Humanitarianism as a Politics of Life

On March 28, 2003, as on the last Friday of every month, the board of administrators of Medecins sans frontieres (MSF; Doctors without Borders) met between five and eleven o’clock in the organization’s head office on the first floor of a building in the eleventh arrondissement of Paris. On that particular evening a peculiar atmosphere of expectation and excitement reigned. There was of course the customary rapid overview of the situation in a number of “missions” in various parts of the world where the organization intervenes, followed by a more in-depth examination, with discussion of various specific topics concerning the running of the association and its humanitarian activities. The construction of the…