What is the main message of Crisis Caravan?

The main message of Crisis Caravan is the exploitative nature of humanitarian aid.

How long does it take to read Crisis Caravan?

The reading time for Crisis Caravan varies based on the reader's speed. The Blinkist summary can be read in just 15 minutes.

Who is the author of Crisis Caravan?

Linda Polman is the author of Crisis Caravan.

Economics

Crisis Caravan Book Summary - Crisis Caravan Book explained in key points

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Crisis Caravan summary

Name: Crisis Caravan
Rating: 4.3 (12 reviews)
Author: Linda Polman

Linda Polman

What’s Wrong with Humanitarian Aid?

4.3 (12 ratings)

16 mins

Brief summary

Crisis Caravan by Linda Polman gives a unique perspective on humanitarian aid. She shows how aid often increases violence and corruption, making the situation worse for the people it intends to help.

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Table of Contents

Crisis Caravan
Summary of 7 key ideas

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Key idea 1 of 7

What’s in it for me? Find out what’s wrong with humanitarian aid.

We’ve all experienced it: we see something terrible on the news – starving children, for instance, or wounded people in a war-torn country – and we want, somehow, to help. And, thanks to humanitarian organizations, we don’t have to rush to the region in crisis; all we have to do is donate to the organization and they’ll provide the aid for us.

But does that donation actually make a difference?

As you keep following the news, you may get the impression that even millions of donations won’t alleviate the suffering. In fact, sometimes, the more aid organizations there are, the more some conflicts seem to drag on and the stronger some warring factions seem to get. Indeed, you’ve probably heard that, for every dollar given, barely ten cents make it to the intended recipients.

So what is it that doesn’t work about humanitarian aid, and how can we change that?

Read on and find out

what terrorists love about refugee camps;
why it sometimes pays for a poor country to hire PR specialists; and
why Caritas International gave money to the Tamil Tigers.

Modern aid organizations often fail to stick to humanitarian principles because they’re now commercial enterprises.

What first comes to mind when you hear the term “humanitarian aid”? Probably, you think of the ICRC – the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Founded in 1863 by Henri Dunant, the Red Cross was the first Western humanitarian aid organization, and countless other aid organizations have sought to emulate its commitment to the principles of neutrality, impartiality and independence.

Unfortunately, however, today’s organizations often fail to uphold these principles. This became clear in 1994, during the Rwandan genocide, when Hutus slaughtered hundreds of thousands of Tutsis.

When armed Tutsi forces tried to fight back, thousands of Hutus fled to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where 250 aid organizations provided them with medical care, food and shelter in refugee camps in Goma. The organizations present included various UN groups, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, Oxfam and several branches of Caritas and CARE.

These refugee camps effectively served as strategic centers for the armed Hutu forces, who then carried out further killings of the Tutsi people. The extremist Hutu government simply relocated to Goma and continued the genocide.

The aid organizations knew about it, too, and failed to stick to the principle of neutrality by siding with the Hutus.

This happened largely because humanitarian organizations are now commercial enterprises.

Consider what happened when an Irish aid organization tried to cut down on supplies in protest of Hutu violence. When they stopped giving out extra soap and mattresses, another organization swooped in and started giving them out.

Aid organizations, instead of working together, are often in competition. They incur sky-high costs, so once they set up in a crisis zone, they try to earn back as much of their investment as possible, which they can only do by winning donor contracts. In the competition for donations, humanitarian principles are often set aside.

Humanitarian aid is regularly abused by warring factions in conflict areas.

Humanitarian aid is supposed to be about easing human suffering. Sometimes, however, it fails to make life better for the people it purports to serve. In some cases, it can even make life worse. How is this possible?

Humanitarian aid is often abused by warring factions. Providing aid in conflict zones is tough and often requires aid organizations to make problematic negotiations.

Depending on their own cost-benefit analysis, aid organizations cherry pick which crises to help.

In 2004, Kofi Annan, the former Secretary General of the United Nations, tried to persuade wealthy member states to provide more funding for projects in the world’s poorer nations. It’s their right, he said, to receive funding. But that’s not really the case. Giving aid is a favor, not a duty.

In other words, aid organizations are free to ignore a crisis if they so choose. To return to the example of the Rwandan genocide: the Tutsis received almost no humanitarian aid; all the money and resources went to Hutus in camps in Goma and the neighboring Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Aid organizations manipulate the media to gain attention for their humanitarian missions.

Few people from stable countries personally travel to conflict zones; instead, they rely on the media to keep them up to date on what’s happening. But aid organizations, in an attempt to draw more donors, often try to gain more media attention. And they often resort to unscrupulous methods.

Aid organizations tend to exaggerate their reports from humanitarian missions. This happened when cholera broke out in a refugee camp in Goma during the Rwandan genocide. The outbreak was covered extensively by a number of journalists, and an international fund-raising campaign was launched almost immediately. A UN representative started holding daily press conferences in which each aid organization gave updates on what was happening.

Victims of crises aren’t protected against unqualified humanitarian aid.

You might expect humanitarian aid workers to be extremely adept at dealing with the intricacies of crisis zones. Unfortunately, this isn’t always the case.

Humanitarian missions teem with unqualified amateurs. Since major aid organizations like the Red Cross and UNHCR have been known to make grave errors, more and more amateurs are coming to believe that they can do a better job. Some now set up their own organizations, which are collectively referred to as “My Own NGO”s, or MONGOs.

Humanitarian aid work has failed in post-9/11 Afghanistan.

Let’s take a closer look at a place where humanitarian aid hasn’t worked: Afghanistan.

The United States’ War on Terror began in Afghanistan one month after September 11th, and with it came one of the greatest humanitarian aid projects of our time. It failed. Why?

We have to criticize humanitarian aid work if we want to improve it.

So how can we make humanitarian aid actually work? There’s no simple answer to this question, but if we want to improve humanitarian aid, we need to change our understanding of it.

First, we need to question the principle of giving aid at any cost. Blind adherence to this principle caused the humanitarian world’s “mother of all controversies” during WWII, when the Red Cross cooperated with Nazi Germany.

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What is Crisis Caravan about?

The Crisis Caravan (2011) is about the complexities and pitfalls that come with delivering humanitarian aid to conflict zones. Though aid is usually provided with nothing but good intentions, there are political, social and economic obstacles that can cause it to do more harm than good. These blinks outline the reasons aid work often fails, and offer advice on how we can improve it.

Crisis Caravan Review

Crisis Caravan (2010) by Linda Polman sheds light on the dark side of humanitarian aid. Here's why this book is worth reading:

The book offers a thought-provoking critique of the humanitarian industry, challenging our assumptions about its impact and effectiveness.
Backed by extensive research and firsthand reporting, Polman exposes the complexities and dilemmas faced by aid organizations in war zones and conflict-ridden areas.
With its compelling storytelling and vivid descriptions, the book manages to make the often-overlooked world of aid work engaging and enlightening.

Best quote from Crisis Caravan

For the aid organizations in Goma it was a matter of feed the killers or go under as an organization.

—Linda Polman

Who should read Crisis Caravan?

Students of politics or conflict studies
Anyone who has donated money to a humanitarian organization
People thinking of working in humanitarian aid

About the Author

Linda Polman is a journalist with over fifteen years of experience reporting from war zones. She is the author of We Did Nothing: Why The Truth Doesn’t Always Come Out When The UN Goes In, which was shortlisted for the Lettre Ulysses Award for the Art of Reportage.

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