In the wake of nearly a decade of protracted conflict in Yemen, I found myself returning – mentally and emotionally – to a question that continues to haunt the development and humanitarian fields: can localised governance and community-driven strategies truly build resilience in fragile, urban environments?
I was raised amidst the wreckage and resilience of Yemen – torn by conflict, defined by community. My work in urban governance and resilience took me deep into the neighbourhoods of Sana’a, where people speak of survival not as a daily struggle but as a civic duty. I have worked as a humanitarian, a researcher, and a policy advisor, often all at once, navigating the uncomfortable intersection between international frameworks and local realities.
In 2024, while revisiting my earlier research, I was struck not by what had changed, but by what hadn’t. Despite global commitments to localisation, resilience, and SDG 11, the practical application of these principles remains selective at best. Aid systems still orbit around centralised actors. Community structures are treated as implementation tools rather than co-architects of solutions. We still ask, “What can we do for them?” instead of “What structures have they already built without us?”
Power and entrapment
International agencies like Mercy Corps advocate for a shift from passive resilience to active transformation, underscoring the importance of local capacity-building. Yet in Yemen, actual community power remains ornamental. We claim to localise, but coordination meetings are still dominated by international actors. Community councils are consulted after decisions are made—if they are consulted at all. Even in “stable zones” like Sana’a – microcosms of global governance failure and grassroots ingenuity – local actors are viewed as implementers of pre-cooked strategies, not as designers or visionaries. The language of participation often masks the reality of exclusion.
Equally concerning is the absence of rigorous academic work examining how urban resilience functions in conflict-afflicted cities that are not active battle zones but remain systemically fragile. These “grey zones” are too peaceful for emergency aid, too unstable for development, and too politically complex for peacebuilding efforts. The literature loves clarity, but the reality is ambiguous. And we don’t yet have the institutional flexibility to deal with that ambiguity.
Resilience is romanticised. Communities in Yemen are often labelled “resilient” simply because they have no choice but to adapt. But adaptation without rights, without resources, and without representation is not resilience – it’s entrapment.
Inclusion or transaction?
One of the most disheartening shifts has been the rise of what I call “the new face of top-down aid.” It’s more polished, more professional, and cloaked in capacity-building language—but still structurally disempowering. Projects are increasingly data-driven, yet blind to context. Artificial Intelligence tools are being used to “predict vulnerabilities,” but rarely to elevate local knowledge. Digital platforms track aid delivery more efficiently than ever, but still fail to answer one simple question: do communities feel more in control?
Research like Beyond the Business of Violence emphasises that peacebuilding in Yemen requires bottom-up engagement, not just elite-level negotiations. After years of being consulted, surveyed, and promised inclusion, community leaders express a quiet scepticism. Participation fatigue is real. Some now view NGO engagement not as a partnership, but as a transaction. If nothing changes in how we engage, the legitimacy of so-called “resilience efforts” will continue to erode.
The geopolitical context has also shifted. With donor fatigue rising globally, and conflicts erupting elsewhere, Yemen is again falling off the radar. The Yemen Humanitarian Response Plan remains significantly underfunded, highlighting the urgent need for equitable financing mechanisms in fragile settings. This shrinking space for funding is pushing agencies into risk-averse programming—fewer experiments, fewer partnerships with local innovators, and a quiet return to old habits.
Reframe resilience. Challenge stability.
Despite countless reports, donor frameworks, and SDG proclamations, the actual implementation of participatory governance in post-conflict settings remains disappointingly superficial. We speak endlessly of resilience yet fail to empower the very communities expected to be resilient. Urban resilience discussions by institutions like UN-Habitat often overlook community governance structures that have adapted organically during crisis.
The World Bank’s Building for Peace report stresses the importance of rebuilding trust alongside physical infrastructure in conflict-affected areas. And yet we cannot build resilience in communities without giving them actual power. That means investing in local governance—not just training it, not just consulting it, but legally, financially, and politically embedding it. It also means accepting that resilience might look messy, political, and even oppositional to top-down order. And that’s okay. We must reframe resilience not as a technocratic objective, but as a political act grounded in trust, ownership, and memory.
Second, we need to challenge the “stability or nothing” mindset. There are degrees of stability, and even in partially functioning areas like Sana’a, governance systems can evolve—if donors and INGOs are willing to let go of full control. That means accepting risk, complexity, and even failure as part of the process.
This disconnect between global frameworks and local realities is further complicated by environmental stressors. The breaching of planetary boundaries disproportionately affects fragile states, making resilience not just a political and social challenge, but also an ecological one — and underscoring the urgency of localised climate governance.
Third, resilience is not an endgame—it’s a means of survival while pushing for structural change. It’s about reclaiming space in a system that never planned for us to survive.
