Recent decades have seen a significant expansion in the
international humanitarian sector which has led to a significant
expansion in the number and complexity of inter-organizational
networks associated with humanitarian policy and programming.
Networks are a crucial mechanism through which humanitarian
actors’ policies and programmes are guided and coordinated at
all levels across the system. Yet there has been very little focused
research or strategic analysis of the role of networks across the
sector (Ramalingam, forthcoming 2010). The limited research
that has been carried out has focused on the effectiveness
and functions of particular networks, rather than exploring
the role of networks in the governance and functions of the
humanitarian system as a whole.
This study recognises that assessing the importance of networks
depends not only on exploring how well individual networks
function, but on how networks interact to influence particular
and global humanitarian actions and outcomes. It describes
the most significant networks in the sector, and analyses how
networks affect the governance of humanitarian policy and
practice across the system as a whole. The study is based
principally upon a wide-ranging desk-based literature review
and semi-structured interviews with representatives and experts
from a range of organisations, including country-level interviews
conducted in Sri Lanka, Sudan and Uganda in early 2010.