Rehabilitation: a bridge between relief and development

An unnecessary polarisation has arisen between `relief' and `development' work and agencies are looking to bridge the gap, moving towards an integrated response to disasters which promotes sustainable development. Effective rehabilitation may provide a way forward, and the author discusses this concept, arguing that development agencies will need to foster relevant capacities in recipients as well as shift their planning, programming, implementation and evaluation approaches, in order to enable rehabilitation to work as a strategy in its own right, rather than as a stop-gap between continuing relief and development work.