At the World Humanitarian Summit in 2016, an agreement was made between some of thelargest international humanitarian organizations and donors to implement measures toenhance partnerships between international and local humanitarian organizations, in an effortto localize humanitarian responses. Since then, criticism has been raised that there exists agap between policy and practice in relation to localization and partnerships, arguing that nosubstantial effort is being placed to address uneven power dynamics or decision-makingpower within these local/international partnerships. This thesis utilized a case-study approachon Christian Aid´s Rohingya Crisis Response in Bangladesh, conducted in collaboration withlocal partners to examine barriers in creating equitable partnerships between international andlocal humanitarian organizations, as well as possible actions to facilitate partnership equity.A theoretical framework on equitable partnership is constructed based on the components ofequality, mutuality and transparency, informed by partnership practices of thee humanitarianpartnerships, and analyzed in relation to practices by Christian Aid in their partnership. The findings show that primary barriers to facilitating partnerships that are equitable includethe exclusion of the local partner in key processes, such as operational planning anddecision-making, lack of mutual understanding of differences in skills and capacity, resultingin responsibilities that are not clearly defined and limited opportunities for complementarity.This amounts to the conclusion that Christian Aid´s partnership lacked any actual transfer ofpower to the local partner, thus facilitating a partnership that remains hierarchical in practice.Possible actions identified to mitigate this is to jointly define support needs and capacity,create space for negotiation and flexibility, and actively include the local partner indecision-making. The findings underline that the theoretical components of equitablepartnership can be translated into practice, with the aim of creating partnerships that are inline with international localization commitments.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:uu-533268 |
| Date | January 2024 |
| Creators | Brossé, Natalie |
| Publisher | Uppsala universitet, Teologiska institutionen |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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