Ines Hijazi- Entry N°5 (Nikolas Kosmatopoulos)

PROS ARGUMENT / Ines Hijazi

Postulate of the author is Tolstoy theory saying that:
-He argues the idea that “we need to rethink our definition of human agency altogether i.e an assemblage of actors and forces such as war and colonialism covert and overt violence expertise and bureaucracy, technology and nature makes not only history and economy but also human agency”.  We have to stop to think that history is just a human production whereas human is the production of several others non-human things.
I do agree that a human of the twenty centuries will not act as a nineteen century human.

MAIN IDEA/ CONSEQUENCE OF THE POSTULATE: Think thanks create a new type of power constituted according to Timothy Mitchell through assemblages comprised of human and non-human forces.  A power that is the origin of the way crisis are fixed and so the origin of history.

About the method of reflection:
Method: - => explore technical features of crisis reports (how they are done)

Then => the crisis think thank as a sentinel device (what they cause)

A really good point for me is :
- The way the author do his reflection. It is really interesting as he gave an concrete or practical example before arguing an idea.

-Interview an individual called Sandrine who worked during 10 years in International Crisis Group.

-An other one Robert

-He argues only before having investigated. It is not dogmatic even If at the beginning I thought that.

Philosophically, it reminds me cavern allegory of Platon, how we can sometimes unconsciously being manipulated by the production of knowledge. The way the author did his reflection also reminds me the Discourse on the Method of Rightly Conducting The Reason of Descartes. As he tries to find the truth about the power of think thank.

About the author ideas.

-I pretty agree with the idea that crisis report can be considered as a balancing act between providing explanation to irrational and inexplicable occurrences. A kind of manipulation can be seen throughout report as the author highlight since a crisis report has to “disseminate enough sense of a world in constant crisis but not too much to give the impression that this cannot be fixed” 

-I think the field we worked is really interesting because it is obvious that what we can read can have a strong influence in what we think and also in politic decisions somehow such as Sandrine affirmed that the « ICG recruit previous diplomats policy makers and high level politicians who are either going on retreat or resign and who are expected to use their own networks in order to put pressure on the international bodies involved in decision making about crises and conflicts. »

-It is an in-depth argumentation
The author shows thanks to the Sandrine experience how projects are chosen i.e by a team discussion compulsory with the agreement gave by the programme director.
Subjectivity is obvious since this point. ICG highlights only what he does want to.
Each crisis report has a goal and I feel like it is important to read it by being aware of this fact.

-it is not impartial, as a matter of fact. According to Robert, who also worked in a crisis think thank, he is obliged to write something that can be attractive to massive audiences worldwide. Or, every subject cannot make the crisis report attractive. Each report has to be sent from 60 to 70 important people around the world.

Why the author said that crisis think thanks are holders of new form of power, which can has strong consequences?

His reflection is based in the critical commentary of contemporary humanitarian interventions given by the sociologist Craig Calhoun.

He shows that a very modern attitude is used by crisis think thanks i.e which combines calculated anxiety in the face of crisis and a “pervasive faith in the capacity to manage it”

Think thank used as a sentinel device.

-fields are heavily event-oriented
-action oriented
-produced and producing overarching systems of alert-and-response

Lack of objectivism in the way a crisis report is done.

I feel this text is really interesting as it is an opportunity to be more aware and less credulous concerning crisis reports.