Talking Humanitarianism

This episode features a discussion on engaging with the Taliban then and now, and in particular what has the international aid community learned from past experiences and what are the consequences for the Afghan population.

Based on his experience in Afghanistan since 1988 first as a United Nations (UN) aid worker and later as a researcher, ⁠Antoio Donini⁠ discusses the similarities and differences between the current context and international engagement in Afghanistan and what happened over twenty years ago.

Held on 21 April 2023, the roundtable was organised and chaired by Dennis Dijkzeul (Institute for International Law of Peace and Armed Conflict) and is the third in a series of discussions on ethics in humanitarian action.

The series is initiated by the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO) and the Norwegian Centre for Humanitarian Studies in collaboration with the Institute for International Law of Peace and Armed Conflict (IFHV) and the Oxford Institute for Ethics, Law and Armed Conflict (ELAC). It relates to the project Red Lines and Grey Zones: Exploring the Ethics of Humanitarian Negotiations, led by Kristoffer Lidén at PRIO. This discussion is also part of the Theory Lab of the Co-Duties project.

In this episode, independent humanitarian consultant and Senior Fellow at SOAS (University of London’s School of Oriental and African Studies) Marc DuBois is invited to share his reflections on the culture, architecture and politics of humanitarian action. Bringing his expertise in policy, advocacy and humanitarian affairs as a former Director of Médecins sans Frontières-UK (MSF or Doctors Without Borders), Marc shares his thoughts on debates around the humanitarian-development-peace nexus, organisational culture and humanitarian principles and ethics.

As United Nations agencies and international humanitarian NGOs negotiate with the Taliban over the ban on women aid workers, this virtual roundtable explores where to draw red lines for humanitarian aid to Afghanistan.

Ought humanitarian operations be halted in response to the Taliban decree of 24 December 2022? Which new guidelines on this issue from the Afghan authorities would be acceptable? In this roundtable, these questions are explored from an ethical perspective: not asking what is strategic for humanitarian agencies but what is best for the Afghan people all things considered. As such, the roundtable is also an exploration of ethics of humanitarian action in general.

This roundtable is the second in a series of discussions on ethics in humanitarian action. Held on 10 February 2023, the roundtable was organised by the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO) and the Norwegian Centre for Humanitarian Studies in collaboration with the Institute for International Law of Peace and Armed Conflict (IFHV) and the Oxford Institute for Ethics, Law and Armed Conflict (ELAC). It relates to the project Red Lines and Grey Zones: Exploring the Ethics of Humanitarian Negotiations, led by Kristoffer Lidén at PRIO.

This episode features a roundtable discussion on the principle and practice of humanitarian neutrality during the Syrian civil war since 2011.

Humanitarian operations during the Syrian civil war were subject to much controversy and criticism. This criticism is reflected upon and carefully discussed by Carsten Wieland in his book Syria and the Neutrality Trap: The Dilemmas of Delivering Humanitarian Aid through Violent Regimes (I.B. Tauris, London (UK), 2021). In this roundtable discussion, Carsten Weiland (Diplomat, scholar and author) provides an introduction based on his book, followed by reflections by Anna Cervi (Norwegian Refugee Council) and Emanuela Chiara-Gillard (Oxford Institute for Ethics, Law and Armed Conflict).

This roundtable is the first in a series of discussions on ethics in humanitarian action. Held on 16 January 2023, the roundtable was organised by the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO) and the Norwegian Centre for Humanitarian Studies in collaboration with the Institute for International Law of Peace and Armed Conflict (IFHV) and the Oxford Institute for Ethics, Law and Armed Conflict (ELAC). It relates to the project Red Lines and Grey Zones: Exploring the Ethics of Humanitarian Negotiations, led by Kristoffer Lidén at PRIO.

In this fourth and final episode of the Climate Resilient Development and Humanitarianism mini-series, Edwige Marty, a PhD candidate at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences, facilitates a discussion between:

· Halvard Buhaug, a Research Professor at the Peace Research Institute Oslo and a Professor at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology,

· Rahma Hassan, a PhD candidate at the University of Nairobi and University of Copenhagen, and

· Siri Eriksen, Professor at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences.

Buhaug, Hassan and Eriksen discuss linkages between conflicts, climate change and humanitarian and development responses, changing authority relations affecting pastoral resilience, and the role of research for humanitarianism and climate change.

In this third episode of the Climate Resilient Development and Humanitarianism mini-series, Edwige Marty, a PhD candidate at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences meets with Jackson Wachira, a PhD candidate at the University of Nairobi. They examine the historic realities and enduring narratives on the arid and semi-arid lands in Kenya, the changing conflicts and livelihoods dynamics in Samburu, which are affecting humanitarian and climate change efforts, and the importance of research in deconstructing bias and evaluating whether responses are working or not and for whom.

In this second episode of the Climate Resilient Development and Humanitarianism mini-series, Edwige Marty, a PhD candidate at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences, explores recurring difficulties in operationalising inclusive long-term climate change programmes and humanitarian responses in Turkana, Kenya with Dennis Ochieng Ong’ech. Ochieng Ong’ech is the Turkana observatory coordinator for the REACH programme, a joint initiative between the University of Nairobi and Oxford University, and PhD candidate at the University of Nairobi. 

The discussion explores emerging climate financing initiatives and the continued need for research in areas where the evidence base remains limited.

In this first episode of the Climate Resilient Development and Humanitarianism mini-series, Edwige Marty, a PhD candidate at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences, explores the concept of climate resilient development together with Siri Eriksen, a Professor at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences and a lead author in the IPCC Sixth Assessment report, Working Group II. 

Eriksen explains how dimensions of climate resilient development, such as ecosystem stewardship, knowledge diversity, equity and justice and inclusion, can help us reconsider current and future humanitarian responses. 

Marty then discusses local humanitarian and development realities with Steiner Sempeta, a community leader from Olkiramatian, a Maasai communal land in Kajiado county, southern Kenya. The discussion emphasises the need for responses to include different sets of stakeholders, and their knowledges, as well as the need for long-term investments to support livelihoods.

What does it mean to move beyond the humanitarian grain? In this episode, Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, Professor of Migration and Refugee Studies at the University College London, delivers the NCHS Annual Lecture titled ‘Against the humanitarian grain’ at the Norwegian Centre for Humanitarian Studies Annual Conference, held in Bergen on 4 November 2022.

In her lecture, Fiddian-Qasmiyeh proposes moving beyond, or even against, what she conceptualises as “the humanitarian grain”, including by exploring what can be gained both analytically and in practical terms by setting aside the ‘humanitarian frame’, and instead focusing on multi-scalar responses to displacement.

Fiddian-Qasmiyeh suggests that displacing the humanitarian (thereby setting aside questions of labelling, geopolitical hegemony and even the quest for a genealogical recognition of the plurality of humanitarianisms) provides a critical opportunity to critically ‘rethink refugee response’.

Now the world has moved out of a liberal international order, where does that leave humanitarianism? In this episode, Michael Barnett, University Professor at George Washington University, delivers the keynote address titled ‘Humanitarianism in a post-liberal age’ to open the Norwegian Centre for Humanitarian Studies Annual Conference, held in Bergen on 4 November 2022.

In his address, Barnett argues that humanitarianism was already exiting the liberal international order starting at the turn of this century, as the forces of destruction shifted from a liberal peace to securitisation; the forces of production from development to marketisation; and the forces of compassion from human rights to bounded cosmopolitanism. Where does humanitarianism go from here?