Daniel H Holmberg has 30+ years as a principled humanitarian Assistance professional in Africa, the Middle East and South Asia. He is currently the senior program policy advisor for the UN World Food Program Country Offices in Libya and Iraq on the Humanitarian-Development-Peace nexus.
How did we first meet?
I first met Sherman Teichman through his former student, acclaimed photo-journalist Nicki Sobecki. I met Nicki in Pakistan in 2010 where I was serving as Country Director for International non-governmental humanitarian aid organization Action Against Hunger / Action Contre la Faim. We had employed Nicki to update our web-page in regard to the work we were doing with populations in North West Pakistan displaced by the Taliban. At a dinner one night in the diplomatic enclave in Islamabad I opened up to Nicki about my two decades in conflict zones, family separation, burn-out, and the feeling that I was trapped in a career path that had no out. She immediately thought of one person. "You need to meet this guy. He is called Sherman Teichman and I think he can help.” I remained in Pakistan for several more months to address humanitarian needs precipitated by the 2010 Indus river flooding, and then followed my wife and kids to the U.S. My wife had just emigrated there 6 months before. Manic and cynical, I met Sherman at Tufts University. After narrating my 20+ years of international experience to him he had two messages for me. 1) "The cynicism has to go, and you need to remember the reason you have devoted your life to this work", 2) "I need you as an INSPIRE fellow at Tufts, to promote the new generation of public service-oriented doers and thinkers". He then directed me towards the Feinstein International Center, and in that one day, not only had I emerged from my cynical funk, but I had been requested by the Feinstein Center Director to apply for a masters program. That was a pivotal day in my life.
Describe your time as an INSPIRE Fellow with us.
I was an INSPIRE Fellow at Tufts for over two years. Having left the U.S. in 1984, and as a non-stop humanitarian practitioner acclimatizing to my home country after several decades, this experience turned out to be pivotal and inspiring door that opened on a new stage of life for me. I was surrounded by excited idealism. I was forced to see my life experiences as valuable, challenged to drop any tired cynicism I had built up, and encouraged to translate my experience to a new generation. It was cathartic and reaffirming of the time bound human tradition of mentoring, which has led to so much good in the world. Somewhat self-centered, I participated in round-table discussions with professionals with whom I had previously seen as 'not part of my highly focused world,' only to discover that we were all part of the same complex mosaic.
· ex- U.S. military immigrants from former Yugoslavia who were experts in cyber-warfare
· U.S. military former commanders of provincial reconstruction teams in Iraq and Afghanistan
· Humanitarian Assistance professionals who had found a niche in refugee resettlement that catered for the most vulnerable
· business leaders with a profound sense of social responsibility.
· Individuals with amazing combinations of academic, military, diplomatic and humanitarian expertise encapsulated into focused capacities
The list went on and on, but the most exciting part was the mentoring I provided that went on after my tenure as an INSPIRE Fellow. The way that Sherman helped me translate my experience into something new, I can now proudly say that I have and continue to do the same for people that Sherman has directed my way.
How were you introduced to the Masters in Humanitarian Assistance program at Fletcher?
As previously stated, Sherman, on the day I met him, directed me towards the Feinsterin International Center and introduced me to the Director at the time (Dr. Peter Walker). I was accepted into this specialized graduate degree program along with four other individuals. It was a mid-career level Joint graduate degree at both the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy. Though the program was ostensibly for humanitarian practitioners, I quickly discovered that I was the most experienced practitioner in the program and at the Fletcher School. Recognition of my experience led to Dr. Walker asking me to critique graduate projects on humanitarian assistance in complex emergencies at Harvard University, and eventually to offers from both the Fletcher School and George Washington University to be an adjunct professor. This degree put into focus my two decades of field experience, filled in the gaps of knowledge I had, and made me into a sharper tool. Shortly thereafter, I became the U.S. Government's Senior Humanitarian Advisor in Sudan, a country I have worked in extensively since 1992.
Give us a thumbnail of your work? What your passions have been? Your aspirations at this point?
