Global Humanitarianism Between Ideals and Realities: Lessons from Gaza’s 2023 Crisis

Conflict and disaster have been part of human history for as long as it has been recorded. Over time, more mechanisms for responding to crises have developed and become more systematized. Today a large and complex ‘global humanitarian response system’ made up of a multitude of local, national and international actors carries out a wide variety of responses. Understanding this intricate system, and the forces that shape it, are the core focus of this book. Daniel G Maxwell and Kirsten Gelsdorf highlight the origins, growth, and specific challenges to, humanitarian action and examine why the contemporary system functions as it does. They outline the main actors, explore how they are organised and look at the ways they plan and carry out their operations. Interrogating major contemporary debates and controversies in the humanitarian system, and the reasons why actions undertaken in its name remain the subject of so much controversy, they provide an important overview of the contemporary humanitarian system and the ways it may develop in the future. This book offers a nuanced understanding of the way humanitarian action operates in the 21st century. It will be essential reading for anyone with an interest in international human rights law, disaster management and international relations. For more information, please see the authors' website: https://www.understandingthehumanitarianworld.com/

Re-imagining the global humanitarian system: Emerging dynamics in the Asia-Pacific

Debates are ongoing on the limits of – and possibilities for – sovereignty in the digital era. While most observers spotlight the implications of the Internet, cryptocurrencies, artificial intelligence/machine learning and advanced data analytics for the sovereignty of nation states, a critical yet under examined question concerns what digital innovations mean for authority, power and control in the humanitarian sphere in which different rules, values and expectations are thought to apply. This forum brings together practitioners and scholars to explore both conceptually and empirically how digitisation and datafication in aid are (re)shaping notions of sovereign power in humanitarian space. The forum’s contributors challenge established understandings of sovereignty in new forms of digital humanitarian action. Among other focus areas, the forum draws attention to how cyber dependencies threaten international humanitarian organisations’ purported digital sovereignty. It also contests the potential of technologies like blockchain to revolutionise notions of sovereignty in humanitarian assistance and hypothesises about the ineluctable parasitic qualities of humanitarian technology. The forum concludes by proposing that digital technologies deployed in migration contexts might be understood as ‘sovereignty experiments’. We invite readers from scholarly, policy and practitioner communities alike to engage closely with these critical perspectives on digitisation and sovereignty in humanitarian space.

EP2.4, e-Poster Terminal 2, September 4, 2025, 11:35 - 12:55AimsTürkiye hosts one of the largest forcibly displaced populations, accounting for 10 percent of global cross-border displacement. This study aimed to examine perceptions and recommendations of humanitarian professionals and affected populations regarding the humanitarian system, with a focus on health.MethodsThe study had a qualitative design, including semi-structured interviews with 22 humanitarian professionals and a photovoice study with 29 displaced youth. Data was collected in Nov-Dec 2024 following ethical approval. Interviews and photovoice discussions were recorded, transcribed, and analyzed thematically, alongside iconographic-iconologic analysis of photos taken by young people.ResultsThe qualitative interview group included 13 female and 9 male professionals working in local, national and international NGOs in Türkiye. Their professional backgrounds were mostly health-related (physician, dentist, psychologist, dietician), with a few from education and social work sectors. The photovoice study involved 21 female and 8 male youth, aged between 18-25 years. Young people predominantly migrated from Syria, followed by Afghanistan and Pakistan, and were residing in Ankara, an urban setting, and Hatay, a smaller province near the border, which was hit by a major earthquake in 2023. Findings indicated a variety of challenges faced by professionals and affected populations within the humanitarian system, but also notable strengths and opportunities regarding the health care system and humanitarian NGOs. Humanitarian efforts in a prolonged crisis situation were affected by dynamic social, cultural, and economic factors, including the effects of the pandemic in 2020-2022 and the devastating earthquake in 2023.ConclusionWhen considering the health needs of millions of displaced people, with half of them being children and youth, there is a need for more international solidarity, as well as more localization efforts at the system level, in addition to more inclusive and health-promoting approaches for young people.KeywordsHumanitarian professionals, displaced youth, photovoice

