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THE ECHO CHAMBER Results, Management and the Humanitarian Effectiveness Agenda

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THE ECHO CHAMBER Results, Management and the Humanitarian Effectiveness Agenda THE ECHO CHAMBER Results, Management and the Humanitarian Effectiveness Agenda Juliano Fiori, Fernando Espada, Jessica Field, Sophie Dicker The Humanitarian Affairs Team Save the Children THE ECHO CHAMBER Results, Management and the Humanitarian Effectiveness Agenda Juliano Fiori, Fernando Espada, Jessica Field, Sophie Dicker The Humanitarian Affairs Team Save the Children This report has been produced as a discussion paper by the Humanitarian Affairs Team in partnership with the Humanitarian and Conflict Response Institute and does not reflect Save the Children policy CONTENTS First published 2016. ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS 5 © The Save the Children Fund 2016. FOREWORD 7 The Save the Children Fund is a charity registered in England and Wales (213890) and Scotland (SC039570). Registered company No. PREFACE 9 178159. A NOTE ON THE WORLD HUMANITARIAN SUMMIT: This publication is copyright, but may be reproduced by any method without fee or prior permission for teaching purposes, but not for resale. SOLUTION OR SYMPTOM? 17 For copying in any other circumstances, prior written permission must be obtained by the publisher. INTRODUCTION: AN APPETITE FOR REFORM Suggested citation: Fiori, Juliano, Fernando Espada, Jessica Field, From ‘duty’ to ‘results’: the new humanitarianism and Sophie Dicker. The Echo Chamber: Results, Management and the and consequentialism 19 Humanitarian Affairs Agenda. London: Humanitarian Affairs Team & Humanitarian and Conflict Response Institute, 2016. Rwanda: the ‘end of the age of innocence’ 21 Contact the Humanitarian Affairs Team: CHAPTER 1: THE HUMANITARIAN [email protected] EFFECTIVENESS AGENDA www.humanitarianeffectivenessproject.com Humanitarian effectiveness in historical context: bureaucracy, management and professionalisation Cover photo credit: Hedinn Halldorsson/Save the Children in the humanitarian sector 27 The birth of the humanitarian effectiveness agenda 32 Evaluation and evidence in humanitarian action 35 A challenge of scale and focus 38 Coherence saves lives: making one out of many 42 Accountability and the humanitarian market place 50 EFFECTS AND LIMITS The theatre of effectiveness: dancing with donors 57 1 In focus 61 The echo chamber 77 Acknowledgements CONCLUSION: REIMAGINING SUCCESS We are grateful to colleagues from across Save the Children for valuable More than tools and mechanisms: challenging an ideology 81 comments on this paper and throughout the project; especially Rigmor Argren, Prisca Benelli, Paula Brennan, Richard Cobb, Jonathan Beyond the humanitarian market-place 82 Glennie, George Graham, Nick Hall, Alice Ladekarl, Caelum Moffatt, From results to systems: rethinking linear Gareth Owen, Hannah Reichardt and Bernice Romero. approaches to the planning, delivery and We would like to thank the project’s advisory board whose experience, evaluation of humanitarian action 83 ideas and comments have contributed greatly to this report: Urvashi Aneja, Raymond Apthorpe, John Borton, Steve Darvill, Eleanor Davey, Reforming organisational structures and processes. Paul Knox-Clarke, Jemilah Mahmood, Alice Obrecht and Bertrand Humanising operational activity 84 Taithe. Sacrificing organisational growth (at least initially) to We would also like to thank James Stacey, Lydia Johnson, Joe Devoir change business models 85 and Ashraf Khader for additional research, Louis Amis for support with Remaking the political economy of humanitarian aid 85 copyediting and Jamie Herron for report design. A cultural shift: promoting principles that reflect a politics of solidarity 86 About the Humanitarian Affairs Team Towards a different conception of knowledge: contextualising humanitarian activities 86 Established in 2012, the Humanitarian Affairs Team seeks to inform and support the development and implementation of Save the APPENDICES Children strategy, offer proposals to improve policy and practice within the organisation and across the humanitarian sector, and foster Administering humanity: the development of opportunities to translate these proposals into practicable plans of humanitarian bureaucracy 89 action. Housed in Save the Children UK’s Humanitarian Department, the ‘Doing more for less’: a revolution in management 92 Humanitarian Affairs Team serves as a counterpoint to programmatic and technical expertise, providing insight into the conceptual and The making of the humanitarian professional 94 theoretical questions that underpin humanitarian practice. Standards and technological utopia 98 ENDNOTES 100 BIBLIOGRAPHY 117 2 3 ACRONYMS ALNAP Active Learning Network for Accountability and Performance in Humanitarian Action CAP Consolidated Appeals Process CHS Core