The humanitarian aid – development – peace Triple Nexus: an instrument of change or no more than an empty shell?

Ten years after it was adopted at the Istanbul World Humanitarian Summit, the Triple Nexus (humanitarian aid, development and peace) is at a crossroads. This new approach, inspired by the need to break down the silos separating emergency aid, development and peace-building – based on the complementary strengths of the protagonists and on the desire for a shared response to the structural causes of the crisis – today falters in the face of a triple challenge: a clash of ideologies, the diminution of financial resources and the constraints that hinder implementation.

By contrast with the traditional linear model (the continuum of emergency – rehabilitation – development), the Triple Nexus proposes a contiguum: an integrated approach whereby the three pillars may be coordinated, as needed. The approach makes obvious sense, in that it gives stakeholders shared objectives that are defined in association with local partners, who work together to diagnose a given situation. However, it is an approach that is simply unrealistic when it comes to implementation.

Now, with international cooperation under threat, how do we rate the ten years of experimenting with the Triple Nexus? Can it still be a convincing approach, in a world where the number of multi-dimensional crises is growing, where there is a deep ideological schism within the international community, and where peace is no longer a priority? Is the Triple Nexus a means of transformation, or is it now just an empty shell?

2016-2026: Taking stock

The approach has had convincing results, but there are still numerous implementation issues.

Observed results

The Triple Nexus goes beyond ‘Band-Aid’-style solutions, enabling the root causes of conflict and structural poverty to be addressed. It entails working towards shared objectives over a multi-year timeframe, with the aim of meeting (and ultimately ending) the need for humanitarian assistance, rather than continuing to provide such assistance indefinitely. The Triple Nexus breaks down organisational silos, and thus benefits from each protagonist’s comparative advantage(s), ensuring that the right resources are available in the right place at the right time. It stimulates a ‘Nexus reflective process’, which gives priority to affected people’s own account of their needs – including security, the rule of law, access to basic services – rather than being straitjacketed by the agencies’ strict mandates. It is a framework within which national actors can realise autonomy: in many cases, they are already using the three ‘pillars’ of the Triple Nexus holistically in their work. In stable countries such as Uganda, the Triple Nexus facilitates the uploading of services to national systems or grids. The approach relies on a more sophisticated reading of the Do no harm principle, helping to ensure that humanitarian assistance does not involuntarily increase tensions or undermine social capital.

Groupe URD has drawn on its extensive work in providing training within the humanitarian aid sector, and as an observer of the sector’s activities, to assess the implementation of the Triple Nexus, and the results achieved (e.g., the RESILAC project, YERETALI, Nex’Eau (in the water sector), or the evaluation of the humanitarian assistance effort in eastern Chad). The approach is complex, demanding, sometimes laborious – but it pays off.

Ongoing challenges

The Triple Nexus faces major obstacles that limit its range and scope. These obstacles are indicative of serious discord or dissension over operational and ethical issues. Increased collaboration with political and military actors comes with a risk of politicisation and instrumentalisation, which compromises neutrality, and may hinder access to regions particularly affected by crises. As for funding, we see a striking paradox: donors officially support the Triple Nexus but their financing mechanisms are still, with few exceptions, rigid and compartmentalised. Agencies are trapped between inadequate budgets for humanitarian assistance, and development funding agencies that hold back from making commitments, because – or so they claim – of the political risks involved. Finally, implementing the Triple Nexus is resource intensive. It relies on enhanced coordination and specialist technical advisers … but at a time when the institutional capacity of key actors has been undermined by high staff turnover, accompanied by a loss of institutional memory and reduced effectiveness.

• The ‘donors’ paradox’

There have been results and progress – e.g., the creation of the AFD’s MINKA funding envelope – but donors have difficulty aligning what they do with what they say. Funding is still often compartmentalised (humanitarian assistance, development, peace), with each funding commitment governed by different rules (exchange rates, audits, market practices and procedures), which make coordination more complicated. The NGOs must steer a path between administrative demands that are sometimes inconsistent with each other: this increases transaction costs and hijacks resources needed in the field.

• A glaring lack of capacity and of shared diagnostics

Many organisations are short of the dedicated staff needed to coordinate analytical work and cross-sectoral planning. Funds are too often allocated on the basis of projects rather than programmes, with collective results being a key criterion. This leads to overlap, as well as a lack of shared vision. Equally problematic is the absence of unified data, making it difficult to agree on the diagnosis of a given crisis. Groupe URD has observed that data quality is often poor, which makes it difficult to agree on an interpretation of the situation on the ground. National actors are too often pushed off in to the margins, which impairs strategic decision making.

