Epistemic Violence in the Humanitarian Sector: A Call for Compassion and Kindness to Unlock Systemic Transitions 

By guest contributor Dr. Safieh Shah

“Don’t look at the world, look at your lens.” – Orientalism by Edward W. Said 

As a humanitarian who grew up steeped in the concept of humanitarianism taught by my religious community and actualized by Pakistan’s humanitarian extraordinaire Abdul Sattar Edhi, I find myself deeply concerned about the impact of epistemic violence within the humanitarian aid sector.

Epistemic violence refers to the harm inflicted upon individuals through the denial of their knowledge, experiences, and voices through abusive, manipulative and erasure tactics, integral to coloniality.

In the context of humanitarian work, this violence occurs because the international aid sector’s policy-making, processes and goals often replicate colonial patterns rather than learning from successful local experiences. This can be done by making plausible estimates of basic mechanisms that might be common to more than one context, through the process of deconstructing colonial relations and practices, locally[1]. Instead of deconstructing colonial relations, aid workers perpetuate existing power structures, aligning with local actors who reinforce colonial norms in favour of the affected people in need of humanitarian support.

Unfortunately, this can have devastating consequences, especially for those who lack robust support systems and willingly risk their safety to help others[2]. In a work culture where silent suffering is seen as altruism, challenging these patterns becomes crucial for meaningful change[3].

Imagine a brave aid worker, driven by compassion, navigating conflict zones, natural disasters, and refugee camps. A brave aid worker is an individual who selflessly risks their own safety and well-being to provide humanitarian assistance in crisis situations, by embodying the moral concern for human life, but the same concern also demands that we recognize their rights and ethical standing as they work toward noble ends. Their commitment to alleviating suffering is unwavering, yet they often face epistemic violence as they are treated as a means to an end – noble reasons can justify an individual risking their life for a greater cause^{2, 3}. I’d like to talk about these individuals that have silently suffered and given all of themselves to humanitarian work. Their sacrifices go unnoticed, overshadowed by headlines and statistics, their stories remain untold, their voices silenced. They perish in the invisibility of a system that — when they express concerns or propose alternative approaches to — dismisses or ignores them[4]. Oftentimes, their expertise is undervalued simply because they are gentle, kind, soft and considerate as well as thoughtful and sensitive, which ought to be the cornerstone qualities valued most by the humanitarian aid sector⁵. Being driven by compassion takes an emotional toll and can lead to empathy burn out; which is when these individuals spend so much of their emotional strength relating deeply to the problems and stress of others — given the nature of their work — they often forget to care for themselves[5]. Further, witnessing trauma takes a toll on their mental and emotional well-being. Yet, they continue, often without adequate support or community. 

These unsung, unheard and unknown heroes whose vulnerability is the reason humanitarian aid work still matters — often live their lives without a strong personal safety net — and they deserve acknowledgement, recognition and protection⁵.

Moving forward, here are five ways I have identified that we can approach this, to make a difference to the lives of the most vulnerable and valuable people in the humanitarian aid sector:

Community Awareness: 

Education: Raise awareness about epistemic violence by talking about how to identify its existence and consciously inculcate measures to stop epistemic violence. This can be done by encouraging open discussions with differing viewpoints, purposefully, within our communities, schools, and workplaces to highlight unknown perspectives and experiences. 

Media Stories: Share the stories of aid workers by highlighting not only their resilience, challenges, and sacrifices but what we could do to support them through their challenges, lessen their need for resilience and prevent their sacrifices. 

Support Systems:

Peer Networks: Create support networks for aid workers across disciplines, generations, cultures and organizations. Intersectional peer-to-peer counseling and debriefing sessions purposed to mitigate emotional strain through mutual acknowledgement and sharing.

Mentorship: Experienced humanitarians with strong self-awareness, self-care practices and community support, who prioritize kindness and are emotionally intelligent and astute can guide newcomers. By nurturing their sense of emotional well-being, fostering their self-care and inculcating coping strategies that involve accepting community support by the new aid worker. 

