Local leadership in a changing humanitarian architecture
A different way of working
Every edition of Humanitarian Exchange begins with a question: whose perspectives shape the conversations that influence humanitarian action? Too often, those closest to crises are invited to contribute examples or validate existing debates, but rarely to define the agenda itself. This edition sets out to do something different. Rather than selecting the theme internally in the Humanitarian Practice Network (HPN), the network invited its partners – the Alliance for Empowering Partnership (A4EP), the Asia Pacific Refugee Rights Network (APRRN), the Feminist Humanitarian Network (FHN), and the Centre for Civil Society and Democracy (CCSD) – to lead the process. Through a series of discussions, they identified the central theme of this issue emerging from practice priorities, local leadership in a changing humanitarian architecture, and brought together authors from across their networks in Bangladesh, Indonesia, Kenya, Palestine, Syria, Thailand and Türkiye. HPN’s role was not to set the agenda, but to create the space for it to emerge through dialogue, collaboration and South–South exchange. In doing so, this edition reflects HPN’s ongoing commitment to fostering more inclusive, collaborative and decolonised knowledge that strengthens both individual and institutional learning across the humanitarian sector.
Furthermore, local actors are usually expected to contribute their expertise, relationships and lived experience without compensation. And yet this takes time, requires intellectual effort and institutional resources. For this edition, authors and partner networks received financial support for their contributions. This was a deliberate recognition that local expertise has value and that equitable partnerships should also be equitable in how they recognise and reward contributions.
Accessibility and inclusion were also guiding principles throughout this work, as we sought to invite authors to write in the language in which they felt most comfortable, while providing support from editors with contextual and linguistic expertise. This led to articles being originally produced in English and Arabic before they were translated into Arabic and Swahili, as necessary.
Inside this issue
As indicated earlier, this edition’s theme is local leadership in a changing humanitarian architecture, and it could not be more timely. The humanitarian reset has renewed calls for responses that are locally led and globally supported. Yet many local and national organisations continue to receive only a small proportion of humanitarian funding and remain underrepresented in decision-making spaces. The articles in this edition move beyond familiar debates to explore what local leadership looks like in practice. They highlight how communities and local organisations are navigating an evolving humanitarian landscape, challenging existing power structures and reimagining partnerships. Together, they offer not only a snapshot of a changing humanitarian architecture, but also valuable insights into what a more equitable and effective future for humanitarian action could look like.
The edition starts with Rajeev Jha from A4EP who explores structural barriers to local leadership that still exist even amidst the reset. Moriab Gerges Haddo, Narges Ardwan and Muhammad Al-Kajak from CCSD further examine the gap between localisation rhetoric and practice based on three years of experience supporting more than 50 Syrian organisations.
The next two articles highlight the experiences of displaced communities and refugee-led organisations that often remain overlooked in localisation debates. Baqir Bayani from APRRN examines how prevailing localisation frameworks continue to exclude refugee-led initiatives despite their role as first responders and trusted community actors in countries such as Indonesia and Thailand. While Khair Ullah and Ahtaram Shin from APRRN draw on the experiences of refugee-led organisations in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, highlighting their contributions to emergency response, education and protection while documenting the structural barriers that prevent their meaningful participation in decision-making.
Despite these constraints, several articles demonstrate how local actors continue to lead in responses. Ohaila Shomar and Majeda Saqqa from FHN reflect on the work of women-led organisations in Palestine and how they have adapted programmes and services to respond to escalating violence, displacement and humanitarian need. Anila Noor and Madina Yunis from FHN showcase the Kente Threads methodology being trialled in Kenya, which exemplifies how displaced Kenyan women are generating and using their own data to shape climate and humanitarian decision-making.
Local humanitarian leaders are also emerging from those who are often viewed primarily as aid recipients. Sara Bahsass from CCSD examines the community-led approach in Syria that enables communities to identify their needs and address them. Areej Al-Mohammad from CCSD spotlights Syrian refugees in Türkiye and how they have transformed themselves from recipients of assistance into humanitarian actors. These articles challenge conventional distinctions between aid providers and aid recipients, and show that affected populations are not merely participants in humanitarian response but leaders in their own right.
This edition also examines efforts to reshape funding relationships. Subin Mulmi from APRRN analyses the Global Statelessness Fund, which provides flexible, multi-year and unrestricted funding to grassroots informal groups addressing statelessness that may lack formal registration or access to funding channels. Amrita Paul from APRRN examines the network’s role in supporting refugee-led and community-based organisations to access and manage pooled funds, illustrating both the opportunities and persistent barriers that exist within humanitarian financing systems.
Key lessons
Although the articles draw on experiences from diverse contexts, from Syria and Palestine to Kenya, Bangladesh and the Asia-Pacific, they converge around a common message: local leadership already exists. Communities, refugee-led organisations, women-led initiatives and local civil society are not waiting to be internationally recognised; they are already leading responses, innovating, adapting and sustaining their communities through crises. What continues to constrain them is not a lack of capacity, but a humanitarian architecture that too often concentrates on funding, decision-making and legitimacy in international institutions.
Across the contributions, authors highlight recurring barriers, including inflexible funding mechanisms, exclusion from coordination and governance spaces, burdensome compliance requirements, and legal and political restrictions that prevent many local actors from accessing resources directly. At the same time, the articles offer compelling examples of alternative approaches, demonstrating how flexible funding, trust-based partnerships, participatory decision-making, community-led responses and recognition of lived experience produce more effective, accountable and sustainable humanitarian action. Together, these contributions challenge the humanitarian sector to move beyond the language of localisation towards a genuine redistribution of power, resources and knowledge, where local leadership is recognised not as an aspiration for the future, but as a reality that already exists and deserves to shape the future of humanitarian action.
Acknowledgements
This edition has been a truly collaborative effort. We extend our sincere thanks to our partner organisations and all the authors who generously shared their knowledge, experience and reflections. We are especially grateful to our editorial team and the translators, namely Tamarind and Hashem el Hashem, whose contextual and linguistic expertise ensured that the ideas presented here could reach audiences in Arabic, Swahili and English while preserving the integrity and voice of each contribution.
Catherine Komuhangi (HPN Coordination Manager) and Serena Abi Khalil (Head of Development and Partnerships)
Issue 87 articles
1. Localisation in words, centralisation in practice: why local leaders still don’t lead
7. Supporting communities rather than replacing them: the evolution of community-led response in Syria
