FLIA’s work on humanitarianism has investigated how people and societies react to conflict. This work has charted how people respond to displacement, how they and their communities respond to their return and how international organisations and aid agencies interact in these complex dynamics.

Displaced persons

Humanitarian protection is a contested, contingent and muddled concept. The Safety of Strangers project examined the underlying motivations for humanitarian action that have been challenged by political leaders and often seem compromised or confusing to those most affected by humanitarian crises. It explored the impact of local protection mechanisms in South Sudan and its borderlands, which had been a primary site for testing humanitarian protection ideas.

One project looked at the complex political economy of diaspora return and investment in post-war states, specifically Somalia. It developed original metrics and gathered rare data to bridge the comparative scholarship on post-conflict Africa, the Middle East and Southeast Asia.

Another project looked at how refugees, internally displaced persons and former combatants negotiate and experience 'return'. It filled a large gap in current knowledge on the 'lifecycle' of conflicts in some of the world's most difficult places.

A similar project looked at the experiences of displacement in Uganda because of the Lord’s Resistance Army’s insurgency and how those affected dealt with leaving and returning to the affected region.

Resilience

Also in Uganda, our research explored how people negotiate, experience and understand their own coping strategies and resilience, as well as how external forces and interventions contribute or detract from these. Extensive fieldwork was undertaken in three post-conflict settings in Uganda: pastoralist Karamoja; areas affected by the LRA insurgency; and West Nile, which has hosted multiple waves of refugees from South Sudan.

Legitimacy

The regime of Omar Al Bashir ruled Sudan from 1989 to 2019 when a popular revolt forced him out of office. This project examines the role of Western donors in shaping legitimacy during a brief period of democratic transition in Sudan in 2019. It specifically focused on higher education and social protection. It looked at how different actors within the reform process perceive reform priorities and processes as morally legitimate or illegitimate.

In South Sudan, FLIA studied the historical and political dynamics of local and national NGOs. Investigating these organisations’ origins, institutional development and contemporary functions, the project informed the UK Department for International Development’s engagement with the localisation agenda in South Sudan.