Citation: Rose, Joanne (2013) The provision of humanitarian aid in complex emergencies: a case study of Somalia. Doctoral thesis, Northumbria University. This version was downloaded from Northumbria Research Link: http://nrl.northumbria.ac.uk/15257/ Northumbria University has developed Northumbria Research Link (NRL) to enable users to access the University’s research output. Copyright © and moral rights for items on NRL are retained by the individual author(s) and/or other copyright owners. Single copies of full items can be reproduced, displayed or performed, and given to third parties in any format or medium for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-profit purposes without prior permission or charge, provided the authors, title and full bibliographic details are given, as well as a hyperlink and/or URL to the original metadata page. The content must not be changed in any way. Full items must not be sold commercially in any format or medium without formal permission of the copyright holder. The full policy is available online: http://nrl.northumbria.ac.uk/policies.html The Provision of Humanitarian Aid in Complex Emergencies: A Case Study of Somalia Joanne Rose PhD 2013 The Provision of Humanitarian Aid in Complex Emergencies: A Case Study of Somalia Joanne Rose A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the University of Northumbria at Newcastle for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Research undertaken in the Faculty of Engineering & Environment May 2013 ii Abstract This thesis examines the delivery of humanitarian assistance in Somalia at the turn of the 21st Century. Humanitarian assistance is considered as an ideal and the key question is, can it be effective in a chronic emergency? Humanitarian assistance itself is examined in detail and placed in a broader context of ideas of vulnerability, resilience and adaptive capacity in response to disasters. The thesis is grounded on evidence based evaluation to generate conclusions for programme and project management. The method taken is one of using conventional social science methods to come to evaluative judgement. The nature of evaluative judgement requires an understanding of the purpose and content of evaluation itself, which is extensively discussed in the methods chapter. The ethics of work in disaster situations is also addressed. The case material comes from two evaluations namely for Action by Churches Together and Norwegian Church Aid conducted in Somalia in 2006-07. The key findings from the case material is that humanitarian projects in chronic emergencies must be delivered within the cultural context i.e. religion supported delivery. The reasons for this are that such delivery pays attention to the critical role of beneficiaries in ensuring effective and sustainable project implementation. This raises key issues about the validity of the top down delivery of humanitarian assistance as well as an understanding of chronic emergency as development rather than disaster projects. The thesis concludes with observations on the limitations of evaluation in the context of humanitarian assistance. It reinforces the central directive of humanitarian delivery as ‘do no harm’ and shows that there are opportunities to ‘do some good’. iii Contents Abstract ........................................................................................................... iii List of Abbreviations ........................................................................................ ix Acknowledgements ......................................................................................... xi Chapter 1 ......................................................................................................... 1 Introduction ...................................................................................................... 1 1.1 The Context ............................................................................................ 1 1.2. Background ........................................................................................... 2 1.3. Research Questions .............................................................................. 4 1.4 Fieldwork and Evaluation Experience .................................................... 4 1.5 Thesis Structure ..................................................................................... 5 Chapter 2 ......................................................................................................... 7 Humanitarian Assistance ................................................................................. 7 2.1 The Emergence of the Humanitarian System ......................................... 7 2.2 The Humanitarian System and Actors .................................................. 10 2.3 Humanitarian Sectors ........................................................................... 11 2.3.1 Health ............................................................................................ 12 2.3.2 Food............................................................................................... 14 2.3.3 Shelter ........................................................................................... 19 2.3.4 Water and Sanitation ..................................................................... 21 2.4 Vulnerable Groups ............................................................................... 24 2.4.1 HIV/AIDS ....................................................................................... 24 2.4.2 Internally Displaced Persons ......................................................... 25 2.5 Funding Humanitarian Aid .................................................................... 27 2.6 Accountability of the Humanitarian System .......................................... 30 2.7 Chronic Complex Emergencies ............................................................ 32 2.7.1 Vulnerability ................................................................................... 35 2.7.2 Resilience ...................................................................................... 39 2.7.3 Adaptive Capacity .......................................................................... 43 2.8 Conclusions .......................................................................................... 47 Chapter 3 ....................................................................................................... 50 Somalia .......................................................................................................... 50 iv 3.1 Introduction ........................................................................................... 50 3.2 The Somali People: Lives and Livelihoods ........................................... 52 3.2.1 Clans and Families ........................................................................ 52 3.2.2 Religion .......................................................................................... 54 2.3 Economy and Livelihoods .................................................................... 56 3.3.1 Pastoralism .................................................................................... 57 3.3.2 Agriculture ...................................................................................... 59 3.3.3 Fishing and Piracy ......................................................................... 61 3.3.4 Telecommunications and Services ................................................ 65 3.4 Basic Indicators in Somalia .................................................................. 66 3.4.1 Health ............................................................................................ 66 3.4.2 Water and sanitation ...................................................................... 68 3.4.3 Food and nutrition .......................................................................... 70 3.4.4 Education ....................................................................................... 72 3.4.5 Shelter ........................................................................................... 75 3.5 Somalia’s History: Early Somalia .......................................................... 79 3.5.1 During the 1990s ........................................................................... 81 3.6. Natural disasters ................................................................................. 88 Chapter 4 ....................................................................................................... 89 Methodology .................................................................................................. 89 4.1 Introduction ........................................................................................... 89 4.2 The Evolution of Evaluation .................................................................. 92 4.3 Definition of Evaluation ......................................................................... 95 4.3.1 Accountability and Lesson Learning .............................................. 97 4.4 Evaluative Criteria .............................................................................. 101 4.4.1 Formative evaluation ................................................................... 107 4.4.2 Summative evaluation.................................................................. 108 4.5 Evaluation Models .............................................................................. 112 4.5.1 Goal-based evaluation ................................................................