Managing

Risk,
Improving Program Guidelines
for Conditions of
Livelihoods Chronic Vulnerability

2nd Edition

Developed by: With:

CARE East and TANGO

Central Africa International
Regional
Management
Unit
 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Acknowledgements
These guidelines were prepared by a team from within and outside of CARE. The CARE
East/Central Africa Regional Food and Livelihood Security Working Group (FLS-WG) wrote
the initial version of this document. The members of the Working Group that contributed to
the writing of these guidelines include Muhoro Ndung’u, Adam Koons, Afurika Juvenal, Holly
Solberg, Dawelbait El Nour, Tilaye Nigussie and Dan Maxwell. TANGO International Inc.
was hired to pull the disparate pieces together into a coherent document, and to add critical
missing elements. Members of the team from TANGO International Inc. that contributed to
these guidelines include Tim Frankenberger, Kristina Luther, Karyn Fox, John Mazzeo and
Tom Spangler.

In addition, many reviewers from within CARE contributed long hours to reviewing drafts,
including Madhuvanti Deshmukh, Jeanne Downen, Michael Drinkwater, Elisa Martinez,
Kathy McCaston, Muita Mugo and Michael Rewald. Several reviewers external to CARE
also provided helpful experience and feedback, including Mike Wekesa (Acacia), Francis
Chabari (CORDAID) and Paul Savage (Christian Aid). We are grateful for help from Joyce
Maxwell and Roger Burks in the production of the document. Funding to develop and publish
this document was provided both by CARE USA (Africa Fund) and by USAID.

In the end, all those who contributed to this document are students of the many communities
with whom CARE works, and without whose efforts and inspiration none of the contents of
this document would have come to our attention or have excited our interests to learn more.

On behalf of the East/Central Africa Regional Management Unit and the Working Group, we
would like to thank all those who contributed to this effort.

Dan Maxwell

Programme Coordinator
Eastern/Central Africa Regional Management Unit

Convener, Food/Livelihood Security Working Group

Nairobi, Kenya
April 2003

This report was made possible in part through support

provided by the Office of Food for Peace, US Agency for
International Development under the terms of CARE’s
Institutional Support Assistance Award FAO-A-00-98-
00055-00 and through support provided by CARE. The
opinions expressed herein are those of CARE and do not
necessarily reflect the views of the US Agency for
International Development. It may be reproduced, if credit is
given to CARE.

Recommended citation:

CARE (2003). “Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods:

Program Guidelines for Conditions of Chronic Vulnerability.”
CARE Eastern/Central Africa Regional Management Unit,
Nairobi.

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements ........................................................................................................................ i
Overview.........................................................................................................................................v
How to Use The Guidelines ........................................................................................................ vi
Useful Websites .......................................................................................................................... vii
Executive Summary.....................................................................................................................ix
1. Introduction to Second Edition ...........................................................................................1
A. The “Relief to Development” Continuum ..................................................................1
B. Changes in Understanding Livelihoods and Vulnerability......................................3
C. Changes in Programming Directions in CARE........................................................4
2. Lessons Learned ...................................................................................................................7
A. Conceptual/Analytical Lessons ..................................................................................7
B. Program Strategy Lessons .........................................................................................8
C. DME Lessons ................................................................................................................9
3. Definitions and Characteristics of Vulnerability................................................................12
A. The Multiple Dimensions of Vulnerability................................................................12
B. A Comprehensive Approach to Understanding Vulnerability..............................15
4. Information Requirements and Chronic Vulnerability: Components of an
Information System and Linkages to Programs ............................................................22
A. Minimum Components of an Information System .................................................23
B. Information-Program Linkages .................................................................................28
C. The Information/Response Gap: What is it and why does it happen? ..............28
5. Program Strategies: Preparedness ..................................................................................35
A. Preparedness: Concepts and Definitions ...............................................................36
B. Components of Emergency Preparedness ............................................................37
6. Program Strategies: Social Protection and Approaches to Mitigating Shocks ...........49
A. Social Protection.........................................................................................................49
B. Programming Considerations in Social Protection................................................50
C. Mitigating the Causes of Vulnerability: Protecting Household Assets ...............52
D. Addressing the Effects of Shocks: Safety Nets .....................................................53
E. Exit Strategies and the Transition to Rehabilitation..............................................55
7. Program Strategies: Transition and Rehabilitation ........................................................58
A. Post Conflict Situations and Transitional Programming Strategies....................58
B. Social and Political Challenges for Rehabilitation Programming........................60

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

C. Important Principles for Rehabilitation Programming...........................................61

D. The Rehabilitation Spectrum ....................................................................................65
8. Program Strategies: Development and Growth for Long-Term Vulnerability
Reduction................................................................................................................................69
A. Traditional Approaches Are Inadequate.................................................................69
B. General Programming Challenges and Components of a Strategy...................70
C. Structural Transformations to Reduce Vulnerability to Climatic and
Economic Shocks: The REAP Program ................................................................73
D. Long-Term Social Safety Nets .................................................................................76
9. Advocacy in Situations of Chronic Vulnerability................................................................80
A. Importance of Advocacy............................................................................................80
B. The Rights-Based Approach ....................................................................................80
C. Understanding Policy Processes .............................................................................81
D. Developing an Advocacy Strategy ..........................................................................82
E. Creating the Advocacy Message .............................................................................83
F. Building Coalitions ......................................................................................................84
G. Operational Considerations for Advocacy and the Rights-Based Approach....85

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Annexes*

Annex I: Defining Characteristics of a Rights-Based Approach

Annex II: Incorporation of a Rights-Based Approach into CARE’s Program

Cycle
Annex III: Incorporating HIV/AIDS into the HLS Framework

Annex IV: Targeting Considerations

Annex V: Comparison Between Humanitarian and Development Principles:
Code of Conduct for the International Red Cross and Red Crescent
Movement and NGOs in Disaster Response Programs

Annex VI: Early Warning and Preparedness in Complex Emergencies

Annex VII-IX: Sources of Risk to Household Livelihood Security

Household Livelihood Security: A Framework for Analysis
CARE’s Livelihood Security Model

*Annexes are available on CD in Acrobat format.

To access documents on the CD, click the html text next to the Acrobat
Reader symbol.

