Development Policy Centre Podcast

Plenary session, 2017 Australasian Aid Conference Chair: Stephen Howes, ANU Speakers: Robin Davies, ANU Adam Kamradt-Scott, University of Sydney Phoebe Wynn-Pope, Australian Red Cross Paul McPhun, Medecins Sans Frontieres Australia Jamie Isbister, DFAT The humanitarian aid system is in crisis. It’s a crisis of identity, financing and conduct. Agencies set up to deal with the immediate impacts of traumatic events find themselves have become de facto providers of long-term development assistance to displaced communities. Agencies set up to develop global norms and provide technical assistance to governments are facing pressure to coordinate flash responses to transboundary threats. In aggregate, funding for crisis response falls far short of needs and is ad hoc and short-term. Humanitarian actors are more than ever divided over traditional principles of humanitarian action, particularly independence and impartiality. Many of these problems have been thrown into sharp relief by the civil conflict in Syria and it