Information Exchange in the Disaster Zone: Interaction Between Aid Workers and Recipients in South Sudan

Abstract

The author's experience of information collection and analysis in the Bahr-el-Ghazal region of south Sudan is reflected on here. The paper suggests that existing strategies of needs assessment are often based on misunderstandings about the cultural, social and economic conditions of war-affected communities. Furthermore, the needs assessment process has taken on a life of its own: for the intended beneficiaries it is often a wearying experience, but one which can yield benefits if the 'correct' answers are provided to sometimes ridiculous and often insensitive questions. For the assessors, participatory patterns of data collection provide an apparently scientific justification for decision-making in contexts characterised by complex political and moral dilemmas and organisational confusion.

Uncertainty and Information Flows in Humanitarian Agencies

“…Data from 1995 relief distributions are used to simulate aspects of uncertainty; paradoxically, uncertainty increased with growing success of the relief operation. The finding is in tune with observations from the same region that Jok (1996) reported in this journal. While uncertainty may remain difficult to reduce, co-operation among agencies and public confidence in their work provide functional equivalents for certainty.…”

“…From the enacted environment perspective, the actions of organisations contribute to the uncertainty that they feel about their environments. For example, Jok has described how, amid serious power differences between relief agencies, local military and groups in need, the needs assessment process has taken a life of its own, satisfying nobody, yet overwhelming the agencies with inaccurate data (Jok, 1996).…”

“…Some parts of the humanitarian agencies will see the quality of their information improve with operational experience. For example, in persistent disasters, the local food economy may become progressively better understood (this view is challenged by Jok (1996), who maintains that relief agencies are poor at transmitting knowledge), and with it the victims' 'coping ability' and their residual needs for outside assistance.…”

International Media’s Role on U.S.-Small State Relations: The Case of Nepal

“…Foucault’s work on knowledge and power illustrates the role that international journalists play in shaping media discourse by intentionally or otherwise selectively omitting elements of a story (Foucault 1980). With reflection upon Boegli’s concerns about post‐Cold War political crises being mislabeled as humanitarian crises (Jok 1996), the Nepal situation was labeled a political crisis instead of a low intensity civil war by many field reporters in Kathmandu, including those for the New York Times and BBC 10 . This fomented a similar perception among senior U.S. policy makers, who consistently formulated responses through this lens (Rocca 2004; Camp 2005; Leahy 2005).…”

Conflict, the Continuum and Chronic Emergencies: A Critical Analysis of the Scope for Linking Relief, Rehabilitation and Development Planning in Sudan

“…The civil war which has plagued southern Sudan over decades has concerned issues of governance, in particular the degree to which the south can act autonomously over its own affairs and benefit from the extraction of the region's rich natural resource base which historically has been dominated by northern political and commercial interests. The war itself has served to reinforce further the economic, social, religious and political divides between the two regions (Jok, 1996).…”