• ‘Little peace’ and ‘big peace’

The notion of ‘peace’ as a component of the Triple Nexus is a source of disagreement between NGOs and the public sector, or national governments. For NGOs, it is to do with social cohesion and inclusion. For the public sector, it is to do with strategic national security risks including stability issues, antiterrorism initiatives, and secure borders. Instruments like the EU Trust Fund for Africa are presented as development tools; in reality, they are focused on controlling migration and achieving regional stability, setting European priorities above local needs. When a situation is unstable, institutional donors often impose unrealistic conditionality – detailed predictions, guaranteed results – when lack of certainty is in fact the norm.  Coupled with an increased securitisation of aid, this approach packages funding so as to respond to political imperatives (migration, terrorism). As a result, we see a confidence deficit, and this is growing. Humanitarian assistance is perceived as an instrument of power, despite its fundamental ethical stance. Is the issue worth the candle? Examples such as Afghanistan make it legitimate to doubt that it is.

As we see in Iraq, Afghanistan or Gaza, antiterrorist legislation imposes intrusive checks (biometrics, releasing lists of employees’ names) which undermine the principles of neutrality and non-discrimination. Some NGOs refuse to comply and therefore have no choice but to pull out (as in Gaza in December 2025). This is an illustration of a growing dilemma: security imperatives or humanitarian imperatives.

• Rhetoric … and results

Major international conferences, such as the 2016 Istanbul conference, are strong on speeches, much less so on concrete results. The over-sized, bureaucratic multilateral system prioritises immediate, quantifiable results – easy to communicate – at the expense of the deep structural changes, often invisible on the surface, that the Triple Nexus requires.

To sum up, in its current form, the Triple Nexus is an attempt to provide a rational response within an irrational system where decisions are often upended because of short-term considerations, dubious security issues and a need to garner visible political kudos. The Triple Nexus, while it has been seen to work in practice, is still too often no more than a piously expressed wish, a semantic label applied to outdated practices.[1] Now, when development aid funding is in free fall, there is a strong temptation to go ‘back to basics’ (see below).

The outlook

The fall in funding is leading to a ‘back to basics’ trend. This trend could wipe out thirty or forty years of work. Over and above that danger, the Triple Nexus could morph into a ‘humanitarian aid-business-security’ nexus, as we are seeing in Gaza.

Despite the structural obstacles, the Triple Nexus approach is supported by the aid sector, in particular by means of trust funds. However, the fall in funding is leading to a ‘back to basics’ trend. This trend could wipe out thirty or forty years of work. Over and above that danger, the Triple Nexus could morph into a ‘humanitarian aid-business-security’ nexus, as we are seeing in Gaza. How, therefore, should we react to this trend?

Trust Funds

Trust funds emerged as key to implementing the Triple Nexus, combining emergency interventions and resilience initiatives. Historically, such funds have been used for humanitarian aid, but they are evolving to bridge the gap between emergency aid and sustainable development.

• Triple Nexus programming in action

Trust funds require an integrated approach from the very outset of a project. Take, for example, Ukraine (2020), where for funding proposals to be eligible they had to include a Triple Nexus element; or Burma, where an EU cofinancing mechanism mingles humanitarian resources (ECHO) and resources for long-term development (INTPA) to provide support for groups who are living through prolonged periods of displacement; or Chad, where humanitarian aid and long-term development donors have established an arrangement similar to that in Burma, focused on the Kanem and Bahr el-Ghazal areas.

• Localisation and flexibility

As purveyors of the principles of the Grand Bargain, Trust Funds enhance flexible funding for local actors, who are less compartmentalised and more fully engaged in the Triple Nexus approach. In Haiti, national NGOs jointly manage funds to ensure that appropriate assistance is provided. Some are trying out multi-year planning and more flexible budget lines (the term crisis modifier is used to describe how these work) that can be flipped rapidly from humanitarian to long-term development aid.

• Specialised funds, and obstacles

In southern Sudan, the UNMISS (RSRTF) fund finance integrated programmes (e.g., conflict resolutions + increased economic autonomy), using a contiguum rather than a linear model. However, the majority of CBPFs (country-based pooled funds) are still earmarked separately for humanitarian aid, with high transaction costs, and with donors passing on risks to NGOs via demands for monitoring, auditing, etc., that may be unrealistic.

