Humanitarianism & War Project

	\|\|\|\| Status Report #27: November 18, 1997.
	THIS IS ANOTHER in our series of reports designed to keep the stakeholders of the Humanitarianism and War Project and its increasingly wide circle of users current on our work. This report covers the period since July 18, 1997.
	CONTENTS:
	Phase III Activities Support Activities and Publications Publications

	PHASE III ACTIVITIES
	Research coordinators, colleagues, consultants, and Project staff converged on September 22 for a meeting at the Humanitarianism and War Project's base at the Watson Institute. The day-long session launched a multi-year sequence of new research into the dynamics of learning by humanitarian organizations after the Cold War. The research is tailored to the expressed needs of the humanitarian agencies that constitute the Project's primary constituency. Materials will be designed for their use in reflection and training. Findings and recommendations will also be of interest to the Project's other main constituencies--policymakers and academics.
	An Issues Note prepared by Project Co-directors Larry Minear and Thomas G. Weiss provided a conceptual framework for the day's discussions and for the new research. The framework will continue to evolve over time. Giles Whitcomb (Research Coordinator for our examination of Humanitarian Interactions), Neil MacFarlane (Humanitarian Politics), and Ian Smillie (Humanitarian Impacts) solicited feedback on the issues and challenges in each research cluster.
	Since September, we have continued to refine the research issues and challenges, identify consultants, mobilize additional funding, and lay the groundwork for visits to the agencies whose work will be reviewed in detail. We plan regular consultations with stakeholders to receive guidance, test hypotheses, and shape our publications along usable lines. One such meeting in a series of policy dialogues with a select group of senior officials from NGOs will be held in New York in January.
	Research and publications growing out of earlier work (for example, on the humanitarian impacts of economic sanctions and on media relations and humanitarian action in the Caucasus) will also be forthcoming. We welcome your feedback and suggestions regarding the issues identified and your own agency's experience in dealing with them.
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	SUPPORT
	We are grateful for contributions received since the time of our last Status Report from the World Health Organization, UNICEF, the United Nations Staff College, the Mennonite Central Committees of the United States and Canada, and the American Red Cross. In addition to these six, the list of contributors to Phase 3 of our work also includes the Andrew W. Mellon, Ford, and McKnight Foundations, the UN Department of Humanitarian Affairs, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, the World Food Programme, the International Organization for Migration, the Dutch and U.S. governments, the Danish Refugee Council, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, Lutheran World Relief, Save the Children US, and World Vision. We look forward to the confirmation of grants from other organizations in the coming months.
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	ACTIVITIES & PUBLICATIONS
	We held a workshop to launch a new set of training materials for humanitarian organizations on media issues in New York on July 24. The materials were prepared by the University of Wisconsin's Disaster Management Center and Interworks, drawing upon the Project's 1996 study, The News Media, Civil War, and Humanitarian Action, by Minear, Weiss, and Colin Scott. Special contributions for the undertaking, including preparation of materials and convening of the workshop, were received from UNDHA, the International Organization for Migration, the American Red Cross, and World Vision. Copies of the trainee self-study materials and instructor's package may be obtained from the Disaster Management Center, 432 North Lake Street, Madison, WI 53706 or at http://epdweb.engr.wisc.edu/dmc/ at a cost of $10.00 for an electronic copy. Humanitarian organizations are encouraged to make use of these materials in their own in-service training courses and to keep us posted on their utility.
	New York was the scene of a second workshop, this one convened by UNDHA to review the draft report, Toward More Humane and Effective Sanctions Management: Enhancing the Capacity of the United Nations System. Comments received from the various humanitarian agencies present were incorporated into the final report, which was published in early October. The findings and recommendations of the report, which was prepared at the request of the United Nations by the Fourth Freedom Forum of Goshen, Indiana, the Kroc Institute at the University of Notre Dame, and the Project, will be reviewed at a meeting of the UN InterAgency Standing Committee later this month in Geneva.
