David Rieff

David Rieff is an American non-fiction author, journalist, and policy analyst known for his extensive writings on humanitarianism, international law, foreign policy, and the politics of memory. His work, often characterized by a skeptical and contrarian perspective, critically examines the moral complexities and frequent failures of humanitarian intervention and international aid. Rieff has reported from numerous conflict zones, including Bosnia, Rwanda, and Iraq, contributing to prominent publications like The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Guardian.

Early life and education

Born in Boston to sociologist Philip Rieff and writer and critic Susan Sontag, he was raised in a prominent intellectual environment in New York City. He attended the Phillips Academy in Andover before earning his bachelor's degree from Princeton University, where he studied under thinkers like Michael Walzer. Rieff also undertook graduate studies in international affairs at the University of Paris, an experience that deepened his engagement with European political thought and set the foundation for his later focus on global crises.

Career

Rieff began his career as a journalist, quickly moving into coverage of international conflicts and humanitarian emergencies. He gained significant recognition for his reporting from the former Yugoslavia during the Bosnian War, which formed the basis for his acclaimed 1995 book, Slaughterhouse: Bosnia and the Failure of the West. He has served as a senior fellow at the World Policy Institute and has written extensively for magazines such as The New Republic, Harper's Magazine, and Foreign Affairs. His later work includes serving as a board member of the International Crisis Group and contributing to policy debates on issues ranging from global migration to the United Nations' role in peacekeeping.

Views and commentary

Rieff is noted for his pessimistic and often controversial critiques of liberal internationalism and the humanitarian enterprise. He has argued that the post-Cold War era of humanitarian intervention, exemplified in Somalia, Bosnia, and Kosovo, often masks geopolitical interests and can cause unintended harm. In books like A Bed for the Night, he questions the moral certainty of organizations like the International Committee of the Red Cross and Médecins Sans Frontières. More recently, in In Praise of Forgetting, he challenges the prevailing wisdom that collective memory is inherently virtuous, arguing it can perpetuate cycles of violence and hinder reconciliation, drawing on examples from the Armenian Genocide to the Spanish Civil War.

Personal life

The only child of Susan Sontag and Philip Rieff, he was deeply involved in his mother's life and career, serving as her literary executor following her death in 2004. He edited and published several posthumous volumes of her work, including the journals Reborn and As Consciousness Is Harnessed to Flesh. Rieff has been married to the artist Jacqueline Rieff, and his personal reflections on filial duty, illness, and caregiving were explored in his memoir Swimming in a Sea of Death, which chronicled Sontag's final illness.

Selected works

* Slaughterhouse: Bosnia and the Failure of the West (1995) * A Bed for the Night: Humanitarianism in Crisis (2002) * At the Point of a Gun: Democratic Dreams and Armed Intervention (2005) * Swimming in a Sea of Death: A Son's Memoir (2008) * Against Remembrance (2011) * The Reproach of Hunger: Food, Justice, and Money in the Twenty-First Century (2015) * In Praise of Forgetting: Historical Memory and Its Ironies (2016)

Category:American journalists Category:American political writers Category:1952 births Category:Living people Category:Princeton University alumni