The CBPFs represent serious progress for the Triple Nexus approach: their effectiveness depends on their capacity to break out of silos, simplify procedures and enlarge their scope beyond the humanitarian sector.

‘Fragility’

The OECD defines fragility as the incapacity of states or societies to absorb shocks because of structural weaknesses (governance, conflict, climate). The Triple Nexus (humanitarian aid-development-peace) is the most appropriate approach for addressing fragility: it facilitates enhanced coordination, flexible funding, and integrated interventions that correspond to the underlying causes of fragility. If the European Commission makes a priority of addressing fragility using the Triple Nexus approach, it could then avoid the pitfalls of fragmented assistance programmes and make sustainable transformations or improvements in-country. Conversely, falling back on sectoral arrangements is likely to exacerbate vulnerability, with consequences for Europe in the medium- to long-term as a result of struggling economies, migration and security issues.

Threats and dangers

Back to basics: the temptation to go back to basic responses

The Triple Nexus is under threat from budgetary cuts and a trend towards ‘basic’ humanitarian aid … two developments that indicate precisely why the Triple Nexus is needed. Even though coordination costs are high, all the available analysis confirms that it is the only viable framework for reaching and treating the underlying causes of crises – now beyond the reach of traditional aid budgets.

• A system in discord

Funding is falling steeply (-24% between 2024 and 2025, according to the OECD) while humanitarian needs are increasing. As a result, the Triple Nexus approach is challenged. In addition, available funds are still enmeshed in the ‘donors’ paradox’, already described in this article. The outcome is that essential jobs (coordination, analysis) are the first to be sacrificed, thus setting up the risk of a return to fragmented, short-term humanitarian aid.

The crisis the aid sector is going through brings to mind an already well-worn saying: ‘There are no purely humanitarian solutions to humanitarian problems.’

• Protect or abandon?

Falling back on basic humanitarian aid raises questions. On the one hand, the motivation for this falling back appears to be a growing instrumentalisation of Triple Nexus on the international scene which is dominated by a surge of imperialism and contempt for international human rights. On the other hand, the motivation seems to be the risk of seeing a system emerge where actors who are less committed to the main principles governing humanitarian aid, come along and redefine the rules and mix up different types of action, etc., thereby adding to the risks already confronting humanitarian actors and affected groups.

In any case, the crisis the aid sector is going through brings to mind an already well-worn saying: ‘There are no purely humanitarian solutions to humanitarian problems.’ Prolonged crises[2] show that short-term responses encourage toxic dependence on aid. That leads us to ask how a going back or withdrawal to basics can be justified without its being part of giving up altogether?

• Why is the Triple Nexus still essential?

The Triple Nexus has three chief advantages: it offers

• Reduction of vulnerabilities by combining forces from all sectors, rather than perpetuating emergency aid with no end in sight;
• A proven return on investment: $1 spent on consolidating peace = $16 of savings on the cost of conflict (source: the IMF).
• Avoidance of the ethical impasse of a humanitarian aid sector reduced to survival mode, which undermines human dignity while ignoring long-term needs or goals (autonomy, stability).

A humanitarian aid-business-security Triple Nexus

A new Triple Nexus is developing in Gaza.[3] It constitutes a precedent, a dangerous drift off course. We are witnessing the colonisation of humanitarian assistance to serve economic and geopolitical interests. If this model worked – trucks arriving with deliveries, famines eradicated, dignity preserved – many people would simply close their eyes. But if you replace aid based on human rights with aid in the hands of private contractors, the civilian beneficiaries are in fact dehumanised and are treated as no more than logistical variables.

• Gaza, laboratory of an alarming future

In the classic model, a citizen has rights. In the business-security model, as in the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a citizen becomes part of a ‘management flow’: access to aid is conditional on biometric checks, and aid goes to ‘the person who collaborates’ not to ‘the hungry person’. If this system – mercenaries + private sector logistics companies – replaces the UN in Gaza, it will surely then be exported elsewhere (Sudan, Yemen …). Humanitarian assistance will no longer be a moral and juridical obligation, but a security issue. People will become stock to be managed, not holders of rights.

