Mean times : humanitarian action in complex political emergencies--stark choices, cruel dilemmas : report of the NGOs in Complex Emergencies Project

From the early 1990s, humanitarian non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have with increasing frequency been working in distinctly hostile envrionments. Commonly called "complex emergencies," these multi-dimensional humanitarian crises usually involve some combination of mass population movement, severe food insecurity, macro-economic collapse, and acute civil and military conflict including even genocide. The Project discusses the complex emergencies in Somalia (1992-93), Rwanda (1994) and Sierra Leone (1996), catastrophes echoed in Cambodia, Sudan, Bosnia, Liberia, Kosovo and Chechnya. Analysis of the case studies demonstrates that, while the non-governmental community has been the object recently of much criticism that is unfair and, at times, irrational, there are serious deficiences for which NGOs are responsible and which individually and jointly, they must address "January 1999." 45 pages ; 28 cm