Alistair Markland

This article will be of particular interest to those who are interested in emotions and anxiety in IR, ontological security, and post-colonial perspectives on global politics.

History matters too. There is a liberal-Western bias in the idea that the past 10 years have been exceptionally anxious. This periodisation ignores longue durée anxieties experienced among racialised and colonised populations.

I argue against over-generalising about 'our' collective emotional condition. Anxiety is experienced differently in different places.

New article published in @risjnl.bsky.social critiques the oft-repeated idea that 'we' are living in Age of Anxiety. I ask: who is the 'we'? A planetary we? Or an insecure (but provincial) Western-liberal subject?
www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Keir Starmer pledges to close loophole that let Gazan family settle in UK The family won an appeal to come to the UK, after originally applying through a scheme for Ukrainians.

The racism here is so brazen. It screams 'how dare the brown people try to come here using a scheme we set up for white people'. www.bbc.com/news/article...

Getting a bit tired of the hypocrisy of political commentators who tweet-complain about the rise of a tech oligarchy FROM TWITTER/X. Put your money where your mouth is and stop using these platforms.

Sadly, little has changed when it comes to war-related accountability. It is unlikely that the families of the disappeared/murdered will ever see justice, and the (so-called) "international community" has largely forgotten about the country's devastating civil war and its aftermath.

Sri Lanka has come a long way - the country now has a Marxist president and the Rajapaksa family - who oversaw atrocities against Tamils - have been outsted and disgraced.

8 years ago now since I visited Sri Lanka, researching key civil society actors, their links to global advocacy networks, and their work fighting for justice and accountability for war crimes committed by the Sri Lankan military.

‘It’s about solidarity, not charity’: the Oxfam chief seeking to decolonise the aid sector Halima Begum outlines her vision for what she sees as a ‘broken model’, with more power over spending given directly to the affected communities

Important news reflecting shifting discourse in Aidland. This will likely cause division among humanitarians. Expect there to be blowback among employees in Global North:

www.theguardian.com/global-devel...

However, the younger humanitarians that I interviewed gave cause for optimism. I spoke to individuals who - while self critical - were passionate about reforming aidwork along non-hierarchical, 'decolonial' lines, where reciprocity is emphasised over patronage.

Growing pressure to decolonise aid - which I see as a positive development - presents an ethical dilemma for many Western expat aidworkers. There is a growing realisation of complicity in the hierarchical & neocolonial nature of aid interventions.

Most expat humanitarians enter the profession with strong ideals about making the world a better place, and a thirst for adventure. But aidworkers experience exceptional levels of stress, burnout, and psychological trauma.

The article concludes that many aidworkers face an 'absurd' condition: trapped between a striving got meaning through moral labour and widespread disillusionment with the day-to-day stresses and the moral/political contradictions of aidwork.

When Aidland Becomes Absurdland: Existential Anxieties in Contemporary Humanitarian Practice Transnational humanitarianism is a deeply meaningful form of labour, defined by moral purity and sensorial intensity. However, the systems of meaning that underpin humanitarian work are frequently ...

Last year I spent time researching aid practitioners in Geneva and beyond. Inspired by research in existential psychology, ontological insecurity and critical ethnographies of aid, I penned this article which is now out in Journal of Intervention & State building: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....