From workshops and trainings to large conferences, our modern facilities — including hybrid options and sustainable catering — ensure a smooth experience. We also offer optional support with guest registration, check-in, ticketing, and event communications. Contact our team for a custom, no-obligation quote:
- This event has passed.
Protecting Culture in Times of Crisis
26 March @ 12:00 - 13:30
Humanitarian Governance webinar series
Join Cultural Emergency Response and The Hague Humanitarian Studies Centre at the International Institute of Social Studies, for a webinar on protecting culture in times of crisis.
Speakers Nimalka Passanha (Project Coordinator at CER), Shyamika Jayasundara-Smits (Associate Professor in Conflict & Peace Studies at ISS) and Kaira Zoe Canete (Senior Researcher at HSC) will discuss the connection between psychosocial care and humanitarian crisis, the interplay between physical sites, buildings and artefacts and the societies in which they are situated, and the importance of maintaining the agency of people within a crisis through their (material and non) culture.
The speakers will also look at the role of international agencies and organisations in facilitating recovery and agency for those affected by crisis, as well as the role of cultural (re)generation and preservation in peacebuilding.
What is Cultural Emergency Response?
Cultural Emergency Response (CER) is an international NGO that collaborates with local partners to safeguard heritage at risk from disaster or conflict.
Acting as a cultural ambulance, CER facilitates rapid and flexible first-aid interventions to protect culture in crisis, preventing irreversible loss and ensuring its preservation for future generations. Since 2003, CER has supported over 560 cultural emergency projects across more than 85 vulnerable and hard-to-reach countries, always working in direct partnership with local actors. Its cultural emergency response mechanism remains active at all times, with grant applications for first-aid to heritage under threat accepted on a rolling basis.
Nimalka Passanha is a Project Coordinator at Cultural Emergency Response (CER), overseeing acute cultural emergency response projects and fostering global partnerships. She plays a key role in strengthening CER’s emergency response mechanism, including early-warning systems, scouting efforts, and proactive network development in vulnerable regions. She currently leads CER’s Action Plans in Ukraine and Palestine.