Spanning "Bleeding" Boundaries: Humanitarianism, NGOs, and the Civilian-Military Nexus in the Post-Cold War Era
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Authors
Roberts, Nancy C.
Subjects
Advisors
Date of Issue
2010
Date
March/April 2010
Publisher
Language
Abstract
How do nongovernmental (NGO), international (IO),
and military organizations cope with their dependencies
and address their perceptual and real diff erences in
order to coordinate their fi eld operations? Th is question
is addressed through the creation of a matrix grouping
civilian (NGOs and IOs) and military operations into
four general types: peacekeeping; disaster relief; complex
humanitarian emergencies/warfare; and stabilization
and reconstruction. Second, using Galbraith’s
information processing approach to organizational
design, a range of formal coordination mechanisms
that organizations use at the strategic and operational
levels to help them cope with their dependencies in
diff erent fi eld operations is identifi ed. Th ird, the author
underscores how communities of practice are emerging
as informal mechanisms of coordination among civilian
and military organizations. And fi nally, a framework of
organizational forms that views communities of practice
as an alternative to hierarchy and markets is off ered.
Believing communities of practice hold the most promise
for coordination in the human security domain when
hierarchies are politically untenable and markets lack
accountability, the author concludes with implications for
interorganization coordination research and practice.
Type
Article
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Series/Report No
Department
Defense Analysis (DA)
Organization
Naval Postgraduate School (U.S.)
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Citation
N.C. Roberts, "Spanning "bleeding" boundaries: humanitarianism, NGOs, and the civilian-military nexus in the Post-Cold war era," Public Administration Review, March/April 2010, pp. 212-222.
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This publication is a work of the U.S. Government as defined in Title 17, United States Code, Section 101. Copyright protection is not available for this work in the United States.