Divine Intervention: The Role of Religious Groups in Providing Humanitarian Assistance to Ukrainian Refugees

Abstract

Despite recent policy interest, the role of religious groups in humanitarian aid has largely been misunderstood or overlooked as an area of study. The invasion of Ukraine by Russian troops on February 24th, 2022, and the subsequent exodus of refugees into Europe, provides a natural case study on the role of religious groups in rapid-onset humanitarian crises.

This thesis analyzes the role of religious groups in humanitarian aid, including their strengths and challenges, and recommends policy options to increase their effectiveness in future humanitarian crises. The research is based on an analysis of previous academic literature on religious aid and fieldwork that I conducted in Eastern Europe during the summer of 2022. Throughout the summer and fall of 2022, in-person and phone interviews were conducted with 30 individuals, including Ukrainian refugees, faith leaders, government officials, and aid volunteers. These interviews were supplemented by news aggregation sites, publicly available refugee data, and email exchanges with European humanitarian aid providers.

I find that religious groups played unique roles as both ‘first responders’ and long-term aid providers for Ukrainian refugees. Structural features like access to volunteer and funding networks, embeddedness in local communities, ability to provide spiritual care, and high rates of volunteerism enable the humanitarian response of religious groups. But religious groups often face internal capacity and external coordination challenges that have limited their aid provision. Major themes emerging from the analysis concern: the evolving nature of humanitarian responses from its first days into long-term aid; the relationship between religious and non-religious aid providers; the impact of politics, culture, and history on refugee reception; and the opportunities––and challenges––for building the capacity of religious groups to respond to humanitarian crises.