Please Note:

Sometimes the first time a CD-ROM is used, the html links have to be updated. To
do this, place the cursor on the html link desired, and right click with the mouse.
One of the menu of option is called “! Update Field.” Select that one, and the html
link will be updated for the machine in which the CD is being used.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods:

Program Guidelines for Conditions of Chronic Vulnerability

Overview

This is the second edition of this document (referred to here as the Guidelines)
prepared by CARE’s East Africa Food/Livelihood Security Working Group. The first
edition, called “Program Guidelines for Chronically Vulnerable Areas,” was published
in early 2000. Both documents are intended for program planners and designers,
project managers, and program staff working in the context of chronic vulnerability,
or concerned with the question of how CARE programs differently in places where
there is reason to think that, over the course of a three or five year planning horizon,
some kind of shock or emergency is likely to happen that will put people’s lives or
livelihoods at significant risk. Neither deals directly with disaster response per se—
for that there are many other documents and tool boxes. The first edition was
oriented towards preparing for and mitigating the impact of shocks or disasters and
post disaster recovery, regardless of the type of program being implemented. This
edition updates the first one, but also focuses on the crucial question of not only
dealing with chronic vulnerability, but also long-term strategies for overcoming
chronic vulnerability.

This second edition of the Guidelines is broken up into three parts. Sections 1-3 are
a conceptual overview of the issues of chronic vulnerability and the main lessons
learned in the past three years of using these tools. Sections 4-8 are about the
programming details of dealing with chronic vulnerability, with emphasis on
protecting people and their livelihoods in such situations, through improved
information systems, improved community-based preparedness, mitigation and
rehabilitation. Section 9 deals with the thornier issue of overcoming chronic
vulnerability, and includes a chapter on longer-term program strategies and a
chapter on advocacy.

This document is intended to raise important issues that need to be taken into
consideration when programming in the context of chronic vulnerability. However,
the list of issues is much too long to present information on how each issue raised
can be dealt with. Instead, the group that drafted and reviewed the Guidelines have
assembled from a variety of sources what they believe to be the best tools and
methodologies, as well as further conceptual papers and practical case studies
related to each section of the main document. These are found on the CD-ROM that
has come with each copy of the main document. The main document is also on the
CD-ROM, and each of the tools, case studies and concept papers listed is linked by
hypertext from the main document. Thus, for example, if someone would like look at
the tools listed at the end of each section (or in some cases, embedded into the
text), clicking on that title or hypertext will automatically open on the CD-ROM.

CARE developed some of these materials. In other cases, CARE has obtained
permission to use these materials, on the grounds that they are not sold.
Therefore, users of this document are free to print out copies of tools, case studies
and concept papers for their own use, but by using this document, all users agree
not to sell any of its contents, including both the main document and the contents
of the CD-ROM.

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

How to use the Guidelines

The Guidelines are not intended to be read straight through. They are intended to
be a useful reference for staff working in particular contexts. For busy senior
managers, probably reading the following Executive Summary is sufficient to get an
idea of what is here. Program directors, sector coordinators, and project managers
would find it worth their time to read through the first three chapters, as well as taking
a look at the last two chapters, and familiarizing themselves with some of the tools
available. Program design teams working in the context of chronic vulnerability
should use this document as a reference in designing programs—again not by
reading the whole document, but by referring to relevant parts of it during the design
process, and by making use of the appropriate attached tools. Emergency staff will
also find the Guidelines useful, even though they do not go into details on response.

Overview of the Second Edition

Several sections of this document are rewritten but appeared in a different form in
the original document. The main lessons learned are presented in Section 2.
Section 3 is a conceptual review of our understanding of vulnerability itself, as well
as the major sources of vulnerability in the Greater Horn of Africa region and more
generally. Section 4 presents an overview of the kinds of information needed for
managing risk in a context of chronic vulnerability and the way in which different
information activities fit together into a logical and coherent information system. This
section also reviews linkages between information and programmatic activities, and
reviews some of the gaps between information and programmatic response.
Sections 5 through 7 update and add to the first edition by reviewing a number of
programmatic activities that deal with chronic vulnerability include community based
preparedness, vulnerability reduction and risk management, mitigation and
rehabilitation. Section 8 is on the critical topic of strategies to overcome the causes
of chronic vulnerability. Section 9 is about advocacy and working in coalitions.

Each of the sections in this document presents the critical factors for consideration in
analysis and development of programs for the topic being addressed. However, the
document itself is not intended as a “how to” guide. Rather, at the end of each
section, there is a collection of the best tools, concept papers, and case studies to
enable programmers from the field level to the head office to be able to actually carry
out any of the activities described here. This collection is deliberately eclectic.
CARE developed some of the technical documents included, but many of them were
developed by other organizations. Some important references could not, for
copyright reasons, be reproduced, so are listed as references only. Thus each
section is followed by a page that appears like the following:

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Resources

To access documents on the CD, click the text next to the Acrobat Reader
symbol.

Tools

Concept Papers

Case Studies

Please Note

Sometimes the first time a CD-ROM is used, the html links have to be updated. To
do this, place the cursor on the html link desired, and right click with the mouse. One
of the menu of option is called “! Update Field.” Select that one, and the html link
will be updated for the machine in which the CD is being used.

Useful Websites

Many of the documents on the CD-ROM have been downloaded from web-sites, and
a partial list of these websites is noted below. In some cases, use of the material
was conditional on providing this information.

1. CARE International

[Link]
[Link]/care/

2. Humanitarian Practice Network (HPN)

Overseas Development Institute
111 Westminster Bridge Road
London SE1 7JD
U.K.

Tel: +44 (0) 20 7922 0331/74

Fax: +44 (0) 20 7922 0399
Email: hpn@[Link]

Note: HPN documents are also available in the following formats:

• The pdf can be downloaded free of charge from the HPN website

• A CD-ROM of HPN and HPG documents published between 1994 and March
2001, available free of charge from HPN.

• Print copies are available on request from HPN.

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

HPN publications are available free of charge to HPN members. Membership is

offered free of charge to individuals and organizations working in the
humanitarian sector. If you would like to join, go to [Link] or contact
HPN.

3. The FEWS Net Project

[Link]

4. The International Food Policy Research Institute

[Link]

5. The Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance (USAID)

[Link]/ofda/

6. The Food and Agriculture Organization

[Link]

7. The World Food Program

[Link]

8. The Feinstein Famine Center, Tufts University

[Link]

9. The Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex

[Link]/ids/

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Executive Summary

Section 1. Introduction to the Second Edition: Beyond the “Relief to

Development” Continuum

In the 1990s, a conceptual framework for linking relief to development (R2D)—or the
“relief to development continuum”—became popular, and was widely adopted into
the thinking and planning of operational agencies. CARE developed its own version
of the R2D concept, noted in Figure 1.4, due to a number of misgivings about the
continuum and because of some new programming directions within CARE. First
and foremost, CARE has committed itself to adopting a rights-based approach (RBA)
in all its programs over the time period of 2001-2006. While all the implications of
this shift are still being worked out, several are immediately applicable to
programming in the context of chronic vulnerability.

