ICRC Protection Standards work; the Australian NGOs standards initiative; the  insertion of Protection into the Sphere review process.  What do these various efforts share in common?  What unmet needs are driving these parallel processes?  How do or will these intersect and how is all of this useful for the global protection community?

Panelists:
Michael Gallagher, SJ, Jesuit Refugee Service
Sandya Manickam, Caritas Australia
Manisha Thomas, International Council of Voluntary Agencies

Question: What does the standard setting exercises mean, in practical terms, for those most in need of protection?

PDF of  Session 6 Common Standards for Protection Notes

SUMMARY

Overall, standards are very useful in several ways:

• Offer practical ways in which field staff can implement often abstract concepts of protection rights
• Provide a starting point of working with communities to focus on affected populations and their needs/priorities
• Offer benchmarks to monitor and measure what is happening, how well it is happening, and how it can be strengthened
• Are tools for advocating with host governments regarding protection issues

Sphere standards, applied over 12 years, have led to good practice. They already incorporate protection in many ways and are practical as minimum for guidance to people who have not learned much about protection, though these standards tend to be camp oriented when more and more, the reality for protection issues is urban centered. Sphere could/should have specific protection standards, perhaps by incorporating ICRC standards. Perhaps a parallel process that INEE took would replicate their success in developing education-related standards. At the same time, there may be a greater likelihood of implementation/acceptability with broader (perhaps more vague) standards relating to protection. There are challenges in applying Sphere, such as the fact that they are not binding or obligatory and they are difficult to introduce in the context of governments opposed or hostile to protection work. Another potential risk is the military looking at and using standards to give activities patina of legitimacy.

While Sphere is recognized as one of the major set of standards that incorporate protection, there are other useful standards emerging (ICRC, Australian NGOs’ effort, Sphere revision). While each offer their strengths, there was some concern over the proliferation of standards would result in confusion and end up with no standards being incorporated. The fact that Sphere is making an effort to better incorporate protection will hopefully create a common point of reference which might help overcome this challenge.

Ultimately, standards won’t mean much without adoption and implementation. Training, incorporation into work, monitoring this incorporation, developing guidance for reporting and referral of protection-related abuses/violations, and advocacy on protection issues are all important areas to tackle. For protection to have durability, it needs a minimum of 3-5 years to be nurtured.  Faith-based institutions need to put their private funding to support this long term learning to make it instinctual practice for staff. Advocacy with funders (especially government agencies) is also critical so that they invest resources to implement protection work. As humanitarian actors seek to meet these standards, it is critical to dialogue/negotiate with each affected community about critical protection needs (specific to their context and more globally recognized ones).