role of mandates concept note

The role of ‘mandates’ – Concept note

Published:

September 2016

The ‘Mandates Study’ is based on a recognition that the majority of international non-governmental organisations that are active in humanitarian response define their purposes broadly, to include both short-term emergency response and long-term development engagement. In contrast, a small minority of organisations exclusively focus on life-saving assistance in emergency settings. In humanitarian discourse, these approaches are frequently distinguished as ‘multi-’ or ‘single-mandate’.

The research has two main goals: (i) To enable humanitarian organisations (and other stakeholders) to understand the implications of different priority settings and strategic choices for their capacity to work in armed conflict. (ii) To shed light on how differences in priority setting and strategic choices between organisations can be successfully combined to foster effective humanitarian action on the ground,in situations of armed conflict.