Kilian Kleinschmidt, the UNHCR staff member tasked with management of Za'atari refugee camp in northern Jordan, recently gave an excellent talk on the unexpected challenges and lessons learned since the camp was opened in 2012. As far as camps are concerned, Za'atari is a logistical dream: less than two hours by highway from Amman, residents of Za'atari have rarely lacked physical needs. Kleinschmidt says it himself: when he was sent there, he just "didn't get it."
Things have changed. "What was wrong?" he asked, before answering himself: "What we had not realized was: they are people. They are simply human beings. And they are all different."
This marked shift in UNHCR policy is a hopeful reflection of Lawson's 2007 reflection on the "ethics of care". Under an institutional obsession with standardization and statistics, the human disappears. Even as donor states obsess over individuality, policy-writers forget that an "individual" is more than a figure in a data set. Care re-centers humanity in humanitarianism.
What is unique--and stunning--about this case is first that the people living in Za'atari demanded that empathy, and second that someone is listening, thinking, and reacting. It's hard to earn a strong sense of life in Za'atari from the far side of the globe, but it sounds like Kleinschmidt is on the right track. With the new camp--or should we say community?--opening in Azraq, time may tell if UNHCR is really on to something.
Things have changed. "What was wrong?" he asked, before answering himself: "What we had not realized was: they are people. They are simply human beings. And they are all different."
This marked shift in UNHCR policy is a hopeful reflection of Lawson's 2007 reflection on the "ethics of care". Under an institutional obsession with standardization and statistics, the human disappears. Even as donor states obsess over individuality, policy-writers forget that an "individual" is more than a figure in a data set. Care re-centers humanity in humanitarianism.
What is unique--and stunning--about this case is first that the people living in Za'atari demanded that empathy, and second that someone is listening, thinking, and reacting. It's hard to earn a strong sense of life in Za'atari from the far side of the globe, but it sounds like Kleinschmidt is on the right track. With the new camp--or should we say community?--opening in Azraq, time may tell if UNHCR is really on to something.