Date, time	5 Mar, 13:15 - 15:00
Location	403
Teacher	Bart Klem
Slides	POST-lecture slides
Reading	Mandatory reading for this class (for suggested reading see below): Hilhorst, Dorothea and Bram Jansen (2010) “Humanitarian space as arena: A perspective on the everyday politics of aid”, Development and Change 41(6): 1117-1139. Bankoff, Greg (2003) "Cultures of Coping: Adaptation to Hazard and Living with Disaster in the Philippines", Philippine Sociological Review, 51: 1-16. We won't be discussing this in any detail in this course, but if you are interested in the operational dimensions of disaster response, have a look at the Sphere Handbook (either the online interactive version, or the pdf of the report). Way too much detail to remember, but you may find it useful to get a sense of what these standards are about.

I this class, we explore disaster response, with an emphasis on humanitarian aid. Humanitarian aid comprises emergency relief (and rehabilitation) in the context of wars or disasters. It is supposed to a neutral form of aid that subscribes to humanitarian principles - a matter of legally inscribed entitlements. At the same time, the provision of material or monetary goods between humans is always embedded power relations, economic force field and social norms of reciprocity.

I strongly recommend these two non-academic books. They are a great read, but also add important insight to the issues we discuss in this class.

Eggers, Dave (2009) Zeitoun. San Francisco: McSweeney’s.
Scroggings, Deborah (2002) Emma's War: An aid worker, a warlord, radical Islam, and the politics of oil – A true story of love and death in Sudan. New York: Pantheon Books.

Suggestions for additional reading

Bankoff, G. (2003) Cultures of Disaster: Society and Natural Hazard in the Philippines. London: Routledge Curzon.

Cropp, Joe (2021) The Humanitarian Fix: Navigating Civilian Protection in Contemporary Wars. Abingdon: Routledge.

Duffield, Mark (2013) “Risk management and the bunkering of the aid industry,” Development Dialogue, 58: 21-36.

Fernando, U., and D. Hilhorst. 2006. “Everyday practices of humanitarian aid: Tsunami response in Sri Lanka,” Development in Practice, 16 (3&4): 292–302. 

Hilhorst, D. (ed.)(2013) Disaster, conflict and society in Crisis: Everyday politics of crisis response, pp. 223-240. London: Routledge.

Korf, Benedikt, Shahul Hasbullah, Pia Hollenbach and Bart Klem (2010) “The Gift of Disaster: The Commodification of Good Intentions in Post-tsunami Sri Lanka”, Disasters, 34(S1): S60-S77.

McGilvray, Dennis and Michelle Gamburd (2010)(eds) Tsunami Recovery in Sri Lanka. Ethnic and regional dimensions. London and New York: Routledge. 2 chapters.

Redfield, Peter (2012) “The unbearable lightness of expats: Double binds of humanitarian mobility”, Cultural Anthropology, 27(2): 358-382.

Stirrat, Jock (2006) “Competitive humanitarianism: Relief and the tsunami in Sri Lanka,” Anthropology Today, 22 (5): 11-16.

Stirrat, Jock (2008) “Mercenaries, missionaries and misfits: Representations of development personnel”, Critique of Anthropology, 28(4): 406-425.