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Humanitarianism and the Quantification of Human Needs: Minimal Humanity By Joël Glasman *

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Humanitarianism and the Quantification of Human Needs: Minimal Humanity By Joël Glasman *

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 October 2024

Abstract

In this iteration of the Review's “Beyond the Literature” series, we have invited Joël Glasman to introduce his recent book Humanitarianism and the Quantification of Human Needs, before then posing a series of questions to Bertrand Taithe, Léa Macias, Dennis Dijkzeul, Andrea Behrends and William Anderson. Bertrand Taithe is Professor of Cultural History at the University of Manchester in the United Kingdom. Léa Macias is an anthropologist focusing on digital humanitarianism in the Middle East, currently working as an Evaluation Officer for the French Development Agency. Dennis Dijkzeul is Professor of Organization and Conflict Studies at Ruhr University Bochum, Germany. Andrea Behrends is Professor of Social and Cultural Anthropology at Leipzig University, Germany. William Anderson is the Executive Director for Sphere based in Geneva.

The Review team is grateful to all five discussants, and to Joël, for taking part in this engaging conversation.

Type
Beyond the Literature
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2024. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of International Committee of the Red Cross

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Footnotes

*

Published by Routledge, Abingdon, 2020. Discussion conducted by Bruno Demeyere, Editor-in-Chief of the Review.

The advice, opinions and statements contained in this article are those of the author/s and do not necessarily reflect the views of the ICRC. The ICRC does not necessarily represent or endorse the accuracy or reliability of any advice, opinion, statement or other information provided in this article.

References

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2 Humanitarianism and the Quantification of Human Needs, p. 9.

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4 Humanitarianism and the Quantification of Human Needs, p. 248.

5 Ibid., p. 140, citing Satterthwaite, Margaret L., “Indicators in Crisis: Rights-Based Humanitarian Indicators in Post-Earthquake Haiti”, New York University Journal of International Law and Politics, Vol. 43, 2011, p. 926Google Scholar.

6 This refers to an apartment on Avenue Giuseppe Motta in Geneva where various early documents of the Sphere Project were stored.

7 Humanitarianism and the Quantification of Human Needs, p. 250.

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10 See Glasman's elaboration on this issue in Glasman, Joël and Lawson, Brendan, “Ten Things We Know about Humanitarian Numbers”, Journal of Humanitarian Affairs, Vol. 5, No. 1, 2023CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

11 Bakewell, Oliver, “Can We Ever Rely on Refugee Statistics?”, Radical Statistics, Vol. 72, 1999Google Scholar, available at: www.radstats.org.uk/no072/article1.htm (all internet references were accessed in August 2024).

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17 Cf. Pinker, Steven, Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress, Penguin Random House, London, 2018, pp. 400409Google Scholar.

18 See also William E. DeMars and Dennis Dijkzeul, “Cómo la teoriá de relaciones internacionales esconde la política de las organizaciones no gubernamentales”, in Laura Zamudio, David Arellano and Jorge Culebro (eds), Puentes, fronteras y murallas disciplinarias en torno a las organizaciones internacionales, Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas, Mexico City, 2016.

19 As Glasman has stressed elsewhere, colonial indifference is an even greater legacy of colonialism than interference. See his provocative piece “White Saviourism is a Colonial Legacy. But White Indifference is the Larger One”, The Humanitarian Blog, 2023, available at: www.ifhv.de/the-humanitarian-blog/WhiteSaviourismisaColonialLegacybutWhiteIndifferenceistheLargerOne.

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23 Humanitarianism and the Quantification of Human Needs, p. 249.

24 Ibid., p. 249, citing M. L. Satterthwaite, above note 5, pp. 872–873.

25 Along with the International Organization for Migration, REACH is one of the main data providers for the humanitarian system. See the REACH website, available at: www.impact-initiatives.org/what-we-do/reach/.

26 Humanitarianism and the Quantification of Human Needs, p. 13.

27 Sandvik, Kristin Bergtora, Humanitarian Extractivism: The Digital Transformation of Aid, Manchester University Press, Manchester, 2023CrossRefGoogle Scholar.