Journalist & Author
born 1982, England
“On the way to Wau, I try to take notes in the dark. I am convinced, with the dedication of a fanatic, that all this must be recorded and that this documentation can somehow save lives here. Save them from what? I don’t know. I am not religious.”
How do people find their place in a world where there is no hope for a fulfilled life? In his writings about conflict regions like South Sudan, author Joshua Craze explores this question, seeking answers on the ground. He delves deep into the wound, not only tracing the causes of traumatic experiences of violence, but also with razor-sharp words, exposing the constraints of Western donor countries‘ humanitarian aid, which traps people in dependency on emergency assistance, thereby depriving them of any long-term prospect of a dignified, self-determined life.
Joshua Craze studied at the Universities of Oxford, Amsterdam, and the University of California, Berkeley, and earned a Ph.D. in sociocultural anthropology from the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales. He was an Assistant Professor and Harper-Schmidt Fellow at the University of Chicago. Since 2010, Joshua Craze has been working as a conflict researcher in South Sudan and other conflict zones for various organizations, including Human Rights Watch and the Small Arms Survey. He is currently writing a book on war, bureaucracy, and silence in those regions.