One of the principles of a rights-based approach is to understand and address

underlying causes of poverty and vulnerability, in addition to rights violations that are
expressed as symptoms. Additionally, the principles of a rights-based approach
require new and higher standards of participation and accountability. Closely related
to this, CARE has also recommitted itself to a principle of gender equity and
diversity, and to work against all forms of discrimination. And in terms of
programming modes, CARE has also committed itself to working much more at the
level of policy advocacy in addition to its more traditional role in on-the-ground
programming. All of these factors have a major impact on programming in the
context of chronic vulnerability.

As a result, whereas dealing with chronic vulnerability was the theme of the first
edition of this document, overcoming chronic vulnerability is the theme of this edition
of the Guidelines—in effect, adding the dotted line in Figure 1.4. The emphasis here
is on proactively managing risks, but it is critical to remember that these are not
separate subjects: A normative pre-occupation with moving from left to right along
the “relief-to-development” continuum was one of the factors that led to the
continuum being abandoned as a useful concept in the first place. But a permanent
preoccupation with disaster response and provision of safety nets is not an
acceptable alternative in a rights-based approach.

This document attempts to carry on the search for realistic and workable alternatives
between these two extremes, recognizing that overcoming chronic vulnerability and
enabling communities to lift themselves out of poverty is the paramount long-term
objective, but assisting communities to prepare for and deal with the short-term
realities of a variety of forms of risk remains a necessary pre-requisite to achieving
that long-term objective.

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Figure1.4 Program Framework for Risk Management

in Contexts of Chronic Vulnerability (2002)

Time Short Term Long Term

Classic R2D Relief Rehabilitation Development

Framework Livelihood Provisioning Livelihood Protection Livelihood Promotion

Risk Emergency Rehabilitation Overcoming

Management Res ponse Chronic
Framework Vulnerability

Community- Info
Based Disaster Systems &
Preparedness Early
& Crisis Warning
Mitigation

Long-Term Safety Nets or

Unsustainable Service Provision

Cross Cutting Analy sis Alliance Building Advocacy

Programmatic
Themes:

Section 2. Lessons Learned

A number of lessons have been learned in recent years regarding programming that
reduces chronic vulnerability. These include the conceptual framework itself; its
application particularly in situations where political vulnerability is the salient form of
risk; operational activities and interventions; partnership and cooperation; the
implications of the HIV/AIDS pandemic; and important advocacy issues for donors.
Section 2 of the Guidelines reviews these major lessons learned. The following is a
list of the main lessons learned.

Conceptual/Analytical Lessons

1. Link relief to development, but be cautious.

2. Be aware of overlapping causes of vulnerability.

3. Recurrent shocks lead to a “poverty trap” and make a long-term perspective

critical.

4. Vulnerability analysis requires differentiated and disaggregated information.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

5. Greater priority must be given to preventative as opposed to curative

interventions.

6. Chronic vulnerability is not just a rural issue: urban-based programming requires

special considerations.

Program Strategy Lessons

7. Long-term presence is a major comparative advantage in programming for

chronic vulnerability.

8. Higher operating costs may be justified.

9. Partnerships are critical to address chronic vulnerability.

10. Develop local organizational capacity.

11. Working with local government in chronically vulnerable situations is important.

12. Advocacy must become part of a program strategy.

13. A long-term perspective is critical for the environmental considerations of short-

term interventions.

Design, Monitoring and Evaluation-Related Lessons

14. There are multiple considerations in program planning.

15. Community-based preparedness is critical.

16. Post-conflict rehabilitation requires certain minimal conditions.

17. Build in the costs of promoting social transformation through rehabilitation.

18. Long-term safety nets are required for orphans and other groups affected by
HIV/AIDS.

19. Female-headed households are a special targeting consideration.

20. Analyze both the benefits and harms of interventions.

21. Special attention should be given in each locality regarding the advantages and
disadvantages of particular risk mitigation tools.

Section 3. Definitions and Characteristics of Vulnerability

Vulnerability was classically defined as exposure to risk and stress, and the lack of
ability to cope with its consequences. An important program distinction that has been
made is distinguishing between the symptoms of vulnerability and the causes of
vulnerability. Traditional relief programs have focused on treating the symptoms or
outcomes of vulnerability such the malnourished, destitute and impoverished
households that have experienced livelihood failure. Shifting the focus to addressing

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

the causes of vulnerability allows for programs to have a greater long-term impact on
livelihoods.

Contemporary understandings of vulnerability have multiple dimensions. The

classically understood causes of livelihood insecurity were environmental, climatic
and demographic factors. While environmental factors still affect farmers and
pastoralists, their impacts on food security are now understood to be underpinned by
policy considerations—they are not entirely “natural” phenomena. Contrasting the
food security literature with the disaster risk assessment literature, some observers
make a sharp distinction between vulnerability to hazards (which may or may not
lead to disasters, depending on how the risk factors are dealt with) and vulnerability
to negative outcomes such as malnutrition, destitution, starvation or death (which
presume that a disaster has occurred). Their major point is that, by focusing on
negative outcomes (which is without argument what either the food security
enterprise or the disaster risk enterprise is ultimately trying to do), causal factors are
largely overlooked when they need to be identified, understood, mitigated, and
ultimately removed. In addition to the classic variables of vulnerability, the current
context in Eastern Africa requires attention to HIV/AIDS as a major contributing
factor. HIV/AIDS is not just another problem of health and under-development. It is
unique by its nature and effects for the following reasons:

• It kills the most productive – and reproductive – members of society.

• It is hidden. The private nature and complex cultural attitudes towards sex lead to
silence, denial, stigma, and discrimination at many levels.

• There is no cure, and drugs to combat AIDS are expensive and difficult to obtain.

• It has both rural and urban dimensions.

• It affects both the rich and the poor, though it is the poor who face the most
severe impact.

• It affects both sexes but is not gender-neutral. Women are biologically more
vulnerable than men to being infected in a given sexual encounter. Moreover,
women are often left with few assets following the death of the husband.

• HIV/AIDS impacts at the individual, society/community and national levels with

serious bearings on the economic, social and other sectors.

• HIV/AIDS has multiple “accelerating” effects on other risk factors (economic,

social, and political).

• Finally, one of the most disturbing aspects of the pandemic is the fact that, as it
intensifies, the local and national capacity to respond is decreasing.

Dimensions of vulnerability include the economic, social and political, as captured by

Figure 3.1.

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Figure 3.1 Political, Social and Economic Dimensions of Vulnerability

Section 4. Information Requirements and Chronic Vulnerability

Chronic vulnerability is defined in terms of a variety of categories of information and

in turn, programmatic responses are driven by information. But often the kind of
information sought may simply not be available or the available information is poor in
quality, methodologically ad hoc, spotty in coverage, and interpreted out of context
by external analysts. Information systems therefore constitute a major constraint to
effectively dealing with chronic vulnerability. Part of the problem stems from the lack
of an organizing framework for information systems, and partly from a lack of
understanding of the linkages between information and programs or policies. As a
result, information systems that are put in place to help meet emergency program
requirements may be very incomplete, ineffective or inefficient.

