Today I am providing a quick update on my work on stress in the aid sector, and news of an exciting, inspiring and innovative conference coming up next week, which everyone can join and participate in!
These last few weeks I’ve reached that point that many doctoral researchers will be familiar with; where the Phd truly takes over and ‘normal life’ grinds to a halt. The good news is that I’m in the finishing stages, and I’m really looking forward to sharing my findings with aid practitioners and people who are interested in engaging further in debates concerning stress and wellbeing in the aid sector.
In the weeks and months ahead I will be publishing some key reflections and findings emerging from my thesis on my blog site. I will be looking at far more than simply the common stressors in the sector, such as the challenges of living in remote or dangerous environments, and considering how aid structures, systems and policies contribute to particular expectations around how staff should behave. The thesis includes a host of personalities from my research in Kenya, who are not simply ‘aid workers’ but human beings with a diversity of experiences, hopes, desires, fears and insecurities. My interest is in highlighting how there are particular assumptions made about what constitutes ‘good’ aid work (heroism and altruism are terms I investigate and deconstruct), and these often leave out the personal lives and vulnerabilities of staff, in racialised and gendered ways. There will be a focus on the inequalities that exist between national and international staff, but also the specific challenges facing, for instance, national women aid workers or African expatriates working in Kenya.
For those who want to learn more right now, before I start publishing some thesis extracts, you have a wonderful opportunity through the Healing Solidarity conference, organised by development practitioner, facilitator and coach Mary Ann Clements. This is a free, online conference running throughout next week, 17-21 September, and featuring a host of speakers from the development sector.
Topics up for discussion include neo-colonial structures of power in aid, bringing humanity back into aid interactions, how to transfer decision-making capacities and resources to grassroots groups, and building sustainable ways of working that address individual and organisational wellbeing. Building on my research findings I will be discussing how western public messaging, as well as aid agency policies and systems, contribute to an idealised image of what constitutes the ‘perfect humanitarian.’This imagery produces expectations and pressures that are difficult to live up to, particularly for aid workers from countries in the global south who do not have the same privileges as their counterparts from Europe or America. You can see a sneak preview here:
We cannot talk about stress and wellbeing in the aid sector without acknowledging the role of aid organisations, systems and structures in shaping the way staff behave and restricting the spaces and opportunities for discussion around personal problems and vulnerabilities.
Please do join us for the conference! Sign up and join the Facebook page to get all the details. Each day from 17-21 September there will be 3-4 discussions with different speakers, which you will be able to comment on via the Facebook page, and there will also be daily live reflective practices that you can join. The full details of the schedule can be found here. This is going to be a great opportunity to interact with development practitioners, experts and activists who are trying to reformulate the way we envisage and deliver aid in ways that foster a more inclusive and equitable workplace and environment. I’m so excited to be part of this conference and look forward to listening to all the incredible speakers!
