Caught Between Two Cultures: When aid in South Sudan is pulled between local norms and western systems

It is widely accepted that aid programmes designed to support recovery and resilience should enhance local coping capacities. In South Sudan, local social support mechanisms are intrinsic to those coping capacities. At the same time, aid actors try to counter practices they associate with misuse and diversion of aid. However, many international actors do not recognise how coping capacities and “diversion” are related, and spring from some of the same social forces. Kinship and community support-based social security mechanisms are vital for the survival of South Sudanese in times of crisis. They are based on concepts and longstanding practices of mutual support, social obligation and vulnerability. These concepts can conflict with western ideals of transparency, accountability and “fair” allocation of resources, including aid. As a result, socially and culturally important coping strategies can be difficult to reconcile with international aid guidelines, values and policies. They can also be seen as undermining aid agencies’ commitment to humanitarian principles. Tensions and dilemmas emerging from these partly incompatible value systems, or this “clash of civilisations”, are particularly evident when NGO staff engage with local authorities and community members. These tensions can pose significant pressures and even risks to aid workers, particularly local staff. This report aims at enhancing donors’ and aid workers’ understanding of the dilemmas, tensions and conflicting goals that emerge when international guidelines, policies and humanitarian principles meet the reality on the ground. Linked to that, the report aims to provide a) insights into local social security mechanisms prevalent in South Sudan and how they relate to external aid, b) local perceptions of what is and is not socially acceptable in terms of influencing and diverting aid, and c) a deeper understanding of the dilemmas, challenges and risks international and South Sudanese aid workers face in relation to social support mechanisms and aid, and how they respond to these challenges. This report is based on 43 interviews that were conducted in Juba, Torit and Akobo in July and August 2018.1 The researchers interviewed international and South Sudanese staff of international and South Sudanese NGOs and UN agencies, donors, academics, experts, South Sudanese authorities, church leaders and some beneficiaries. Moreover, the report draws on previous CSRF research on aid in former Northern Bahr el-Ghazal.