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Paper short abstract:

The paper explores how refugees in camps in Tanzania perceive of humanitarian assistance and the kind of moral judgements that they make on the various donors; from donor governments in the Global North, to local villages helping out in times of need.

Paper long abstract:

In Nyarugusu camp in Western Tanzania a Burundian refugee explains the difference between the kind of help she receives from international humanitarian organisations and the help she receives from Tanzanians in the villages surrounding the large refugee camp where she has lived for five years. The wazungu (white people), she explains, give a lot but it is only what they do not need themselves. It is surplus. Local Tanzanians, on the other hand, are ‘poor like us’, they ‘feel pain’ when they share the limited resources that they have. This is real giving, she explains.

In this paper, we dig further into how recipients of humanitarian assistance perceive of this assistance and the kind of moral judgements that they make on the various donors, whether donor governments from the Global North, wealthy Tanzanian philanthropists, faith groups and national NGOs or local villages helping out in times of need. With this , we not only shift the gaze to local everyday humanitarians in the Global South but also flip the gaze from the giver to the receiver. So, rather than explore how the receiver is shaped and morally positioned by the powerful giver, we explore how different givers are perceived and morally shaped by the receivers of help. If we are to recognize refugees as more than (un)grateful recipients of humanitarian assistance, or the victims of humanitarian constructs, we need also to acknowledge their constructions of their benefactors and humanitarianism.