Papers and reports
Policy papers, campaign reports, and research.
Full list of policy papers
Shooting Down the MDGs: How irresponsible arms transfers undermine development goals
Irresponsible arms transfers are undermining many developing countries’ chances of achieving their Millennium Development Goal (MDG) targets. This paper shows new evidence of how this is happening in parts of Asia, Latin America, and Africa – either by draining governments’ resources or by fuelling armed violence or conflict.
The forecast for tomorrow: the UK's climate for change
A snapshot of a country deeply torn by good and bad climate policies and actions among business, public and government – with each group inextricably bound by the actions of the others. Whether the UK succeeds in achieving its emissions reduction targets and in becoming a leader in international climate negotiations depends on whether good or bad policies prevail. At stake are the lives and livelihoods of millions of poor people around the world, who will suffer first and worst from climate change despite being the least responsible for it.
For a Safer Tomorrow: Protecting civilians in a multipolar world
Some states and non-state actors choose to kill civilians, or pursue strategies in which civilians are too likely to die. Some governments choose to protect their citizens: to keep them safe. Some do not protect all of them, or not well enough. This report will argue that this is far from inevitable - that successful examples of protecting civilians show what governments and others can do when they choose to.
Out of Site: Building better responses to displacement in the Democratic Republic of the Congo by helping host families
Despite new peace agreements, continued conflict among and between armed militias and government forces in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) in the last year has seen thousands of new internally displaced persons in the east of the country, many of whom have poured into camps seeking shelter and safety.
Mission incomplete: why civilians remain at risk in eastern Chad
The international community took an important step in deploying the UN and EUFOR mission to volatile and insecure eastern Chad. However, one year on, this mission is not capable of adequately protecting civilians and requires urgent reform.
From Emergency to Recovery: Rescuing northern Uganda’s transition
Despite the absence of a final peace settlement, a dramatic improvement in security in war-ravaged northern Uganda is allowing displaced civilians to return home and has transformed the humanitarian operating environment. A transition is now under way from a relief effort led by international agencies to government-driven recovery. But that shift is generating new challenges for northern Ugandans and institutional confusion among the actors working to help them rebuild their lives.
Climate Wrongs and Human Rights: Putting people at the heart of climate-change policy
In failing to tackle climate change with urgency, rich countries are effectively violating the human rights of millions of the world’s poorest people. Continued excessive greenhouse-gas emissions primarily from industrialised nations are – with scientific certainty – creating floods, droughts, hurricanes, sea-level rise, and seasonal unpredictability. The result is failed harvests, disappearing islands, destroyed homes, water scarcity, and deepening health crises, which are undermining millions of peoples’ rights to life, security, food, water, health, shelter, and culture. Such rights violations could never truly be remedied in courts of law. Human-rights principles must be put at the heart of international climate-change policy making now, in order to stop this irreversible damage to humanity’s future.
Survival of the fittest: Pastoralism and climate change in East Africa
Climate change is having a destructive impact on many groups around the world. Pastoralists in East Africa have been adapting to climate variability for millennia and their adaptability ought to enable them to cope with this growing challenge. This paper explains the policies required to enable sustainable and productive pastoralist communities to cope with the impact of climate change and generate sustainable livelihoods.
Failing women, withholding protection: 15 lost years in making female condoms accessible
Policy makers lament women’s vulnerablity to HIV infection, yet for 15 years they have failed to utilise a technology which can help women to protect and empower themselves. The female condom is the only female-initiated method which provides protection from HIV infection; it also prevents unwanted pregnancy. Studies have shown it is acceptable to users, increases the proportion of protected sex acts, and is cost-effective when provided in addition to male condoms. Yet most women cannot access female condoms. Female condoms exist now; the push for universal access to them should begin now.
Turning up the heat: climate change and poverty in Uganda
People in Uganda, whose contribution to global warming has been minuscule, are feeling the impacts of climate change first and worst. On the one hand there is more erratic rainfall in the March to June rainy season, bringing drought and reductions in crop yields and plant varieties; on the other hand, the rainfall, especially in the later rains towards the end of the year, is reported as coming in downpours that are more intense and destructive, bringing floods, landslides, and soil erosion.
Another Inconvenient Truth: How biofuel policies are deepening poverty and accelerating climate change
The current biofuel policies of rich countries are neither a solution to the climate crisis nor the oil crisis, and instead are contributing to a third: the food crisis. In poor countries, biofuels may offer some genuine development opportunities, but the potential economic, social, and environmental costs are severe, and decision makers should proceed with caution.
