Apocalypse Now, Humanitarian Crises, and the Right of Interference

David Rieff, an author I admire very much though I hardly agree with everything he says, has a hard-hitting op-ed piece entitled “Save us from the Rescuers” in a recent issue of LAT. Rieff is merciless in pointing out inconvenient truths. For example, he notes that:

In reality, no one yet knows what the death toll from the cyclone [in Myanmar] is, let alone how resilient the survivors will be. One thing is known, however, and that is that in crisis after crisis, from the refugee emergency in eastern Zaire after the Rwandan genocide, through the Kosovo crisis, to the U.S. wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, to the 2004 South Asian tsunami, many of the leading aid agencies, Oxfam prominent among them, have predicted far more casualties than there would later turn out to have been.

In part, this is because relief work is, in a sense, a business, and humanitarian charities are competing with every other sort of philanthropic cause for the charitable dollar and euro, and thus have to exaggerate to be noticed. It is also because coping with disasters for a living simply makes the worst-case scenario always seem the most credible one, and, honorably enough, relief workers feel they must always be prepared for the worst.

But whatever the motivations, it is really no longer possible to take the relief community's apocalyptic claims seriously. It has wrongly cried wolf too many times.

For this reason, I long ago decided not to give one red cent to organizations like Oxfam. I will not support them until they stop being Chicken Littles. I prefer to give instead to organizations like UMCOR – many other examples might be cited – which quietly go about doing the work of God without politicizing their efforts, or indulging in speculation for the sake of the greater good as they define it.

It causes me no joy to say it, but the “Oxfam syndrome” whereby one proclaims “apocalypse now” in the face of every crisis also characterizes the scientific community and many environmentalists with respect to climate change. To be sure, the “apocalypse now” approach among humanitarians, do-gooding scientists, and enviros is understandable. It is no different, really, than the Naherwartung [imminent expectation] of the End that often characterizes vital religious movements. But unless the “apocalypse now” mindset is relativized by other perspectives – the New Testament might serve as a helpful model – humanitarianism, science and green awareness risk being discredited in the eyes of many.

[Ed.: You really enjoy pointing out how an ancient text like the New Testament is more balanced and less unhinged than what passes for enlightenment today. You bet I do.]

In the title, I mention the right of interference. This is another of David Rieff’s concerns. I will discuss it in my next post.