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Search within Central and East Africa, Displacement and humanitarian protection,
77 results found
Case study
SSHAP learning note: Building a localised approach
This learning note shares insights, experiences and lessons from SSHAP's approach to the localisation of its operational responses in sub-Saharan Africa.
Article
The safety of strangers: the realities and politics of protecting civilians in times of war
Recent wars have brutally shown that civilians are not safe. This is despite high-level global commitments and multi-billion-dollar humanitarian spending to keep civilian strangers protected. The high civilian death tolls in recent armed conflicts are prompting new questions about how…
Article
Protection and containment: surviving COVID-19 in Palabek refugee settlement, Northern Uganda
Humanitarian assistance is framed around ‘protection’. Deciding whom to protect and against what is not straightforward, particularly during a pandemic. This article critically explores containment and protection by focusing on refugee self-protection in Uganda.
Article
Seeking safety: Identifying protection gaps for artists in South Sudan
Protection of artists during times of conflict has no specific framework in international humanitarian law. However, cultural sites, artefacts and institutions are protected. This article contributes empirical evidence from South Sudan to reveal how artists experience the protection gap and…
Article
Safety among displaced South Sudanese in Khartoum: the role of Christian faith communities
Christianity occupies an integral part of South Sudanese journeys through wars and displacement. This article explores the role of Christian faith communities in providing protection during South Sudanese displacement in Khartoum.
Article
Sing safety: understanding South Sudanese protection strategies through song
This article argues that paying attention to music can help humanitarians understand self-protection strategies, especially as music can create space for discussion even about emotive or political topics that cannot be verbalised in other ways.
Article
Negotiating faith in exile: learning from displacements from and into Arua, North West Uganda
Humanitarians have recently championed faith actors as valuable resources in delivering humanitarian aid. This paper explores how faith has been entangled within the dynamics of two spatially connected crises: Ugandans fleeing post-Amin reprisals in the mid-1980s, and South Sudanese fleeing…
Report
Conflict-sensitive returns and integration in South Sudan
This research aims to provide a stronger understanding of the risks and opportunities associated with ‘returns’ and ‘integration’ in South Sudan, as well as highlight opportunities for conflict-sensitive (re)integration and early solutions activities.
Article
Community self-protection, public authority and the safety of strangers in Bor and Ler, South Sudan
Protection is not simply something done or delivered to people by states, humanitarian organisations and armed peacekeepers. We use interview data from communities in Bor and Ler, South Sudan, long affected by conflict, to show how attention to the relationship…
Article
Humanitarian protection activities and the safety of strangers in the DRC, Syria and South Sudan
Many contemporary humanitarian organisations derive their legitimacy from their claims to protect civilians. Yet, what these organisations do in its name includes a diverse and contested range of activities that are often far from what global publics and affected populations…
Briefing
Mutual aid lessons and experiences from Emergency Response Rooms in Sudan arfr
A Key Considerations brief based on the first case study of the volunteer networks known as Emergency Response Rooms, conducted June to August 2024.
Briefing
Humanitarian responses to famine and war in Sudan ar
This Key Considerations brief offers key information about the background to the civil war in Sudan, responses to the humanitarian crisis and reasons why relief has been inadequate, setting out opportunities to push against the obstacles or constraints to relief.
Briefing
Food assistance prioritisation in refugee settlements in Uganda and its impacts sw
This brief considers the humanitarian and policy implications of the general food and cash assistance prioritisation strategy in Uganda’s refugee settlements.
Infographic
Responding to floods in South Sudan through the humanitarian-peace-development nexus infographic arfr
This infographic summarises the insights from a recent key considerations brief on responding to floods in South Sudan, describing the multidimensional impacts of flooding on peace, health, livelihoods and governance.
Briefing
Responding to floods in South Sudan through the humanitarian-peace-development nexus arfr
This Key Considerations brief looks at interconnected problems in the context of South Sudan through a focus on flooding, with wider relevance to other countries in the region, such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Sudan, experiencing similar…
Briefing
Crisis in Sudan: Briefing note on displacement from Sudan to South Sudan ar
This Key Considerations brief focuses on the historical and socio-political dynamics humanitarian agencies need to consider when providing assistance to South Sudanese fleeing Khartoum and other parts of Sudan to South Sudan, and to Sudanese fleeing Sudan to South Sudan.
Infographic
Crisis in Sudan: Note on displacement from Sudan to South Sudan ar
This infographic summarises the insights from a recent briefing note on displacement due to the crisis in Sudan.
Article
Hiding in plain sight: IDP’s protection strategies after closing Juba’s protection of civilian sites
This article examines how former Protection of Civilian site (PoCs) residents are staying safe and protecting themselves after the United Nations Mission in South Sudan's (UNMISS) handing over of the PoCs to the Revitalised-Transitional Government of National Unity (R-TGoNU).
Working paper
Hosting New Neighbors : Perspectives of Host Communities on Social Cohesion in Eastern DRC
Situations of forced displacement create unique challenges for social cohesion because of the major disruption of social dynamics among both displaced persons and host communities. This paper uses a sequential mixed method approach to analyze the relationship between hosting displaced…
Research paper
Repatriation of South Sudanese refugees from the West Nile districts, Uganda. What do we learn from the process?
