Migrant Management and National Liberation
Channel: Simpson Center
Date: 2020-12-17

Jessica Whyte and Emma Meyer discuss national liberation struggles and the management of migrants as key arenas for rethinking the concepts of humanity, humanitarianism, refuge-making and law by focusing on the formerly unrecognized arenas and actors of humanitarianism in the Global South. Recorded December 3, 2020.

Part of the Mellon Sawyer Seminar speaker series "Humanitarianisms: Migrations & Care through the Global South." Made possible by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation & supported by the Simpson Center for the Humanities.  

*Learn more about the series:* 
✔ https://www.humanitarianisms.org/​ 

*Clickable Chapter Markers*
00:00 Introduction to series
05:34 Introduction speakers
07:24 Jessica Whyte: “The Opposite of Humanity:” Anti-colonial Challenges to International Humanitarian Law
7:47 National liberation movements and challenges to international humanitarian law
9:06 Henry Dunant’s vision for the Red Cross and roots of humanitarian universalism 
11:31 Anti-colonial movements in the Global South and demands for inclusion
12:07 Limits of “humanity” in Western humanitarianism, colonial violence and displacement
18:08 Eurocentrism and other contestations of humanity in national liberation struggles
22:23 Concluding Remarks: “Humanity” and new forms of warfare and imperialist violence
26:31 Emma Meyer: “Managing Migrants, Resettling Refugees”
26:50 Famine, War, and Indian Evacuees from Burma at the end of British colonialism in India  31:00 “International Refugee Regime” in inter-Asian context
33:14 Failed repatriation and evacuees’ demands for return after WWII 
36:03 Evacuee petitions, discourses of poverty, and demand for mobility 
42:02 Concluding Remarks: Port closures, bureaucratic appeals for survival  after 1950
44:30 Discussant Question
52:44 Q&A 

Produced & edited by Simpson Center for the Humanities Program & Events Manager Caitlin Palo.

*Full Webinar Credits*
Co-Convened by Professors Arzoo Osanloo (Law, Societies, & Justice; Director, Middle East Center, UW) & Cabeiri Robinson (International Studies, Comparative Religions, & South Asian Studies, UW) 
Discussant: Mediha P. Sorma (Mellon Sawyer Doctoral Fellow)
Moderator: Cristian Capotescu (Mellon Sawyer Postdoctoral Fellow)
Chapter Markings: Mediha P. Sorma (Mellon Sawyer Doctoral Fellow)
Captions: Sarah Grace Faulk
Poster & Background Graphic Design: Ana Karina Luna 
Intro/Outro Music:  Lobo Loco, “Night at Sahara Dune” on Diversity of Life. CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. 
Video Production & Editing by Caitlin Palo 

*Description of Jessica Whyte's and Emma Meyer's prepared remarks*
Jessica Whyte's talk, "‘The Opposite of Humanity’: Anti-colonial Challenges to International Humanitarian Law” considers the contributions of post-colonial nations and national liberation movements to international humanitarian law in the 1970s. Rejecting the view that their role was to confirm the incipient universalism of the humanitarianism of the Red Cross, Whyte traces their attempt to re-orient international humanitarian law to serve struggles for decolonization.

Emma Meyer, in  “Managing Migrants, Resettling Refugees,” discusses mid-twentieth century, colonial-era efforts to regulate and control migrants of Indian descent crossing the Bay of Bengal became central to later systems of managing displacement in South Asia. Her talk focuses on Visakhapatnam, India, which has become a continuous site of resettlement for displaced people since WWII.

*Speaker bios*
Jessica Whyte is Scientia Associate Professor of Philosophy and Law at the University of New South Wales, Australia. She is author of The Morals of the Market: Human Rights and the Rise of Neoliberalism (Verso, 2019).

Emma Meyer holds a PhD in modern South Asian history from Emory University. Her research focuses on the intersections of migration, labor, citizenship, and humanitarianism. 

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 ✔ https://www.humanitarianisms.org/​
 
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