Are Aid Organizations Upholding The Humanitarian Imperative?
Talking about sex is hard. Talking about staff misconduct—like trading sex for aid—can be like walking through a legal, financial, cultural, reputational and moral minefield. But talking about the rights, dignity and safety of disaster- and conflict-affected people resonates with almost every humanitarian and development aid worker I've met. And if that doesn't open the door for a thoughtful discussion on a sensitive topic, framing it around the organizational risk associated with a lack of prevention and response systems should ring an alarm bell (CEOs, I'm looking at you!).
After spending two days last week in a workshop on setting up Community Based Complaints Mechanisms to address Sexual Exploitation and Abuse (SEA) of beneficiaries by aid workers,* I'm struck by all that remains to be done to build organizational intolerance for and action to address SEA. A few things are clear— organizations need 1) a code of conduct, 2) a formal system that is financially empowered to respond to allegations, and 3) a culture that doesn't tolerate such actions by its staff or partners. This isn't easy, and unwavering commitment from the highest levels within all organizations is a necessity before these things can be institutionalized. The next logical step is initiating a system wherein organizations provide avenues for beneficiaries report allegations of SEA, a system one that should be integrated with other complaints (or, as I prefer to call them—suggestions and feedback) mechanisms.
At this year's InterAction Forum, one participant noted that sexual exploitation and abuse of beneficiaries should be seen as one of the basest and grossest violation of humanitarian principles. I'd have to agree. So, I'm encouraging everyone reading this to actively contribute to a culture within your organization that prioritizes the dignity and voice of beneficiaries. As a simple first step, that might be refamiliarizing yourself with your organization's code of conduct and the systems in place to support it. If, by some small chance, your code or systems need improvement, get in touch with InterAction and we can help.
Also, check out www.interaction.org/sea, where in the coming weeks we will be posting some good tools and two e-learnings on preventing and responding to SEA.
A shout out to the U.S. Department of State's Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration (https://www.facebook.com/State.PRM) who supported this workshop in a series over the past year, and who continue to fund dedicated InterAction staff to work on prevention and response to sexual exploitation and abuse.