Family Understanding: 

Dialogue: Families of humanitarians need to understand the realities of humanitarian work and what it entails, requires, and its effect on the family dynamics. Open conversations about what the individual job is on a day-to-day basis can dispel misconceptions and build empathy, belonging as well as connection between family members of humanitarian aid workers. 

Validation: Acknowledge the potential risks, how to minimize sacrifices to reduce resentment in the family dynamics and discussing potential consequences as well as the work culture can lead to celebrating the humanitarian aid workers courage and commitment, making them stronger and more resilient emotionally as well as mentally. 

Policy Advocacy:

Organizations: Humanitarian agencies of all sizes must make initial mental health assessments and regular mental health evaluations as well as support as an essential aspect of aid work, to recognize epistemic violence as well as to promote inclusive decision-making[6]. The practice of reactivity or repercussions towards those with opposing, dissenting or differing points of views needs to end^{4, [7]}. It is unproductive, self-limiting and enables epistemic violence, ableism and unnecessary risky behaviors in already volatile contexts.

Legal Protections: Formal, home-grown and international advocates for the implementation of legal protection of aid workers — the world over, regardless of nationality — are necessary to ensure the safety and the well-being of the aid workers while they are far from home.

Decoloniality:

Coloniality of Being[8]: When we openly reflect on our lived experiences of coloniality — both as individuals and collectively within our humanitarian identity — we uncover critical insights. By examining which aspects of these experiences influence the perceived value of local actors and knowledge, we can better understand how this value is determined. Unfortunately, the lack of such reflection perpetuates colonial power dynamics. These dynamics replicate hierarchies and working relations with local and national actors aligned with the humanitarian aid sector. This alignment, rooted in coloniality, results in epistemic violence, erasure, and devaluation of affected people. Ironically, it also surrenders control to the very actors responsible for the humanitarian aid needs in the first place.

Extrapolation¹: To truly transform humanitarian aid, we must shift our focus from dictating to local communities to reinforcing their priorities and complementing their capacities⁷. This means embracing new perspectives and approaches that recognize the humanity and prioritize the agency of affected people. At the forefront of humanitarian contexts — as any aid worker in the thick of it will know — we can easily reconstruct relations and practices while dismantling colonial patterns. By doing so, we can generate extremely valuable context-specific knowledge that honors individual and collective capacities of community engagement.

Epistemic violence must yield to compassion and understanding of our own experiences and shared humanity, for collective action so we can honor the bravery of humanitarianism we all have within us to transition into a empathetic world, together. 

References:

[1] Bardach, E (2003) The Extrapolation Problem, Presidential Address, Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management, 209-210.

[2] Ahmad, A., Eckenwiler, L., Leach Scully, J., Ganguli-Mitra, A., Chung, R., & Hunt, M. (2018). Identities, intersectionalities and vulnerabilities in humanitarian operations: A response to Slim. Humanitarian Law & Policy Blog.

[3] Baer D. The ultimate sacrifice and the ethics of humanitarian intervention. Review of International Studies. 2011;37(1):301-326.

[4] Clint G. Graves & Leland G. Spencer (2022) Against Knowing: The Rhetorical Structure of Epistemic Violence, Southern Communication Journal, 87:5, 403-417

⁵ Costa, B., Lázaro Gutiérrez, R., & Rausch, T. (2020) Self-care as an ethical responsibility. Translation and Interpreting Studies. The Journal of the American Translation and Interpreting Studies Association, V15,(1): 36-56

[6] Lough, O., Barbelet, V. and Njeri, S. (2022) Inclusion and exclusion in humanitarian action: findings from a three-year study. HPG report. London: ODI

[7] CDA Collaborative. Partnerships in humanitarian action (blog). URL: https://www.cdacollaborative.org/blog/partnerships-in-humanitarian-action/ accessed on 31^st July 2024

[8] Maldonado-Torres, N (2007) On the Coloniality of Being. Cultural Studies Vol. 21, Nos. 2 3 March/May 2007, pp. 240 270 ISSN 0950-2386 print/ISSN 1466-4348 online – 2007 Taylor & Francis http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals

Views expressed by contributors are solely those of individual contributors, and not necessarily those of PLOS.