Localisation, as it aims to shift power in the humanitarian system, will involve the increased inclusion of local faith actors, those national and local faith-affiliated groups and organisations that are often first, and last, responders in crises and have been responding in humanitarian contexts for many years, but often in parallel to humanitarian coordination mechanisms. In primary research in South Sudan with local faith actors and international humanitarian actors, this article aims to examine the inroads and barriers to local faith actor involvement in the humanitarian system and the realisation of localisation with local actors such as these. The research is based on an ethnographic study in which researchers were imbedded in a humanitarian project that aimed to help bridge divides between local faith actors and the international humanitarian system. The findings are based on one-on-one and group interviews with 89 participants from a range of international and local, and faith and secular, organisations. Findings indicate that local faith actors are active in responding to crises and want to be linked to the humanitarian system, but they feel distanced from it and pigeonholed as local faith actors. Formalisation through the appropriate registration systems and then training and networking with the humanitarian system helped them build legitimacy and feel confident to participate in humanitarian coordination. International humanitarian actors can help bridge barriers by understanding and connecting with the local faith actors and challenging their own assumptions about who local faith actors are.

The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) has developed a humanitarian supply management system (SUMA) that records, tracks and reports the flow of donations and purchased goods into a disaster area. While a lot of the received goods are in-kind donations, there is a procurement process triggered by the cash funds to meet specific needs. This procurement process also needs to comply with the humanitarian principles, and is therefore susceptible to manipulations from different stakeholders. SUMA has contributed to all the different deployments with the ability to build transparency and accountability in complex operations. These two contributions help to isolate the political factors from the supply chain and protect the humanitarian principles and space.

The global call for localization and locally led emergency response acknowledges the reality that the humanitarian system is currently organized around international actors. More than the limited access to direct funding, the core issue is the power imbalance between local and international actors. In the Philippines, national and local networks of humanitarian, faith-based, developmental organizations and private sector foundations have been conducting and leading small- and large-scale disaster responses for decades. However, the discourse and struggle for localization have grown in recent years due to the prominence and dominance of international humanitarian actors, especially during large-scale emergencies. Oxfam is one of several international organizations that have signed up to the Grand Bargain, Charter for Change and other agreements that push for localization, and Oxfam in the Philippines has embraced the local humanitarian leadership (LHL) approach holistically.

This article explores the benefits and limitations of anthropological research produced in the area of refugee studies over the past twenty years. It shows that anthropological research has been extremely useful when based on intensive fieldwork and empirical data as it highlighted the ideological bias of the refugee category and underlined the complex sociological reality it actually covers. On the other hand, the lack of historical and empirical approach has sometimes led anthropologists to reify precisely those categories they meant to deconstruct. Indeed, many studies from the 80's and 90's describe refugees alternatively as passive victims, dominated by the humanitarian system, or active agents resisting to the aid system thanks to unexpected coping strategies. Adopting a victimizing and/or populist attitude, this research has been shaped by changing historical, political and intellectual contexts, which have conducted anthropologists to judge rather than explain the social reality observed. In order to avoid such interpretative bias, this article suggests restoring an ethnographical and historical approaches to the study of forced migration and refugees by ‘suspending the judgment’ and analysing the dynamic of social change, which take place at the interface between three spaces - a humanitarian and international space, a national space and a local/historical space - each space having its own set of legitimate norms and institutions. In that respect, the author stresses the need to go beyond the ‘paradigm of the camp’ and calls for more research to be conducted on the normative and institutional pluralism created by the introduction of refugee law and humanitarian law in Southern countries.

ABSTRACT‘Humanitarian space’ denotes the physical or symbolic space which humanitarian agents need to deliver their services according to the principles they uphold. This concept, which separates humanitarian action from its politicized environment, is widely used in policy documents and academic texts, even though empirical evidence abounds that this space is in fact highly politicized. To some extent the uncritical use of the concept of humanitarian space is understandable because of its aspirational character. This article explores a different angle: how different actors use the concept and the language of humanitarian space and principles in the everyday politics of aid delivery. It proposes an empirical perspective that approaches humanitarian space from the perspective of everyday practices of policy and implementation. It maintains that the humanitarian space is an arena where a multitude of actors, including humanitarians and the disaster‐affected recipients of aid, shape the everyday realities of humanitarian action. The paper develops this perspective for two humanitarian operations: a protracted refugee camp in Kakuma, Kenya, and the tsunami response in Sri Lanka.

