Introduction: Doctoral Researcher Helena Berchtold

12.11.2026 -

Helena Berchtold is a doctoral researcher at the Institute for International Law of Peace and Armed Conflict (IFHV) at Ruhr University Bochum and a member of the Network Humanitarian Research (NHF), funded by the Gerda Henkel Stiftung. 

In her PhD project Rendering Lives Actionable. Knowledge Production within LGBTIQ+ Humanitarian Governance in Lebanon, she examines how knowledge about forms of marginalisation affecting LGBTIQ+ persons is produced and negotiated within humanitarian systems in Lebanon. Her research focuses particularly on local LGBTIQ+ organisations as knowledge-producing actors situated between heterogeneous communities, donors, and humanitarian institutions. Through reporting, needs assessments, and research, these organisations contribute to how experiences of marginalisation are documented, interpreted, and communicated within humanitarian settings. 

The project examines how these processes take place within relations of power, and how the categories and representations produced become socially and politically consequential. Drawing on feminist and postcolonial theories of knowledge, critical humanitarian studies, and organisational sociology, the research follows a discourse-analytical design based on qualitative interviews and document analysis.

Before starting her PhD, Helena worked with the Beirut-based organisation MOSAIC and on evaluations of German development cooperation in the WANA region.