Rethinking aid system narratives: The case for collaborative leadership

Disasters—whether so called ‘natural’ disasters or conflict related crises—are a growing challenge. Their impacts have a profound impact on development outcomes since disasters at best mitigate against development gains, and more commonly lead to development losses, particularly for people living in poverty. Yet while disasters are often treated as exceptional events, they in fact highlight failures in our development pathways—and expose the humanitarian and development system as unfit to respond adequately to these challenges. This paper reflects on the ways of thinking and incentives that shape the behaviour that leads to the perpetuation of this siloed and reactionary system and argues that there is a need to re-frame disasters as contextual factors rather than exceptional events within the development framework. Additionally, there is a need to support leaders who collaborate, instead of working to achieve individual success for their department or institution, and to strengthen accountability to make the development and humanitarian system more effective in supporting disaster affected and at-risk communities.