Aid agencies ask academics for critical input
Relief agencies such as Oxfam and the Red Cross want to be challenged by academic research, they told researchers from the University of Sussex and the Institute of Development Studies at a meeting on campus last month.
Relief: Humanitarian workers in Sudan. Photo: Sudan Envoy
Critically constructive engagement with academics is needed, said the humanitarian agencies, because - driven by the need to be accountable to donors - they often lack the research capacity and the time to reflect on these issues themselves.
They welcome research that questions not only how they go about the mechanics of delivering aid in emergencies, but also the core principles and practices that lie behind their actions.
During the New Humanitarian Agendas conference on 19 October, hosted by the Global Transformations research theme at Sussex, the relief agencies discussed with Sussex and IDS researchers how research can be of benefit in the provision of emergency relief and ‘capacity building’ in the most vulnerable, crisis-prone regions of the world.
Professor Alan Lester, the Global Transformations theme leader, said: “Agencies such as Oxfam and the British Red Cross are interested in research that helps them to think about ways of building resilience to future disasters into each major intervention that they make.
“Rather than constantly fire-fighting around the globe, returning again and again to provide emergency relief to the same regions of conflict and natural hazard, they want to understand better the drivers of these disasters and ways of helping local communities to avoid or cope with them before things get so bad.
“One of the major goals of the Global Transformations research theme is to help build a network of researchers who can provide such critically constructive advice.”
The October meeting arose as a result of the co-ordination of research on various strands of humanitarian work across the University - exactly the kind of activity that the research themes are designed to promote.
At an initial internal consultation in May 2011, researchers from 12 different departments presented and discussed their research with one another.
Identifying some common themes in that scoping meeting allowed the researchers to present their ideas to senior figures from Médecins Sans Frontières, Oxfam, the British Red Cross, Care International and other humanitarian agencies as well as the Department for International Development at this month’s conference.
In turn, Sussex and IDS researchers were able to hear directly from these agencies what kind of research they feel is most required to assist their work.