How Humanitarian Workers of the Future See the World

Crises have become the new normal. Humanitarian response is no longer only about the initial phase of an acute crisis when the focus is on saving lives. Conflicts drag on, become frozen and protracted. People affected by conflicts often cannot move from their place of refuge. Natural disasters are happening with increasing frequencies.

Yet many question: How relevant is the work of humanitarian agencies? Are they keeping up with the era of uncertainty or still living in the past with standalone, short crises and colonial ways of dealing with them? The issue of relevance has become dramatically pertinent with the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic over the last 3 months.

How legacies of power and inequality shape relevance

The inflexible, self-centered, single-narrative approach to humanitarian assistance is rooted in the past missionary efforts to 'modernize' and 'educate' and to rescue the colonized from the wrath of nature. This approach disregards local knowledge and traditional coping strategies. The aid is provided top-down and is very much dominated by the Global North (resources, staff).

Even though officially this approach is abandoned in favor of equal and respectful partnerships, the old ways still influence both modern humanitarian aid and development work.

Humanitarian and development interventions are designed to suit the priorities and policies of the target group, recipient and donor. In an ideal world, the needs of the target population are aligned within the community, the governments’ priorities, and the policies of donors. However, in reality such a theory makes a large number of assumptions. For instance, that the target community is homogenous, which it often is not. Nor are priorities at central and decentralized levels identical - be it for a real difference in needs or for political reasons.

Who is humanitarian aid for?

In a protracted crisis situation, the needs of affected people become more diverse, dynamic and sometimes at odds from the viewpoint of an external person. The people affected are highly diverse – hence, the question of relevance ‘for whom’ is not a straightforward one to answer.

Experience shows that a supply-driven approach - understanding of what people most need – is steered by a pre-determined humanitarian offer. Armed with hammers, humanitarian organizations recognize the nails. Governments and agencies have their own perceptions of ‘humanitarian’ needs, according to their own institutionalized priorities, business models, resource constraints and world view.

The past has shown that there is often an insufficient understanding of how crises affect different demographic groups. There is particular concern regarding how women and girls, older people, and people with disabilities are excluded from the picture of needs. Others highlight failures to consider gender minorities. Harassment or exclusion from assistance happens!

Rather than looking just at needs, a holistic approach starts from what people have, not with what they need to develop with contextually appropriate strategies. However, the reality of high-urgency, low-resource humanitarian responses make ‘holistic’ seem like a tall order. There are also problems of high staff turnover and limited expertise, and the lack of existing knowledge about the context in a sector that is still largely foreign-led. A stronger interface with development organizations for a better grasp of the situation but also for learning from the methodological experience would certainly help.

To unravel the complexity of relevance and to propose measures how relevance can be enhanced, the Active Learning Network for Accountability and Performance (ALNAP) had invested considerable efforts in preparing a comprehensive background paper that outlines and discusses 10 ways to better understand what people really need. The assumption is that humanitarian response happens in a complex environment, the context is dynamic, and systems include a multitude of actors with diverse interests and priorities. Having a polyphonic understanding of the context, i.e. being able to listen to different voices, being adaptive, having an understanding of system dynamics, co-creation of solutions, and an inclusive understanding. We have been discussing these issues in the development sector for a considerable period and we have been experimenting and practicing with new approaches to address them on the ground.