This section of the Guidelines outlines the components needed for an adequate
information system to deal with chronic vulnerability, and the links between the
components. Table 4.1 outlines the major components of an information system,
and the purpose of each component, presented in logical sequence. In practice,
many components are missing, and systems are not necessarily organized in a
logical manner—meaning that program decisions are often made on the basis of
poor information, or even presumptions or complete ignorance.

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Table 4.1 Components of Humanitarian Information System, Frequency of Analysis, and Major Questions Addressed
Logical Frequency of Information Categories/Questions Addressed
Component
Sequence Analysis

• What are the basic livelihoods of groups?

1. Baseline Vulnerability
• What are known or likely hazards: natural, social, economic and political? HIV prevalence?
and Poverty Infrequent
• What is the likelihood of these occurring, and what indicators would predict?
Assessment (Every 5 years, or
• Who are the most vulnerable groups?
when context
(BVPA) changes) • What capacities, services and resources (physical, human, social) exist to mitigate vulnerability?
• What are coping and risk minimization strategies?
• What baseline information is available against which to analyze trends?

• Indicator trend analysis: is there a problem shaping up?

2. Early Warning
• Where and how quickly is it developing?
Continuous
(EW) • What are the geographic dimensions of the problem?
• In what areas should an in-depth assessment be concentrated?

• What are the nature and dimensions of the problem?

3. Emergency Needs • How long is it going to last?
Assessment
As needed • Who are the most vulnerable groups?
• What and how much is needed; what is the best response?
(ENA) • To what extent is local coping capacity and provision of services overwhelmed?
• What are major logistical and resource considerations?

<< Programmatic Intervention (based on information generated, but not part of Information System per se) >>
4. Program Monitoring • Are inputs accounted for (logistical accounting)?
Continuous
(While program is • Are outputs achieved (end-use monitoring)?
(PM)
on-going) • Pipeline analysis: is the pipeline “flow” adequate for meeting upcoming requirements?

5. Impact Evaluation Regular Intervals

• Is the intervention achieving the intended result?
(While program is
• What adjustments are necessary (response, quantity, targeting)?
(IE) ongoing)

• What are the possibilities for exit, recovery, or transition for longer-term responses?
6. Context Monitoring
• What are institutional capacities and vulnerabilities?
Continuous
(CM) • What are the risks of transition?
• Does situation require re-assessment?
7. Program Evaluation
• How can overall program (information system, preparedness, response) be improved?
and Lessons Learned Periodic • Are humanitarian principles being upheld by programs?
• What lessons can be learned from experience and mistakes?
(PE/LL)

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Section 5. Program Strategies: Preparedness

Emergency preparedness entails being in the best possible position to predict and
respond appropriately to any emergency context – a food crisis, a complex political
emergency, an economic shock or a natural disaster. In Eastern and Central Africa,
and other areas characterized by chronic vulnerability, the integration of emergency
preparedness into longer-term development programming can hardly be over-
emphasized.

Despite extensive experience in community-based approaches and emergency

response, these two programming areas are often viewed separately. A
commitment to a rights-based approach (RBA) requires attention to the process of
emergency programming, in addition to the outcome or service delivery side. The
principles of a rights-based approach require addressing the underlying causes of
vulnerability through participatory processes. In effect, the process of empowering
communities to prepare for emergencies is a more holistic programming approach
that integrates development and emergency initiatives within a common livelihoods
framework.

Based on CARE Eastern and Central Africa’s earlier “Community Based Emergency
Preparedness” paper, this chapter contains information on community-based early
warning and preparedness; contingency planning; planning for community-based
interventions and management; managing resources and exit strategies. The
schematic overview of community-based preparedness is shown in Figure 5.1.

Section 6. Program Strategies: Social Protection and Approaches to

Mitigating Shock

Social protection encompasses those activities that address (1) the causes of
vulnerability through mitigation by protecting household assets and (2) the effects of
shocks through the strengthening and supporting of formal and informal safety nets.
This section discusses the short and medium term programmatic approaches to
dealing with vulnerability by addressing both the causes (mitigation) and effects
(safety nets) of shocks.

Interventions designed to mitigate shocks by addressing the causes of vulnerability

should protect assets and should emphasize livelihood diversification. In addition,
formal and informal safety nets should be strengthened and supported, because they
offer essential kinds of insurance to buffer households against shocks. Social safety
nets include short-term response mechanisms designed to deal with quick-onset
shock-related events, and long-term responses that address crisis events with an
ongoing dedication of resources for extended periods of time.

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 Figure 5.1 Community-Based Preparedness: Conceptual Framework (CARE 2001)

Community-based analysis
of underlying causes, Community-based
vulnerabilities and existing Assessment
capacity

EWS Community-Based Program Livelihood

Information Preparedness Emergency Work Strategies
Response(s)
Planning Process

Policy
Influencing

Capacity
Analysis,
Skills Audit
and Capacity
Long-term
building Portfolio of Responses Development
Strategies

Long-Term Development
Work Plans

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

This chapter covers topics on programming considerations in social protection,

reiterating the broader definition of vulnerability; different types and duration of
shocks; resilience, empowerment and a rights-based approach to social protection.
It emphasizes protecting households’ assets as a key component of mitigation, and
discusses exit and transition strategies.

Section 7. Program Strategies: Transition and Rehabilitation

Rehabilitation programming is about rebuilding and reinforcing people’s capacity to

resume pursuing their livelihood activities. In chronically vulnerable situations, it is
typical that a recurring crisis could move an intervention from the rehabilitation stage
back to emergency response or mitigation. Rehabilitation is part of a process of
protecting and promoting the livelihoods of people enduring or recovering from
crises. Rehabilitation should be a strategic or proactive process whose success is
measured by its ability to protect household livelihoods by lessening vulnerability
roughly in a post-disaster or post-conflict situation.

This chapter is based on CARE’s earlier “Program Guidelines for Rehabilitation.” It

defines rehabilitation as that which “provides short-term income transfers, rebuilds
household and community assets, and rebuilds institutions.” Basically, rehabilitation
programming serves to strengthen the recovery potential of an affected population
by empowering households with the means to stabilize their livelihood systems.
Rehabilitation lays the foundations for future development initiatives, notably those
involving the improvement of household livelihood security. The vision of
rehabilitation programmers should recognize the value of a diverse range of activities
and operating principles in their programming to include conflict resolution, human
rights and gender equality among others.

