From the ivory tower to the field: The impact of humanitarian operations research on humanitarian practice

Since the first publications on humanitarian operations, researchers have been concerned about the impact of our research on humanitarian practice. This paper seeks to better understand the gap between research and practice and, thus, how to narrow it. We incorporate not only the research perspective, through a review of 640 abstracts in humanitarian operations and a survey of the author community, but also the practitioner perspective, through 18 interviews with experienced humanitarian practitioners and a review of 131 practitioner conference proceedings. We assess the extent of practice impact, and find limited but important instances. We identify new barriers to achieving practice impact from the practitioner perspective. Finally, we develop a framework for describing the depth and reach of practice impact achieved by a research project, with a description of many ways in which such impact may be (and has been) achieved. We hope these efforts enable greater researcher accountability to practitioners and clearer paths to practice impact for the field.