Author: Davide Rodogno, Professor in International History and Politics and Director of the Executive Certificate on Advocacy in International Affairs
Book Description
Night on Earth is a broad-ranging account of international humanitarian programs in Central and Eastern Europe, the Balkans and the Near East from 1918 to 1930. Davide Rodogno shows that international ‘relief’ and ‘development’ were intertwined long before the birth of the United Nations with humanitarians operating in a region devastated by war and famine and in which state sovereignty was deficient. Influenced by colonial motivations and ideologies these humanitarians attempted to reshape entire communities and nations through reconstruction and rehabilitation programmes.
The book draws on the activities of a wide range of secular and religious organisations and philanthropic foundations in the US and Europe including the American Relief Administration, the American Red Cross, the Quakers, Save the Children, the Near East Relief, the American Women’s Hospitals, the League of Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross.
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Reviews
« Carefully dissecting what he calls ‘Promethean’ elements in international relief organisations in the Near East at a crucial juncture, Davide Rodogno has written a deeply informed and passionate book. Night on Earth is a landmark contribution to the history of humanitarianism. »
Peter Gatrell – author of The Unsettling of Europe: the Great Migration, 1945-the Present
« This is a profound, poetic, erudite and moving book. Inspired by Jim Jarmush and a profound sense of humanity, Davide Rodogno’s latest work is a magnus opus drawing its transnational history from an unprecedented range of sources and archives. It is a major contribution to the scholarship on humanitarian aid and to our understanding of the tragic history of the Near East one hundred years ago. »
Bertrand Taithe – author of The Charity Market and Humanitarianism in Britain and The Killer Trail
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