ODI

Some aid experts, though, think it's not all bad news.

Nalima Gulrajani with ODI Global, an international affairs think tank, says the foreign aid system may be in need of a shake-up.

There have been

activists and even officials saying, questioning the value for money we're getting from the aid system, the impact, you know, whether it just perpetuates asymmetric power in the global economic

His research explores maritime security in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, Houthi cross-border networks and operations, and foreign and defense policies towards Yemen.

Ibrahim has worked with the UN, the Carnegie Middle East Center, the Middle East Institute, the Overseas Development Institute, and Chemonics.

Welcome to the Guns for Hire podcast.

Thanks for having me, Alia.

How did international institutions engage with displaced communities in developing their response efforts? And what could they have done differently?

Thank you so much, Sara and ODI, for hosting this conversation.

Well, what we witnessed following the two massive earthquakes that nearly destroyed two cities in the capital area of Venezuela is a micro-manifestation, if we can call it that way, to the global economy.

scope.

Thanks, Ana.

And that is a very good and valid challenge, including, you know, to think tanks like us.

And that's a journey ODI Global has been on.

And we've been doing a lot of Thinking about our operations, about our policies, definitely the culture is still at the very beginning of the journey.

That raises some important questions.

What makes these systems legitimate? How do movements make decisions? How do they manage internal disagreements? How do they avoid reproducing the very power structures that they are resisting? And what happens when governments, humanitarian organizations, donors, and diaspora communities try to support them? Today's episode builds on a seminar series that ODI Global co-hosted with the Arab Renaissance for Democracy and Development, ARDD, which brought together activists, researchers, and practitioners to explore how movements organize, how they resist, and how they govern in some of the world's most challenging contexts.

I'm joined by Charles Petrie, former UN Assistant Secretary General and visiting senior fellow at ODI Global, Ibrahim Basher, Deputy Team Leader of the Yemen Flexible Fund Mechanism and Senior Technical Advisor to the Yemen Support Facility, and Mardau, Lebanese activist, public affairs expert, and member of the Lebanese Parliament since 2022.

Welcome

to you all.

But how can they use the natural resources they have in a transparent and accountable manner that also feeds into the local governance mechanisms that they put in place, the local administrations, etc., etc.? ?

Well, this has been such a mind-expanding conversation.

I mean, at ODI Global, we're following a lot of these really closely and supporting what movements are doing.