We Don't Need Saving: Local Crisis Resilience

Communities don’t need to be rescued, they need support to build local solutions to their own crises.

Justin Corbett has a 35 years of experience working on the front face of humanitarian crises, with aid organisations, supporting community-led responses. He joins us over video call, with Mark Amery about supporting grassroots community resilience.

Justin has been working with youth groups in Sudan, as well as continuing work with groups in Ethiopia, Somalia, Syria, India, Myanmar and the Philippines. He feels a deep unease with the current disempowering norms of mainstream humanitarian and protection programming, while being inspired by what local people can achieve when supported to lead their own initiatives. He is currently helping establish a new philanthropic global fund to support national civil society organizations strengthen this autonomous “mutual-aid” of crisis-affected communities. When not travelling, he is a resident of France and of Paekākāriki on the Kāpiti Coast.