Restricted Access: Humanitarian NGOs Responses to Restrictions

• In Event: NGOs, IOs, and Human Rights Protection

Abstract

In response to both protracted conflict and natural disasters, non-governmental organizations are responsible for delivering humanitarian assistance-in the form of food, medical care, or other essential services--to people in need. However, NGOs face both logistical and administrative barriers to delivering these urgently needed goods and services. This paper describes how humanitarian NGOs respond to administrative restrictions imposed by governments. This outcome is under-studied; research on government restriction of NGOs focuses on how, when, and why governments \textit{impose} such restrictions rather than whether NGOs defer to the restrictions imposed by recipient governments or defy them by continuing their operations. I leverage data from a survey of humanitarian professionals and in-depth interviews to show that organizations defer to administrative restrictions, even when they perceive government enforcement to be unlikely. I argue that this is due to a norm among humanitarian NGOs to follow a standard set of practices to maintain access even when doing so undermines their effectiveness.

Author

• Allison Namias Grossman, Tulane University