Humanitarianism And The Quantification Of Human Needs

Author : Joël Glasman
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1000762599
Total Pages : 259 pages
Book Rating : 4.94/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Humanitarianism and the Quantification of Human Needs written by Joël Glasman and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-01-06 with total page 259 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides a historical inquiry into the quantification of needs in humanitarian assistance. Needs are increasingly seen as the lowest common denominator of humanity. Standard definitions of basic needs, however, set a minimalist version of humanity – both in the sense that they are narrow in what they compare, and that they set a low bar for satisfaction. The book argues that we cannot understand humanitarian governance if we do not understand how humanitarian agencies made human suffering commensurable across borders in the first place. The book identifies four basic elements of needs: As a concept, as a system of classification and triage, as a material apparatus, and as a set of standards. Drawing on a range of archival sources, including the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), Médecins sans Frontières (MSF), and the Sphere Project, the book traces the concept of needs from its emergence in the 1960s right through to the present day, and United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s call for “evidence-based humanitarianism.” Finally, the book assesses how the international governmentality of needs has played out in a recent humanitarian crisis, drawing on field research on Central African refugees in the Cameroonian borderland in 2014–2016. This important historical inquiry into the universal nature of human suffering will be an important read for humanitarian researchers and practitioners, as well as readers with an interest in international history and development.

Author : Joël Glasman
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1000762238
Total Pages : 275 pages
Book Rating : 4.35/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Humanitarianism and the Quantification of Human Needs written by Joël Glasman and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-12-06 with total page 275 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides a historical inquiry into the quantification of needs in humanitarian assistance. Needs are increasingly seen as the lowest common denominator of humanity. Standard definitions of basic needs, however, set a minimalist version of humanity – both in the sense that they are narrow in what they compare, and that they set a low bar for satisfaction. The book argues that we cannot understand humanitarian governance if we do not understand how humanitarian agencies made human suffering commensurable across borders in the first place. The book identifies four basic elements of needs: As a concept, as a system of classification and triage, as a material apparatus, and as a set of standards. Drawing on a range of archival sources, including the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), Médecins sans Frontières (MSF), and the Sphere Project, the book traces the concept of needs from its emergence in the 1960s right through to the present day, and United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s call for “evidence-based humanitarianism.” Finally, the book assesses how the international governmentality of needs has played out in a recent humanitarian crisis, drawing on field research on Central African refugees in the Cameroonian borderland in 2014–2016. This important historical inquiry into the universal nature of human suffering will be an important read for humanitarian researchers and practitioners, as well as readers with an interest in international history and development. The Introduction, Conclusion, and Chapers 1, 4, 5, and 6 of this book are freely available as downloadable Open Access PDFs at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

Author : Sally Engle Merry
Publisher : University of Chicago Press
ISBN 13 : 022626131X
Total Pages : 260 pages
Book Rating : 4.17/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Seductions of Quantification written by Sally Engle Merry and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2016-06-10 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: We live in a world where seemingly everything can be measured. We rely on indicators to translate social phenomena into simple, quantified terms, which in turn can be used to guide individuals, organizations, and governments in establishing policy. Yet counting things requires finding a way to make them comparable. And in the process of translating the confusion of social life into neat categories, we inevitably strip it of context and meaning—and risk hiding or distorting as much as we reveal. With The Seductions of Quantification, leading legal anthropologist Sally Engle Merry investigates the techniques by which information is gathered and analyzed in the production of global indicators on human rights, gender violence, and sex trafficking. Although such numbers convey an aura of objective truth and scientific validity, Merry argues persuasively that measurement systems constitute a form of power by incorporating theories about social change in their design but rarely explicitly acknowledging them. For instance, the US State Department’s Trafficking in Persons Report, which ranks countries in terms of their compliance with antitrafficking activities, assumes that prosecuting traffickers as criminals is an effective corrective strategy—overlooking cultures where women and children are frequently sold by their own families. As Merry shows, indicators are indeed seductive in their promise of providing concrete knowledge about how the world works, but they are implemented most successfully when paired with context-rich qualitative accounts grounded in local knowledge.

Author :
Publisher : BRILL
ISBN 13 : 9004431144
Total Pages : 262 pages
Book Rating : 4.40/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Humanitarianism: Keywords written by and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2020-09-07 with total page 262 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Humanitarianism: Keywords is a comprehensive dictionary designed as a compass for navigating the conceptual universe of humanitarianism. It is an intuitive toolkit to map contemporary humanitarianism and to explore its current and future articulations. The dictionary serves a broad readership of practitioners, students, and researchers by providing informed access to the extensive humanitarian vocabulary.

Author : Patrick Meier
Publisher : Taylor & Francis
ISBN 13 : 1040083803
Total Pages : 161 pages
Book Rating : 4.02/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Digital Humanitarians written by Patrick Meier and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2015-01-06 with total page 161 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The overflow of information generated during disasters can be as paralyzing to humanitarian response as the lack of information. This flash flood of information‘social media, satellite imagery and more is often referred to as Big Data. Making sense of this data deluge during disasters is proving an impossible challenge for traditional humanitarian

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Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9789291399055
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.51/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Humanitarian Charter and Minimum Standards in Disaster Response written by and published by . This book was released on 1998 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : R. Tomasini
Publisher : Springer
ISBN 13 : 0230233481
Total Pages : 178 pages
Book Rating : 4.85/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Humanitarian Logistics written by R. Tomasini and published by Springer. This book was released on 2009-02-19 with total page 178 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Imagine planning an event like the Olympics. Now imagine planning the same event but not knowing when or where it will take place, or how many will attend. This is what humanitarian logisticians are up against. Oversights result in serious consequences for the victims of disasters. So they have to get it right, fast.

Author : David Keen
Publisher : Polity
ISBN 13 : 0745640192
Total Pages : 305 pages
Book Rating : 4.98/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Complex Emergencies written by David Keen and published by Polity. This book was released on 2008-01-22 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Analysing the abusive systems that surround and produce humanitarian disasters, this text gives particular attention to the economic, political and psychological functions of civil conflicts and humanitarian disasters.

Author :
Publisher : UNICEF
ISBN 13 : 9280645129
Total Pages : 60 pages
Book Rating : 4.25/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Core Commitments for Children in Humanitarian Action written by and published by UNICEF. This book was released on 2010-05 with total page 60 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : Monika Krause
Publisher : University of Chicago Press
ISBN 13 : 022613153X
Total Pages : 233 pages
Book Rating : 4.35/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Good Project written by Monika Krause and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2014-06-19 with total page 233 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NGOs set out to save lives, relieve suffering, and service basic human needs. They are committed to serving people across national borders and without regard to race, ethnicity, gender, or religion, and they offer crucial help during earthquakes, tsunamis, wars, and pandemics. But with so many ailing areas in need of assistance, how do these organizations decide where to go—and who gets the aid? In The Good Project, Monika Krause dives into the intricacies of the decision-making process at NGOs and uncovers a basic truth: It may be the case that relief agencies try to help people but, in practical terms, the main focus of their work is to produce projects. Agencies sell projects to key institutional donors, and in the process the project and its beneficiaries become commodities. In an effort to guarantee a successful project, organizations are incentivized to help those who are easy to help, while those who are hardest to help often receive no assistance at all. The poorest of the world are made to compete against each other to become projects—and in exchange they offer legitimacy to aid agencies and donor governments. Sure to be controversial, The Good Project offers a provocative new perspective on how NGOs succeed and fail on a local and global level.