Humanitarian Advisor and '07 Alum Returns to North Park
Johan Eldebo, senior humanitarian policy advisor at World Vision, spent a week speaking with students across campus
CHICAGO (November 20, 2014) — Johan Eldebo, senior humanitarian policy advisor at World Vision and a 2007 alum of North Park University’s politics and government major, has seen his fair share of crisis and conflict. There is one story in particular that he says is significant to his work.
While responding to the refugee crisis in Lebanon in 2013, a result of more than a million people fleeing the civil war in Syria, Eldebo was part of a team delivering food and water to the refugee camps. But there wasn’t enough aid to supply everyone in the camp, so Eldebo and his team had to decide which 30 percent of families were not going to receive any supplies. They then had to deliver the news.
“I had to go into these families’ makeshift tents, many of whom were formerly middle class in Syria, and tell them they were no longer going to receive food and water,” Eldebo says. “It was heartbreaking.”
But Eldebo’s story doesn’t end there. “After that trip, my team and I returned home to London and we relayed our stories to powerful officials in government and nonprofit organizations, people who had the power and resources to approve more aid to those in need,” Eldebo says. “Those stories made a real difference in the response effort. I realized I can be a voice for people who have no voice.”
Eldebo visited North Park earlier this month and told stories like these to classes and student groups across campus, providing what Dean Charles Peterson says is “an outstanding example to our students of living a life of significance and service.”
He spent the week with students from the global studies and politics and government majors; speaking to religion and politics and introduction to conflict transformation classes; at an event hosted by the Career Development and Internships Offices; and with the Middle Eastern Student Association.
“Students got a sense that it is possible to make a significant contribution to the world with their North Park education and gained a glimpse into international initiatives,” says Dr. Mary Trujillo, professor of communications arts and instructor in the conflict transformation program. “Johan was quite honest in sharing the dilemma of humanitarian relief effort, especially in the examples he gave of being an outsider in a conflict situation.”
Global perspective
A native of Sweden, Eldebo took an unusual journey to North Park. “I worked at a Covenant summer camp in New Hampshire for six years and a lot of people there went to North Park,” Eldebo says. “I figured once I finished high school in Sweden, I’d give living in Chicago for a semester a try. One semester turned into three years.”
Eldebo spent time as an EMT paramedic, led the North Park chapter of the Model UN, and had an internship with the Chicago Council on Global Affairs.
“My only interest in policy is because I think it should help people,” Eldebo says. “If you want to help people you have to figure out how the power structures work and who has influence over what. When you look around the world most problems are man-made. You have to figure out who’s in charge of what, who can actually make a difference, and what it takes to get them to a point where they want to make a difference. That’s the politics bit.”
Eldebo’s career after North Park includes work at the United Nations secretariat and a graduate degree at King's College London, where he did research on conflict prevention. He began working in World Vision’s London office in 2010.
That position has taken him to conflict situations around the world, including West Africa, the Central African Republic, Somalia, South Sudan, and the Middle East. He showed students pictures of flying around in UN airplanes in war zones, and tells stories of being awoken by nearby gunfire. It’s not always that eventful; Eldebo admits some of his important work includes sitting in his London office, “trying to get conference calls with influential people, helping to coordinate aid efforts in various countries, and figuring out how to convince the government to fund projects.” But sometimes adrenaline and fear are real parts of his job.
“I tell myself I will quit this job if I either stop caring about the people, or I stop being slightly scared of situations,” Eldebo says. “That’s one of the signs that you need to take a break. This cowboy mentality that people talk about where you are hurled into a war zone from an airplane without knowing what’s on the ground—we don’t do that. It’s more that there are calculated risks, with plans to mitigate them. Of course, the sequence of events rarely goes according to plan.”
Eldebo’s work will soon take him back to the armed conflict in South Sudan, where nearly a million people have fled their homes. He recently wrote about the situation there, including the lack of aid and media attention to the growing crisis. He plans to interview and document the real-life situations of local communities, including local children, and report back to London what needs to be done.
He’s going to be the voice.
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