As with most focus topics in the international affairs arena, any given topic has within it a plethora of specialized focus areas. For many years, I worked in a sub-culture of field practitioners in conflict and transitional areas of fragile states. Over time, as I became more senior and a part of the humanitarian architecture that influences political policy decisions, I became aware that INGO voices, while powerful from a 'reality check'-moral basis, were also compromised by their reliance on donors. When I became a U.S. diplomat and the humanitarian representative for the largest donor in the world in a given context, I carried with me the moral compass and operational knowledge from my past and inserted it into the sometimes timid, transactional and dogmatic world of engagement with foreign governments, diplomatic missions with their many equities, and United Nations bureaucracy where it is adverse to change in the status quo. As the former U.S. Ambassador to Ethiopia put it, "Daniel speaks truth to power." At times, this had negative effects on my political capital and personal well-being, but through this approach I became the de-facto humanitarian lead voice in both Sudan and Ethiopia. With the support I garnered from INGO's, like minded UN allies, and other diplomatic missions, I was able to challenge comfort zones of big power and big egos, and shift the humanitarian architecture and diplomatic policies towards outcomes that had huge effects on the lives of the millions of vulnerable people we are meant to serve in these countries. Through my years of experience, my almost obsessive devotion to research and having the right information, the correct amalgam of components, and my inclination towards doing better than what is acceptable, to many I have been, on several occasions, one of few in the room with the understanding of what needs to be done ' five steps ahead,' and the risk-taking orientation to act. This is my passion, and now the arena of 'a single humanitarian response' has become an arena I no longer want to commit to. I want to contribute a step further to the thoughtful design of new approaches based in operational and political reality that address the inefficiencies of the current practice and norms of humanitarian assistance. The budget for Humanitarian assistance grows larger every year. Climate change, population youth bulges in developing countries, fragile states faced with a swing to the political right, isolationism of wealthy donor countries, and their subsequent disengagement with issues of regional stability, all denote the heightened relevance of the capacities of the humanitarian assistance community and a need for new approaches. My passion is to be one of the global think tank contributors to this need.
How you have helped our students in the past, and how you are available now to continue doing so?
I recall a persistent inclination I have had throughout my career. When I had a supervisor or colleague who demonstrates ego, arrogance or ineptitude in the work-place, either towards me or towards another, I made a mental note to 'never be like that'. This is easier said than done, because it implies sometimes standing up for change in the status quo and in sub-cultural norms. It is this that has guided my approach not only to assisting students that Sherman has sent my way, but to empowering those I see who have been dis-empowered in the workplace owing to norms of social status and the tendency those with access to information to hold it for themselves in support of the power base they have established. I have taken colleagues and subordinates who are not recognized and divulged to them what is going on in the decision-making realm above them. I actively de-mystify power and decision-making structures to those who are excluded from such knowledge. In doing so, I have seen seeds become flowers and timidity become confidence, in some cases leading to promotions to positions of power and access for individuals I have believed would be worthy of such responsibility, and for whom there was no one else assisting them. My approach is not uncommon, but it is still generally a minority social orientation.
Sherman directed Barbara Majid to me. She had an MPH and was working in New York for the international Rescue Committee. She wanted to go to the field and be a humanitarian practitioner, but didn't know how. I spoke to her at Sherman's behest with a template of 'need-to-know knowledge' in hand as I did so. She impressed, not just her technical knowledge, but with her humanity and work ethic. I reached out to former colleagues at Action against Hunger (the premier nutrition INGO) and told them I found a gem. They followed up. I prepped her for the interview and helped her decompress afterward. Long story short, she became an emergency nutrition coordinator for them in the Congo. I stayed in touch with her, trying to be of help with the adjustment to the field, and the process of taking that field operations energy as a catalyst for inspiration towards shooting for excellence. She kindly offers me up as having gotten her the job. I am honored by such sentiment, but know full well that I was only a helper who de-mystified a piece of the world for a qualified individual. I encouraged her to do the same for others.
I have assisted several other students with guidance and networking introductions, and I am currently assisting IGL grad Ananda Páez Rodas with intro's, guidance on where she can exploit her talents and de-mystifying the seemingly mystifying.
It is this part of my life that inspires me to revitalize former opportunities I had in the field of academics. I was offered an adjunct teaching gig at the University of Denver when I was the head of OFDA in Ethiopia. My organization did not value this enough to give me the time off, but now that I am on a different and new path, it seems obvious that advancing my academic participation as a professor and potential mentor would be one of the things that would be of benefit to myself and others.
Daniel as a young UN staffer in the rebel HQ of Sudanese Peoples Liberation Movement faction leader Riek Machar (Now the vice president of South Sudan) in his Rebel HQ in Nasir, South Sudan ~ 1992. Also in the picture was his British wife Emma Riek, and to the right of Daniel, two nurses from International Rescue Committee.
With Jean Louis Romanet, we finally met!
