Paper details

Paper authors	Norbert Götz
In panel on	Key Humanitarian Concepts in Historical Perspective
Paper presenter(s) will be presenting	In-Person / Online

Abstract

This contribution to the roundtable discussion addresses how cultures of humanitarianism in different epochs have dealt with limits of humanitarian empathy and the finite resources available to them, something that may be called the ‘moral economy’ of humanitarian efforts. It suggests ‘triage’ as a key concept to understanding humanitarian practice, and the alignment of aid supplies and demand as the crucial task of humanitarian agents. This approach – in contrast to the dominant geopolitical timeline – favours a socioeconomic and cultural perspective on different periods of humanitarian efforts, distinguishing nineteenth-century ad hoc humanitarianism, the organised humanitarianism of the first seven decades of the twentieth century, and the expressive humanitarianism of the past half-century. An implication of this recalibration is that we may learn more about humanitarianism by studying humanitarian agents than the problems they claim to remedy.

Back