Humanitarian Disaster Response: the Impact of Cultural Distance on Bilateral Aid Allocation

The global climate situation of the last decade remains to be desired. Each year we witness a series of different natural disasters that impact the daily lives of those affected. Due to their Severity, natural disasters sometimes cause considerable damage, exceeding the local government's capacity to respond using their resources but just relying on humanitarian aid. To provide an adequate response, fund allocation from various governments may apply. How does the donor decide whom to help when the need alert comes from all the places in the world, especially if the environment differs from his? Our work aims to study the Hofstede cultural difference of Individualism and Uncertainty Avoidance on the donor's attitude when allocating bilateral funding during natural disaster response from 2014-2019. Using data collected on the FTS website, our result demonstrates a positive attitude of generosity from donors willing to give despite the difference in culture. However, we also notice a change in terms of similarity and non-similarity for high individualism donors when allocating funds, while high Uncertainty avoidance donors demonstrate a static attitude. Our research enables donors to make financial decisions that could improve the flow of donations to better the distant other, which helps to achieve more effective humanitarian aid.