The paper highlights the fundamental steps followed during a well-planned, structured, and effective repatriation of South Sudanese refugees from Uganda. Understanding repatriation requires an appreciation of how it is implemented to support offering an effective, durable, and lasting solution to…
Research paper
Water insecurity and sexual and gender-based violence among refugee youth: qualitative insights from a humanitarian setting in Uganda
This paper argues that youth and communities should be meaningfully engaged in developing contextually relevant, gender transformative services to mitigate SGBV risks and advance health and rights.
Research paper
Resistant Resilience: Agency and Resilience Among Refugees Resisting Humanitarian Corruption in Uganda
Resilience is a dominant humanitarian-development theme. Nonetheless, some humanitarian-development programmes have demonstrably negative impacts which encourage vulnerable people to actively resist these programmes. Based on 12 months ethnographic fieldwork in a Ugandan refugee settlement during 2017–18, this paper argues refugee residents…
Report
Mobile Livelihoods: Borderland dynamics between Uganda and South Sudan
This report from the Rift Valley Institute explores the dynamics of transnational movement and networks of kin of South Sudanese and South Sudanese refugees in Uganda.
Research paper
Relational Factors and HIV Testing Practices: Qualitative Insights from Urban Refugee Youth in Kampala, Uganda
This paper explores perspectives, experiences, and preferences for social support in HIV testing among refugee youth aged 16–24 in Kampala, Uganda.
Research paper
Sexual violence against men in conflict and post-conflict settings: A qualitative research methodology
This article describes the research design and the strategies employed in qualitative research with South Sudanese male refugee survivors of sexual violence who have resettled in two communities in Uganda since the onset of the 2013 South Sudan conflict.
Research paper
‘When the World Turns Upside Down, Live Like a Bat!’ Idioms of Suffering, Coping, and Resilience among Elderly Female Zande Refugees in Kiryandongo Refugee Settlement, Uganda (2019-20)
This paper draws on ethnographic research with South Sudanese Zande refugees in Kiryandongo Refugee Settlement, Uganda, to show a different and often overlooked perspective; that of elderly refugee women. Having lived through decades of war and displacement, these women have…
Communicative Health Promotion for Refugee Children in Uganda
Uganda’s refugee policy framework seeks to cover health care needs of refugees within a dynamic social context. Focusing on the ecosystem of urban refugees, the authors examine refugee health care expectations, support networks, and how health communication traditions and perspectives…
Research paper
Violence, abuse and exploitation among trafficked women and girls: a mixed-methods study in Nigeria and Uganda
Africa is the global region where modern-slavery is most prevalent, especially among women and girls. Despite the severe health consequences of human trafficking, evidence on the risks and experiences of trafficked adolescents and young women is scarce for the region.…
Research paper
Is translocality a hidden solution to overcome protracted displacement in the DR Congo?
Policy makers and practitioners usually focus on three durable solutions for IDPs to overcome protracted displacement; return, resettlement and local integration. Based on empirical realities, this paper asks to what extent translocality can be seen as another solution. Drawing on…
Research paper
Engaging refugee women and girls as experts: co-creating evidence on sexual exploitation and abuse in humanitarian crises using creative, participatory methods
This paper explores how creative and participatory practices can address the barriers, such as illiteracy (including computer illiteracy) and lack of training, often cited as limiting researchers’ ability to share power with affected communities, and allow for greater co-production of…
Research paper
Humanitarian Shapeshifting: Navigation, Brokerage and Access in Eastern DR Congo
This article examines the experience of Congolese humanitarians negotiating access with armed groups in eastern DRC. It describes how humanitarians become shapeshifters: they play different roles for different audiences as a tactic of social navigation in a context of uncertainty.…
Research paper
Why local concepts matter: Using cultural expressions of distress to explore the construct validity of research instruments to measure mental health problems among Congolese women in Nyarugusu refugee camp
This mixed-methods study presents an innovative additional method for assessing the local “cultural fit” of globally used tools for measuring mental health in cross-cultural research.
Research paper
Mixed-methods findings from the Ngutulu Kagwero (agents of change) participatory comic pilot study on post-rape clinical care and sexual violence prevention with refugee youth in a humanitarian setting in Uganda
There is a dearth of evidence-based post-rape clinical care interventions tailored for refugee adolescents and youth in low-income humanitarian settings. Comics, a low-cost, low-literacy and youth-friendly method, integrate visual images with text to spark emotion and share health-promoting information.
Research paper
Access to HIV/AIDS or TB care among refugees in Kampala, Uganda: exploring the enablers and barriers during the COVID-19 pandemic
The rapid spread of COVID-19 overwhelmed existing health care systems, finding it challenging to provide essential health services besides the COVID-19 response interventions. Refugees are disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic because of the barriers they face to access health…
Research paper
Hiding in plain sight: IDP’s protection strategies after closing Juba’s protection of civilian sites
When civil war broke out in South Sudan in 2013, people from the Nuer minority ethnic group became targeted by government forces and sought protection in United Nations peace-keeping bases which expanded and became known as Protection of Civilian sites…
Research paper
“He Cannot Marry Her”: Excluding The Living And Including The Dead In South Sudanese Citizenship In Sudan
Using qualitative interviews and observations of Nuer chiefs’ courts to examine reforms to marriage laws within a South Sudanese refugee camp in Sudan, this article argues that chiefs’ courts contested humanitarian assumptions about citizenship by re-emphasising kinship as the primary…
