IRRC No. 894
Book Review: The Ironic Spectator
Reading time 1 min read
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Abstract
Humanitarian organizations and media are closely intertwined. As early as 1899, Gustave Moynier, the first president of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), attributed the success of emerging humanitarian work to the new technology of his time – the telegraph – that revolutionized the speed of information. For Moynier, the telegraph allowed everyday spectators to know every detail of any event of war at the speed of light.