Humanitarian Aid

The book presents good practices in humanitarian assistance and empowerment of Ukrainian refugees in various areas: emergency aid to large groups crossing the border, organisation of support in places of temporary stay, learning local languages, inclusion of children in school and adults in the labour market, and inclusion in the local community. It indicates the forms of international protection and the scope of their application by migrants from Ukraine, and discusses the temporary protection status dedicated to Ukrainian refugees. The volume will be of great interest to scholars and researchers of migration and diaspora studies, immigration law, and public policy.

Forced population movements are a defining feature of almost any humanitarian crisis, shaping the design, targeting, and delivery of emergency responses. This book's operational and theoretical insights will be useful for a range of readers, from humanitarian and migration researchers and students to practitioners and policymakers.

What motivates states to assist other countries in need? Focusing on Chinese, Russian, and American decisions about COVID-19 aid, this book illuminates the role of historically contingent ideas in donors' decisions. Drawing on the theoretical insights of the critical geopolitics tradition, it advances and tests explanations for aid-related decisions on a novel global dataset of COVID-19 aid. Rigorously theorized, meticulously researched, and accessibly written, this book illuminates the ways in which China and Russia seek to reshape the humanitarian field consistent with their geopolitical visions. Their competition with the US over approaches to aid has weakened the integrity of the humanitarian system.

How should humanitarian organisations respond when their aid goes awry? Should they stay and remain engaged with the needy, or should they withdraw and leave? Investigating the choices involved and the judgements required when tackling these questions, this book explores the unique 'Humanitarian Exit Dilemma' that confronts humanitarian organisations. Humanitarian practitioners often are too concerned with the outcome of action but fail to recognise that there are other equally weighty moral considerations they should consider. Focusing simply on the results of projects, such as the number of lives saved alone, is inadequate. To address this problem, this book highlights three value-based normative considerations, namely humanitarian aid workers' special relationships with those whom they are assisting, humanitarian organisations' causal responsibility to assist those they have made vulnerable, and humanitarian organisations' obligations to fulfil reasonable expectations of those assisted. Together, these three non-instrumental reasonings serve as the main arguments of the author's value-based normative account, the 'Non-Consequentialist Approach', to address the Humanitarian Exit Dilemma. Offering a unique perspective on how humanitarian organisations should navigate the Humanitarian Exit Dilemma, this book will be of interest to scholars and practitioners in the field of Humanitarian Studies, African Studies, Refugee Studies, political philosophy, humanitarian action, and human rights.

This new textbook provides an introduction to humanitarian protection, a field of study concerned with international responses to armed conflict, political violence, and humanitarian crisis. The book engages with a wide range of empirical and normative questions, providing an overview of the academic literature whilst simultaneously discussing the policies and practices associated with protective responses to conflict and humanitarian emergencies that put the lives and livelihoods of vulnerable populations, including civilians, refugees, and minority groups, at risk. Divided into three parts, covering the origins of the humanitarian protection regime, the range of actors involved, and the responsibilities of these actors, the book offers an accessible entry point into the major contemporary debates, providing readers with the conceptual tools for understanding core issues. Key points are reinforced and illustrated through the deployment of selected case studies, and a comprehensive glossary is provided for key terms. Each chapter ends with a summary of key points, questions for further reflection, and a list of recommended reading. This book will be of much interest to students of human protection, humanitarianism, the Responsibility to Protect, human security, peacekeeping, and International Relations in general.

During the past decade, Syria's displacement crisis has made the Middle East one of the world's foremost refugee-hosting regions. The measures to prevent refugees and migrants from leaving the region, and returning those who do, has made the region a zone of containment where millions remain displaced. The volume explores responses to mass migration and traces the genealogy of humanitarian containment from the Ottoman Empire and the emergence of the first refugee camps to the present-day displacement 'crises' and the re-bordering of Europe.

In May 2016, the World Humanitarian Summit represented a turning point for humanitarian policies. The Summit gave the impetus to seriously reflect on how to operate in environments where people's needs don't coincide anymore with existing mandates and sectors. The OECD believes that an effective humanitarian response is the one that addresses affected people's needs in a timely and efficient manner. One way to measure effectiveness is to ask aid beneficiaries what they think about the aid they get. With this is mind, the OECD initiated a first round of surveys during the cycle 2016-2017 in six countries affected by different type of crisis : Lebanon, Afghanistan, Haiti, Iraq, Somalia and Uganda. Two years after the World humanitarian Summit, the OECD and Ground Truth Solutions took another round of surveys in the same countries, plus Bangladesh. The purpose of this second round of surveys is to assess whether the commitments made at the World Humanitarian Summit, including the Grand Bargain, are having a tangible impact on people's lives in the most difficult contexts in the world. This paper provides some answers to this question.

