Little Room to Maneuver: The Challenges to Humanitarian Action in the New Global Security Environment

Abstract

The current global politico-security environment poses challenges to principled humanitarian action on three levels. Humanitarian actors are at pains to preserve a neutral stance in contested political environments, specifically those of occupation and counter-insurgency operations within the US-led Global War on Terror — a particularly difficult proposition when the major donor for humanitarian activities is also the occupying power. Their second challenge is to maintain operational independence in environments of post-conflict transition and other contexts where the life-saving work is over and political pressure increases for all international actors to operate under a unified, politically coherent peace-building strategy. Finally, humanitarians perceive a greater threat than ever before to the physical security of their own workers, as incidents of violence against aid workers appear to be on the rise.

Factors associated with common mental health problems of humanitarian workers in South Sudan

“…Thirdly, our sample may not be fully representative of the humanitarian community in South Sudan. Although data on the composition of the humanitarian community in South Sudan are scarce, recent estimates suggest that national staff make up 92% of the NGO staffing [ 95 ], in line with the global estimate of 90% of the humanitarian workforce in field locations [ 40 ]. By contrast, our sample comprises of 52% national and 43% international staff.…”

“…access to security support), the nature of work undertaken (e.g. deployment in high-risk contexts), and the level of dependency on jobs in the sector to sustain livelihoods [ 40 ]. This has resulted in the majority of research in this field to date focusing on either national or international staff [ 16 , 21 ].…”

External Actors and the Provision of Public Health Services in Somalia

“…First, within the aid community, the concept of acceptance—cultivating relations with local actors and communities—is increasingly recognized as an appropriate and effective approach to providing services in insecure settings (Stoddard and Harmer ). The acceptance and support of local actors (e.g.…”

A Framework for Integrating Qualitative and Quantitative Data in Knowledge, Attitude, and Practice Studies: A Case Study of Pesticide Usage in Eastern Uganda

“…The success of public health interventions (PHIs) in resource-limited settings critically depends on our understanding of the socio-anthropological and economic aspects of the context in which these interventions are implemented ( 1 – 3 ). However, PHIs have historically followed a top down approach, consistently ignoring the social, political, and cultural context which perpetuates “a-one-size-fits-all” mentality ( 4 – 6 ). The impact that comes with a departure from such an approach is well demonstrated in the recent Ebola outbreak in West Africa ( 3 ).…”