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Paper short abstract

The paper raises important questions in relation to transnational humanitarian action in a global crisis (Covid-19), and the ways in which local networks of support and solidarity, at national and transnational level, pose an alternative to established humanitarian actors in the navigation of those.

Paper long abstract

This paper focuses on the everyday humanitarianism and emerging forms of solidarity in times of crisis among

migrant communities with liminal status in three cities in the Horn of Africa: Nairobi, Addis Ababa, and Khartoum. It is framed around the concept of lived citizenship, defined as a means to secure wellbeing through everyday acts and practices for those who lack formal rights and entitlements. Based on an analysis of comparative interview data among Eritrean and Ethiopian migrant communities in each city, the article takes the example of the Covid-19 pandemic as an unexpected crisis. It argues that Covid-19 has impacted lived citizenship practices to different degrees, linked to previous forms of precarity, and the means and networks of coping with those. Disruptions of transnational support

networks resulted in a turn towards local networks and everyday practices of solidarity. These forms of everyday humanitarianism range from spontaneous to more organised forms, united by a perceived lack of involvement by international humanitarian actors and the local state. The paper raises important questions in relation to transnational humanitarian action in a global crisis, and the ways in which local networks of support and solidarity, at national and transnational level, may .