Suchergebnisse

This review traces anthropological studies of humanitarianism starting in the late 1980s, when humanitarianism began to take shape as a particular moral and political project through the formation of transnational nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). It follows both the evolving relationship of anthropologists to humanitarianism—initially as allies, then as critics, alternately embracing and challenging their conjoined humanist legacy—and the growing field of the anthropology of humanitarianism.

In recent years, humanitarianism has been portrayed as a revolutionary new force in the anti-nuclear movement. This article challenges this progressive understanding of humanitarianism's role in nuclear affairs by exploring how the language and concept of humanitarianism have been deployed by two states that have been deeply involved in international nuclear law projects over the last 50 years: Australia and New Zealand. It argues that contrary to popular perceptions about the radical potential of humanitarianism in nuclear affairs, the phenomenon's track record in Australia and New Zealand is chequered. Indeed, in certain key respects, humanitarianism has impeded anti-nuclear agendas in Australia and New Zealand: first, the ambiguity inherent in the language of humanitarianism has allowed it to be deployed to support the maintenance of nuclear weapons; and secondly, humanitarianism has generated outcomes that often support and reinforce the status quo legally and structurally. The article also offers some reflections on the relationship between humanitarianism and international law in the nuclear context. Specifically, it shows how the Australian and New Zealand case studies reveal contradictory approaches to, and understandings of, humanitarianism as law.

Abstract
This article explores how pilgrimage to Arabia became the catalyst for Northern Nigerian Muslim leaders to develop a kind of humanitarianism for the poor to expand their political power in the era of independence from Britain and postcolonial Afro-Arab alliance-making. Muslim elites forced the British to provide welfare for poor pilgrims who conducted the pilgrimage over land through Sudan and then undertook their own relief and reform as means to resist national integration with Southern Nigeria and bolster their reputation and influence in the Muslim world. Muslim West Africans did not simply side with Sudanese or Saudi Arabian officials in the matter of hajj but instead critiqued Arab racism and enslavement of Africans while also playing on British and American fears of communism in Africa and attempts to use Islam and religious discourse more broadly to create alliances with Muslim Nigerians. Hajj humanitarianism reveals careful Nigerian negotiations of global politics during the Cold War and non-Western involvement in international humanitarianism, which has been treated as a largely Euro-American phenomenon.

Explores the ethical dilemma of providing humanitarian & foreign aid to areas where political tyrants & perpetrators of mass violence may benefit, but argues that the withdrawal of life-saving services in protest is unacceptable. Relentless & tenacious efforts by aid agencies to stop human rights violations can force negligent or ruthless governments & groups to change. US ostracism of the Democratic Republic of Congo diminished Washington's influence in central Africa, while engagement with the People's Republic of China, despite its human rights violations, offers potential leverage. Governments & agencies should not politicize their humanitarian efforts, but should work to humanize the political agenda of nations. Even though caught in a foreign policy vacuum, impartial humanitarian aid agencies cannot place themselves in the position to determine fugitives among the refugees & the undeserving among the destitute. L. A. Hoffman

Extent to which U.S. private and government aid for disaster victims is guided by political motivations; role of mainstream U.S. religions. Efforts of the Reagan administration since 1985 to describe nonmilitary aid to the Nicaraguan contras as "humanitarian."