The coordination of international intervention in conflicts is an old sore. Although nobody is in principle against coordination, in practice efforts to achieve coordinated action lead to irritation and frustration. Coordination efforts can quickly provoke institutional 'turf' wars. The discussion about coordination then degenerates into one of power and authority. Nothing quite reveals the 'international humanitarian system' as the opposite of a 'system', as a study of the coordination between humanitarian actors intervening in conflict. ' Humanitarian action' tends to appear as a rather bewildering array of institutional actors running around in an 'arena' with shifting alliances and competing interests that sometimes closely resemble the 'clanic factionalism' that aid workers so deplore in some societies they operate in.
