This article reviews the prevailing explanations, assumptions, and research on why humanitarian actors experience security threats. It argues that one stream of the academic literature focuses on documenting violence against aid workers — a proximate cause approach — while a second proposes explanations, or deep causes, often without empirical evidence. Moreover, the deep cause literature emphasizes external, changing global conditions to the neglect of other possible micro and internal explanations. Both of these approaches have negative implications for our understanding of, and therefore strategies to address, security threats against aid workers. More attention to assumptions about cause and more openness to the complex interplay of deep and proximate causes and internal and external factors will contribute to more effective security management and humanitarian action.
One literature stream examines proximate causes and relies on empirical evidence in making its claims, while a second stream focuses on macro explanations and deep causes, and uses primarily anecdotal evidence. These literatures focus on different levels to explain the causes and risk factors related to security issues. A number of attempts to standardise and compile multiple data sources about security incidents have failed or ended, inhibiting attempts to draw conclusions from a more comprehensive data set. Further findings include the following:
- Researchers who have attempted to collect data on this topic agree that the obstacles are abundant and frustrating. The research, it seems, has not yet caught up with some claims in the literature, and it appears unlikely to do so.
- We know very little about the motivations and intentions of those who attack humanitarian workers. One possible remedy lies in more standardised and accessible data, but even this will only provide partial information, because motive and intention are either absent or assumed from such data. Without the arrest or prosecution of perpetrators, or informal interviews of those who target aid workers, we are unlikely to gain such insight.
- Attention to the ‘why’ question, and especially attention to individual and organisational factors, very often collides with liability concerns. Several exceptions do exist, primarily in security manuals or best practice documentation, that acknowledge the link between personal conduct and security incidents.
- In practice, these discrepancies are important because of the implications for security management. Underlying assumptions and beliefs about cause and intention, including whether criminal or targeted violence is the central threat, influence how and with what mechanisms an agency protects its staff. The obvious danger is that we develop policies and agendas that wrongly identify the problems and causes.
