Introducing our learning paper: lessons on meaningful participation in humanitarian action

People with disabilities and older people are disproportionately affected during humanitarian crises yet are often excluded from shaping the initiatives designed to assist them. Despite global frameworks advocating for disability inclusion, practical implementation remains a persistent challenge. Bridging this gap requires innovative solutions and actionable evidence.

To address these challenges, our Humanitarian Innovation Fund (HIF) launched the Meaningful Participation Innovation Challenge in July 2020. This initiative funded two groundbreaking projects in Indonesia and Ethiopia to develop, pilot, and assess mechanisms for enhancing the meaningful participation of people with disabilities and older people in humanitarian action.

Redefining Meaningful Participation

Meaningful participation defined as enabling people with disabilities and older people to actively and effectively engage in decision-making across all stages of humanitarian programs—from design to evaluation. Participation must be free from barriers such as cultural stigma, communication challenges, or inaccessible environments, making it a matter of individual choice rather than imposed limitations.

Insights from the Innovation Projects

Project 1: Localising Inclusive Humanitarian Responses (PIONEER) in Indonesia

This project established equitable partnerships between Organisations of Persons with Disabilities (OPDs), Older People’s Associations (OPAs), and local humanitarian organisations. It:

• Enhanced capacity and awareness to drive locally led, inclusive responses.
• Created collaborative frameworks for designing and implementing inclusive programs.
• Shifted OPDs and OPAs from passive beneficiaries to active leaders in humanitarian planning and governance.

Project 2: Participatory Audits in Ethiopia

Focusing on “Nothing About Us Without Us,” this initiative involved older people, people with disabilities, and their associations in:

• Developing an inclusive auditing tool tailored for humanitarian programs.
• Conducting audits to evaluate inclusivity in existing responses.
• Creating a context-specific, inclusive humanitarian response strategy for their community.

Results and Reflections

Both projects demonstrated transformative impacts:

• Active participation of OPDs and OPAs significantly increased, empowering them to co-lead and monitor humanitarian initiatives.
• New tools and strategies tailored to the local context enabled measurable improvements in inclusion.
• Challenges in measuring effectiveness highlighted the need for innovative, inclusive methodologies and early-stage capacity building to assess complex social innovations.

This learning paper shares key findings and reflections to guide humanitarian actors in embedding meaningful participation into their practices. It highlights the importance of:

• Adopting inclusive evaluation methods to capture qualitative impacts.
• Strengthening the capacity of organisations to measure participation effectively.
• Providing tailored support at the project outset to align methodologies with local realities.

Download the full learning paper to explore actionable recommendations for advancing meaningful participation in humanitarian action.

Photo Credit: A worker with Tearfund talks to an older community member in Kigali, Rwanda. ‘Giving older people a voice’ Credit: Will Boase