue reading
Interview with Jeremy Adelman • Professor of History, Princeton University
J. Adelman
In October 2018, the workshop “Humanitarian Photojournalism: A History of the Present” was organised at Princeton University. The main goal of this event was to think about “the connections between the rising importance of photojournalism and the rise of global humanitarianism”. One of the workshop’s organisers, the Global Historian Jeremy Adelman, granted us an interview. Continue reading
Michaël Neuman • Directeur d’études, Centre de réflexion sur l’action et les savoirs humanitaires (Crash)/Médecins Sans Frontières
M. Neuman
Can Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) be first responder, advisor and activist, all at the same time? While the organisation has never seemed to be on the front line with regards the effects of the “migration crisis”, the question is still being asked internally, particularly in the French section. All credit to Michaël Neuman – and his role at the Centre de Réflexion sur l’Action et les Savoirs Humanitaires (CRASH) – for leading this discussion. Continue reading
Marie-Luce Desgrandchamps • Historienne, université de Manchester et université de Genève
M. L. Desgrandchamps
In short, this is where it all began: history and legend, ambiguities and dilemmas, principles and their limits. Drawing on her recent book on Biafra, Marie-Luce Desgrandchamps looks back at what took place in Nigeria fifty years ago. Pierre Micheletti and Bruno-Georges David then discuss how images and representations of humanitarian work have evolved over half a century.
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Entretien avec Pierre Micheletti et Bruno-Georges David
B.-G. David
P. Micheletti
From pictures of famished children in Biafra to those of victims of the Sulawesi tsunami, have portrayals of humanitarianism changed very much? Above all, do these images help capture the reality of humanitarian action in people’s minds or do they only camouflage it to better “sell” a cause? These are questions that we asked both Pierre Micheletti and Bruno-Georges David to better understand the constraints and drifts of communication in humanitarianism. Continue reading