Biography

Umutcan Yüksel is a senior humanitarian professional with over 10 years of experience in migration governance and protection programming. As Programme Specialist at DG ECHO (2017-2022), he supported the management of EU Facility for Refugees in Turkey, identifying critical gaps between cash assistance and protection outcomes. He subsequently led multi-million EUR portfolios at international organisations including earthquake response operations. He examines EU migration management, political economy of EU externalisation and humanitarian funding dynamics at Swedish Research Institute in Istanbul. He founded Integrity Consulting to advance localisation and evidence-based humanitarian programming. His research on power dynamics in humanitarian aid and migration governance appears in International Journal of Human Mobility and GAPs project publications. He holds a BA in International Relations and has significant experience in big data analysis, quantitative research techniques, data visualisation, protection monitoring and advocacy. As a Policy Leader Fellow, he will conduct research on Humanitarian Funding and EU Migration Policy in Polycrisis Settings.

Fields of expertise