Inside Geneva’s Summer Profiles: the Red Cross Museum

Podcast: Inside Geneva
Host: Imogen Foulkes
Guests: Pascal Hufschweig (Director, International Red Cross and Red Crescent Museum), Elisa Ruska (Director of Collections and Exhibitions)
Date: August 19, 2025

Overview

This episode of Inside Geneva is a special “summer profile,” not of a person, but of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Museum in Geneva. Host Imogen Foulkes visits the museum, which faces existential challenges, and talks with Director Pascal Hufschweig and Director of Collections Elisa Ruska. The conversation delves into the museum’s vital role, its unique sound-focused exhibition “Tuning In,” and the ways in which humanitarian principles, international law, and shared experiences are made tangible for visitors.

The Museum’s Purpose and Challenges

Key Points:

• The International Red Cross and Red Crescent Museum is under threat of closure in 2027 due to federal cost-cutting.
• The museum works to remind authorities and the public of its importance in daily life, humanitarian action, culture, diplomacy, education, research, and tourism.
• It strives to make humanitarian principles and international law relatable and accessible to everyone, from children to heads of state.

Notable Quotes:

"We really bend over backwards to explain humanitarian principles, international humanitarian law, and to show that there are embodied experiences we can all relate to."
— Pascal Hufschweig (00:48, 02:54)

“For the past year or so, we've been really, really reminding public authorities of the key role we play… fighting for this institution, which is useful and important.”
— Pascal Hufschweig (01:57)

Timestamps:

• 01:34 Pascal introduces himself and the museum’s dire situation.
• 01:57-04:31 Pascal discusses the existential challenges and why the museum is fundamentally different from typical institutions.

Connecting Humanitarianism to Daily Life

Key Points:

• The museum links global humanitarian issues with individual responsibility and community behavior.
• It tells stories ranging from personal experiences to global events, grounded in Geneva’s and Switzerland’s humanitarian legacy.

Notable Quotes:

"It's not something you only hear about on TV or in the news. It's something that makes sense in the way you behave in your own community, how you connect with your neighbors, how you are an active citizen..."
— Pascal Hufschweig (03:37)

The "Tuning In" Exhibition: Sound, Memory, and Humanitarian Action

Key Points:

• Exhibition Focus: “Tuning In” explores humanitarian sound archives from the ICRC and Museum collections.
• Historical Recordings: Includes everything from radio dramas on public health (e.g., Nigeria’s “The fly is your enemy” from 1966) to disaster preparedness songs and personal soundscapes.
• Music and Human Dignity: Showcases how music, often overlooked, supports dignity and mental health in crisis situations (e.g., Red Cross volunteers playing music for children and wounded soldiers).
• Sound as Emotion: Features an installation where aid workers vocalize basic human emotions, highlighting the universality of feeling.

Notable Quotes & Moments:

“This one... is ‘the fly is your enemy’ from the Nigerian Red Cross in 1966.”
— Elisa Ruska (07:36)

"You should keep [flies] out of your house. So use fly nets... The way the program is made is quite playful... But nevertheless, the message of health was really well brought out and effective.”
— Elisa Ruska (07:50)

“The idea was to create an exhibition that is not just sound, to make it more inclusive and more also open to a larger understanding on what does it mean to deal with music... it helps us feel better, it helps us to relate to the other, it helps us maybe forget also moment of distress.”
— Elisa Ruska (10:39)

Timestamps:

• 05:18 Elisa introduces the “Tuning In” exhibition.
• 07:36–08:41 Playback and discussion of the “fly is your enemy” PSA.
• 08:52–09:01 Disaster preparedness songs—“Be Prepared” from Grenada Red Cross.
• 10:39–12:00 The role of music in humanitarianism; music’s presence in crises, hospitals, and prisons.
• 12:31–13:44 Rediscovering “just music” tapes—re-evaluating the emotional significance of archival audio.
• 14:13–16:28 The “Voices of Emotions” installation: 42 humanitarian workers vocalize emotions, highlighting empathy and universality.

Humanitarianism as a Plurality of Voices

Key Points:

• The exhibition prompts visitors to consider not only the information that aid agencies want heard, but also the internal and external voices of those affected by crisis—and the aid workers themselves.
• Sound and music are shown to be powerful tools for memory, healing, empathy, and shared humanity.

Memorable Quote:

“Humanitarianism is a plurality of voices and should be also a way to make those voices heard.”
— Elisa Ruska (19:11)

Visitor Impact:

• More than 10,000 people visit per month; feedback is overwhelmingly positive.
• The approach encourages new ways of thinking about the relationship between humanitarianism, emotion, and sound.

The Museum’s Irreplaceable Role

Key Points:

• The museum preserves key items of world heritage: Henri Dunant’s Nobel Peace Prize medal, and war prisoners’ records.
• Its loss would be a “confusing message” and significant loss for Switzerland and the world.
• The museum is a guardian not just of objects, but of principles and memories at the core of humanitarian values.

Notable Quotes:

“You would want to have your dignity protected… people you see on the screen... aren't just images and aren't just statistics, but they're people like you, like me. We all just want to have normal lives because that's such a huge privilege.”
— Pascal Hufschweig (19:47)

"Had this museum closed or if we'd lose this museum, we'd be sending a very confusing message, and this would certainly be a loss for Switzerland and the loss for Geneva... losing this collection would be a loss for people way beyond Switzerland."
— Pascal Hufschweig (21:15)

Key Moments & Quotes with Timestamps

Museum’s Significance

• 02:54 Pascal Hufschweig: “It's something different... we ask a central question which is, what does humanitarian action have to do with me in my life here and now?”

Exhibits and Sound Archives

• 07:36 Elisa Ruska: “This one in particular that I really like is the fly is your enemy from the Nigerian red Cross in 1966.”
• 08:41 Pascal Hufschweig: “First, hurricane warnings, 11:00am Eastern Standard Time...”
• 10:39 Elisa Ruska: “So the idea was to create an exhibition that is not just sound, to make it more inclusive... the presence of music is really important in what we call the preservation of human dignity.”

Emotions and Memory

• 12:31 Elisa Ruska: “What's outside the picture is also important. And here these are sounds that have not a real label. We don't really know what they are... the material... include[s] some parts that were ...labeled 'don't keep just music.'”
• 14:37 Elisa Ruska: “...delegates and Red Cross volunteers recorded a lot of things... they are exposed to landscapes that are very particular and that stick to them even when they came back.”

Universal Humanitarian Message

• 19:11 Elisa Ruska: “That humanitarianism is a plurality of voices and should be also a way to make those voices heard.”
• 19:47 Pascal Hufschweig: “When you visit the museum, you instinctively understand that you would want to have your dignity protected...”

Closing Thoughts

• 21:15 Pascal Hufschweig: “We also have key items of world heritage in this museum... losing this collection would be a loss for people way beyond Switzerland.”

Conclusion

This edition of Inside Geneva offers a deeply personal and sensory-rich profile of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Museum. Listeners gain unique insight into the role the museum plays in connecting abstract humanitarian values to everyday life, and how even ephemeral things—like sounds, music, and emotions—are vital in preserving and communicating human dignity. With its future uncertain, the museum stands as a testimony to shared humanity, memory, and the power of making voices—past, present, and sometimes wordless—truly heard.