Chapter 29 Chapter Summary

This chapter has provided a snapshot of many of the most important issues facing humanitarian actors, researchers of humanitarianism, and affected populations. It has provided an overview of the history of modern humanitarian action, showing the major organizing principles and forces that have shaped the contemporary sector. It has also highlighted some of the difficulties encountered by those engaged in providing humanitarian assistance, from navigating difficult ethical terrain to negotiating the core humanitarian principles of independence, neutrality, impartiality, and even humanity itself. It has considered the various types of actors, the funding they rely on to carry out their work, and the wider political economy implications that humanitarian assistance poses in terms of foreign relations, foreign policy, and aid economies. While linked in many ways to the wider field of development studies, humanitarian studies has a dynamics of its own. Its importance in the coming years looks set to increase. It is therefore a fertile area of study both in its own right and in relation to wider development questions.