Jan – April 2014
Note from Sara Pantuliano, Head of HPG
Over the last few months we’ve seen the devastating consequences of theescalation of violence in South Sudan, affecting more than one million civilians. Reflecting on the role of the international community, I emphasised how donor-driven technical fixes have failed South Sudan. I argued that the transition in South Sudan has been treated as a technical exercise in state building instead of being seen as a highly political process where power relations, causes of vulnerability and drivers of conflict need to be continuously analysed to inform engagement.
Continuing our focus on protection of civilians (POC), Ashley Jackson examined the gap between norms, laws and policies on POC and the reality on the ground in conflicts such as South Sudan, Syria, Central African Republic and many others in a new Policy Brief. Eva Svoboda followed up with a second Policy Brief looking at why international agencies in Syria have largely focused on access, not protection – and what other options exist for civilians trying to survive in Syria.
Examining another area of protection in crises, the Humanitarian Practice Network released a suite of publications on gender-based violence (GBV) in emergencies. A Network Paper sought to evaluatewhat works in responding to and preventing GBV while an issue of the Humanitarian Exchange Magazine presented good practice and reflections from a range of aid organisations working on GBV, including IRC, MSF and the ICRC. These publications were launched at an event with our largest online audience to date, and presented at the Dubai International Humanitarian Aid Development Conference and Exhibition (DIHAD) at the end of March.
Looking more broadly at changes in humanitarian action, we held a conference in Amman with the Humanitarian Forum, the OIC and other partners on challenges and opportunities for humanitarian action in the Arab region, bringing together a range of international and Arab organisations. We followed this conference with a high-level roundtable in Jakarta to examine the role of ASEAN in humanitarian action, reflecting on the successes and limitations of regional engagement in crises such as Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines and the Rakhine crisis in Myanmar.
For a full account of our publications, blogs & op-eds and events over the last quarter see below or visit our webpage.thu
