A Fraught Embrace: The Romance and Reality of AIDS Altruism in Africa

Ann Swidler and Susan Cotts Watkins

Princeton Studies in Cultural Sociology

Hardcover

Price:: $26.95/£22.00
ISBN:
Published:: Dec 4, 2018
Copyright:: 2019
Pages:: 304
Size:: 6.12 x 9.25 in.
Illus:: 17 b/w illus., 2 tables

Paperback

Price:: $26.95/£22.00
ISBN:
Published:: Dec 4, 2018
Copyright:: 2019
Pages:: 304
Size:: 6.12 x 9.25 in.
Illus:: 17 b/w illus., 2 tables

ebook

Price:: $26.95/£22.00
ISBN:
Published:: Dec 4, 2018
Copyright:: 2019
Pages:: 304
Size:: 6.12 x 9.25 in.
Illus:: 17 b/w illus., 2 tables

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In the wake of the AIDS pandemic, legions of organizations and compassionate individuals from faraway places descended on Africa to offer help and save lives. Ann Swidler and Susan Cotts Watkins vividly describe the often mismatched expectations and fantasies of altruists who dream of transforming lives, of the villagers who desperately seek help, and of the brokers on whom both Western altruists and impoverished villagers must rely. Based on years of fieldwork in the heavily AIDS-affected country of Malawi, this incisive, irreverent book digs into the sprawling AIDS enterprise and unravels the paradoxes of policy and practice. All who want to do good—from idealistic volunteers to world-weary development professionals—depend on brokers as guides, fixers, and cultural translators. The mutual misunderstandings among these players create all the drama of a romance: longing, exhilaration, disappointment, heartache, and sometimes an enduring connection. A Fraught Embrace unveils the tangled relations of those involved in the collective struggle to contain an epidemic.

Awards and Recognition

One of Foreign Affairs Best of Books 2017 – Africa / Malawi
Winner of the 2018 Best Scholarly Book Award, Global and Transnational Section of the American Sociological Association
Honorable Mention for the 2018 Outstanding Published Book Award, Altruism, Morality and Social Solidarity Section of the American Sociological Association
Finalist for the 2018 Melville J. Herskovits Prize, African Studies Association

"A Fraught Embrace is both an important piece of transnational public sociology and one of the most important works in cultural sociology to have been published in a long while."—Iddo Tavory, European Journal of Sociology

"Few books can claim to address a social problem involving billions of dollars with millions of lives hanging in the balance, but Swidler and Watkins’s A Fraught Embrace does just that. Dissecting the role of foreign altruists and local brokers in aid efforts to stem the HIV/AIDS epidemic in sub-Saharan Africa generally, and Malawi more specifically, this book makes a compelling sociological contribution to the study of foreign aid—a field of research more often reserved for economists and international development studies scholars."—Liam Swiss, American Journal of Sociology

“Ann Swidler and Susan Cotts Watkins provide a scathing, often funny, and always compassionate look at donor-sponsored AIDS prevention programs in Malawi.”—Kristin Harper, Interdisciplinary Association for Population Health Science

“This splendid account of development aid explores how reality confronts donors’ dreams of effective altruism and recipients’ dreams of a better life. Swidler and Watkins show how a combination of ignorance, incomprehension, and conflicting aims brews the ‘working misunderstandings’ behind an enterprise that suits everyone yet fails to meet its nominal purpose.”—Angus Deaton, Nobel Laureate in Economics

“[A]n extremely readable and deeply informative exploration of the international AIDS enterprise, essential reading for anyone interested in AIDS and the larger machinations of the international development system.”—Rachael Bonawitz, African Studies Review

A Fraught Embrace

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