Department of Anthropology and Sociology, Williams College, Williamstown, MA 01267, USA.
Health Hum Rights. 2008;10(1):109-22.
The international humanitarian organization, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), is strongly committed to principles of universalism, egalitarianism, and equity, in both its internal and external relations. Nevertheless, the organization distinguishes between so-called "national" staff members (those who are indigenous to the countries where MSF projects are located), and "expatriate" staff (those who are involved in projects outside their countries of residence), in certain ways that it has self-critically termed "discriminatory", "colonialist", and even "racist". It has resolved to remedy such practices. Through a first-hand case study of MSF activities in Russia, this article demonstrates that the dynamics of the "nationals"/ "expatriates" divide is a more complex phenomenon than MSF's self-accusatory diagnosis implies; that a fuller recognition and utilization of nationals' local knowledge would mitigate some of the conditions of inequality and inequity that they experience; but that it would not necessarily be desirable to expunge all differences between the two groups of staff Furthermore, because they are intrinsic to the structure and conditions of international humanitarian action, some of these differences could not easily be elminated by MSF, or by any other organization engaged in this kind of action.
国际人道主义组织无国界医生组织（MSF）在其内部和外部关系中都坚定地遵循普遍主义、平等主义和平等原则。然而，该组织在某些方面将所谓的“国内”工作人员（那些来自 MSF 项目所在地的本土人士）和“侨民”工作人员（那些参与其居住国以外项目的人士）区分开来，它自己称之为“歧视性”、“殖民主义”，甚至“种族主义”。该组织已决心纠正这些做法。本文通过对 MSF 在俄罗斯的活动进行个案研究，表明“国内/侨民”划分的动态是一个比 MSF 自我指责的诊断更为复杂的现象；充分认识和利用国内人员的本地知识将减轻他们所经历的一些不平等和不公平的条件；但并不一定希望消除这两组工作人员之间的所有差异。此外，由于这些差异是国际人道主义行动的结构和条件所固有，因此，MSF 或任何其他从事此类行动的组织都不可能轻易消除其中的一些差异。
