Understanding Doctors Without Borders (MSF)

“Saving the world, or at least alleviating some of the world's pain, is supposed to be rewarding. But care and healthcare activities are also known to be the most exposed to professional stress and burn-out. What then is happening in the humanitarian sector, and more specifically at Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), a sector at the convergence of these two perspectives? (Conclusion) Original PhD work available here: https://theses.hal.science/tel-03281513

“Saving the world, or at least alleviating some of the world's pain, is supposed to be rewarding. But care and healthcare activities are also known to be the most exposed to professional stress and burn-out. What then is happening in the humanitarian sector, and more specifically at Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), a sector at the convergence of these two perspectives? (Part 3 - People) Original PhD work available here: https://theses.hal.science/tel-03281513

“Saving the world, or at least alleviating some of the world's pain, is supposed to be rewarding. But care and healthcare activities are also known to be the most exposed to professional stress and burn-out. What then is happening in the humanitarian sector, and more specifically at Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), a sector at the convergence of these two perspectives? (Part 2 - Contexts) Original PhD work available here: https://theses.hal.science/tel-03281513

“Saving the world, or at least alleviating some of the world's pain, is supposed to be rewarding. But care and healthcare activities are also known to be the most exposed to professional stress and burn-out. What then is happening in the humanitarian sector, and more specifically at Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), a sector at the convergence of these two perspectives? (Part 1 - Definitions) Original PhD work available here: https://theses.hal.science/tel-03281513

“Saving the world, or at least alleviating some of the world's pain, is supposed to be rewarding. But care and healthcare activities are also known to be the most exposed to professional stress and burn-out. What then is happening in the humanitarian sector, and more specifically at Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), a sector at the convergence of these two perspectives? (Introduction) Original PhD work available here: https://theses.hal.science/tel-03281513

“Saving the world, or at least alleviating some of the world's pain, is supposed to be rewarding. But care and healthcare activities are also known to be the most exposed to professional stress and burn-out. What then is happening in the humanitarian sector, and more specifically at Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), a sector at the convergence of these two perspectives? Original PhD work available here: https://theses.hal.science/tel-03281513

This podcast discusses the fact that humanitarian mission conditions limit local integration and the analytical article on which this podcast is based suggests three forms of attachment: home (“break expatriates”), elsewhere (“multi‑homeland expatriates”) or nowhere (“duty‑free expatriates”). For the latter, MSF plays, until their departure from the organization, the role of substitute homeland. Original written article: https://hal.science/hal-03323244/

In the humanitarian sector, dedicated to alleviating people’s suffering, how to qualify a misconduct and impose a potentially painful sanction? How can one judge, i.e. consider that everyone is responsible for their act, in a working area based on the fact that human inequalities are partly due to social determinisms? To what extent tolerating deviance is exacerbated and sentences are attenuated if not lifted? Article: https://shs.cairn.info/revue-sociologies-pratiques-2023-1-page-55?

What meaning does the notion of off-work have when employees, such as those at Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), remain constrained by their uninterrupted world of work for months on end? Original written article: https://hal.science/hal-04502525/file/Spaces%20of%20control%20and%20spaces%20of%20intimacy.pdf

Over the past thirty years, many players in the international aid sector tried to involve the populations they work with in a movement of “southernization”. At MSF, this resulted in a diversification of the origin of “expatriates”, which itself led to a partial depoliticization of the organization, shifted its strategic balance and gave rise to a new social stratification. Article: https://shs.cairn.info/revue-internationale-des-etudes-du-developpement-2020-1-page-165