Whether this is the “age of crises”,[1]Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, States of Fragility 2022, OECD Publishing, 2022, https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/development/states-of-fragility-2022_c7fedf5e-en polycrisis or permacrisis, the idea that we are living in an unprecedented period of instability and uncertainty has become a common way of understanding our times. At the time of writing these lines, the future of humanitarian action and human solidarity appears even more precarious, as the erosion of multilateralism, cuts in public development aid and the global rise of the far right increasingly challenge the very notion of international cooperation.
“Crises” are regularly proclaimed in all facets of our lives, reflecting the overuse of the term and manipulation of its function. Crises are approached as disruptive events that must be managed or stopped one by one in an effort to bring back normality and order, or even as mechanisms to fuel fear and provoke a reaction against perceived threats. Rarely do crises function as evidence of our unsustainable and unequal present. When everything is a crisis, what is it?
It is in this context that climate change offers an opportunity to revisit the meaning and function of crisis in our societies and in humanitarian action. The scientific evidence about the acceleration of climate change, the destruction of ecosystems, and the growing numbers of people directly affected by climate-related events suggest that the world is on the verge of an epochal change. Such is the consensus, that the terms climate change and the climate crisis have become interchangeable.
While aid organisations have been observing, preparing and responding to the impact of climate change-related events for decades, the recent “crisification” of climate change seems to give the humanitarian system a central role in responding to it. While in 2019 OCHA’s Global Humanitarian Overview[2]Report published each year by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. All editions are available here : … Continue reading stressed the high human cost of climate change, in 2022 the report talked about the climate crisis as a threat multiplier and in 2025 the global climate emergency is flagged as the main driver of needs together with conflict, reflecting the gradual shift of attention to this issue across the humanitarian system over the last years. Despite this, the engagement of humanitarian actors with climate change is happening at a modest scale and slow pace. Humanitarian organisations seem to have reconciled climate change to their existing analytical frameworks, planning and ways of working instead of acknowledging that the nature of the climate crisis may require a fundamental reform of their mission, role and worldviews. This is also clear in how humanitarian reform processes have approached the issue of climate change: a combination of warnings about the humanitarian impact of the climate crisis, lack of urgency, apparent unwillingness to challenge the current status quo, and vague commitments to work with other actors. A paradoxical continuation of longstanding dynamics that have dominated humanitarian reform initiatives over the last decades.
If “crisis” is the opposite of “normality” and humanitarian actors’ role requires them to accept this duality, the practical and conceptual limits of humanitarian action become apparent when confronted with a crisis of planetary scale. What will “crisis” mean when the impact of climate change intensifies? What are the consequences of approaching the climate crisis as a humanitarian crisis? What is the “normal state” that humanitarian actors will seek to re-establish in crisis contexts? How will the association of the humanitarian system with the liberal international order and multilateralism (also in crisis) influence approaches to the climate crisis?
“The crisis of humanitarian action in the age of climate change” Focus includes a range of contributions that propose different perspectives to humanitarian actors’ current approaches to crisis and future options for reforming the humanitarian system when considering the challenges posed by climate change. Rodrigo Mena helps set the scene with a nuanced perspective of the relationship between climate change and humanitarian crises, emphasising the interplay of human, socio-economic and political factors. The article by Pierre-Marie Goimard, Olivia Pélegrin and Chloé Orland calls humanitarian organisations to undertake a profound reform of current knowledge and practices to connect humans with ecosystems. Aline Hubert invites humanitarian organisations to move beyond measures to implement the ecological transition and, instead, prioritise environmental justice. The relevance of One health and Planetary health approaches to adopt a systemic view to the climate crisis as a health crisis is the focus of the article by Davide Ziveri, Isabelle Bolon and Rafael Ruiz de Castaneda. Vincent Pradier reflects on the environmental and decolonial challenges that French non-governmental organisations (NGOs) face to change their organisational models in response to the climate crisis. Michiel Hofman and Angela Uyen focus their attention on what they describe as incompatible expectations on humanitarian organisations, Médecins Sans Frontières in particular, between to do more in response to the climate crisis and to do less, reducing the carbon emissions of their operations. Joël Moudio and Vincent Habaga contribute an account of the interplay between population growth, deforestation and soil degradation in Makalingaï (Cameroon), and effective ways to tackle humanitarian and ecological issues in an integrated manner. Finally, Andrii Bahinksy and Nina Potarska bring the perspective of the climate-humanitarian crisis in the Russia-Ukraine war, with testimonies from Ukrainians impacted by the destruction of infrastructures and of ecosystems.
Taken together, the contributions to this Focus shed new light on how climate change challenges the very foundations of humanitarian action, exposing its limitations and calling for a fundamental rethinking of its role, strategies, and ethical imperatives. As the climate crisis reshapes the landscape of global crises, it compels humanitarian actors to critically assess their role in global governance processes. A demand that will no doubt be very difficult to meet, at a time when global governance is going through some very serious turbulence.
This Focus has been possible thanks to the partnership between Humanitarian Alternatives and Alameda, an international institute for collective research rooted in contemporary social struggles (https://alameda.institute).
Picture Credit : © Cyril Zannettacci / Agence Vu’ pour Action contre la Faim