• Profit vs. international human rights

A private business has primary responsibility to its shareholders, not to the Geneva Conventions.[4] Unlike NGOs or the UN, a PMC (private military company) withdraws if risks threaten its profitability, abandoning zones that are difficult to access, where needs are often the most desperate. By replacing witnesses to wrongdoing with service providers bound together by secrecy, you ‘switch off the light’. Without reporting on misappropriations, aid turns into a ‘lubricant’ to maintain the security status quo, not an arm of justice.

A model as just described would mark the culmination of a system where life no longer has a universal value, but instead a geopolitical value. In entrusting people’s survival to private dealers, political responsibility is privatised and the idea of the ‘citizen of the world’ is tossed aside. If mercenaries replace the forces operating under UN mandates in Lebanon, or Gaza, or elsewhere, a precedent will be set for the future.

• A new world disorder?

A model as just described would mark the culmination of a system where life no longer has a universal value, but instead a geopolitical value. In entrusting people’s survival to private dealers, political responsibility is privatised and the idea of the ‘citizen of the world’ is tossed aside. If mercenaries replace the forces operating under UN mandates in Lebanon, or Gaza, or elsewhere, a precedent will be set for the future. If rules no longer apply in this domain, they will soon apply nowhere.

If we lose the UN system and international law and human rights, we lose the only common framework and language that makes it possible to stem the tide of barbarism. Without them, we slide into a sort of modern feudalism where the ‘strongest’ impose their will, in the name of an illusory freedom. Let us remember the words of Jean de la Bruyère: ‘In a well-run government, the law is liberty; but when the strong confront the weak, freedom is the oppressor and law the liberator.’

Conclusion: resist

We need to mobilise vigorously against a ‘blind’ return to basics. Otherwise, the Triple Nexus will soon be nothing more than a beautiful idea, a memory, an empty shell. The sector would lose a powerful instrument of change.

Resisting the challenges to international cooperation and its guiding principles should not stop at expressing indignation.

Faced with an attempt at full-scale instrumentalisation and repeated violations of international human rights, juridical and political protest is being organised. There is an emerging movement against humanitarian washing.[5] NGOs[6] publish reports that deconstruct initiatives like the proposal for a Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. Groups of lawyers and NGOs draw on international human rights statutes to show that subcontracting aid to private sector actors, without proper checks,[7] constitutes an illegal abrogation of responsibility by occupying states. Although it is not receiving much media attention, a huge battle is being waged at the UN.

Faced with the threat of having to go back thirty years, in response to the fall in funding and the call to go ‘back to basics’, humanitarians seem undecided. However, as we have seen, an effective response to humanitarian crises calls for a finely balanced mixture of emergency assistance, development and peace. Despite the difficulties, the Triple Nexus approach is the only one that provides the appropriate framework. This is illustrated by the way trust funds originally designed to respond to emergencies have evolved into support for the Triple Nexus as an overarching concept. Given the fragility of multiple regions and contexts worldwide, and the increasing number of emergencies as a result, what other concept or approach can we imagine? The international cooperation sector must deal with an existential crisis.

We need to mobilise vigorously against a ‘blind’ return to basics. Otherwise, the Triple Nexus will soon be nothing more than a beautiful idea, a memory, an empty shell. The sector would lose a powerful instrument of change. Without it, 300 million people (OCHA’s figure) who rely on international aid and development will have as their only prospect a long-term dependence on humanitarian assistance that is provisional, inadequate and unpredictable.

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Following twenty years of field experience working with NGOs, international organisations, donors, state and non-state actors, and the private sector in fragile areas, Laurent Saillard joined Groupe URD in 2021 as a research, evaluation and training officer. He works mainly on issues of fragility and the humanitarian-development-peace nexus.

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[1] It is also sometimes called ‘Nexus Canada Dry’.

[2] According to UNHCR, refugees are in a situation of displacement for an average of 26 years.

[3] See the bibliography at the end of this article.

[4] The 2008 Montreux Declaration reminded states and PMCs (private military companies) of their responsibilities in the case of armed conflict: however, this declaration unfortunately has no binding power.

[5] Abusive or misleading use of the term ‘humanitarian’ which makes it an instrument of control, while cloaking itself in the vocabulary of international cooperation.

[6] MSF, Oxfam, Amnesty International, ICRC, UNRWA, UNOCHA, etc.

[7] These bodies operate using public money but without having to submit accounts: they are exempted from any requirement for transparency (no independent audits) and protected by governments that see in them a means of supplanting the UN or any other inconvenient witness.