Week #10: March 19

An International State of Exception

Topics covered include:
• The emergency imaginary • humanitarian governance • progress and civilization • contemporary missionary logics • military intervention

Required Readings:

Fassin, Didier, & Pandolfi, Mariella, “Introduction: Military and Humanitarian Government in the Age of Intervention,” pp. 9-25, in: Didier Fassin & Mariella Pandolfi (eds.). (2010). Contemporary States of Emergency: The Politics of Military and Humanitarian Interventions. New York: Zone Books.

Calhoun, Craig, “The Idea of Emergency: Humanitarian Action and Global (Dis)Order,” pp. 29-58, in: Didier Fassin & Mariella Pandolfi (eds.). (2010). Contemporary States of Emergency: The Politics of Military and Humanitarian Interventions. New York: Zone Books.

Mattei, Ugo, “Emergency-Based Predatory Capitalism: The Rule of Law, Alternative Dispute Resolution, and Development,” pp. 89-105, in: Didier Fassin & Mariella Pandolfi (eds.). (2010). Contemporary States of Emergency: The Politics of Military and Humanitarian Interventions. New York: Zone Books.

Film:
Libya: Race, Empire, and the Invention of Humanitarian Emergency
“Based on the Maximilian Forte’s latest book, Slouching Towards Sirte: NATO’s War On Libya and Africa (Baraka Books, Montreal, 2012), and nearly two years of extensive documentary research, this film places the 2011 US/NATO war in Libya in a more meaningful context than that of a war to ‘protect civilians’ driven by the urgent need to ‘save Benghazi’. Instead it counters such notions with the actual destruction of Sirte, and the consistent and determined persecution of black Libyans and African migrant workers by the armed opposition, supported by NATO, as it sought to violently overthrow Muammar Gaddafi and the Jamahiriyah. This film takes us through some of the stock justifications for the war, focusing on protecting civilians, the responsibility to protect (R2P), and ‘genocide prevention,’ and examines the racial biases and political prejudice that underpinned them. The role of Western human rights organizations, as well as misinformation spread through ‘social media’ with the intent of fostering fear of rampaging black people, are especially scrutinized.”

» Presentations, peer review (worth 10%): Five students presenting for this session, commentary and questions expected from seminar participants.

Optional Readings in the New Imperialism Course Pack on Reserve:

Jean BRICMONT
Humanitarian Imperialism: Using Human Rights to Sell War (Monthly Review Press, 2006) – Ch. 3, “Questions to Human Rights Defenders,” 61-90

Noam CHOMSKY
The New Military Humanism: Lessons from Kosovo (Common Courage Press, 1999) – Ch. 1, “In the Name of Principles and Values,” 1-23

Additional Resources:

►Course Blog: Rudyard Kipling’s “The White Man’s Burden” (1899)