OPINION:
The World Humanitarian Summit process has shown that when consensus is needed to formulate commitments among States, there are still a lot to be done to change perceptions regarding the value of cash transfer programming and the role it should play in humanitarian assistance. Paula Gil Baizan, CaLP’s Advocacy Coordinator, takes us through cash transfer programmes should be higher up on the agenda.
The World Humanitarian Summit process has shown that there is one thing the world agrees with: we need to get better at assisting people in need. Big problems require big solutions. The Agenda for Humanity calls for big solutions.
A substantial amount of research – a great deal of it produced by CaLP – shows that delivering aid directly in the form of cash is one of those big solutions. Cash is often a highly effective way of alleviating suffering as it makes aid budgets go further at a time where organisations are asked to do more with less, and in increasingly complex environments. Beneficiaries prefer to receive cash. Advancements in technology can be leveraged to deliver cash, and have a positive impact in building people’s resilience and provide aid in a timely manner in hard to reach areas.
There are still important disagreements regarding the true value of cash transfer programming
Unfortunately, the World Humanitarian Summit process has shown that, when consensus is needed to formulate commitments among States, there are still important disagreements regarding the true value of cash transfer programming and the role it should play in humanitarian assistance.
Take, for example, the Grand Bargain. A process that for many represents the best chance to achieve something concrete at the Summit. Many men/women hours and a great deal of political will have been invested in crafting papers and negotiating commitments relating to cash transfer programming. We had bold proposals and clear calls for action to significantly scale up cash as a default and preferred option. Participants were called to work together to understand and manage the actual and
perceived risks of scaling up cash, measure outcomes and implement ambitious recommendations on cash coordination.
Now, take a look at the cash section of the final version of the Grand Bargain. You’ll see that the language is more sober. The aspirational tone is nowhere to be found. In the final version ‘some donors may wish to scale up significantly’, ‘ensure that coordination […] mechanisms are put in place,’ ‘increase the routine use of cash’. The terms ‘scale-up’ and ‘preferred’ that have been the protagonists of heated discussions these last months are absent from the commitments. The infamous ‘default’ form the UN SG’s report for the
WHS is not even in the document. How did we end up with this text? Are these sober commitments in relation to cash an indication that we have failed?
Let’s zoom out.
If we look at the World Humanitarian Summit in comparison to other similar global processes that aim to achieve change at a global level within the UN framework, we realise that the WHS is special. It is a process that from the very beginning has privileged diversity over unanimity. The WHS doesn’t require States to make commitments by consensus. There isn’t a single objective for the Summit and States won’t sign a negotiated document at the end of it. Commitments are also not binding. Someone in the WHS Secretariat explained to me that the logic behind this design is that
in international processes like this, the level of diversity and aspirations in the commitments tend to be inversely proportional to the level of consensus required to achieve them.
Putting cash first is about putting people first
But if the WHS is in general an open-ended process, the Grand Bargain formal consultations and negotiations have been going on for months. So I conclude that the less aspirational wording of the cash commitments in the Grand Bargain is only a reflection of what is actually possible with the level of understanding of cash transfer programming at that level of decision-making. Its sobriety represents what is doable in relation to cash transfer programming when consensus is necessary. It shows that while at the technical level we are making great progress towards scaling up multipurpose
cash and understanding new ways of operating more efficiently; at a strategic level there is still a need to raise awareness and advocate for the value of cash transfer programming as an effective way of alleviating human suffering and the lead role it should play in humanitarian assistance.
What got lost in the consensus is deeply worrying. The intention behind scaling up cash and making it the preferred option for response is to give affected populations what they prefer and to provide a degree of control over their own recovery. Putting cash first is about putting people first.
Let’s go back to the cash commitments in the final version of the Grand Bargain. Have we failed? Of course not. The commitments are important achievements and should be used by organizations to leverage their own commitments to scale up cash transfer programming. They should also be used as a baseline to measure the effectiveness of other cash-related global advocacy work – aimed at changing perceptions, behaviours and policies. Being able to maintain the momentum of change after the Summit should be our only marker of success.
We all agree we need to get better at assisting people in need. Big problems require equally big solutions. We just need to get better at showcasing how big a solution cash transfer programming really is.
Paula Gil Baizan is CaLP’s Advocacy Coordinator. She started her Humanitarian career in Latin America and has since worked in the Middle East, East Africa and Asia. Follow Paula at @chicledeuva for live updates during the WHS.
Read more
- Read more Humanitarian blogs
- Find out more about the Cash Learning Partnership
Author: Paula Gil Baizan
Archive blog. Originally posted on Oxfam Policy & Practice.