From local philanthropy to political humanitarianism: South Asian and Egyptian humanitarian aid during the period of decolonisation

Abstract

This working paper focuses on the provision of Egyptian and South Asian humanitarian aid du-ring decolonisation that saw the emergence of India and Egypt as independent nation-states in the late 1940s and early 1950s. The authors aim to show the continuities and shifts in the relief efforts of the Egyptian Red Crescent and of the Hindu Mahasabha by examining their ideas of giving and the practises they followed during the (late) colonial and the postcolonial periods. The paper starts with a short overview of the burgeoning field of humanitarian history. Our emphasis, hereby, is on the current lack of non-western perspectives on humanitarianism and its relationship with colonialism and decolonisation. Following this, the paper delineates local charitable and philanthropic traditions in Egypt and South Asia that influenced the Egyptian Red Crescent and the Hindu Mahasabha respectively. Finally, we analyse the work of these organisations in humanitarian crises during the period of decolonisation, paying special heed to their potential politicisation and their relationships with the postcolonial governments. The paper stresses the importance of taking into account the local and regional social and political contexts in order to understand seriously multiple forms of humanitarianism. We argue that in the wake of decolonialisation, both organisations continued their existing practises of relief provisions, but also had to adapt to new circumstances. Thus, they had to negotiate their relations and status not only with the newly established postcolonial governments, but also other (international) humanitarian organisations and actors.