Expanding Ethical Registers in Humanitarianism? Practices and Experiences of Assisting in the Syrian Refugee Crisis

The emergency temporality in current humanitarian response together with the increasing professionalization and the continuous insistence on the humanitarian principles of neutrality, impartiality and independence have created a particular sense of urgency where the past and the future are ignored in favour of addressing a radical present of immediate human suffering and action[i]. In this sense of urgency individual experiences (both ‘victims’ and humanitarian workers), histories and futures are written off as subjective and impulsive and the scale of rational ethics is acted out at larger scales (institutional, regional, nation state)[ii]. In this talk, I analyse the policy context for Syrian refugees in Jordan, the humanitarian response and the practices and experiences of individual refugees and humanitarian workers in this long term refugee situation. By taking into account the limits of humanitarianism, I explore possibilities of rescaling both spatially and temporally, the ethical register in humanitarian practice. In particular I engage with recent ideas, principles and discussions in ethics of care that may be helpful for understanding and changing current practices and principles of humanitarianism.  

Everyone is welcome!

[i] Redfield, P. 2005. Doctors, borders, and life in crisis. Cultural Anthropology 20(3): 328 - 361.
[ii] Olson, E. 2015. Geography and ethics I: waiting and urgency. Progress in Human Geography 39(4): 517 - 526.