With an eye to the future: An investigation of humanitarian relief organizations’ policies, practices and scope of responsibility to promote longer term positive benefits for communities affected by crises
Overview
Humanitarian action is largely structured as short-term interventions launched from afar by international organizations and focused on immediate emergency needs of populations affected by war or disaster, with resources often shifted elsewhere as new crises arise or are deemed of higher priority.
Emerging Questions
- What is the proper scope of humanitarian organizations’ responsibilities during and also following interventions?
- What is the extent of responsibility to implement acute response projects in ways that will increase the likelihood that benefits will be sustained for communities over the medium to longer term?
Gap in Current Focus
While the responsibility to minimize future harms has been a major focus of humanitarian ethics and humanitarian policy, critical investigation of considerations related to promoting enduring benefits has received less attention.
Project Aim
This project aims to explore this terrain: in humanitarian policy, in its application in humanitarian projects, and through engagement with theory, and to bring these components together through an integrated study design. Ultimately, the research aims to develop practical guidance to support humanitarian organizations as they seek to design, implement and, eventually close project in a way that increases the likelihood of longer-term benefits for populations affected by crises.
Expected Contributions
To support dissemination of findings, we will create: video summaries, infographics, blogs, project reports and will host a one-day Research Forum in both country settings to promote knowledge exchange on this topic.
Connecting policy, practice and normative analysis, this research will generate knowledge on a crucial contemporary question of humanitarian action: the ways that humanitarian organizations can implement their projects with an ‘eye to the future’, and their scope of responsibilities for doing so.
Findings will have action potential to guide humanitarian policy and shape practices, and we will work with the Center for Disaster Preparedness and the Canadian Red Cross and its in country partners to actively mobilize the knowledge generated through this program of research to support humanitarian organizations, civil society organizations, governments, communities affected by crises, and other stakeholders.
The project includes three overlapping phases
PHASE 1
Phase 1 aims to better understand how humanitarian policy documents incorporate considerations of sustainability and longer-term benefits, and opportunities to increase coherence and alignment.
We are mapping and critically appraising policies and guidance documents from the humanitarian sector.
Once the policy review is complete, we will interview stakeholders (e.g. humanitarian practitioners, policymakers, government officials, civil society representatives, funders) to better understand this policy landscape and their perceptions of responsibilities, mandates, obstacles and uptake.
PHASE 2
Phase 2 is focused on humanitarian practices and includes two qualitative inquires.
The first is taking place in the Philippines in partnership with the Center for Disaster Preparedness. The second will take place with the Canadian Red Cross.
In each country, we will begin the inquiry with 8–10 semi-structured key informant interviews at the national level. The national level interviews will also support the selection of three case studies for each inquiry.
Case studies will be focused on three locations in the country where emergency humanitarian projects were implemented. For each case, we anticipate 15–20 interviews with people involved in or affected by the humanitarian projects, as well as the analysis of available documentation (end of project reports, memoranda of understanding, etc).
PHASE 3
Phase 3 will draw on phases 1 and 2, and a normative framework, the Ethics of the Temporary, which was developed by our team in previous work with the Center for Disaster Preparedness.
In this component of the research, we will examine humanitarian organizations’ responsibilities, including their justifications, scope, and limits to account for longer term effects, especially the promotion of sustained benefits and increased resilience to future crises, as part of emergency operations and priority-setting.
HUMANITARIAN HEALTH ETHICS 