Dear CIHA blog readers,

We wish everyone an insightful and interesting 2012! We are delighted to begin the year with a post by Jonathan Agensky, who is completing his Ph.D. at Cambridge and has been working on faith-based NGOs in Sudan. Jonathan raises the critical issue of whether and how what we might call "secularist" assumptions shape attitudes about faith-based NGOs, particularly but not exclusively in the West and in academia. He argues that we need to look both at the similarities between faith-based and secular aid organizations, and the differences between faith-based organizations themselves, particularly how they work in specific contexts, to be able to assess their influence and record.

With your help, we are striving to create a growing forum to address the many contours and perspectives within ongoing debates about humanitarianism in Africa. Please help us grow (we now have a readership of over 1000 people across Africa, North America, Europe, and parts of Asia) by sharing our site with interested friends and colleagues, and letting us know!

Please also check out our "In the News" and "Opportunities" sections -- there are a number of new opportunities listed.

Sincerely,

Cecelia Lynch
Blog Editor, CIHA
Professor, Department of Political Science
Director, Center for Global Peace and Conflict Studies

University of California, Irvine
3151 Social Science Plaza
Irvine, CA 92697 USA
tel: (949)824-1428
fax: (949)824-1544

If you would like to unsubscribe from our mailing list, please send an email to cihablog@uci.edu with your request.