Purpose The COVID-19 epidemic caused significant disruptions to numerous supply chains. In order to enhance the resilience of supply chains, Collaboration (CO), Information Alignment (IA), and Big Data Analytics Capability (BDAC) have emerged as contemporary strategies within the humanitarian context. This study was conducted to explore the mechanism via which the effect of BDAC, IA and CO on Humanitarian Supply Chain Resilience (HSCR) in the humanitarian space could be optimized through Organizational Flexibility (OF). Design/methodology/approach A model of six hypotheses was developed based on the Organizational Information Processing Theory (OIPT). Data from 127 supply chain managers in humanitarian organizations were used to test the hypotheses. The analysis employed both descriptive and inferential statistics using SPSS version 26 and Smart-PLS version 3. Findings The study revealed that BDAC, IA, and CO individually influence supply chain resilience in the humanitarian setting while OF did not moderate the relationship between BDAC, IA, CO, and HSCR. Practical implications It is essential that humanitarian stakeholders prioritize factors that could increase supply chain resilience by employing contemporary BDA technologies, effective information flow, and collaborative strategies to set up a robust humanitarian SC system that could help lessen the impact of disasters. Originality/value This presents interesting insights that advance theoretical debates on how CO, IA, and BDAC under varying levels of OF could influence SCR in the humanitarian context. The paper further offers some useful guidance to managers in relief organizations who desire to build resilient supply chains by leveraging BDAC, collaboration and information alignment. Finally, the paper may also provoke future humanitarian scholars to replicate the study using different approaches.

The aims of this research is focusing to identify of the function of the derivational suffixes found in the BBC News: “War in Gaza”. Descriptive qualitative methods were used to identify the explanation about the function of derivational suffixes that found. The theories from Katamba (1994) and McCarthy (2002) were used to analyze the data. The news from BBC News: “War in Gaza” were used. Based on the analysis, this study found 202 data of suffixes that categorized as class changing and class maintaining. The suffixes that changing the word class found in this study were found 120 (62%) data of noun derived from verb, 11 (6%) data of adjective derived from verb, 20 (10%) data of adjective derived from noun, 9 (5%) data of noun derived from adjective and 33 (17%) data of adverb derived from adjective. It was found many nouns derived from verb suffix in the class changing because based on McCarthy, suffix -er is the most common way to form the noun. Meanwhile the suffix that maintaining the word class, it was found 9 (4%) data. It was only from noun derived from noun because the suffixes are commonly used in the news.

This thesis explores how English child protection proceedings embed meaningful participation. The collection and interpretation of wishes and feelings during statutory social work practice (s.53 Children Act 2004) should give insight into the child’s lived experience, as well as highlighting their opinion of the impact of social work on their lives. However, with no statutory, participatory social work model currently in place, children are missing opportunities to comment on decisions made for them, by adults, at all stages of the child protection process. Phase One comprised of semi-structured qualitative interviews and focus groups with parents, social workers and participation workers from one local authority. The findings revealed innovative social work practice taking place, along with examples of how practitioners and parents balance protection with participation. However, all research participants identified gaps in both service provision and their personal understanding of (or commitment to) participation. Emerging themes such as the imbalance of power, knowledge and application of social work legislation, relationship building, advocacy, the presence of the child in decision-making forums and the challenges / appropriateness of sharing information with children led to the development of a new model for participation in child protection proceedings. Creative, semi-structured interviews with children aged 8-12 years, who were the subject of a child protection plan and living at home with their parents, were the focus of Phase Two. Whilst most of the participating children shared how much they appreciated their social worker, all indicated a breakdown in their ability to participate, particularly regarding the amount and type of information shared between the practitioner, the parent and the child. The child’s experience of child protection proceedings, and their understanding of their own child protection plan, further tested and validated the usefulness of the newly designed participatory model. Using the work of Bourdieu, this thesis reflects on the field of child protection; the challenge of sharing power in a social space where service user presence is involuntary. What becomes clear is that, despite growing amounts of social work research and literature, there remains little guidance for social workers (particularly newly qualified social workers) to routinely, inclusively and knowledgably embed participation into their daily social work practice. This thesis therefore aims to provide practical responses to service user and practitioner dilemmas, and bridge the gap between research and practice.