The chapter deals with post-conflict situations and transitional programming

strategies; social and political challenges for rehabilitation programming; and
important principles for rehabilitation programming. These include identifying the
causes of vulnerability; promoting social and political transformation; sequencing of
program phases; allocating and utilizing resources; institutional networking and
community participation; gender equality and human rights; and civil society
strengthening.

Section 8. Program Strategies: Development and Growth for Long-Term

Vulnerability Reduction

The relationship between poverty and vulnerability depends upon the nature and
severity of the risks being faced and what assets are available to the household for
use as insurance against risk or in coping with shocks. This chapter identifies
potential strategies that assist the poor to overcome chronic vulnerability by
managing risk and increasing income. It focuses on improving productivity of assets,
increasing their resilience and improving the predictability of benefit streams. This
section lays out a strategy for overcoming these factors, with emphasis on some
proven strategies for dealing with climatic and economic factors.

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

The chapter deals with the inadequacy of traditional approaches to development in

situations of chronic vulnerability; lays out general principles for long-term reduction
of vulnerability; and the use of area program strategic frameworks as a means of
focusing on long-term objectives, even when stuck with short-term funding
opportunities. It provides a detailed example of one program strategy developed to
overcome factors that render households chronically vulnerable, rather than simply
help households to cope with such factors (the REAP Program in Kenya). Finally, in
highly vulnerable contexts, it shows that safety nets need to be incorporated into
long-term strategies.

Section 9. Advocating in Situations of Chronic Vulnerability

This chapter is based on CARE’s adoption of a rights-based approach, and is

therefore primarily oriented at an internal readership—unlike the rest of the
document. It is also based partially on CARE’s Advocacy Guidelines and the
Benefits/Harms Analysis Manual. CARE defines advocacy as the deliberate process
of influencing those who make policy decisions. Advocacy is a means for holding
governments (at all levels) and other institutions accountable. CARE’s use of
advocacy will always attempt to improve the livelihood of a significant number of
people, including the most vulnerable and marginalized, target policymakers and
implementers at levels above the household, and be rooted in CARE’s field
experience and core values.

This chapter covers the basics of a rights-based approach, and then discusses key
issues in advocacy: understanding policy processes; the issue of “capture” or elite
domination; and the development of an advocacy strategy and message. It
addresses related issues such as coalition building; linking work in chronic
vulnerability to the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper effort; and some operational
considerations.

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Section 1
Introduction to the Second Edition

This is the second edition of this document prepared by CARE’s Eastern and Central
Africa Food/Livelihood Security Working Group. The first edition, called “Program
Guidelines for Chronically Vulnerable Areas,” was published in early 2000. After
defining what was meant by “Chronically Vulnerable Areas,” the document was
primarily concerned with the question of how CARE programs differently in places
where we have reason to think that, over the course of a three or five year planning
horizon, some kind of shock or emergency is likely to happen that will put people’s
lives or livelihoods at risk. While the original guidelines were not concerned with
disaster response per se, they were oriented towards preparing for and mitigating
the impact of shocks or disasters and post disaster recovery, regardless of the type
of program being implemented.

A number of factors have required that the document to be rewritten. This

introduction outlines the changes in analysis and programming that have required
the document to be rewritten and updated, and provides a brief overview of the rest
of the document. The main factors that have changed include changes in thinking
about the “Relief-to-Development” continuum; changes in both our understanding of
the concept of vulnerability and a broadening of our understanding of the sources of
vulnerability (which has meant less of a concern with geographic areas that are
vulnerable, and a greater focus on human populations that are vulnerable); and
changes in programming directions within CARE. These differences are discussed
below. The conceptual changes are discussed in more detail in Section 3.

A. The “Relief to Development” Continuum

In the 1990s, a conceptual framework for linking relief to development (R2D)—or the
“relief to development continuum”—became popular, and was widely adopted into
the thinking and planning of operational agencies. The notion was that if relief
activities could be tied to developmental objectives; better-designed development
programs could protect people’s assets better and reduce the need for relief in
response to shocks; post-emergency recovery time would be reduced; and long-term
improvements would be more sustainable. “Protecting livelihoods saves lives” was
the theme (IDS 1994). The R2D framework also put greater emphasis on
intermediate activities as a category of interventions in their own right, particularly
rehabilitation and mitigation (Figure 1.1).

However, by the end of the decade, there were three generally perceived problems
with the R2D framework. First, the continuum idea was driven by a normative
perception that over time, programs should shift from left to right along the
continuum (as depicted by the arrow in Figure 1.1). However, the observation of
practical experience was that the tendency is anything but linear, and often cycles
back towards emergency response, or gets “stuck” in permanent provisioning of
relief or safety nets (which the classic continuum model did not recognize). The
picture was much more complicated than the simple “continuum” model suggested,
with a variety of different activities along the “continuum” taking place
simultaneously.

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Figure 1.1 A Classic View of the “Relief to Development” Continuum

Short Term Medium Term Long Term

Relief Rehabilitation Development

(Livelihood Provisioning) (Livelihood Protection) (Livelihood Promotion)

Program Examples: Program Examples: Program Examples:

• Safety and protection • Provision of food until • Small enterprise
• Food and non-food harvest development/ credit
distribution • Distribution of seeds • Agricultural/natural
• Supplementary and and tools resource development
therapeutic feeding • Restocking of livestock • Development of rural
• Emergency health herds services
• Emergency shelter • Restoration of services
• Emergency water and • Rebuilding of
sanitation infrastructure

Second, the classic relief-to-development continuum also lacked a clear conceptual

basis about the nature of livelihood shocks—the concept was based largely on
experience with natural disasters, particularly drought in Africa. It was applied—
sometimes too hastily—in complex political emergencies and other forms of
disasters, often with perverse and very counter-productive results. Livelihoods
themselves, and the institutions that supported them, are often targeted by
combatants, meaning perversely that people with better livelihood assets found
themselves more vulnerable to attack.

And third, the presumption of a shock or emergency with a clearly defined beginning
and end (and therefore clearly delineated programmatic transitions points) clearly did
not apply in situations where low-grade conflict continued for years or even decades.
Given the different types of vulnerability, it was perhaps not surprising that
“continuum” approaches to programming in complex emergencies proved more
problematic.

The first edition of the Guidelines in 2000 attempted to update the R2D framework,
taking into account these factors, and is outlined in Figure 1.2.

By the end of the 1990s the R2D framework had virtually been dropped by the
research community as a useful analytical concept, but it is still frequently referred to
in programming terms, if primarily only in a descriptive manner. Despite significant
research on the topic, no alternative conceptual framework has yet emerged,
although several other factors have been observed.

