Rethinking Durable Solutions: A System Dynamics Approach for Enhanced Decision-Making in Displacement Contexts

Patience N. Saungweme, Stefan Spinler,

WHU Otto Beisheim School of Management, Burgplatz 2, 56179 Vallendar, Germany

Escalating human displacement resulting from conflict, natural disasters, and climate change, termed complex crises, represents a major global challenge today. Refugees, the second-largest displaced group, situated in locations experiencing protracted crises with declining living conditions, represent a major hurdle for humanitarian efforts. There exists low interest in research on Humanitarian Operations on the overlap of Humanitarian Logistics and Political Science, essential for addressing issues in conflict-induced displacement interventions. This area lacks exploration of viable operations management strategies in conflict zones, beyond access and security, for durable solutions realization. Decisions regarding refugees are subject to the political discretion of host countries, influenced by foreign policy negotiations and minimum standards set by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees for basic survival needs. This often neglects long-term welfare needs of food security and livelihood recovery. We aim to create a framework using System Dynamics to analyze trade-offs between temporary and permanent solutions in crises causing displacement, incorporating protractedness and conflict sensitivity. The result expected is a codification of realities and insights gained from multiple case analysis, and their inclusion into a versatile operational decision framework for various displacement contexts and future integration with traditional Operations Research models with a goal of securing better long-term food security and livelihood outcomes for displaced populations.

Patience is a chemical engineer turned business engineer through experience, working in the Fast-Moving Consumer Goods industry on process technologies, in the Home Care, Personal Care, Household Care and Food categories. She has a decade-long worth of professional experience at Unilever (8 yrs.) and Upfield (2yrs.) working in Supply Chain, Technology & Innovation, and Engineering across Africa, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and Europe. Patience holds a Bachelor of Science degree with Honors in Chemical Engineering from the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa, as well as an MBA with a specialization in Finance (Class of ’22), from WHU Otto Beisheim School of Management, Germany. Deeply passionate about processes, technology, and complex systems, with a neck for creating order out of chaos, her doctoral research in Operations Management at WHU focuses on exploring sustainable and resilient operations in complex crises contexts.