The powerful role of media in disaster philanthropy and why funding beyond emergency response is vital to tackling inequity

In 2025, an estimated 22.9 million people in Afghanistan will require humanitarian assistance to survive, yet funding remains critically low.

Recent US government cuts to international aid have exacerbated the situation, resulting in 9 million Afghans losing access to vital health services.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is experiencing one of the world’s most prolonged and severe humanitarian crises. Ongoing conflicts have displaced over 7 million people who are facing outbreaks of diseases like cholera, diarrhoea, measles and malaria, yet have limited access to essential services.

Yet these complex humanitarian emergencies (CHEs) are often exacerbated by historical injustices, such as colonialism, and rarely make headlines.

What are complex humanitarian emergencies?

CHEs are crises that persist for years or even decades, leaving communities in cycles of poverty and dependence. They typically involve ongoing conflict, violence, economic collapse, displacement, food insecurity and unstable governance.

Despite the scale of these crises, the pattern remains the same: a disaster strikes, funding surges, media attention peaks, then headlines fade and so does the support. The story of long-term recovery struggles to gain traction, particularly when funding is limited, and this reduces local communities’ capacity to recover in the longer-term.

US and UK government cuts to international aid are making the situation even worse. Budgets are stretched thin, and the lack of global humanitarian funding is only deepening. If ever there was a time to rethink how we fund humanitarian responses, it is now.

The media’s influence on funding responses to humanitarian crises

The correlation between media attention and funding is undeniable. A 2021 study found that crises receiving extensive coverage had significantly higher levels of international aid. The war in Ukraine, for example, garnered billions in relief funding, largely due to its geopolitical significance and Western proximity. Meanwhile, crises in Africa struggle to gain traction despite extensive humanitarian needs.

Media narratives are shaped by power structures, geopolitical interests and historical biases. Yet, media attention is selective and directly impact nonprofit organisations.

A powerful example of media influence comes from research carried out in 2023 by Greg Philo and Mike Berry. They analysed four weeks of BBC news coverage and found that terms like ‘murder’ and ‘mass murder’ were consistently used when referring to Israeli deaths but were rarely applied to Palestinian deaths. This discrepancy reflects a broader pattern where primarily Western perspectives are favoured and historical context is often omitted, shaping public perception and reinforcing bias in how different conflicts are reported. This heavily influences how communities in conflicts are perceived, and it has contributed to the dehumanisation of Palestinians and significantly less funding being channelled towards Palestine compared to other crises. We see this in our work at GlobalGiving where our Ukraine Crisis Relief Fund has raised 28 times more money to date than our Middle East Crisis Relief Fund.

Rethinking disaster philanthropy

The funding landscape is becoming even more uncertain. The recent USAID freeze has already impacted more than half of GlobalGiving nonprofit partners surveyed, deepening existing funding inequities. At a time when needs are at their highest, local organisations responding to their communities are struggling to sustain essential services.

CHEs often remain underfunded because they don’t fit the traditional disaster response model which relies on urgent, high-profile appeals and prioritises immediate relief over long-term recovery. To build a more equitable disaster philanthropy model, we must move from reactive funding to proactive investment in disaster preparedness and community-led responses.

Having recognised this pattern over decades, in 2022 we launched the GlobalGiving Hope in Crisis Fund to channel flexible, trust-based funding directly to overlooked and underfunded communities most affected by inequity. This fund has supported GlobalGiving partner Mleci ASBL, which is making a profound impact in the DRC by supporting 300 families with food, essential supplies and tools for long-term growth. In Fizi, DRC, where communities struggle daily to meet basic needs, Mleci is installing two new pumps so that people have reliable access to clean water, while also providing seeds and agricultural tools to help families grow nutritious food and rebuild their livelihoods.

In Afghanistan, another GlobalGiving partner and Hope in Crisis Fund grantee, Teach for Afghanistan (TfA), is providing education to children and responding to crises when they strike. After floods in 2024, TfA repaired schools, provided materials and offered psychological support to students, helping over 20,000 children. TfA’s efforts show how local organisations have the strongest connections with their community, and are often pivoting to address community needs. Funding streams must match this.

How you can help shift funder mindsets

International development and philanthropy professionals play a vital role in shifting funder mindsets towards justice-based approaches and funding structures that extend beyond short-term emergency response.

We can also call on the media to broaden its coverage by moving beyond cultural familiarity and clickbait headlines to ensure crises are reported with equal attention. We can help to promote fairer coverage by connecting journalists to credible sources, encouraging reporting on underreported crises, and elevating local voices to tell their own stories and direct attention where it’s most needed.

As institutional support wanes, philanthropy remains a crucial lifeline. It offers the agility needed to be responsive to communities, support long-term recovery and take an innovative, justice-based and reparative approach. The latest US and UK funding cuts highlight the urgent need to shift to flexible and sustainable philanthropy models that look beyond the media spotlight.