Podcast

Dr Sema Karaosmanoğlu is the first guest in our new series of episodes on “Contested Aid”. Ralf Südhoff talks with her about the Humanitarian Reset process and the opportunities, but also possible limitations of a truly locally led system.

Ramesh Rajasingham, Head and Representative of OCHA in Geneva, was a keynote speaker at the CHA Conference 2025. In the follow up Ralf Südhoff spoke with him about a global crisis which goes well beyond the humanitarian system and about the status and the limitations of the ‘humanitarian reset’ agenda.   

Hibak Kalfan is Executive Director at NEAR, a network of local humanitarian and development actors in the Global South. In CHAtroom #22 CHA director Ralf Südhoff asks her about their view on the current state of humanitarian aid and the discussed humanitarian reset.

Niels Annen, Parliamentary State Secretary at the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, in an interview with Ralf Südhoff on the current controversies surrounding humanitarian action and development cooperation. [German]

In our three CHAtroom special features on the CHA Conference 2024, we welcome Janani Vivekananda, Pınar Okur and Shashwat Saraf.

Ralf Südhoff discusses with Hugo Slim which criteria should be used to prioritise humanitarian aid in the future.

Why might the forecasted right populist swing at the European elections be no problem for humanitarian aid? Former Director General Michael Köhler of DG ECHO in in the CHAtroom with Ralf Südhoff.

Ralf Südhoff leads the research project on Linking German and European policy capacities. In the CHAtroom he talks about how European donors could drive much-needed humanitarian reform through strategic coordination.

Arbie Baguios is a humanitarian and development professional, founder of Aid Re-imagined, and rapporteur at the CHAConference 2023. In the CHAtroom he explains how management impacts power imbalances in the humanitarian system.

Valentina Shafina is working for the IRC as a Technical Specialist, at the #CHA23 she will be discussing digital technologies and accountability in humanitarian action – and gives a glimpse of it in the CHAtroom.

How does racism manifest itself in humanitarian organisations in Germany? How do organisations address the issue? Nezahat Xuereb, co-founder of the “BIPoC Network in Development and Humanitarian NGOs” is our guest in the CHAtroom.

New technology-driven approaches are already an integral part of humanitarian responses. These technologies have many benefits for aid users and aid organisations. But they also deepen the power imbalance, they have impacts on inclusion. With Oliver Lough, Kerrie Holloway and John Bryant, Humanitarian Policy Group, ODI.

160 years after Henri Dunants Essay on the Battle of Solferino, Hugo Slim wrote a book on new warfare, cyber wars and its implications for the reform of the humanitarian sector. We discuss this in the 10th episode of the CHAtroom podcast.

The consequences of climate change pose immense challenges to the humanitarian system - at the same time humanitarian aid itself is also responsible for environmental impacts and needs to change in this respect. With Véronique de Geoffroy, Groupe URD, we talk about the buzzword "Greening Aid".

Is climate change just another humanitarian challenge or a game changer for the entire humanitarian system? In CHAtroom No.8 Paul Knox Clark, director of the ADAPT Initiative, provides answers.

Which road is still there, which bridge is still standing? After a disaster, aid organizations need to know quickly what the situation is on the ground. In this episode, Dr. Carolin Klonner and Dr. Natascha Bing explain how important geoinformation is for humanitarian action and how maps are created for this purpose. [German]

How does the localisation of humanitarian action work in practice? Don’t we perhaps even have too romantic an idea of local partners? In this sixth episode of the CHAtroom, Kayu Orellana from Help – Hilfe zur Selbsthilfe e.V. provides answers [in German].

Jan Egeland, Eminent Person of the Grand Bargain was on a panel discussion about the urgent needed reform of the humanitarian system in Berlin in September. CHA-Director Ralf Südhoff asked him about his plans and ambitions to create a new GB 2.0 momentum among humanitarian organizations and at the highest political level. In this podcast episode, we have compiled his answers.

Why he has been carrying a photo of Che Guevara in his wallet since he was 15, how the decolonisation agenda can be more than just an empty promise and why every voice is a “legitimate voice” is revealed by former MSF staff member and the new Director of the Global Health Centre Tammam Aloudat in the fourth episode of our CHAtroom. The episode is available in English. Listen and share!

In the third episode of CHAtroom, CHA Research Fellow Darina Pellowska explains what the so-called Grand Bargain and localisation of humanitarian aid are all about, what makes an organisation “local” – and what her camera has to do with it.

In the second episode of our new podcast CHAtroom, Lena Schellhammer from the Syrian NGO Maram Foundation is our guest. Lena explains what fatal consequences counter-terrorism laws have for aid in Syria, why she focuses on a “Breaking the Silence” in her new CHA Paper and what her daily work in the Syrian border area is like.

The CHAtroom is online – a podcast that makes the people behind humanitarian work visible – or rather audible. In the first episode of CHAtroom, CHA Director Ralf Südhoff reveals how he came to CHA, what happened there in the last two years and what he would like to see in 2021. Prick up your ears and listen!