Interesting but Wrong vs Right but Obvious

I realise that lolcatz are yesterday's news.

The second round of Humanitarian Innovation Fund grants have now been decided, and should be posted on the HIF large grants website before too long. Once again, the Grants Panel discussions about innovation were as interesting as the projects themselves – possibly more so this time, because I had a feeling that the level of innovation in the proposals submitted for this round was even weaker than the last round.

That evening I had a chance to catch up with Ben Ramalingam, whose work on complexity and aid is some of the most interesting research being done in the sector at the moment. We had a wide-ranging and fascinating discussion that took in landscape engineering, urban mathematics, humanitarian futurology and the relative merits of the Sandman and Lucifer comic books (I’m down with Lucifer, Ben with Sandman – but he’s going to give Lucifer another chance).

I don’t agree with Ben on everything, but his views are always interesting, and this started me thinking. Where are the interesting thinkers in the humanitarian sector? There’s a lot of thoughtful people working on aid issues (some of whom blog), but being thoughtful isn’t always enough to qualify as an interesting thinker. The blogs I linked to are consistently insightful, but they’re tightly focused on aid, without much effort to introduce tie together new ideas in an innovative way.

While I was in London for the HIF, I also had the chance to drop in on the Truth and Beauty sessions curated by Vinay Gupta. Up front, I disagree with Vinay on a lot of issues – but he has the ability to pull together widely divergent thoughts into something coherent and his views are never less than interesting. Vinay is in a different (if tangentially related) space to the humanitarian sector, and I actually struggle to think of many individuals in the humanitarian sector who have the same capacity.

Since then I’ve chatted with a few friends and colleagues, and asked them the question: who are the interesting thinkers in the humanitarian sector? So far I haven’t been able to build a list, and that worries me. The humanitarian community is struggling at the moment with a range of issues which we’re ill-equipped to deal with, and the default solution to tough challenges is to add more layers to the bureaucracy. There’s a serious lack of vision within the sector, and nobody’s close to addressing that gap.

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6 Responses to Interesting but Wrong vs Right but Obvious

1. Pingback: The Unforgiving Minute » Decrease of distance in the digital age:

2. Vinay Gupta | November 22, 2011 at 8:37 |

   Hi, Vinay here. I’d absolutely identify myself as part of the humanitarian sector – after all, I invented the Hexayurt Project, worked with the Netherlands Red Cross for years on shelter workshops and regularly provide context on humanitarian affairs.

   But the humanitarian sector is a ghetto because people who seriously question the fundamental assumptions of the sector – political neutrality, for example – are pretty soon herded out. Look at the issues around direct disbursement, or evidence-based interventions…

   Thinking gets your funding cut. That’s why people in the sector, who want to remain in the funded areas, keep their mouths shut.

   $0.02, but tell me I’m wrong

3. Paul Currion | November 24, 2011 at 13:30 |

   Hi Vinay, I like to think that being wrong is a badge of honour, as long as you’re wearing your jacket the right way around, which is something that I frequently overlook.

   I don’t think the humanitarian sector is a ghetto – in fact, I’d glibly propose that the humanitarian sector has a higher throughput of staff from a wider range of other sectors than any other work area in the history of the world. (Or at least it did until it became a career, and now an increasing percentage of aid workers are e.g. international relations graduates. THERE’S NOTHING WRONG WITH INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, but if you really want to help people you’d be better off doing an engineering degree, amirite?)

   The humanitarian sector is also filled to the brim with people who question its fundamental assumptions. Again, I’d glibly propose that the humanitarian sector is more self-flagellating than any other except the priesthood, especially around the principles. (A beautiful but outlying example of this might be MSF’s recent book on how much compromise they suffer when principles hit the real world. I agree that the sector isn’t that open in public, but in private? We hate ourselves a lot of the time.)

   I’m not sure why you cite direct disbursement as an example (by which I assume you mean cash disbursement?). From being marginal and opposed, it swung into mainstream discourse over the last few years and is increasingly widespread, and is likely to become a standard tool in the kit in the future. I agree that the sector is conservative overall, and has difficulty managing innovation effectively – my belief is that there is a lot of innovation out there, but no mechanisms for recognising and encouraging it. Hence my support for the Humanitarian Innovation Fund, which is one solution to that.

   One reason that I find your thinking interesting (although wrong – note, discuss elsewhere) is because you’re not part of the sector, by which I meant you aren’t located professionally within the sector (which doesn’t mean that you can’t make valuable contributions, of course). The main reason for interest is that you pull together ideas from all over into an interesting shape, and then push out to see if it will break. I appreciate this because I do the same (I just don’t write about it as much as I should). By “interesting thinkersâ€

4. Pingback: Blood and Milk » Blog Archive » Where are the interesting aid thinkers?

5. K. Irani | January 14, 2012 at 23:42 |

   Vinay is right on to point to political neutrality and the non-ideology-ideology of much of the humanitarian field. When looking at the notion of institutions of helping others we see two main ideologies. One is the dominant powers that be offering services and short term help to alleviate the pain of the “downtrodden”. Those that suffer because of the policies created by the dominant group. This aid comes from on high, rarely involving the “client” in deep, respectful, and meaningful ways where her/his thinking is central to the effort.

   The other area is self-help and mutual aid groups that come out of the organization and thinking of the “downtrodden”. Such initiatives usually have larger political goals, such as the elimination of some form of oppression. However, a strategy to that larger goal is to offer services or aid so that the community/constituency can become active and conscious. (In the USA many free breakfast programs for poor children were started by the Black Panther Party as a way to offer help, but also educate and organize the parents. Most such programs today are stripped of any political or power analysis).

   Today, many large international well-funded institutions serve the ideology of the powerful and aid to wash their hands of having to address power, and sharing power, so that all may have an equal chance to be happy and prosper.

6. Paul Currion | January 29, 2012 at 10:06 |

   Hi K. – thanks for the comment. I agree that the international system rests on institutions designed by the powerful, and thus usually (but not always) operates to maintain the interests of the powerful. However I do think that the line between top-down and bottom-up efforts is more blurred than we generally think, and is in a constant process of negotiation (although unfortunately the negotiation favours the powerful).

   It’s also the case that in a humanitarian context – and here I am using the word in the global sense – there is no other choice. Those affected by disasters (and to a lesser extent, conflicts) simply need support to re-establish their lives and livelihoods, regardless of the power politics involved. We might believe that this support simply perpetuates their weaker position but, when it’s life-or-death, it’s hard to see any other option.