Edited by Davide Rodogno, Professor of International History at the Institute, and Heide Fehrenbach, from Northern Illinois University, this volume examines the historical evolution of what we today call “humanitarian photography” – the mobilization of photography in the service of humanitarian initiatives across state boundaries.

For well over a century, humanitarians and their organisations have used photographic imagery and the latest media technologies to raise public awareness and funds to alleviate human suffering. The book asks how we can account for the shift from the fitful and debatable use of photography for humanitarian purposes in the late nineteenth century to our current situation in which photographers market themselves as “humanitarian photographers.”

Humanitarian Photography: A History is the first book to investigate how humanitarian photography emerged and how it operates in diverse political, institutional, and social contexts, bringing together more than a dozen scholars working on the history of humanitarianism, international organisations and nongovernmental organisations, and visual culture in Africa, Asia, the Middle East, Europe and the United States. Based on original archival research and informed by current historical and theoretical approaches, the chapters explore the history of the mobilization of images and emotions in the globalisation of humanitarian agendas up to the present.

It is part of Human Rights in History, a series that showcases new scholarship exploring the backgrounds of human rights today.