An interview with UN relief chief Tom Fletcher | Rethinking Humanitarianism
The New Humanitarian
“It's not just our finances that are under attack, but it's also our morale and our legitimacy.” In a fresh season of the podcast, TNH CEO Tammam Aloudat, our new host, sits down with people who have something important to say about the future of aid. In this episode, he’s joined by the UN’s emergency aid chief, Tom Fletcher, to discuss the humanitarian reset, the need for more mental health support given “enormous amounts of trauma”, and whether he should be the last white British man in the role. Guests: Tom Fletcher, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and...
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Don’t look away from Gaza | What’s Unsaid
The New Humanitarian
On 7 October 2023, Rita Baroud was a 20-year-old in Gaza thinking about doing a master’s degree. Today, evacuated to France after surviving nearly 20 months of genocide, she’s a journalist who recently met with Macron and told him, “You have to stop this bloodshed”. In a special What’s Unsaid episode, she speaks to Eric Reidy, our editor managing coverage of Gaza. They have been working together for the past year on a series of first-person articles about how lives in Gaza have been torn apart. These have now been collected into a series titled “”. Please take a moment to...
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What’s missing is a relationship with the grassroots | Power Shift
The New Humanitarian
Power Shift is an experiment in dialogue that puts decision-makers in aid and philanthropy and those affected by their decisions in honest, one-on-one conversations about the aid sector’s inequalities. ___ In the latest episode of Power Shift, Hafsar Tameesuddin, a stateless Rohingya refugee and LGBTQ+ rights activist, and Raouf Mazou, one of the UN refugee agency’s highest-ranking officials, navigate the complex dynamics of global refugee protection, the righteous anger of refugees and stateless people, and the challenges of supporting the more than 122 million people around the world...
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Should we talk to the jihadists? | What’s Unsaid
The New Humanitarian
After a decade of fighting jihadist groups in the Sahel – and losing – isn’t it time for governments to try dialogue? Speaking about her research project Negotiating with Islamist and jihadi armed groups: practices, discourses and mechanisms across Asia and Africa, Laura Berlingozzi tells What’s Unsaid host Obi Anyadike she’s detected a “timid openness” from the region's military juntas for dialogue. What’s Unsaid is a podcast by The New Humanitarian, where we explore open secrets and uncomfortable conversations around the world’s conflicts and disasters.
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No one wants to depend on aid, including refugees | Power Shift
The New Humanitarian
Power Shift is an experiment in dialogue that puts decision-makers in aid and philanthropy and those affected by their decisions in honest, one-on-one conversations about the aid sector’s inequalities. ___ What happens when a stateless activist sits down with one of the UN refugee agency’s highest-ranking officials? What if they had the chance to tell him what it’s like to lose everything, to have to depend on aid, and what it would take for refugees to have more agency? Can the decisions he makes in Geneva affect the lives of refugees on the other side of the world? And could their...
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Is it time to declare a humanitarian crisis in the US? | What’s Unsaid
The New Humanitarian
Daylight abductions of permanent residents. Mass deportations with no due process. Homelessness at a record high. Outbreaks of previously eliminated childhood diseases. Sounds like a humanitarian crisis could be unfolding in the US. “When is the UN going to come in?” asks Carlos Menchaca, a legislator, activist, organiser, and former New York City council member. What’s Unsaid is a podcast by The New Humanitarian, where we explore open secrets and uncomfortable conversations around the world’s conflicts and disasters.
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Change is so incremental that it’s not happening | Power Shift
The New Humanitarian
is an experiment in dialogue that puts decision-makers in aid and philanthropy and those affected by their decisions in honest, one-on-one conversations about the aid sector’s inequalities. ___ In the second episode of Power Shift, we continue our candid conversation between Grand Bargain ambassador Michael Köhler, formerly a senior leader of the EU’s humanitarian aid arm, and Nadine Saba, founder of a Lebanese grassroots NGO. As the global humanitarian system faces unprecedented challenges – from donor cuts to accusations of colonial structures – they explore whether the system can...
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Do we want to relinquish power, or not? | Power Shift
The New Humanitarian
is an experiment in dialogue that puts decision-makers in aid and philanthropy and those affected by their decisions in honest, one-on-one conversations about the aid sector’s inequalities. ___ Michael Köhler and Nadine Saba are just two of the many people tasked with advancing the goals of the Grand Bargain – one of the most ambitious attempts at delivering humanitarian aid more effectively and efficiently. As such, they often log into the same meetings by videoconference. And yet, Köhler, one of three ambassadors tasked with overseeing the process, and Saba, a Grand Bargain...
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Why reforming humanitarianism isn't enough | First Person
The New Humanitarian
The Trump administration’s aid freeze is a pivotal moment for the humanitarian sector. Veteran aid worker and TNH CEO Tammam Aloudat doesn’t believe that simply restoring funding will fix a broken system. While imagining what remaking humanitarianism might look like, he makes a plea: “Let’s start shifting the conversation.” The New Humanitarian aims to amplify the voices of refugees, asylum seekers, and people affected by conflict and disaster – placing them at the centre of the conversations about the policies and events that shape their lives. Listen to more First Person stories...
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If not (US) aid, then what? | Event
The New Humanitarian
The US aid freeze has exposed not only the fragility of humanitarian funding but also longstanding dependencies, vulnerabilities, and power dynamics that demand a broader reckoning. This event will explore the urgent need for structural change, seeking clarity and ideas amid the chaos. In what we hope will be one conversation of many, we reimagine the future of humanitarian aid in an era of mounting challenges and transformative opportunities. SPEAKERS The event was moderated by TNH CEO Tammam Aloudat, who was joined by: Deborah Doane – Author of The INGO Problem: Power, privilege and...
info_outlinePower Shift is an experiment in dialogue that puts decision-makers in aid and philanthropy and those affected by their decisions in honest, one-on-one conversations about the aid sector’s inequalities.
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Michael Köhler and Nadine Saba are just two of the many people tasked with advancing the goals of the Grand Bargain – one of the most ambitious attempts at delivering humanitarian aid more effectively and efficiently.
As such, they often log into the same meetings by videoconference. And yet, Köhler, one of three ambassadors tasked with overseeing the process, and Saba, a Grand Bargain sherpa representing Global South NGOs, have never spoken one-on-one. Until now.
Over the course of seven weeks in mid-2024, Köhler and Saba met over Zoom as part of the Power Shift experiment – one leading high-level meetings from Brussels, and the other contending with real-life humanitarian crises on the ground as both a local organisation leader, and citizen.
Much has changed in the aid sector since these initial meetings, but the spirited, yet convivial, debates between Köhler and Saba have taken on a new urgency as the world reacts to the loss of major Western humanitarian funding.
“Are we relinquishing power? Are we keeping it in the hands of the donors?” Saba challenged Köhler, “And if we're keeping it in the hands of the donor, how much are they attuned to what is happening on the fields? Not much.”
Listen in to the no-holds-barred conversations between Köhler and Saba as they take on a range of topics, from the yawning gap between headquarters-level decisions and realities in the field, to the dilemma of donor countries’ competing obligations to constituents and affected people, to the need to treat the Grand Bargain – and other attempts at change – with a lot more urgency.
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