Social Science Research Council

It is frequently heard that Arabs/Muslims and their media were silent, unmoved or without opinion over Darfur. These suppositions tend to contain a measure of moral equivalence and finger-pointing, suggesting that responding as a Westerner — regardless of the quality, timing or efficacy of response — is the most correct option. In most conceptions, there [...]

I have the feeling this Abu Sharati business is a storm in a teacup. I have no idea for certain whether he was a plant or not, and I suspect few of us who have been following the story do. A quick bit of research reveals he has made around 3 statements in the mainstream [...]

To a considerable extent, crises in far-off lands are defined by foreigners and not by those living through them, which then creates a perceived moral imperative to do something about it. Darfur became Darfur when the West got involved, and continues to dominate its parameters.
As noted in a previous post,the media were slow [...]

Writing in the New York Review of Books recently, Pullitzer winner and Darfur advocate Nicholas Kristof noted that “Darfur fatigue” had set in, and that “the [Save Darfur] movement has lost its steam.”
A close analysis of the frequency with which the media mentions Darfur in recent months suggests he is right about the fatigue. [...]

Recently on this blog, an interesting question was posed: where was Save Darfur “and its advocacy and influence” in 2003? It is a good question, but seems to valorise advocacy excessively (as has this whole Mamdani / Save Darfur debate) when it has not (yet) supplanted the media as the Fourth Estate. Undoubtedly, there is [...]

For Darfur watchers, the death toll is as much a political statement as an expression of fact. For those with just a passing interest in the region, ascertaining the number who have died involves making judgements on the credibility of estimates, given that these can vary by hundreds of thousands, depending on the source.
Bitter [...]