In this report, Southern Responses to Displacement PI, Prof. Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, offers a critical reflection on humanitarianism under siege, in which the framing of “siege" is not treated as a temporary condition or even a military tactic, but rather as a governance model. This framing prompts a shift from the narrative of “how to deliver... Continue Reading →
Prof. Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh to deliver the Norwegian Centre for Humanitarian Studies Annual Lecture: ‘Against the Humanitarian Grain’
Drawing on the Southern Responses to Displacement project, Prof Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh delivered the NCHS Annual Lecture at the Norwegian Centre for Humanitarian Studies on the 4th of November 2022. You can listen to the lecture here: https://player.vimeo.com/video/782529295?h=51ec5d8c8a Abstract: 'In this lecture I propose moving beyond, or even against, what I conceptualise as “the humanitarian grain”,... Continue Reading →
A colonial past and humanitarian present.
Despite continued calls for the decolonisation of humanitarian research and practice, many argue that action to dismantle the colonial legacy of the ‘global North’ in the ‘global South’ is having little impact. In this two part blog piece, Sorcha Daly, Southern Responses to Displacement’s Project and Communications Coordinator, draws largely on Prof. Fiddian-Qasmiyeh’s and Dr... Continue Reading →
Bringing Social Class into Humanitarian Debates: The Case of Northern Lebanon – Part Two The Hidden Role of Social Class
In Part Two of this two-part series examining class-based inequality that can be both ignored and exacerbated by humanitarian programmes and aid workers, Dr Carpi draws on research conducted for the Southern Responses to Displacement project and argues that economic changes brought about by the introduction of a humanitarian economy of consumerism and labour in... Continue Reading →
Different Shades of ‘Neutrality’: Arab Gulf NGOs in Lebanon
‘Humanitarian neutrality’ is a phrase synonymous with large ‘western’ NGOs and one that is understood by many to have a clear and static conceptualisation and application. However, in this extract from her chapter in the new free to download Open Access volume edited by Prof. Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, Refuge in a Moving World: Tracing Migrant and... Continue Reading →
Southern Responses to Displacement 