Hafez Sali, Clarke Amber, Richter Katharina, Lokot Michelle, Rivas Althea-Maria, Singh Neha S
Health in Humanitarian Crises Centre, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London, United Kingdom.
FAIR Network, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London, United Kingdom.
PLOS Glob Public Health. 2025 Jul 23;5(7):e0004833. doi: 10.1371/journal.pgph.0004833. eCollection 2025.
Despite a burgeoning discourse within the humanitarian health community regarding decolonisation, there remains lack of practical guidance for researchers seeking to decolonise their work. We conducted a qualitative study which aimed to explore the perceptions of research and teaching staff at the Health in Humanitarian Crisis Centre (HHCC) and their external partners -including humanitarian health researchers, practitioners, and donors- regarding how to decolonise research, teaching and partnerships at a leading global health Higher Education institution in the UK. We conducted 20 semi-structured interviews and 3 focus group discussions with HHCC members and external partners, including donors, academic institutions in conflict-affected and humanitarian settings, and practitioners from local and international humanitarian organisations. The first theme explored the concept of decolonisation itself, examining the disparate definitions and understandings held by HHCC members and partners, along with examining the institutional appetite and the role of leadership in driving decolonisation efforts. The second theme focused on sectoral and structural barriers to decolonising HHCC's work, including the dominance of Western-defined knowledge models, inequitable funding policies and practices, and epistemic injustice. Finally, the third theme explored HHCC's experiences in decolonising teaching and curriculum. The study identifies good practices within the HHCC community including knowledge co-production, equitable authorship arrangements, co-dissemination of findings, assigning co-principal investigators from conflict-affected countries, and centring and building on the experiences of researchers with relevant lived experience. However, these individual efforts contrast with a lack of appetite at the institutional level to address the underlying structural barriers. Our study provides the foundations for humanitarian health researchers and educators based in the Global North to begin to practically decolonise their work in the sphere of global/humanitarian health.
尽管人道主义卫生界内部关于去殖民化的讨论日益增多，但对于寻求将其工作去殖民化的研究人员而言，仍然缺乏切实可行的指导。我们开展了一项定性研究，旨在探究人道主义危机中的健康中心（HHCC）的研究和教学人员及其外部合作伙伴（包括人道主义卫生研究人员、从业者和捐助者）对于在英国一所领先的全球卫生高等教育机构如何使研究、教学和伙伴关系去殖民化的看法。我们与HHCC成员及外部合作伙伴（包括捐助者、受冲突影响地区和人道主义环境中的学术机构，以及当地和国际人道主义组织的从业者）进行了20次半结构化访谈和3次焦点小组讨论。第一个主题探讨了去殖民化本身的概念，审视了HHCC成员和合作伙伴所持的不同定义和理解，同时考察了机构的意愿以及领导层在推动去殖民化努力中的作用。第二个主题聚焦于HHCC工作去殖民化的部门和结构障碍，包括西方定义的知识模式的主导地位、不公平的资金政策和做法，以及认知不公正。最后，第三个主题探究了HHCC在教学和课程去殖民化方面的经验。该研究确定了HHCC社区内的良好做法，包括知识共同生产、公平的作者身份安排、研究结果的共同传播、指定来自受冲突影响国家的共同首席研究员，以及以有相关实际经验的研究人员的经验为核心并在此基础上进行拓展。然而，这些个人努力与机构层面缺乏解决潜在结构障碍的意愿形成了对比。我们的研究为全球北方的人道主义卫生研究人员和教育工作者在全球/人道主义卫生领域切实开展去殖民化工作奠定了基础。
