In January 2018, the Women’s Refugee Commission (WRC) launched the Sexual Violence Project, a three-year initiative focusing on sexual violence against displaced men and boys,[1] including gay, bisexual, transgender and others with diverse sexual orientation and gender identity and/or expression…
There is a strong mandate in academic work to carefully plan and conduct research projects in alignment with the four tenets of ethical research: non-maleficence, beneficence, justice and autonomy. Indeed, university-based researchers cannot proceed without approval from an independent institutional…
In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Western research bodies and governments started establishing internal ethics review committees and these have now become the main way academic institutions address ethical concerns. In the case of non-governmental organisations (NGOs), despite conducting…
Travel medicine (TM) as a specific field emerged in the 1980s, driven in great part by the pharmaceutical industry catering for tourists from northern countries visiting tropical areas. However, why should travel-tailored health care be reserved for wealthy travellers? What…
The principles of humanity, impartiality, neutrality and independence are intended to enable, characterise and guide the delivery of humanitarian assistance. However, as conflicts grow more complex, interpretations of humanitarian principles are being questioned, particularly in areas under the control or…
Over recent years, EU migration policies have negatively affected the conditions under which humanitarian actors can carry out their work along migration routes. National Red Cross Societies are witnessing with concern how these policies are narrowing the space for them…
I first made contact with Barbara in October 2011, after hearing a BBC radio interview with her in which she denounced as premature the planned invocation of the cessation clause for Rwandan refugees. Her defence of Rwandan refugees of different…
Barbara Harrell-Bond’s major works Imposing Aid and Rights in Exile (the latter co-authored with Guglielmo Verdirame) examine aid modalities in two different eras: Southern Sudan in the early 1980s, and Kenya and Uganda in the late 1990s. They are rich…
Founded by Barbara Harrell-Bond in 2003, the Africa and Middle East Refugee Assistance (AMERA) organisation embodied her philosophies of promoting refugee voices, ensuring accountability among the people and institutions mandated to decide refugees’ destinies, and achieving normative change within the…
Being affable was not one of Barbara Harrell-Bond’s qualities. Irascible, impatient and demanding, she alienated and inspired people in equal numbers with what at times seemed to be a one-person quest to advocate for refugees. She had no time for…