COP Participation - Joint statement to humanitarian leaders - A community-led "humanitarian reset"

COP Participation - Joint statement to humanitarian leaders - A community-led "humanitarian reset"

In 2016 humanitarian actors committed to launch a ‘participation revolution”, ensuring people in crisis-affected communities had a greater influence over and leadership role in the decisions that affect their lives.

By any measure, the participation revolution hasn’t taken place. The 2023 Independent Report on the Grand Bargain found “no evidence of a substantive shift in practice on the ground” despite growing awareness of the value of participation, plenty of discussion,  and increased investment. Efforts have been too disjointed, too blind to power dynamics and have existed in silos instead of driving change across the humanitarian system.

But sweeping aid cuts, with more to come, mean dramatic changes to the ways humanitarian assistance is allocated and delivered. This reduction in humanitarian support is unequivocally disastrous: cuts are already impacting lives, health and livelihoods across the globe.  Against this backdrop, however, cuts offer both opportunity and impetus for renewed change. Humanitarian action is at a crossroads: prioritisation exercises could be driven by power and politics, resulting in a slimmed-down version of the current inefficient model. Or the changes could be driven by what people in crisis need and prioritise, resulting in a radical rethinking of what humanitarian aid can do towards something better, fairer and more future-fit. 

Last week the first meeting of the Grand Bargain Community of Practice on Participation brought together nearly 200 humanitarian practitioners and policymakers from across the globe: from local NGOs to UN agencies and donors. We agreed on the urgent need to ensure that prioritisation in the wake of aid cuts starts from what communities in crisis need and prioritise.

This is not just a moral argument but an economic one. Decades of data shows that where humanitarian response is not founded on meaningful engagement with and leadership of crisis-affected communities, and where their needs and preferences are not taken into account we see less effective support: mismatches between people’s priority needs and the aid they receive, people re-selling the aid they receive to access what they really want, and cycles of emergency response when people want long term support.

We acknowledge the “humanitarian reset” proposed by the ERC and IASC Principals, and urge them to ensure it is driven primarily by the needs and priorities of communities in crisis. We acknowledge the references to putting people facing crises first and maximising funding to local and national actors in the ERC’s letter to the IASC Principals, and the Grand Bargain Ambassadors’ appeal to signatories to uphold Grand Bargain commitments, including those on participation, as funding is cut. Now humanitarian leaders need to turn these words into action.

That can include:

• Pilot new approaches and learn from them: draw on decades of evidence on what has worked well in community-led response
• Include representatives from crisis-affected communities and grassroots organisations in discussions on the future of aid
• Reorient (as far as possible) to demand-driven response: base needs assessment and response planning on data directly from frontline communities, building meaningful feedback loops and adapting in response
• Launch a wholesale shift in power and resources to local actors: acknowledging that means international organisations will shrink and play a more supportive and effective intermediary role
• Better support community-driven and mutual aid efforts recognising the efficiencies this enables and the local knowledge
• Better connect humanitarian and development responses to serve people’s long term aspirations and build resilience
• Be bold: fundamental change to the system is needed.

This group has the reach, the knowledge, the data and the commitment to support your efforts. We can offer:

• Data from and connections with crisis-affected communities across the globe
• Evidence of what’s working
• A wealth of resources and evidence on participation
• Holding IASC Principals, EDG and senior leadership teams accountable for making decisions based on community views
• Willingness to work together and break out of silos to drive change

We look forward to engaging with you and supporting you in this process. Please reach out to heba@groundtruthsolutions.org or sophie@groundtruthsolutions.org with any questions or requests for engagement.

The Grand Bargain Community of Practice on Participation.