While I was thinking about  Eyal Weizman‘s reflections on what he calls ‘the humanitarian present’, I stumbled across what looks set to be a fascinating conference organised by the University of Manchester’s Humanitarian and Conflict Response Institute, 8-10 November 2012:

The provisional programme includes keynotes from (among others) Mark Duffield, ‘How did we become unprepared? From modernist to post-modernist conceptions of disaster’, Mary Kaldor, ‘The evolution of humanitarian intervention’ [with a response from Maja Zehfuss] and Janice Gross Stein and Michael Barnett, ‘The globalization of humanitarianism’, and papers from (among others) Simon Reid-Henry, ‘Humanitarian Reason, Moral Geography and the contemporary Will-to-Care’, Michael Givoni, ‘Gazing back: local perceptions and humanitarian knowledge’, Larissa Fast, ‘Aid and violence: reaffirming “Humanity” in Humanitarianism’, Gary Blank, ‘Framing Third World Victimhood: Oxfam, the “Biafra Lobby”, and the politics of famine in Britain 1968-1970’, Roland Bleier, ‘The visual dehumanization of refugees’, James Thompson, ‘Humanitarian performance’ and Kathleen Coppens, ‘Long-term conflicts and humanitarian aid’. My selections just scratch the surface, but what’s particularly interesting is the mix of presenters – scholars, professionals and activists.