This special issue explores the increased interest and engagement by donor and national governments in ‘stabilising’ contexts affected by armed conflict and complex emergencies, and considers its implications for international humanitarian action.
A renewed donor interest in stabilising countries affected by political violence, armed conflict and chronic poverty – so-called fragile states – should come as a welcome development to humanitarians who have long complained of the indifference shown to large-scale human suffering in these contexts. In some places, at least, it could mean that humanitarian assistance is no longer used for ‘moral absolution' in the absence of serious political commitment to protecting civilians.
This HPG Working Paper considers the implications of ‘stabilisation’ for international humanitarian action. It argues that, while humanitarian actors have been most preoccupied with the growing engagement of the military in the humanitarian sphere, it is trends in international political engagement in these contexts that represent the more fundamental challenge.
This document, commissioned by CARE, provides a review of the literature on the nature of pastoralists’ vulnerability in the Horn of Africa (focusing specifically on Kenya, Somalia and Ethiopia) and chart ways in which agencies have responded and identifying best practice.
Twenty years on from the adoption of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, children are still 'invisible' in key development debates.
How visible are child rights in aid policies and programmes? This Background Note, prepared with UNICEF, proposes a framework to assess that visibility.
Piracy off the coast of Somalia has been big news in recent months and is an issue that defies any neat classification. Pirates are not linked to any particular state. They operate in international waters, targeting ships owned by a wide variety of countries. They use shadowy international networks to plan their operations and bargain for the lives of their hostages. In the words of a recent Guardian article, this is ‘a regional phenomenon [turned] into a global criminal business’.