This review essay critically examines three recent books on the digitalization and datafication of humanitarian action: #Help, Humanitarian Extractivism, and Technocolonialism. Each monograph offers a compelling analysis of the myriad ways that humanitarians’ use of digital technologies has reshaped governance and the international order, created new risks, and exacerbated power imbalances. Fundamentally, each book concludes that the various transformations technology has wrought in humanitarianism are, at best, unintended, inconsistent, or unfulfilled in their impact and, at worst, deeply problematic. Setting aside the books’ contributions, each leaves out two important elements. First, in selecting examples, the authors leave mostly unanswered the question of what, if any, positive impacts data and technology have had on or for humanitarian response and those whom it is intended to help. Second, each is mostly silent with regard to practical steps that can be taken to address its critiques, with only Technocolonialism offering three broad avenues for reform. In the context of the current crisis in the humanitarian sector, with the closure of USAID and dramatic declines in funding, there is a need for pragmatic options for the future that, by necessity, involve a creative reimagining of the digital infrastructures underpinning the humanitarian response.

This paper examines the humanitarian work of Taiwan’s Tzu-Chi in the U.S. and discusses how the work in the U.S. has facilitated Tzu-Chi in becoming a global humanitarian NGO. Founded in 1966 by a Buddhist nun and a group of women in Taiwan, Tzu-Chi is now the largest civil association working in Taiwan and a reputable humanitarian INGO. However, the internationalization of Tzu-Chi is often taken for granted. This paper problematizes the internationalization process and engages with two theoretical perspectives—resource dependence and structural opportunity. Both perspectives cannot properly explain Tzu-Chi’s internationalization process. Drawing on historical materials and engaging with social movement theories, we argue that the U.S. experience has offered (1) cognitive liberation; (2) learning of new organizational forms. This study provides a rare case study on how a non-Western NGO becomes an INGO and offers a co-evolutionary angle to the internationalization process.

This article sets out to establish a taxonomy of Christian faith-based humanitarian agencies, challenging assumptions that such agencies are similarly informed by Christian theology and pursue a uniform mission. Christian principles and missionary efforts are central in the development of humanitarianism, and the agencies associated with the Christian tradition comprise a prominent and growing portion of international humanitarian agencies. Little, however, is known about how Christian faith-based agencies diverge from one another in their orientation and operations, how their theological tradition shapes their humanitarianism, and whether or how they are distinct from secular agencies. Examining the humanitarianism of Christian faith-based agencies in light of their theological roots, this article delineates three classifications of Christian faith-based agencies: Accommodative–Humanitarian, Synthesis–Humanitarian, and Evangelistic–Humanitarian agencies. The study demonstrates the importance of distinguishing not simply between faith-based and secular agencies, but among faith-based agencies themselves.

Drawing on fieldwork in Greece, we examine the politics and practices of autonomous volunteering in the context of the migration crisis. This involves individuals engaging in activities to support migrants through non-registered, self-organized and self-governed groups that work independent from and in some cases, even in opposition to NGOs. We consider autonomous volunteering as a form of collective action and argue that it constitutes an alternative humanitarianism. While recent literature has sought to identify the rise of emergent practices of alternative humanitarianism in Europe, research has often overlooked how autonomous volunteers distinguish themselves from, relate to and collaborate with NGOs and conversely, how NGOs view and engage with them. We found that despite their critiques of NGOs and their determination to work independently, there were instances of cooperation between autonomous volunteers and NGOs. These interactions did not become substantive alliances, as the work of NGOs and autonomous volunteers continued to be disconnected from each other.

