International humanitarian agencies invested more effort and energy into being “accountable to affected people” (AAP) in responding to the 2013 Typhoon Haiyan response in the Philippines than ever before. This briefing paper summarises powerful research into how affected people experienced these accountability efforts, comparing their perspectives with the perspectives of the agencies themselves. It reveals that, while important advances have been made, there are still some fundamental obstacles to overcome. This paper summarises the organisational and systemic factors that enabled some agencies to make real progress in AAP and the factors that inhibited others. The overall aim is to inform current debates and initiatives to improve the ways in which humanitarian agencies engage with affected populations.
The research was carried out between November 2014 and February 2015. It is based on qualitative methods.