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Priests of God: An Enchanted Humanitarianism on the African Migration Route
Author(s) -
Ngo May
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
journal of international development
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.533
H-Index - 66
eISSN - 1099-1328
pISSN - 0954-1748
DOI - 10.1002/jid.3297
Subject(s) - ambiguity , faith , identity (music) , evangelism , flexibility (engineering) , sociology , gender studies , religious studies , theology , philosophy , management , aesthetics , economics , linguistics
This article examines a prevailing ‘enchanted humanitarianism’ discourse within a faith‐based organisation working with migrants in Morocco that encompassed tensions, contestations and ambiguity, revealing a fundamental ‘identity ambiguity’ in the organisation between evangelism and humanitarianism. This was the source of much tension in the organisation's operations and is indicative of entangling constructions of the sacred and the secular in faith‐based organisations, going against an essentialised or monolithic conception of the role of ‘religion’ in humanitarianism. These entanglements are illustrated through an examination of two organisational issues—the identity of staff and the flexibility of criteria for its beneficiaries. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.