While the principled case for humanitarian accountability is relatively straightforward, the practice is demonstrably more complicated, necessitating constant negotiation among stakeholders. However, despite the wave of research into nongovernmental accountability, few empirical studies have grappled with the phenomenon’s inherently contested nature. This paper foregrounds tensions arising in the elaboration of nonprofit accountability. Its approach is informed by critical constructivist theory, an international relations approach attuned to social power, identity and exclusion, and conceptual contestation; its conclusions are supported by interview data with key stakeholders. Focusing on the Humanitarian Accountability Partnership (HAP) International, it finds that initial consensus on the desirability of beneficiary (downward) accountability quickly gave way to principled disagreements and operational difficulties. Specifically, the initiation stage of HAP was marked by two conflicts—a debate about enforcement and a turf war over control—culminating in rebranding and relocation. The implementation stage was characterized by tensions over certification and intra-organizational struggles over leadership. The contemporary practice of accountability is shown to be a contingent and contested social process, with humanitarian identity and practice ultimately at stake.

During humanitarian crises, diasporas often contribute vital support to the survival and reconstruction of their communities of origin. This ‘diaspora humanitarianism’ reshapes the international humanitarian system, but its scope, modality and impact remain understudied, partly due to the ‘invisible’ nature of diaspora interventions. This paper expands the understanding on the how and why diasporas engage in humanitarian responses, by examining survey data on the responses of six Australia-based diasporas to a range of crises (i.e. sociopolitical crises, military conflicts and disasters). Our findings demonstrate that diasporas’ contributions focus on the household level, present gender-differentiated patterns and vary according to the nature of the crises. While our data reveal a ‘coordination gap’ between diaspora communities and the humanitarian sector, these communities are keen to cooperate with other actors. These results unveil not only the strengths and challenges of diaspora humanitarianism, but potential avenues to integrate it to the humanitarian system.

This paper examines whether three sets of factors—humanitarianism, the South Korean government’s official aid, and concerns regarding performance—affect South Korean CSOs’ decisions regarding aid recipients and the amount of aid to them. The statistical results of these two-stage analyses show that South Korean CSOs take into consideration different sets of factors at each stage of their aid allocation decisions. While humanitarianism and ODA allocation are consistently important at both stages of South Korean CSOs’ aid allocation decisions, performance concerns for aid effectiveness and efficiency (language and religion) matter especially at the second stage. Governance level of a developing country has a positive relationship with aid allocation decisions, while the direction of influence changes when only recipient countries are included in the regression analysis. These findings suggest that concerns regarding accountability and autonomy of CSOs in the context of their growing engagement in development cooperation may be unwarranted.

How do the gendered patterns of foreign aid operate in the rare occurrence when refugee men are the focus of aid programs? This article uses critical narrative analysis to understand refugee men’s navigation of gendered hierarchies in the aid program Darfur United, a refugee men’s soccer team formed in eastern Chad’s refugee camps. Through juxtaposing the objectives and aims of Darfur United as a program for men with those of aid programs for refugee women and children, I argue that men must demonstrate innocuous and essentialized practices of masculinity to receive care, while ultimately serving as conduits for increased humanitarian support for refugee women and children. This analysis extends existing literature on the absence of humanitarian programs for refugee men and disrupts dominant understandings of gender and refugee men. By centering men’s own understandings of aid’s gendered patterns, it expands contemporary discussions on gender, displacement, and humanitarianism.

The relationship involving the unknown other has so far been exclusively translated into the language of fear as part of the securitised response to migration. The fear of the unknown other divides people into those who are associated with illegality and chaos and those who need to be protected from such ‘danger’. In contrast, the humanitarian approach to migration challenges the securitised response to the unknown other: it refuses to separate the self from the other and instead appeals to the idea of common humanity. This paper draws on the idea of the gothic to develop a humanitarian way of embracing the fear of the unknown. In the gothic framework, the other is feared not because of categorical differences between the self and the other, embodied in the securitised response to migration, but categorical ambiguity between the two. Using UK-based welcome activism as an example, I argue that gothic-inspired humanitarianism embraces the fear of the unknown other through the sharing of not knowing oneself. This offers a new basis for solidarity, in the language of fear, without resorting to the securitised relationship between the self and the other.