Disaster has become big business. Best-selling journalist Antony Loewenstein trav els across Afghanistan, Pakistan, Haiti, Papua New Guinea, the United States, Britain, Greece, and Australia to witness the reality of disaster capitalism. He discovers how companies cash in on or ganized misery in a hidden world of privatized detention centers, militarized private security, aid profiteering, and destructive mining. What emerges through Loewenstein's re porting is a dark history of multinational corpo rations that, with the aid of media and political elites, have grown more powerful than national governments. In the twenty-first century, the vulnerable have become the world's most valu able commodity.

Foreign assistance is a fundamental component of the international affairs budget and is viewed by many as an essential instrument of U.S. foreign policy. On the basis of national security, commercial, and humanitarian rationales, U.S. assistance flows through many federal agencies and supports myriad objectives, including promoting economic growth, reducing poverty, improving governance, expanding access to health care and education, promoting stability in conflictive regions, countering terrorism, promoting human rights, strengthening allies, and curbing illicit drug production and trafficking. This book provides an overview of the U.S. foreign assistance program by answering frequently asked questions on the subject. It also provides a description of U.S. international food aid programs under current law; discusses several important policy issues related to U.S. international food aid; and describes Administration and congressional proposals intended to change the nature of U.S. food international aid.

From natural disaster areas to conflict zones, humanitarian workers today find themselves operating in diverse and difficult environments. While humanitarian work has always presented unique ethical challenges, such efforts are now further complicated by the impact of globalization, the escalating refugee crisis, and mounting criticisms of established humanitarian practice. Featuring contributions from humanitarian practitioners, health professionals, and social and political scientists, this book explores the question of ethics in modern humanitarian work, drawing on the lived experience of humanitarian workers themselves. Its essential case studies cover humanitarian work in countries ranging from Haiti and South Sudan to Syria and Iraq, and address issues such as gender based violence, migration, and the growing phenomenon of 'volunteer tourism'. Together, these contributions offer new perspectives on humanitarian ethics, as well as insight into how such ethical considerations might inform more effective approaches to humanitarian work.

At the age of 48, Moritz Thomsen sold his pig farm and joined the Peace Corps. As he tells the story, his awareness of the comic elements in the human situation -- including his own -- and his ability to convey it in fast-moving, earthy prose have made Living Poor a classic.

"Hilariously funny at times, grimly sad at others and leavened with perceptive insights into the ways of the people and with breathtaking descriptions of the Ecuadorian landscape". -- St. Louis Post-Dispatch