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The Humanitarian Action Initiative
At The Elliott School of International Affairs
The Humanitarian Action Initiative (HAI) was founded in 2020 as part of an Elliott School initiative to support scholarship and policy engagement on humanitarian assistance. Humanitarian assistance is a broad field of activity that includes responses to earthquakes, floods, droughts and famines, involves assistance to refugees and migrants, and addresses basic human needs to permit individuals affected by conflict, climate change, or health emergencies to live life with dignity. Through our events, research activities, and policy engagement, we introduce the many dimensions of humanitarian assistance to the GW community, engage in critical inquiry, and produce scholarship to inform humanitarian policy and practice. Our world renowned faculty represent a breadth of disciplines from anthropology to political science to media and public affairs and engineering and challenge students to both master understanding of the core institutions, practices, and principles of humanitarian assistance and question and critique ways of doing and knowing to build more inclusive, resilient, and sustainable strategies for addressing humanitarian needs.
Initiative Spotlights:
Humanitarian Aid Faces a Crossroads, New GW Study Finds
In post-USAID era, humanitarian ecosystem is not simply experiencing temporary disruption, it is reconfiguring.
