Organized by the the International Peace Research Association (IPRA), ISS PhD researchers Rod Mena and Samantha Melis presentend papers at the ionference held in Freetown, Sierra Leone
The conference, bringing together peace researchers, experts, activists, representatives of civil society organizations and community based organizations, social activists and human rights activists from all over the world, was held from 27 November to 1 December in Freetown, Sierra Leone.
ISS PhD researchers Samantha Melis and Rod Mena both presentend well-received papers at the conference on their research.
Rod Mena gave a presentation entitled 'Disaster response in high-intensity conflict scenarios: Aid-Society relations, challenges and legitimacy' in which he explored which aid agencies and societal actors respond to socio-natural disasters in places affected by high-intensity levels of violent social conflict. He went on to discuss the challenges that they face, and how these actors deal with these challenges.
The paper by Samantha Melis was entitled 'The Fragile State of Disaster Response: understanding aid-state-society relations in post-conflict settings'. In her presentation she discussed the question of how aid, state and societal actors respond to disasters and how they manoeuver in the humanitarian arena of actors with divergent goals and motives in a post-conflict setting.
- More information