A Comparative Study of After Action Review (AAR) in the Context of the Southern Africa Crisis: A Case Study Paper for ALNAP

This paper provides background to the ALNAP Key Messages sheet (KMS) – A Comparative study of After Action Reviews in the context of the Southern Africa Crisis.1 The aim of the KMS was to ‘distil’ out the essential elements of After Action Review (AAR) good practice as demonstrated by humanitarian agencies engaged in emergency response to the Southern Africa famine crisis. The KMS provides good practice guidance on the effective design and use of AAR processes. Much of this guidance has come from practitioners who were deeply involved in putting together AAR type events or actively engaged as facilitators. Their descriptions have been captured in this paper providing a set of three detailed case studies. Each is a ‘standalone’ example of an AAR-type activity, demonstrating considerable variation in approach and in the name by which these activities are known within each organisation. All form part of a learning review process directly related to some aspect of agency relief work in the famine disaster. The AAR-type events took place between October 2002 and February 2003.