[Along with my colleague Urvashi Aneja, I have authored this article on ODI’s HPN (Humanitarian Practice Network) website. Thanks to our colleagues Paul Harvey, Sean Healy and Sandrine Tiller for their comments. And thanks to HPN’s Wendy Fenton and Matthew Foley for their suggestions and edits.]

For many, the coronavirus pandemic’s novelty, deadliness and potential persistence mean we are facing a new ‘historical divide’ of BC and AC – before and after Covid-19. Reviewing scores of blogs, articles and reports as part of the MSF Reflection and Analysis Network, we found considerable evidence that the humanitarian sector (if not the world) sees itself as poised at just such a critical juncture – yet little agreement as to the direction of travel (more/less authoritarian, more/less interconnected, more/less green, more/less local). Still more pressure to change comes from the anti-racism movement, bringing powerful calls for a sectoral decolonisation.

Given this attention on Covid-19 and calls for the transformation of power dynamics within the aid arena, we identified several key issues, themes and challenges that we think need to be addressed in the months to come…

The rest of the article can be found here.