Paper details
| Paper authors | Pegah A.M Seidi, Tina Naseri, Dilshad Jaff |
| In panel on | Reimagining Humanitarian Action: Innovations and Knowledge Infrastructures Driving Transformation |
| Paper presenter(s) will be presenting |
In-Person / |
Abstract
This paper is written in response to the call for papers for the panel “Rethinking Humanitarian Action: Innovations and Knowledge Infrastructures for Change” (Istanbul, IHSA 2025), and is based on the authors’ field experience providing mental health services in crisis-affected areas of Iraq and the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI).
In humanitarian contexts characterized by protracted conflict, forced displacement, and widespread psychological trauma, such as Iraq and the KRI, the current models of mental health service delivery are neither effective in terms of population coverage nor culturally adapted. By critiquing existing structures, this article argues for a rethinking of humanitarian mental health infrastructures and calls for the integration of locally grounded and community-based innovations in intervention design; innovations that work beyond the limitations of expert-driven systems.
Using a critical approach with the emphasis on localization, this article critiques the technocratic and Eurocentric assumptions of conventional models and proposes two underutilized but effective strategies: first, the deployment of lay counsellors trained within affected communities; and second, the implementation of low-intensity, scalable interventions, such as Thought Field Therapy (TFT), which are low-cost, short-term, and adaptable to diverse cultural and linguistic contexts.
The article also examines how leadership and organizational institutions – such as international organization, ministries of health, and humanitarian coordinating bodies - can adopt and implement these innovations by redesigning mental health services, reforming training structures and funding models to support decentralized mental health responses.
