Imagining Human Rights

Nina Berman

Neoliberal Charity:German Contraband Humanitarians in Kenya

Human Rights and Humanitarianism

How is the imagination of human rights related to humanitarian practice? More specifically, how is the history of this relationship relevant to understanding present-day forms of humanitarian practice? To answer these questions, this essay offers a brief discussion of approaches to the history of human rights, including its relationship to humanitarian practices and debates over rights that emerged in the context of colonialism. The link to colonial rule, specifically, highlights the conditional nature of humanitarian practices and its connection to the adoption of particular economic orders. Today’s humanitarianism is also conditional and ...