Humanitarian Standard CIPRODEH Centre for the Investigation and Promotion of Human Rights DAC Development Assistance Committee (of the OECD) DANIDA Danish International Development Agency DEC Disasters Emergencies Committee DFID UK Department for International Development ECHO European Commission's Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection Department (formerly the European Community Humanitarian Aid Office) FAO Food and Agriculture Organisation HAP Humanitarian Accountability Partnership HAT Humanitarian Affairs Team HCRI Humanitarian and Conflict Response Institute IASC Inter-Agency Standing Committee ICRC International Committee of the Red Cross IEC International Electrotechnical Commission ISO International Standardisation Organisation JEEAR Joint Evaluation of Emergency Assistance to Rwanda JSI Joint Standards Initiative LoN League of Nations MBO Management by Objectives MDGs Millennium Development Goals MIRA 1 Multi-Cluster/Sector Initial Rapid Assessment (following Typhoon Haiyan) MIRA 2 Multi-Cluster Needs Assessment (following Typhoon Haiyan) 4 5 PREFACE MSF Médecins Sans Frontières NPM New Public Management OCHA United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs ODA Overseas Development Administration FOREWORD OECD Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development OPT Occupied Palestinian Territories PbR Payment by Results When I started out as an aid worker twenty five years ago, I had no PPB Planning, Programming and Budgeting idea what a log frame was, my position had no terms of reference and PUMA Public Management Committee (of the OECD) key performance indicators were not part of my daily work. I could be RedR Register of Engineers for Disaster Relief a humanitarian worker without having to write a funding proposal or a RBM Results-Based Management donor report. And I was no exception. We humanitarians were largely free to follow our instincts and trust the relationships we built, largely RPF Rwandan Patriotic Front un-encumbered with dizzying notions of standards or principles. We SCHR Steering Committee for Humanitarian Response did good things but also made mistakes, because we did not have the SIDA Swedish International Development knowledge or the right tools. Cooperation Agency They were rewarding and demanding times and we did not notice we CIDA Canadian International Development Agency were venturing into a dawning age of ‘industrialised’ humanitarianism SOHS State of the Humanitarian System radically different from our individual experience as aid workers. The Sphere Standards Project for Humanitarian Relief change was gradual but consistent: we became caught up in an ever TEC Tsunami Evaluation Coalition growing and increasingly globalised penchant for managerialism. UNDHA United Nations Department of Humanitarian Affairs Improving the way we plan, manage, monitor and evaluate our UNHCR Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for humanitarian programmes has been necessary and inevitable. Similarly, Refugees the professionalisation of the sector has brought many benefits in UNICEF United Nations Children’s Fund terms of the quality of our work on the ground. This shift has markedly UNREO United Nations Rwanda Emergency Office improved our performance in many key areas. As Humanitarian Director UNRRA United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation of Save the Children UK, I can undoubtedly count my organisation (and Administration myself) among the big winners of this transformation in terms of our UNRWA United Nations Relief and Works Agency for capacity to deliver assistance to populations in need, and also in terms Palestinian Refugees in the Near East of ‘market share’. UNSCC United Nations Standards Coordinating Committee Indeed, as the years have rolled by the aid sector’s ‘love affair’ with URD Groupe Urgence Réhabilitation and Dévelopment the application of managerial principles, professionalisation and USAID United States Agency for International Development the pursuit of organisational growth has shown few signs of waning. USC United Somali Congress However, without denying the good intentions and progress made, it is time to ask about the real cost and limits of this transformation. That is WADEM World Association for Disaster and Emergency Medicine what The Echo Chamber does. WFP World Food Programme When I hear ‘business English’ and the ‘market logic’ being WHS World Humanitarian Summit systematically used in meetings and publications I cannot help but WHO World Health Organisation 6 7 THE ECHO CHAMBER fear we risk dehumanising the humanitarian endeavour. Even more importantly, I wonder whether in this process we are by-passing the massed ranks of humanitarians who courageously fight for the humanitarian cause on the world’s frontlines. Young aid workers from all over the world still seek to follow the same path of humanitarian PREFACE doing,
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