Dissertation: Empowering local organizations make humanitarian aid more sustainable (Khan)
Localization is not a one-size-fits-all process. Khan’s research highlights that local initiatives lead to sustainable and effective aid responses, while externally controlled efforts by a few international actors and donor communities result in low-quality localization.
“These initiatives reinforce the power asymmetries of international dominance in the aid chain, perpetuating colonial legacies and acting as a ‘Trojan horse’ under the guise of local empowerment”, explains Khan.
Sustainable localization requires transferring decision-making power and authority to local organizations and directing funding and resources to locally led initiatives.
Multiple external actors lead to action dilemmas
In Cox’s Bazar, humanitarian aid is provided to more than one million Rohingya refugees, including the host communities. Khan’s research focuses on the Rohingya response, where the implementation of localization is significantly influenced by ongoing negotiations at different levels.
However, the presence of multiple actors with different mandates creates institutional multiplicity. This fragmentation often leads to collective action dilemmas, creating governance challenges and hindering the effective implementation of localization efforts.
The ‘constrained humanitarian space’ significantly limits the participation of local Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), as the Bangladesh government enforces strict repatriation policies. This clashes with donors’ preference for long-term programming, making it difficult to integrate peace efforts within the Humanitarian-Development-Peace (HDP) nexus.
“Without a fundamental change in humanitarian governance, true localization will remain a rhetoric.”
In Cox’s Bazar, excessive reliance on foreign funding has strengthened the dominance of international agencies, thereby limiting meaningful local involvement.
“Without a fundamental change in humanitarian governance, true localization will remain a rhetoric”, Khan argues.
To achieve sustainable localization, funding should be distributed more equitably, and stronger partnerships with local and international actors should be fostered.
“Local organizations must build strong structures to manage large-scale responses independently, while moving away from the profit-driven motives associated with refugee capitalism.”
Khan’s study has the potential to influence the revision of Finland’s development cooperation funding policies, advocating for a greater emphasis on local NGO engagement, capacity building, and the establishment of an exit strategy to mitigate mission creep and promote sustainable localization.
“Finland’s development cooperation funding focuses only on Finnish civil society organizations but does not directly fund local ones in the affected areas. By shifting to more support for local NGOs the localizations will be more sustainable”, suggests Khan.
Master of Philosophy Abdul Khan defends the doctoral dissertation “Localization of humanitarian action: Exploring the views of organizations involved in the Rohingya response in Bangladesh” on April 9, 2025 at 12 in the old assembly hall of the Seminarium building at the Ģֱ. The opponent is Professor Palash Kamruzzaman (University of South Wales) and the custos is Professor Tiina Kontinen (Ģֱ).
The public examination of the dissertation is held in English.
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Abdul Khan