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Figure 1.2 Modified Relief to Development Continuum Framework

for Chronically Vulnerable Areas (2000)

Time Short Term Long Term

Classic R2D Relief Rehabilitation Development

Framework Livelihood provisioning Livelihood Protection Livelihood Promotion

Modified R2D Emergency Rehabilitation Sustainable

Framework Response Development
for CVAs

Crisis Early
Mitigation Warning

Long-Term Safety Nets or

Unsustainable Service Provision

B. Changes in Understanding Livelihoods and Vulnerability

A broad understanding of the relationship between poverty and vulnerability also

stretches back to the mid 1990s. Poverty itself is often thought of as some level of
well being (or livelihood outcomes, in the language of the livelihoods framework)
below which one is impoverished, and above which, one is not. It is thus about
current status, and often heavily associated with material status, though social and
political elements have slowly been incorporated in the general understanding of
poverty. Vulnerability, on the other hand, has been understood to be concerned
about the risk of exposure to a hazard, which may leave one impoverished (or
worse), but the basic concept is more about risk, and the ability to cope with it, than it
is about current material status. However, there are many linkages between material
and social status and risk, and there has been much new thinking and writing on this
topic, which are reviewed in greater detail in Section 3.

At it’s simplest, the livelihoods analytical framework is concerned with the assets that
people (usually in social units such as households) hold, the strategies that they
employ, and the outcomes that they achieve. The household is always in some kind
of context—both with regard to vulnerability or the risk factors it faces, but also the
regulatory, institutional, social and political environment within which is operates.
There may be overlap between the risk factors and the social/political context, but to
some extent they are looked at separately in analysis. More recently, attempts have
been made to understand livelihoods in a more dynamic context—looking for
example at the way in which risk factors and the social/political environment impinge
on both decisions that people make, and the way in which all these factors translate

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Figure 1.3 Livelihoods, Risks and Constraints in a Dynamic Context

Cultural/community norms Technical/climatic constraints

Tenure institutions Expected output prices
Asset markets Tenure institutions
Economic policy
Assets
Input prices
Natural
Physical
Human
Financial
Social

Perceptions Consumption/Investment Production/Exchange Perceptions

of risk Decisions and behaviors Decisions and Behaviors of risk

Income
Cash
In-kind
Regulatory system
Indebtedness Actual output prices
Requirements Weather/climatic conditions
Prices of basic needs Formal and informal transfers

Adapted from Maxwell and Wiebe (1999)

“outcomes” from one time period into “assets” in the next (the time period may be an
agricultural cycle as in implied in Figure 1.3, or it may be a single day if Figure 1.3
were modified to reflect the livelihood of a hawker in the urban informal economy).

The first edition of this document was primarily concerned with only two major
sources of vulnerability: drought and conflict (and was largely perceived to be only
about the former). This led to a focus on geographic areas that were characterized
by these kinds of hazards/shocks and their consequences. It also led to overlooking
the consequences of vulnerability to a host of other hazards or potential hazards,
including other environmental/climatic factors besides drought; economic and market
forms of vulnerability; political factors and institutional or policy failures in addition to
just overt conflict; and increasingly, both the risk and the knock-on effects of the
HIV/AIDS pandemic. Many of these factors are not specific to a geographic area, so
the emphasis on geographic areas of vulnerability is greatly reduced in this edition.

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Figure 1.4 Program Framework for Risk Management

in Contexts of Chronic Vulnerability (2003)

Time Short Term Long Term

Classic R2D Relief Rehabilitation Development

Framework Livelihood Provisioning Livelihood Protection Livelihood Promotion

Risk Emergency Rehabilitation Overcoming

Management Response Chronic
Framework Vulnerability

Community- Info
Based Disaster Systems &
Preparedness Early
& Crisis Warning
Mitigation

Long-Term Safety Nets or

Unsustainable Service Provision

Cross Cutting Analysis Alliance Building Advocacy

Programmatic
Themes:

C. Changes in Programming Directions in CARE

The Household Livelihood Security analytical framework informed the first edition.
While HLS and an understanding of livelihoods remains a critical component of this
edition, much has changed within CARE since the first edition was published. First
and foremost, CARE has committed itself to adopting a rights-based approach (RBA)
in all its programs over the time period of 2001-2006. While all the implications of
this shift are still being worked out, several are immediately applicable to
programming in the context of chronic vulnerability.1

One of the principles of a rights-based approach is to understand and address

underlying causes of poverty and vulnerability, in addition to rights violations that are
expressed as symptoms (see Annexes I and II). As a result, for example, in its new
food aid policy, CARE commits itself to addressing underlying causes of food
insecurity if and when food aid is provided either as part of an emergency response
or as part of helping to provide long-term safety nets. Additionally, the principles of a
rights-based approach require new and higher standards of participation and
accountability. Closely related to this, CARE has also recommitted itself to a
principle of gender equity and diversity, and to work against all forms of
discrimination. And in terms of programming modes, CARE has also committed itself

1
The defining characteristics or principles of a rights-based approach as articulated by CARE to date
are included in Annex I.

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

to working much more at the level of policy advocacy in addition to its more
traditional role in on-the-ground programming. All of these factors have a major
impact on programming in the context of chronic vulnerability.

As a result, whereas dealing with chronic vulnerability was the theme of the first
edition of this document, overcoming chronic vulnerability is the theme of this edition.
In effect, adding the dotted line in Figure 1.4. The emphasis here is on proactively
managing risks, but it is critical to remember that these are not separate subjects: A
normative pre-occupation with moving from left to right along the “relief-to-
development” continuum was one of the factors that led to the continuum being
abandoned as a useful concept in the first place. But a permanent preoccupation
with disaster response and provision of safety nets is not an acceptable alternative in
a rights-based approach—with its emphasis on addressing underlying causes of
poverty.

This document attempts to carry on the search for realistic and workable alternatives
between these two extremes, recognizing that overcoming chronic vulnerability and
enabling communities to lift themselves out of poverty is the paramount long-term
objective, but assisting communities prepare for and deal with the short-term realities
of a variety of risks remains a necessary pre-requisite to achieving that long-term
objective.

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Section 2
Lessons Learned

A number of lessons have been learned in recent years regarding programming that
reduces chronic vulnerability. CARE has learned much about the conceptual
framework itself and its application particularly in situations where political
vulnerability is the salient form of risk; operational activities and interventions;
partnership and cooperation; and important advocacy issues for donors. This
section of the guidelines reviews these major lessons learned. Sections 3-9 address
many of these issues in more detail. Main lessons learned are presented below,
grouped as conceptual/analytical lessons, program strategy lessons, and lessons
related to the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of programs.

