The concept of humanitarianism has evolved greatly in recent decades, posing different implications for the operations of humanitarian NGOs. Practitioners and academics alike have recognized that the core principles of 'classical' humanitarianism (humanity, impartiality, neutrality and independence), are challenging to uphold in practice. Thus, scholars have issued different calls for ‘new’ humanitarianism that embrace the linkage between aid, sociopolitical issues and human rights, then for a data-driven turn in humanitarianism (including evaluation, sector professionalization and NGOization), and more recently, calls for relational or decolonized humanitarianism, localized humanitarianism, and even calls for a returns to classical humanitarianism, with a concerted enforcement of the core principles, emphasizing political neutrality. At this paradigmatic crossroads, humanitarian international NGOs (HINGOs) navigate the imperative to provide humanitarian relief, but also to advocate for structural changes to prevent future humanitarian catastrophes and improve livelihoods. As a result, human rights discourse has overlapped with humanitarian operations. However, human rights activism and humanitarianism have been referred to as “competing moral logics”, and scholars often treat humanitarian and human rights NGOs as theoretically distinct. I argue that aid-providing humanitarian NGOs serve important advocacy functions, due to operating in a post-neutral humanitarian space. In my dissertation, I trace ‘political dilemmas’ of humanitarianism, areas of ethical and instrumental contestation that emerge in international humanitarian aid operations in the post-neutral era, asking whether and how the adoption of rights-based advocacy by humanitarian aid agencies affects their political influence, and donor support. Each dilemma is addressed in a study corresponding to a chapter of the dissertation:
(1) How can humanitarian NGOs uphold the universalist ethos of humanitarianism when donor preferences, media narratives, and racialized empathy create strong incentives to prioritize Ukraine and frame it differently from other crises? I propose an argument that humanitarian aid appeals are an important advocacy tool used by HINGOs to frame humanitarian aid in a rights-based lens. I also argue that these appeals are not impartial, as they often apply differential framing to similar emergencies. Using an original dataset collected from emergency appeal texts from UK-based HINGOs, I examine whether certain appeals, such as those for Ukraine, demand larger donations, or emphasize cultural proximity, or geopolitical alignment compared to appeals for crises in non-Western contexts.
(2) How do HINGOs advocate for the security and human rights of LGBTQ+ persons in the Global South, when accusations of imposing LGBTQ+ rights on unwilling societies comes from both sympathetic supporters who decry ‘homocolonialism’, and queerphobic opposition from those favoring ‘traditional’ societies? The study, Humanitarian INGOs, Homocolonialism and the Global Recession of LGBTQ+ Rights, introduces the concept of “homocolonial dilemmas,” where HINGOs must balance solidarity with marginalized groups against accusations of cultural imperialism. Using the 100 largest organizations from the Global Database of Humanitarian Organizations (GDHO), I draw on data scraped from the websites of these HINGOs, to identify global patterns. I analyze whether, and under what organizational conditions (e.g. size, country of headquarters, religious orientation) HINGOs advocate for LGBTQ+ citizens
(3) What policy solutions to the climate crisis incur lower political costs for HINGOs? How can humanitarian actors retain credibility and legitimacy while sustaining the resources and public trust needed to deliver aid? Further, some HINGOs call for increased climate aid, while others call for rights-based framing and ‘climate reparations’. What might explain this variation in framing? The study What determines US public support for climate reparations? Evidence from a survey experiment tests how demands for different reparative climate justice policies, (1) financial reparations for Global South nations and (2) acceptance of climate migrants into the U.S., affect public support for the appeal and willingness to donate to a humanitarian NGO. I find that both issue frames depress public support, but that the public is less supportive of solutions involving the relocation of climate refugees. These results are moderated by the degree of ‘charitable ethnocentrism’ in the public, i.e. the belief that ‘charity begins at home’, as well as other ideational and demographic characteristics.