Return to Nowhere

Episode #385: Minna Fredriksson, human rights advisor at the Swedish development organization Diakonia, describes her humanitarian work and critiques the humanitarian aid field based on her years of work in Southeast Asia. Fredriksson managed humanitarian efforts in refugee camps along the Thai-Myanmar border in 2013. This was at the start of the democratic transition, and when donor governments such as the U.S., Sweden, Germany, and Japan were urging refugees to return to Myanmar despite persistent insecurity. She observed firsthand the disconnect between donor timelines and refugee realities.

Later, inside Myanmar, Fredriksson found that decades of repression had shaped how people communicated even in safe settings, highlighting the need for culturally-sensitive modes of communication and trust-building. She stresses that aid responses must be trauma-informed, participatory, and led by communities themselves, and offers examples of successful local initiatives. However, she cautions against overromanticizing societies, including traditional societies, noting that all exhibit inequalities and prejudices of some kind or other. “Those need to be addressed,” she says firmly.

She also warns of the global trend of aid retrenchment, especially Sweden’s shift toward nationalist priorities, which undermines those on-the-ground gains. “It breaks my heart when I hear that people say, ‘It’s like the world doesn’t care,’” she says.

In closing, Fredriksson highlights the damaging effects of information repression inside Myanmar, which she calls a form of “soft violence,” as well as the international marginalization and erasure of Myanmar’s crisis. She affirms her commitment to amplifying Myanmar’s voices: “The motivation, of course, to continue to talk about Myanmar… and make sure that there is information about what’s happening.”