Introduction: New humanitarians getting old? Zeynep Sezgin & Dennis Dijkzeul Part 1 A brief history of humanitarian actors and the humanitarian principles 1. A brief history of humanitarian actors and principles Wolf-Dieter Eberwein & Bob Reinalda Part 2 New donor humanitarianism 2. India as humanitarian actor: Convergences and divergences with DAC-Donor principles and practices Kristina Roepstorff 3. Turkey as a rising power: An emerging global humanitarian actor Alpaslan Ozerdem Part 3 Multi-Mandate organisations and developmental humanitarianism 4. Multi-Mandate organisations in humanitarian aid Dorethea Hilhorst & Eline Pereboom Part 4 Armed humanitarianism 5. Blurred lines, shrunken space? Offensive peacekeepers, networked humanitarians and the performance of principle in Democratic Republic Congo Ryan O'neill 6. Rebels without borders: Armed groups as humanitarian actors Ryan O'neill 7. The military, the private sector and traditional humanitarian actors: Interaction, interoperability and effectiveness Samuel Carpenter & Randolph Kent Part 5 Private humanitarianism 8. Business in humanitarian crises - For better or for worse? Gilles Carbonnier & Piedra Lightfoot 9. Humanitarian action for sale : Private military and security companies in the humanitarian space Jutta Joachim & Andrea Schneiker Part 6 Diaspora humanitarianism 10. Diaspora humanitarianism: The invisibility of a third humanitarian domain Cindy Horst, Stephen Lubkemann & Robtel Neajai Pailey 11. Diaspora humanitarianism: Implications for the humanitarian action in Syria and neighbouring countries Zeynep Sezgin Part 7 Faith-Based humanitarianism 12. International Muslim NGOs: Added value or an echo of Western principles and donor wishes? Marie Juul Petersen 13. Writing the other into humanitarianism: A conversation between South-South and faith-based humanitarianisms Elene Fiddian-Qasmiyeh & Julia Pacitto Part 8 Regional and local humanitarianism 14. Regional organisations and the humanitarian system: History, trends and implications Lilianne Fan 15. Traditional and non-traditional humanitarian actors in disaster response in India Tony Vaux Conclusion Dennis Dijkzeul, Ryan O'neill & Zeynep Sezgin

Calls for a greater inclusion of local actors into humanitarian action are far from new, but have gained momentum in the wake of the World Humanitarian Summit 2016. However, the inclusion of local actors raises a range of questions, both conceptually and regarding its implementation. This is particularly the case in the interplay of humanitarian action and peacebuilding. This paper seeks to contribute to the debate on the humanitarian system’s localisation agenda within the context of the humanitarian-peacebuilding nexus. It argues that further research should be guided by a critical localism (Mac Ginty 2015) that overcomes a simple binary opposition of the local and the international and looks at power asymmetries in the humanitarian system.

The global humanitarian system is overstretched; inadequately investing in risk reduction and prevention, and providing assistance that is often insufficient, inappropriate and late. Humanitarian action led by governments in crisis-affected countries, assisted and held accountable by civil society, is usually faster and more appropriate, saving more lives and alleviating the suffering of many more men, women and children. Yet, during 2007–2013, less than 2 percent of annual humanitarian assistance went directly to local actors. In this research report, Oxfam puts the humanitarian system under the lens and finds that it must change to remain effective; with locally led humanitarian action whenever possible; adequate funding to state and non-state actors in affected countries; and stronger partnerships between international and local actors, focusing on strengthening local capacity.