Abstract
Despite the knowledge gained on post-disaster sheltering and housing over the last several decades, there remains a disconnect in the evidence needed by humanitarian practitioners and the learning that the research community is capturing. To determine the research needed by practitioners, we assembled a Delphi panel of experts in humanitarian shelter and settlements. They first identified and then ranked the relative importance of research topics. Ninety-six research needs were identified and ranked by importance in six key areas that included: (1) comparing and evaluating approaches to sheltering, (2) shelter and settlement programming, (3) design and construction of shelter, (4) understanding impacts and outcomes of shelter, (5) disaster risk reduction and the humanitarian-development nexus, and (6) challenging contexts and topics. Top research priorities identified include a need to better understand how to support shelter self-recovery, longitudinal and long-term impacts of shelter, and the transition from response to recovery. The resulting needs provide a research agenda for humanitarian organizations, academic institutions, and donors, aligning with the Global Shelter Cluster's strategy to invest in evidence-based response.
Highlights
The provision of adequate shelter has been described as one of the most difficult areas of international humanitarian response [1]
We argue that while there is no shortage of problems facing humanitarian response requiring researchers’ attention, there is a need to more deliberately focus limited resources toward the most critical evidence needed by practice
We first provide a snapshot of how the humanitarian sector has examined evidence on shelter and the organization of the current body of knowledge on this topic, followed by bounding the humani tarian shelter and settlements field, outlining why a research agenda is needed
Summary
The provision of adequate shelter has been described as one of the most difficult areas of international humanitarian response [1]. In the face of rising challenges, such as protracted crises, climate change, and growing number of displaced populations, the humanitarian system faces unprecedented change This change requires better incorporating lessons from the past and generating new knowledge that can support aid to better assist communities affected by conflict and disaster. Shel tering and housing practice and study has saved lives, fostered stronger livelihoods, and strengthened disaster risk reduction. As Smith and Wenger [22] note, recovery phases are often assumed to occur in a linear, delimited fashion, when experiences of disaster-affected populations deviate from these bounded constructions These terms have significance for making sense of the complexity of crises and making knowledge more accessible to those that need it. In the context of this work, we seek to build upon knowledge that has under scored both ends of this spectrum [25,26]
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