ngo case study > strategic criteria

4/ “Humanitarian intelligence”

Considering the complexity of relief programmes in armed conflicts, the criterion of the political awareness is finally what enables to understand the professional performance of an NGO. In fact, none of the other criteria is sufficient, taken alone, to identify the humanitarian character of a charity.

Indeed, an NGO’s ideological involvement does not always imply dubious programmes. A support to a guerrilla can turn out to be positive as long as it respects the Geneva Conventions. Among the various “humanitarian branches” of African armed movements, ERA (Eritrean Relief Association) and REST (Relief Society of Tigray) were very different from empty shells like the SRRA (Sudan Relief and Rehabilitation Association), in Sudan, and they have really sought to help people in need respectively in Eritrea and Ethiopia. In other words, the support to a belligerent can be less important than the incapacity to appreciate the reliability of local partners. The fairness of a political cause is certainly not enough to certify the humanitarian position of one of the parties at war: fighting the Islamic junta in power in Khartoum, for instance, does not turn the SRRA into the democratic apparatus of a guerrilla famous for its violations of human rights. In the same way, good intentions are no excuse for humanitarian blindness.

The impossible political neutrality in the field, another strategic criteria, is not so much of a problem when it shows a real empathy with the victims. Politicisation is not always opposed to humanitarian goals since it assigns international NGOs to watch, testify, report, advocate and lobby, especially during multilateral negotiations on the protection of refugees, human rights, environment or the establishment of a criminal court in charge of punishing crimes against humanity. Handicap International did much in favour of the treaty banning the use of landmines. Thanks to many petitions, Doctors Without Borders (Médecins sans frontières) managed to get a parliamentary committee to inquire on the role of France in Rwanda; not to mention the active diplomacy of mediators such as the Community of Sant’Egidio which helped to put an end to the civil war in Mozambique in 1992.

The financial dependence on institutional backers is not a discriminatory criterion either, as we have seen: NGOs can diversify their public funds to avoid being the subcontractor of a donor state, and they sometimes even give up official support when the pursuit of an aid operation is counter-productive for the victims. Moreover, private funds are not untouched by conditions. Some corporate donors are deeply involved in the preparation of programmes and they impose geographical or thematic constraints on a humanitarian project. This tend to be a problem patrons like mining or oil companies are already parties to a conflict.

The absence of transparency, finally, is not automatically the sign of bad will, especially when one thinks about the small third world associations which cannot even afford a computer. From that point of view, the analytical capacity of a humanitarian actor constitutes without doubt the most important criterion in the matter. During emergencies, only a few NGOs take the time to try, more or less empirically, to understand the local context and to adapt their programmes in consequence. As the staff of an NGO changes frequently, and there is little “institutional memory”, learning the lessons from the past is not easy.