‘Little did I realize that medicine is actually a social science, or ought to be. And that much as mind and body are connected, so are individuals and societies. This book helps me connect my fragmented pieces of understanding from various studies, experiences and jobs I have had. As we now set out on the decade of action to reach the SDGs, this book will help many of us not just understand, but also to do a better job.’ —Stefan Swartling Peterson, Chief of Child Survival, United Nations Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF), USA ‘This book offers a perspective whose time has come. No matter whether we are humanitarians or development workers, academics or philanthropists, we need to acknowledge that the entire expanse of our respective strengths enfolds when we work in complementarity, rather than competition.’ —Pierre Micheletti, President, Action Against Hunger (ACF), Professor, Grenoble Institute of Political Studies, France ‘Cornelia Walther's book has the merit of repositioning people's beliefs and motivations as an indispensable factor in addressing our humanitarian and social challenges.’ —Benoit Miribel, Co-founder of Forum Espace Humanitaire (FEH) and Humanitarian Alternatives Review, France This book examines how human behavior is shaped by our aspirations, emotions, thoughts and sensations, and conversely, how the experiences that result from our behavior impact ourselves, others and the planet. Based on an analysis of the constant interplay between these four layers, it offers practical solutions to systematically induce sustainable social change dynamics. It shows why change, in addition to economic and political transformation at the macro-level, begins with mind-shifts at the micro-level. Hereby it establishes the missing link between investments in personal empowerment and collective welfare. A novel theoretical paradigm is the foundation of this book, which is anchored in the perspective of an ongoing ‘body-mind-heart-soul connection.’ Based on the premise that an equitable society is to the benefit of everyone it is argued that efforts made for others have benefits at three levels – for the individual who acts, the one who has been acted for, and for society. Cornelia C. Walther has been working for the past 18 years with the United Nations Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF) in West Africa, Afghanistan and Haiti, focusing on the design of innovative communication and advocacy approaches.

The presence of expatriate humanitarian workers in African cities is not neutral. Country capitals receive large and sudden influx of expatriates during humanitarian crises responses. This book examines the influence of this presence on the local urban ecosystem, from the building of a security discourse to the self-segregation of aid agencies in expatriate enclaves. The examples of Abidjan, Bamako, Juba and Nairobi illustrate different variants of urban change induced by the normative power of aid organisations.

This book demonstrates how a focus on children's rights can help practitioners to safeguard children during humanitarian crisis. Child Rights in Humanitarian Crisis focuses on understanding and advancing child rights through practical applications of a child rights perspective in crisis response. The book establishes that with accessible, child-friendly participatory means, crisis response can improve from a child rights perspective and even advance children's rights whilst also supporting and furthering the development of a child's agency. The volume presents the reader with a clear focus on children from a range of backgrounds, including those most marginalised, such as children with disabilities. Drawing on expertise from the field as well as academia, and providing practical examples which link case studies to legal policies in recent and protracted humanitarian responses, such as in Turkey and at the Lithuania-Belarus border, this book is a treasure trove of advice from some of the humanitarian and development sector's most experienced professionals. Combining insights from both research and practice, this book will be an essential read for humanitarian students and practitioners.

Humanitarian crises have become more frequent, complex and protracted. If current trends continue, it is estimated that by 2030, humanitarian assistance costs could increase to $50 billion per year. By then, two-thirds of the world's poor are at risk of living in conflict-affected countries. To bridge the gap, humanitarian organizations are increasingly utilizing innovative financing tools such as impact bonds, faith-based finance and other innovative financial products and services to mobilize greater funding to address humanitarian needs. This book is among the first to assess a set of innovative financing mechanisms that have been transforming the humanitarian sector and explores their key opportunities, challenges and future prospects. This book will be of interest to academics, practitioners, humanitarian organizations and policy makers involved in humanitarian financing and to the humanitarian sector in general.

The Syrian war has been an example of the abuse and insufficient delivery of humanitarian assistance. According to international practice, humanitarian aid should be channelled through a state government that bears a particular responsibility for its population. Yet in Syria, the bulk of relief went through Damascus while the regime caused the vast majority of civilian deaths. Should the UN have severed its cooperation with the government and neglected its humanitarian duty to help all people in need? Decision-makers face these tough policy dilemmas, and often the "neutrality trap" snaps shut. This book discusses the political and moral considerations of how to respond to a brutal and complex crisis while adhering to international law and practice. The author, a scholar and senior diplomat involved in the UN peace talks in Geneva, draws from first-hand diplomatic, practitioner and UN sources. He sheds light on the UN's credibility crisis and the wider implications for the development of international humanitarian and human rights law. This includes covering the key questions asked by Western diplomats, NGOs and international organizations, such as: Why did the UN not confront the Syrian government more boldly? Was it not only legally correct but also morally justifiable to deliver humanitarian aid to regime areas where rockets were launched and warplanes started? Why was it so difficult to render cross-border aid possible where it was badly needed? The meticulous account of current international practice is both insightful and disturbing. It tackles the painful lessons learnt and provides recommendations for future challenges where politics fails and humanitarians fill the moral void.