A. Conceptual/Analytical Lessons

Link relief to development, but be cautious. Using emergency relief for

developmental purposes and designing long-term development strategies to
minimize the impacts of shocks (and therefore minimize the need for emergency
relief) are both worthy goals to strive for. But they may not represent compatible
strategies for working in all kinds of chronically vulnerable contexts. The analytical
capacity to determine the best course of action is critical; programs should not be
normatively oriented toward “development” if the possibility of transition from
emergency response to rehabilitation or development does not exist. On the other
hand, livelihood activities and their protection can be important for survival even
under acute emergency conditions. Judging the timing and criteria for transitions is
crucial. The bottom line is that there is no good substitute for careful analysis, good
judgment, and participatory decision-making.

Be aware of overlapping causes of vulnerability. The causes of chronic

vulnerability are varied, and major differences exist between programming in a
context where recurrent natural disasters are the basic cause of vulnerability, and a
context where civil, political, or military conflict are the basic cause of vulnerability.
But other dimensions of vulnerability need to be taken into account such as
entitlement (economic) failure, political marginalization and social exploitation and
discrimination. Vulnerability as a result of HIV-AIDS may cut across all of these.
Because vulnerability is multi-faceted, it is important to determine how a given
hazard interacts with each dimension of vulnerability.

Recurrent shocks lead to a “poverty trap” and make a long-term perspective

critical. Households or communities threatened with repeated shocks faces greater
risks of destitution, because they have less time and fewer resources that enable
them to recover from shocks. Furthermore, these populations are additionally
impacted by the fact that recurrent shocks that lead to asset divestment increase the
vulnerability of a population to future risks. Mitigation strategies need to act to
prevent these initial losses of assets in a timely and equitable manner.

Vulnerability analysis requires differentiated and disaggregated information.

Differences in vulnerability may be expressed at the household level, so to
adequately understand and identify vulnerability, it is necessary to differentiate

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

between different kinds of households—on the basis of demographics, livelihoods,

assets etc. So it is important to have information and data that differentiate
households accordingly. But differences in vulnerability may also be expressed at
the individual level, or in terms of groups (such as gender, age) that cut across
households. So it is equally important to have disaggregated information that
identifies and analyzes the condition and position of these groups.

Greater priority must be given to preventative as opposed to curative

interventions. Although it is often difficult to determine the best interventions and
the timing of their implementation, long-term development activities are both more
sustainable and cost-effective than disaster relief programs. This change in
approach not only empowers vulnerable populations to protect their productive
assets, it encourages resiliency by allowing them to play critical roles in analyzing,
planning and implementing mitigation programs.

Chronic vulnerability is not just a rural issue: urban-based programming

requires special considerations. Programs need to address specifically urban
livelihood needs. First, urban livelihoods demonstrate a dependency on the market
and are thereby made more vulnerable to the effects of inflation. Urban households
also face added problems of securing adequate housing and proper sanitation given
the overcrowded and deteriorating conditions of urban spaces. Individuals also face
the increased risks of contracting HIV because of the generally higher prevalence
rates among urban poor populations. Finally, a lack of security in urban areas due to
relatively higher rates of violent crime and the fact that most political violence takes
place in urban areas.

B. Program Strategy Lessons

Long-term presence is a major comparative advantage in programming for

chronic vulnerability. Longevity of presence in programming activities with
vulnerable people is important to understanding local livelihood systems and
improving participatory decision-making. It lowers the cost of emergency response
when required, and permits transition back to previous activities in longer-term
programming when a crisis subsides. Long-term presence may also enable more
rapid mobilization in the case of an emergency, puts emergency resources to some
developmental purposes, and strengthens the capacity of civil society
organizations—which may be a major longer-term objective of programming to
reduce vulnerability.

Higher operating costs may be justified. Because of long supply lines, poor
communications, and often because of security concerns, the cost of operations in
areas where chronically vulnerable people live may be higher than other
developmental contexts. Where populations are relatively sparse, this may make the
cost of operations per beneficiary very high in comparison with programs in less
vulnerable areas. However programmatic presence should be aimed at reducing
long-term vulnerability—making emergency responses less likely, and making
emergency responses quicker and more appropriately targeted when required.

Partnerships are critical to address chronic vulnerability. Capacity building and

partnership with local organizations are crucial for transition and exit strategies.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

However, in complex emergencies, civil society organizations may be specifically

targeted by combatants, and may be severely weakened or destroyed by conflict.
Identifying local capacities and knowledge are an important component of
emergency preparedness, as well as transition and exit strategies. Working in
partnership with local organizations and communities in emergencies may require
extra effort in planning and emergency preparedness, which requires on-going (pre-
emergency) presence in chronically vulnerable situations.

Develop local organizational capacity. The capacity of local institutions may be a

constraint on rehabilitation and development activities, particularly in complex
emergencies. Rehabilitation and development activities can themselves be
destructive if carried out at inappropriate times, or if civil society institutions are not
involved from the beginning (Harvey, Campbell and Maxwell 1997). However, under
the correct circumstances, working with indigenous civil society organizations is an
extremely effective strategy for all activity categories in the conceptual framework.

Working with local government in chronically vulnerable situations is

important. Collaboration with local government may be necessary to achieve
complementarity in technical areas, to influence government policy, and to avoid
marginalizing local government. However, in complex emergencies, government will
almost certainly be one of the parties to the conflict, and collaboration could
jeopardize neutrality. Even in the absence of militarized conflict, government policy
may be a cause of the marginalization of populations. Yet collaboration with other
agencies in rehabilitation is critical.

Advocacy must become part of a program strategy. Because chronically

vulnerable populations may be found in marginalized areas, interventions require not
only program activities but also advocacy with donors, governments, and other
important actors (See Section 9). Many of these power relationships will be
threatened by empowerment activities and conflict may be an outcome, especially if
the status quo is being challenged. Awareness of potential political sensitivities or
backlash is important to ensure that advocacy efforts do not result in backlashes
against the very marginalized communities on whose behalf advocacy is undertaken.

A long-term perspective is critical for the environmental considerations of

short-term interventions. Environmentally unsound practices in short-term
mitigation responses can have long-term negative impacts especially when these
responses involve the utilization of natural resources. Mitigation responses need to
consider these impacts so that the work during the rehabilitation phase to rebuild the
natural resource base can be reduced (See Section 6).

C. Design, Monitoring and Evaluation-Related Lessons

There are multiple considerations in program planning. In addition to

emergency response, rehabilitation and long-term development activities (which
constituted the traditional continuum from relief to development), other program
considerations are needed to address chronic vulnerability include safety nets, early
warning and information systems generally, and emergency preparedness and
mitigation strategies. Other programming themes cut across all of these particular
activities: particularly good analysis, alliance building, and advocacy.

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Community-based preparedness is critical. Community-based approaches and

emergency preparedness/response tend to be viewed separately. Commitment to a
rights-based approach (RBA) demands attention to the process of emergency
programming, in addition to the outcome or service delivery side. The process of
empowering communities to prepare for emergencies is a more holistic programming
approach that integrates development and emergency initiatives within a common
livelihoods framework (see Section 5 and various case studies).