Credibility crunch - Food, poverty, and climate change: an agenda for rich-country leaders
The year 2008 is halfway to the deadline for reaching the Millennium Development Goals. Despite some progress, they will not be achieved if current trends continue. Aid promises are predicted to be missed by $30bn, at a potential cost of 5 million lives. Starting with the G8 meeting in Japan, rich countries must use a series of high-profile summits in 2008 to make sure the Goals are met, and to tackle both climate change and the current food crisis. Economic woes must not be used as excuses: rich countries’ credibility is on the line.
Health insurance in low-income countries: Where is the evidence that it works?
Some donors and governments propose that health insurance mechanisms can close health financing gaps and benefit poor people. Although beneficial for the people able to join, this method of financing health care has so far been unable to sufficiently fill financing gaps in health systems and improve access to quality health care for the poor. Donors and governments need to consider the evidence and scale up public resources for the health sector. Without adequate public funding and government stewardship, health insurance mechanisms pose a threat rather than an opportunity to the objectives of equity and universal access to health care.
Fast Forward: How the European Commission can take the lead in providing high-quality budget support for education and health
Developing-country governments desperately need more long-term and predictable aid, given through their budgets, to finance the expansion of health care, education, and other vital social services. The European Commission (EC) is one of the biggest donors providing this kind of essential budget support, and has innovative plans to further improve and increase this aid.
Rethinking disasters: why death and destruction is not nature's fault but human failure
A destructive combination of earthquakes, floods, droughts and other hazards make South Asia is the world’s most disaster-prone region. The effects are aggravated by climate change, unsuitable social and development policies, and environmental degradation. The effect is to slow or block development and keep millions trapped in poverty.The Gaza Strip: a humanitarian implosion
The situation for 1.5 million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip is worse now than it has ever been since the start of the Israeli military occupation in 1967. The current situation in Gaza is man-made, completely avoidable and, with the necessary political will, can also be reversed.
Community peacebuilding in Afghanistan: The case for a national strategy
Existing measures to promote peace in Afghanistan are not succeeding. This is not only due to the revival of the Taliban, but also because little has been done to try to ensure that families, communities, and tribes – the fundamental units of Afghan society – get on better with each other. War has fractured the social fabric of the country and, in the context of severe and persistent poverty, local disputes have the potential to turn violent and to exacerbate the wider conflict. But there is no effective strategy to help Afghans deal with disputes in a peaceful and constructive way.
After the cyclone: lessons from a disaster
Three months after Cyclone Sidr struck the coastal areas of Bangladesh, Oxfam reports on the fate of those who lost their loved ones, their homes and their jobs on 15 November 2007. With more than 1.3 million Bangladeshis still living in temporary shelter and hundreds of thousands unable to recover their incomes, Oxfam calls on the government and the international community to scale up their recovery and rehabilitation efforts to meet the cyclone survivors’ urgent need for housing and livelihoods.
Afghanistan: development and humanitarian priorities
While aid has contributed to progress in Afghanistan, especially in social and economic infrastructure – and whilst more aid is needed – the development process has to date been too centralised, top-heavy and insufficient. Urgent action is required to promote comprehensive rural development, reforming subnational governance, and channelling more resources directly to communities.
Oxfam Analysis of the Bali Conference Outcomes (18 December 2007)
Investing for life: Meeting poor people’s needs for access to medicines through responsible business practice
There are major shortcomings in the pharmaceutical industry’s current initiatives to ensure that poor people have access to medicines. The industry must put access to medicines at the heart of its decision-making and practices to allow it to better play its role in achieving the universal right to health.
Climate Alarm: Disasters increase as climate change bites
Climatic disasters are increasing as temperatures climb and rainfall intensifies. A rise in small- and medium-scale disasters is a particularly worrying trend. Yet even extreme weather need not bring disasters; it is poverty and powerlessness that make people vulnerable.
Up in smoke? Asia and the Pacific
The latest global scientific consensus from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) indicates that all of Asia is very likely to warm during this century, accompanied by less predictable and more extreme patterns of rainfall.
Bio-fuelling poverty: why the EU renewable fuel target may be disastrous for poor people
In January of this year, the European Commission published its Renewable Energy Roadmap, proposing a mandatory target that biofuels must provide ten per cent of member states’ transport fuels by 2020.
What agenda now for agriculture?: A response to the World Development Report 2008
After two decades of indefensible neglect, agriculture is back on the agenda. The World Bank’s publication of the ‘World Development Report 2008: Agriculture For Development’ reflects this renewed interest in the sector’s potential to reduce rural poverty and inequality.
Africa’s missing billions: International arms flows and the cost of conflict
Africa suffers enormously from conflict and armed violence. As well as the human tragedy, armed conflict costs Africa around $18bn per year, seriously derailing development.
Rising to the humanitarian challenge
in Iraq
Armed violence is the greatest threat facing Iraqis, but the population is also experiencing another kind of crisis of an alarming scale and severity.
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