Who defines humanitarianism? Challenging the International Imaginary of Aid.

This panel explores the global emergency imaginary, how we think about, narrate, and frame what constitutes a humanitarian emergency and what it means to do humanitarian work. Humanitarian action is imagined to be politically neutral and impartial, delivered by international organizations, and conceived as short-term responses to urgent, exceptional crises. Lauren Carruth (American University) and Hugo Slim (University of Oxford) challenge this conventional imaginary and offer new understandings of what it means to do humanitarian work. Hugo Slim, in Solferino 21 (Hurst 2022), argues political solidarity and geographic proximity will increasingly form the foundation of humanitarian action. In Love and Liberation: Humanitarian Work in Ethiopia’s Somali Region (Cornell 2022), Lauren Carruth provides an alternative vision of what humanitarian response means in practice, driven by what Somalis call samafal or the cultivation of lasting relationships of care, interdependence and solidarity. Join us as Carruth and Slim discuss their books and debate the meaning of humanitarian work. Maryam Z. Deloffre (George Washington University) will facilitate the discussion.