Disability and Humanitarian Assistance - Negotiating Aid along Vulnerability Categories in Kyangwali Refugee Settlement

In Kyangwali refugee settlement in Hoima, Western Uganda, people with physical disabilities are considered as among the most vulnerable of the refugee population by international aid organizations and specifically targeted and supported by means of vulnerability categories. The practice of distributing aid and managing support is however contested and the question, whether someone belongs into a specific category is not always clear but subject to negotiation. Both humanitarian workers and beneficiaries perceive the categories as well as their implementation as ambiguous, with tensions easily coming up, especially as differing perspectives of recognizing and meeting need for assistance clash. Taking these tensions as a point of departure, this study explores the contested line of demand and allocation in a setting in which aid is distributed by means of a categorization system. By analysing how this categorization system is meaningfully appropriated and assistance negotiated by humanitarian workers, people with physical disabilities and their social environment, I aim to disclose the workings of aid distribution and to reveal its consequences and relevance for people’s everyday life opportunities. With my ethnographic example I draw on and aim to extend existing theoretical approaches and research within the fields of the anthropology of aid and anthropological disability studies. By carefully delineating how aid distribution works through claims and complaints within a complex set of interdependent relations and by illuminating different views on the distribution of aid, my work seeks to understand points of disagreement and hopes to contribute to creating a better understanding between people with physical disabilities and humanitarian organisations.