Increasingly humanitarian NGOs operate in the context of armed conflicts where the security risks are higher than in contexts of natural disaster. Working in Afghanistan, Somalia, Sudan, South Sudan, Pakistan and Sri Lanka is particularly dangerous for humanitarians. This existential threat affects the physical existence of aid workers and the implementation of humanitarian programs, and the core beliefs of humanitarians and the underlying principles of humanitarian action. For NGOs it is difficult to accept that they are attacked despite their good intentions, sometimes even by the very communities they seek to help. For these reasons, humanitarian NGOs have to change their approaches to security by not only adapting their policies, procedures and structures to the changing environment, but also reviewing the underlying principles of their work. This book contributes to debates by demonstrating how issues of (in)security affect humanitarian NGOs and the humanitarian identity, situating the structural changes within the humanitarian NGO community in the context of conflict aid governance and explains how non-state actors establish their own governance structures, independent from state-sponsored solutions, and contributes to the emerging literature on the redefinition of the concept of epistemic communities.

Increasingly humanitarian NGOs operate in the context of armed conflicts where the security risks are higher than in contexts of natural disaster. For NGOs it is difficult to accept that they are attacked despite their good intentions, sometimes even by the very communities they seek to help. As such, humanitarian NGOs have to change their approaches to security by not only adapting their policies, procedures and structures to the changing environment, but also review the underlying principles of their work. This book contributes to debates by demonstrating how issues of (in-)security affect humanitarian NGOs and the humanitarian identity, situating the structural changes within the humanitarian NGO community in the context of conflict aid governance and explains how non-state actors establish their own governance structures, independent from state-sponsored solutions, and contributes to the emerging literature on the redefinition of the concept of epistemic communities.

Attacks against nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in high-risk conflict zones have increased exponentially over the last two decades. However, the few existing empirical studies on NGO insecurity have tended to focus on external factors influencing attacks, with little attention paid to the actions of aid workers themselves. To fill this gap, this dissertation theorizes that aid workers may have contributed to their own insecurity by engaging in greater political action. Both quantitative and qualitative methods are used to assess the impact of political activity by NGOs on the insecurity of aid workers. The quantitative analyses test the theory at two levels. The first is a large-N country-level analysis of 117 nations from 1999 to 2015 using panel corrected standard errors. The second is a subnational-level statistical analysis of four case studies: Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, and Colombia from 2000 to 2014. Both the country- and provincial- level analyses show that the magnitude of aid tends to be a significant determinant of aid worker security. The qualitative methods of "structured-focused comparison" and "process tracing" are used to analyze the four cases. Results show that aid workers are most likely to be victims of politically-motivated attacks while in-transit. Consistent with the quantitative findings, it is speculated that if workers are engaged in a large-scale project over an extended period of time, attackers will be able to monitor their daily activities and routines closely, making it easier to orchestrate a successful ambush. Furthermore, the analysis reveals that political statements made by NGOs—regardless of their sectors of activity—have increased insecurity for the broader aid community. These results dispel the myth that humanitarian activity has historically been independent, impartial, and neutral. Several NGOs have relied on this false assumption for security, believing that adherence to core principles has contributed to "humanitarian space." The results also dispel the popular NGO assumption that targeted attacks are not official tactics of organized militants, but rather the result of criminality or mistaken identity. In fact, the overwhelming majority of aid workers attacked in high-risk conflict zones have been targeted by political actors.

The mass media, press and television have always been central in the formation of corporate identity and the promotion of business image and reputation. This volume provides a new perspective into the interrelationships between media and organizations across three dimensions: Media as Business, Media in business and Business in the media.

Humanitarian aid workers increasingly remain present in contexts of violence and are injured, kidnapped, and killed as a result. Since 9/11 and in response to these dangers, aid organizations have fortified themselves to shield their staff and programs from outside threats. In Aid in Danger, Larissa Fast critically examines the causes of violence against aid workers and the consequences of the approaches aid agencies use to protect themselves from attack. Based on more than a decade of research, Aid in Danger explores the assumptions underpinning existing explanations of and responses to violence against aid workers. According to Fast, most explanations of attacks locate the causes externally and maintain an image of aid workers as an exceptional category of civilians. The resulting approaches to security rely on separation and fortification and alienate aid workers from those in need, representing both a symptom and a cause of crisis in the humanitarian system. Missing from most analyses are the internal vulnerabilities, exemplified in the everyday decisions and ordinary human frailties and organizational mistakes that sometimes contribute to the conditions leading to violence. This oversight contributes to the normalization of danger in aid work and undermines the humanitarian ethos. As an alternative, Fast proposes a relational framework that captures both external threats and internal vulnerabilities. By uncovering overlooked causes of violence, Aid in Danger offers a unique perspective on the challenges of providing aid in perilous settings and on the prospects of reforming the system in service of core humanitarian values.

This open access book offers an innovative account of how relief organizations’ visual depiction of Syrian displacement contributes to reproduce and reinforce a securitized account of refugees. Through visual analysis, the book demonstrates how the securitization process takes place in three different ways. First of all, even if marginally, it occurs through the reproduction of mainstream media and political accounts that have depicted refugees in terms of threats. Secondly, and more consistently, through a representation of Syrian displaced people that, despite the undeniable innovative aesthetic patterns focusing on dignity and empowerment, continue to reinforce a visual narrative around refugees in terms of victimhood and passivity. The reproduction of a securitized account takes also place through the dialectic between what is made visible in the pictures and what is not. At the same time the book identifies visual glimmers and minor displacements in the humanitarian discourse that have the potentiality to produce alternative discourses on refugees and displacement beyond the mainstream securitized ones. By showing how relief organizations’ visual representation contributes to the securitization of the refugee issue, this book provides a great resource to students and academics in migration, visuality, humanitarianism and securitization, as well as social scientists and policy-makers.