The humanitarian system is changing around us, but from moments of crisis come opportunities.
Amidst the understandable heartache about what has been lost and the great uncertainty about the future, there is a vital window of opportunity we must not miss to surface fresh approaches, champion new initiatives, bring in different voices, challenge existing thinking and create space for dialogue about the future of the humanitarian learning landscape.
We need to embrace this evolution, recognise what has come before, and create something new, good and lasting.
That’s why on Tuesday, 3 March, ALNAP and our members and partners are launching New Learning Landscapes, an exciting, co-created campaign to shape a more inclusive, equitable and effective humanitarian learning architecture fit for the future.
While the withdrawal last year of US funding and the announcement of cuts by other government funders was a massive shock, many declining trends were already entrenched.
Even prior to last year the humanitarian system was not how we wanted it to be. As a sector, we have long struggled to be sufficiently receptive and responsive to change on the basis of learning. The recent shifts have only re-emphasised this and risk further exacerbating it.
We know humanitarians are deeply committed to learning and finding ways to work together to share knowledge and experience. So we are asking them to share their thinking on how we can collectively protect valuable learning from before, and remind people of the wealth of knowledge we already have and the knowledge we may be missing out on or under-representing.
Far too small a proportion of the sector has been shaping and accessing the collective knowledge base. It has not been representative of the range of experience and learning that exists within the humanitarian sector. There have been increasing calls for localisation and greater levels of locally-led action for years. Yet in the learning space – just like in the operational part of the sector – we have been very slow to respond. Knowledge generation and learning spaces have continued to be dominated by Global North organisations and Northern-style approaches.
With a small number of donors funding the same organisations, there has been no incentive for change. We have fallen into a self-affirming learning loop, which reinforces the status quo rather than questioning it.
A healthier, more productive learning landscape would have far more learning points, spaces and producers contributing to a much more complex, collective and systems-based knowledge architecture. Humanitarians now need to break from old patterns and take more risks to cultivate a far greater range of initiatives globally that better represent the diversity of learning and experience that exists.
We must strive for knowledge equity and get better at recognising, valuing, respecting and using the wealth of diverse learning within the sector. Peer-reviewed PDF reports are not the only form of legitimate learning.
Before the cuts we were already acutely conscious of the negative impact of the funding environment on collective learning. The more competition between organisations, the less willing they were to share their best evidence and learning.
We can reasonably anticipate we are going to have to push even harder now to protect the collective learning space, to ensure people will prioritise working together and share their evidence and learning. But if the financing model was different, the incentives would be different. Donors could prioritise funding collectives, require all learning to be made public or impress upon organisations area-based learning approaches.
At this moment of change, what the sector needs is more collective approaches and action. That means moving away from turf wars and nurturing the interests and sustainability of their own organisations and looking more towards what we can achieve together.
While acknowledging the need to evolve, we must also value and make use of the wealth of learning from the last 25 years that sets out many priorities for action we would do well to take seriously at this time. We should remember as humanitarians we are accountable for doing exactly that. The preservation of knowledge is essential in underpinning a sector that is accountable and able to learn.
With a small number of donors funding the same organisations, there has been no incentive for change. We have fallen into a self-affirming learning loop, which reinforces the status quo rather than questioning it.
New Learning Landscapes is ALNAP’s positive, direct and collective response to the loss of learning we are experiencing and the continued threats to our knowledge culture in the humanitarian sector.
At a time where learning is more important than ever, we will be encouraging humanitarians present and past to emerge from survival mode to join a new movement to stabilise, protect, enable, co-create and expand humanitarian knowledge.
We know humanitarians are deeply committed to learning and finding ways to work together to share knowledge and experience. So we are asking them to share their thinking on how we can collectively protect valuable learning from before, and remind people of the wealth of knowledge we already have and the knowledge we may be missing out on or under-representing.
We will celebrate examples of where learning has been courageously preserved and pinpoint where vital knowledge is at-risk and immediate action is needed to guard against its loss.
We also want to envisage how humanitarian learning can be done differently in future – what has to change, what would improve things and protect against future assaults.
Together, we will renew our commitment to learning and acknowledge the huge impact our knowledge and learning initiatives have had – and are having – on humanitarian work.
Join us as we draw on our collective resolve and ingenuity and begin to shape a new chapter in humanitarian learning.
