The WCHS testifies to the growing field of humanitarian studies. To create a more permanent international venue for researchers on aspects of humanitarian crises, the WCHS will occasion the launch of the International Humanitarian Studies Association (IHSA).

IHSA will create a network of people engaged in humanitarian studies regardless of their ideological opinion, school of thought, scientific discipline or origins. The IHSA equally welcomes academic scholars, consultants, policy researchers, and reflective practitioners among its membership.  Perhaps one of the most unique aspects of humanitarian studies is the large proportion of research which is funded through aid monitoring and evaluation structures, the large contribution therefore of consultants to the generation of knowledge and the keen interest in research-based policy development of many people in the field. It is a vibrant field of studies, and IHSA will provide a venue to discuss the dynamic constel¬lations for knowledge generation and challenges that result from the relationships between these different kinds of research.

The areas of interest to IHSA are:

• the causes, dynamics and effects of humanitarian crises (conflict and/ or natural disaster);

• the responses practices of crisis-affected people and the political, military and humanitarian interventions towards crises;

• the politics, discourses and dynamics of humanitarian response programmes and organisations

• the policies and practices of disaster preparedness, early warning, rehabilitation and the linkages with development, peacebuilding, and security;

• legal issues pertaining to humanitarian crises and humanitarian affairs;

• the experiences and lifeworlds of refugees and internally displaced people, and the refugee regimes employed towards them.

The programme of IHSA will evolve through time. Activities will be geared towards securing and developing institutional and personal contacts between people engaged in humanitarian studies throughout the world, and may include the convening of confe¬rences, the promotion of research and the preparation of publications. An important focus of IHSA is to make the World Conference of Humanitarian Studies a recurring event.

Participants to the WCHS will be invited to become a member of the IHSA during the conference. According to the statutes, the membership will elect officers. During the first term, however, the IHSA will be governed by a founding Board. The IHSA will be hosted by Disaster Studies at Wageningen University, the Netherlands. Dorothea Hilhorst, professor of humanitarian aid and reconstruction, will be the General Secretary.

Founding Board Members of IHSA are (in alphabetical order):

Yasemin Aysan, Consultant; Risk Management and Recovery Planning; Turkey

Mihir Bhatt, Director All India Disaster Mitigation Institute, Gujarat

Ian Christoplos, Researcher Swedish University for Agricultural Sciences (SLU); humanitarian consultant

Dennis Dijkzeul, professor in the management of humanitarian crisis, Ruhr University, Bochum, Germany

Virginia García Acosta, General Director Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios Superiores en Antropología Social (CIESAS), Mexico

Paul Harvey, consultant Humanitarian Outcomes, editor International Journal of Disasters

Alex de Waal, Program Director at the Social Science Research Council, New York, and fellow at the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative.

Peter Walker, Director Feinstein International Center, Tufts University, Boston, USA

Invitations for a Board member from Africa are outstanding and these will be announced during the conference.