ABSTRACT
Steven O’Brien was reporting about the humanitarian crisis in Africa and the Middle East, and, once again, he tried his best to capture the delegates’ attention. A good indicator of the changing role of quantification in humanitarian aid is the shift in the definition of “humanitarian impartiality.” All major actors now agree that humanitarian aid should be “impartial,” and that “aid priorities calculated on the basis of need alone.” Humanitarian agencies have however merged the two endeavors: The idea of humanity as a single and common community, and the commensurability of all human suffering have become two sides of the same coin. The globe as a whole is seen as the natural horizon of humanitarianism. The United Nations system, following its former Secretary-General, calls for a new age of international aid shaped by a “data revolution” and an “evidence based humanitarianism.” The chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.