	Also underway at the moment is a study undertaken at the request of UNICEF of its experience in selected countries regarding the transition from emergency relief to reconstruction and development. Carried out by Joanna Macrae and Mark Bradbury of the Overseas Development Institute in London, this research will figure prominently in our own work on Issue 5: Capitalizing on Development Potential. The results will be shared in a debriefing at UNICEF headquarters in January 1998.
	The Project's Co-directors have participated in a number of other international missions and meetings. At the request of the UN Staff College, Larry Minear served as a member of a UN Inter-Agency Mission in September/October to draft a strategic framework for international assistance in Afghanistan. Afghanistan is one of several countries selected by the UN's Administrative Committee on Coordination (ACC) in which a special effort will be made to enhance the effectiveness of current UN policies and programs in the area of post-conflict peacebuilding. The team's report will be the subject of a colloquium of senior UN officials at UN headquarters. Minear prepared a separate report that reviews the strategic planning process and its potential for replication in other conflict situations.
	Thomas Weiss served as a resource person at a consultation sponsored by the World Health Organization in Annecy, France in November on the issue of health as a bridge to peace. In addition to contributing to WHO work in this area, our participation advances our own research on Issue 4, managing the conflict connection. Weiss also made presentations on "Operational Issues for the UN System and NGOs" at a conference in Bergen, Norway, organized by The Center for Development Studies and the Christian Michelsen Institute and on "Moral Issues in Humanitarian Crises" at the Pearson International Peacekeeping Training Centre in Cornwallis, Nova Scotia.
	Early this fall we updated our website to make it more accessible to users, now numbering some 300-400 each week. We also added an extensive list of links as a resource to our users as well as an electronic order-form for publications that cannot be downloaded directly from the web. We are hoping that this resource constitutes a kind of "one-stop shopping" opportunity for researchers. The website will be regularly updated to reflect the progress of our new research. We welcome feedback, particularly suggestions for making the information more serviceable still.
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	PUBLICATIONS
	Three publications have appeared since our last Status Report, with two additional works scheduled for publication during December.
	Toward More Humane and Effective Sanctions Management: Enhancing The Capacity of The United Nations System, by Larry Minear, David Cortright, Julia Wagler, George A. Lopez, and Thomas G. Weiss. New York: Department of Humanitarian Affairs, October 1997 (54 pp.)
	"Cooperation and Conflict: Humanitarian Action in the Post-Cold War World," by Thomas G. Weiss, in Eric Belgrad and Nitza Nachmias, eds. The Politics of International Humanitarian Aid. Westport: Praeger, 1997, pp. 171-187.
	Beyond UN Subcontracting: Task-sharing with Regional Security Arrangements and Service-Providing NGOs, edited by Thomas G. Weiss, a special issue of the Third World Quarterly, vol. 18 no. 3, 1997, and subsequently by London: Macmillan, 1997.
	The Humanitarian Impacts of Economic Sanctions on Burundi will appear in December as a Watson Institute Occasional Paper and on our website. Written by consultants Eric Hoskins and Samantha Nutt based on research conducted earlier in the year in the Great Lakes region, the study offers the first detailed assessment of the economic and political impacts of the sanctions imposed by governments of the region on civilians in Burundi and on the agencies assisting them. A preliminary report is already available on our website.
	Scheduled for publication in mid-December is Political Gain and Civilian Pain: The Humanitarian Impact of Economic Sanctions, edited by Thomas G. Weiss, David Cortright, George Lopez, and Larry Minear. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1998. In addition to a Foreword by Lakhdar Brahimi and an analytical framework provided by the authors, the volume contains individual chapters on South Africa (by Neta Crawford), Iraq (Eric Hoskins), the Former Yugoslavia (Julia Devin and Jaleh Dashti-Gibson), and Haiti (Sarah Zaidi).
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