Learning from Lesbos
8
WORKING
WITHIN A
COMPLEX CONTEXT
As no two cities are alike, no two cities in crisis are alike.
Effective urban humanitarian response requires a full
understanding of the scale and complexities of the local
context, its interconnected systems and stakeholders,
and the way in which diverse urban communities live
within it and alongside one another. To be most effective,
humanitarian actors working in an urban context should
take into account local power dynamics, social networks,
existing structures, systems and geography in order
to identify suitable entry points and opportunities to
leverage the distinct characteristics of the city or town.
SUPPORTING RECOVERY
AND RESILIENCE
Building long-term recovery and resilience must
be considered from the outset of a crisis, as the
transition from emergency response to recovery can
be rapid and normally involves a period in which the
two phases overlap. Cities operate on longstanding
and interconnected networks of service provision
channels (such as education, health, and legal services),
markets, governance structures and social systems.
Humanitarians should strive to work within these
systems, to avoid their duplication or disruption, and
to work in ways that leaves them stronger and better
able to ensure long-term recovery and resilience.
URBAN PARTNERSHIPS,
COLLABORATION
AND INCLUSION
Cities are shaped by a multitude of international,
national and local actors from multiple sectors,
including government, civil society organisations
(CSOs), the academic community, the private sector and
development practitioners. These diverse actors, who
possess valuable knowledge of and influence over how
the city functions, form networks that humanitarians can
leverage to inform effective and inclusive responses.
Their understanding of how the city operates and
provides services, as well as how legal and social
frameworks affect the lives of urban residents and
communities is a critical, but often overlooked, resource.
Humanitarians should support local authorities and
service providers to coordinate responses while leveraging
the emergence of national and locally led response
networks to ensure that activities and advocacy are well
coordinated. Such an approach will help build local and
sustainable capacity for preparedness and response
while striving for the inclusion and empowerment of
marginalised groups, such as women and minority groups.
The IRC’s Principles of Urban Humanitarian Response
The IRC has been working in cities and towns impacted by humanitarian crises for decades and our experience
shows that urban settings require new approaches to delivering assistance. We are currently exploring innovative
ways to support the displaced and host communities in urban contexts to survive, recover and rebuild their lives.
We are dedicated to not only meeting the immediate needs of affected populations, but to also fostering
recovery, resilience, and self-reliance in the aftermath of a crisis, so that affected populations are safer and
healthier, with less disruption to their education, economic wellbeing, and ability to influence decisions that affect
them, and the city is able to better cope with future shocks and stresses. We are committed to improving our
response to urban crises and sharing our experience and evidence with the wider humanitarian community.
While there is no effective one-size-fits-all approach, the following principles can guide an effective response
to humanitarian crises in urban contexts.
right: Mytilene is home to over a third of the population of Lesbos
It is the administrative centre for the single municipality which covers
the whole island, as well as a regional capital.
Samer Saliba/IRC
Learning from Lesbos
9
Overview
This report is an output of the International Rescue
Committee’s advocacy and learning partnership with
the UK’s Department for International Development
(DFID) on urban humanitarian crises.
Using a combination of desk-based research and primary
qualitative data, this report aims to shed light on the
following questions in relation to the IRC’s activities
on Lesbos from September 2015 to March 2016:
k
Were the IRC’s programming models
designed to take into account the urban
environment and its stakeholders?
k
In what capacity is the IRC supporting the
municipal government in Lesbos in its operations
to respond to an influx of refugees and other
migrants, and how effective is this collaboration?
k
Are the IRC’s programmes addressing social
tensions between refugees and migrant
populations and their host communities?
k
What key lessons does the Lesbos case study
provide for humanitarian practitioners in relation to
improving emergency response in urban settings?
Seeking to analyse urban emergency response from both
humanitarian and local government perspectives, the
process began with a desk review, followed by a series
of observational visits and semi-structured key informant
interviews with humanitarian aid workers and local
community-based actors in two locations where the IRC has
programmes – the city of Mytilene and the town of Molyvos
on the Greek island of Lesbos (the whole of which comes
under one municipal authority). The interviews focused on
collaboration between humanitarians, the government sector
and civil society as well as the challenges and opportunities
associated with the emergency response to the arrival of
unprecedented numbers of refugees and other migrants
on Lesbos. The IRC’s Urban Response Learning Manager
conducted all research for this report and relied on internal
research conducted previously by IRC colleagues.
The Lesbos Case Study
The ongoing refugee crisis on Lesbos highlights the need
for a more contextually appropriate approach to responding
to humanitarian crises in urban areas. Lesbos, the main
landing point for refugees and migrants from Syria, Iraq,
Afghanistan, Pakistan, Morocco and Somalia (among other
places of origin), has a population of just over 86,000. In the
nine months between July 2015 and March 2016, Lesbos
received a total of 559,659 arrivals, an average of over
2,000 arrivals per day. The height of the crisis was October
2016, when the island received over 135,000 arrivals.
4
The sheer volume of people arriving on this small European
island, the economy of which is based largely on tourism,
posed a significant challenge to the humanitarian emergency
response: how do we meet the needs of refugees and
migrants while respecting the urban dynamics of the island?
This is the question that up to 81 international and local
NGOs (of which only 30 were locally registered) and
countless volunteers should have been asking themselves.
5
Introduction
Pakistan
4%
Others
2.8%
Morocco
0.2%
Iran
3%
Iraq
19%
Afghanistan
27%
Syria
44%
Country of Origin of Arrivals on Lesbos,
February 2016
source: Figures from Hellenic Police
and Hellenic Coastguard, quoted in UNHCR,
“Lesvos data snapshot,” 30 March, 2016