Post-conflict rehabilitation requires certain minimal conditions. Rehabilitation

in chronically vulnerable situations is complex, because of the continually unstable
and crisis-weakened context in which to lay groundwork for future development
activities. However, there are minimal conditions for the transition from relief to
rehabilitation to take place. These include the cessation of conflict, increased political
accommodation to guarantee a reasonable level of security, a certain level of respect
for human rights and accommodation of humanitarian groups, and acceptance of the
controlling political authority by donors (see Section 7).

Build in the costs of promoting social transformation through rehabilitation.

Rebuilding without transformation inevitably leads to a return of the traditional status
quo and may serve to reproduce the same conditions of power that led to the original
emergency. For a rehabilitation project to be transformative it must challenge the
status quo, which can have transitional costs associated with it. Challenges to the
status quo may compromise the security of projects and personnel during an
emergency as they become targets for reprisals from enforcers of the traditional
status quo. The human and material costs of transformation during the rehabilitation
process raise important issues about accepting loss and assuming responsibility for
loss that are difficult for humanitarian agencies to deal with (see Section 8).

Long-term safety nets are required for orphans and other groups affected by
HIV/AIDS. The issue of who will care for AIDS orphans falls under the rubric of both
informal and formal safety nets. AIDS orphans are generally unable to provide for
themselves, and at the moment are supported, if at all, by a combination of relatives,
their communities, and limited charity programs run by churches and NGOs.
However traditional support systems are increasingly strained, and while one wants
to avoid duplicating community support, some kind of carefully designed program
that reinforces the grandparents, communities, and NGOs that are struggling to cope
with the growing number of orphans almost certainly needs to be part of the safety
net strategy. Other groups may not be as acutely vulnerable as orphans, but
orphans are not the only vulnerable group affected by HIV/AIDS (see Section 8).

Female-headed households are a special targeting consideration. Female-

headed households often constitute a significant minority of any population and often
represent a disproportionate number among the poor. Such households suffer triple-
jeopardy in this regard: (1) they have fewer potential adult workers than other
households; (2) there are more demands on the primary adult breadwinner -
because she also has primary responsibility for childcare and household
management; and (3) she is – by custom (and often because of lower education
levels)- less readily employable outside the household, and as a result, is typically
paid less when she is employed.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Analyze both the benefits and harms of interventions. Especially in complex

emergencies, experience shows that there is the potential for interventions to have
unintended harmful impacts as well as beneficial impacts. Importantly, both the
unintended negative impacts (such as the misuse of aid for military purposes) and
the failure to achieve minimal requirements of intended impacts must be viewed as
“harms.” A good analysis of potential harmful impacts, the means to mitigate or
prevent these impacts, and a judgment as to whether the harms outweigh the
benefits, are all crucial components of program design, as well as a necessary
component of on-going monitoring.

Special attention should be given in each locality regarding the advantages

and disadvantages of particular risk mitigation tools. For example, labor
migration is a common strategy employed by households coping with shock.
However, the risk of contracting HIV may be greater for migrating individuals and this
risk is subsequently passed to individuals who comprise the sexual network of the
returning migrant. Women are the ultimate victims of this risky coping strategy,
because they are most vulnerable to contracting the disease and may infect their
children during pregnancy, childbirth or while breastfeeding.

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Section 3
Definitions and Characteristics of Vulnerability

Vulnerability was classically defined as exposure to risk and stress, and the lack of
ability to cope with the consequences of risk (Chambers 1989, Webb and
Harinarayan 1999). Chronic vulnerability in the region was described in the original
edition of this document as characterized by one or more of the following:

• The deterioration or destruction of primary livelihood systems

• The loss or depletion of productive assets
• Long-term dependence on unsustainable coping mechanisms
• Environmental degradation and deterioration of natural resources to the point that
carrying capacity may be exceeded and production has declined below recovery
levels
• Increasing impoverishment of community and households
• Geographical isolation (in terms of infrastructure and communication)
• Dependence on relief assistance
• Breakdown of social institutions and relations

While these still provide a partial description of vulnerability, there is clearly much
more to a complete understanding of the concept, and an understanding of its
causes—both in the Greater Horn of Africa region and more broadly. A substantial
body of recent research has been devoted to understanding vulnerability (Dilley and
Boudreau 2001; Bankoff 2001; Boyce 2000; Watts and Bohle 1993).

An important program distinction that has been made is distinguishing between the
symptoms of vulnerability and the causes of vulnerability. Traditional relief programs
have focused on treating the symptoms or outcomes of vulnerability such the
malnourished, destitute and impoverished households that have experienced
livelihood failure. Shifting the focus to addressing the causes of vulnerability allows
for programs to have a greater long term impact on livelihoods.

A. The Multiple Dimensions of Vulnerability

Concern traditionally focused on resource-poor farmers, landless laborers,

pastoralists, and women (particularly widowed and women headed households).
These were primarily rural categories, and food insecurity (and poverty or livelihood
insecurity generally) was primarily thought to be a rural phenomenon. Increasing
attention has been paid over recent decades to refugees and internally displaced
groups—not only at immediate risk of death and disease, but also separated from
their means of livelihoods—often for extended periods of time. Newer categories of
vulnerable include the urban poor, the rural destitute (individuals or households with
no productive assets, and who are food-insecure even in “good” years), and
particularly HIV/AIDS affected individuals and households.

The classically understood causes of livelihood insecurity were environmental,

climatic and demographic factors—long-term resource degradation, poor rainfall,
land/population pressure, resulting in poor yields, small holding size, a declining rural
economy, and a high degree of variance in rural incomes from year to year—much of

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

which contributed to the causes of urban migration. While environmental factors still
affect farmers and pastoralists, their impacts on food security are now understood to
be underpinned by policy considerations—they are not entirely “natural” phenomena.
Many factors make people vulnerable. It has now become apparent that identifying
the causes of vulnerability and addressing those causes is more complex.

Contrasting the food security literature with the disaster risk assessment literature,
Dilley and Boudreau (2001) make a sharp distinction between vulnerability to
hazards (which may or may not lead to disasters, depending on how the risk factors
are dealt with) and vulnerability to negative outcomes such as malnutrition,
destitution, starvation or death (which of course presume that a disaster has
occurred). Their major point is that, by focusing on negative outcomes (which is
without argument what either the food security enterprise or the disaster risk
enterprise is ultimately trying to do), causal factors are largely overlooked when they
need to be identified, understood, mitigated, and ultimately removed. The questions
of “vulnerability to what?” is thus crucial to any discussion about vulnerability. Thus,
in the language of the food economy analysis (as adopted by the FEWSNET
project):

Vulnerability + Hazard = Risk

(internal susceptibility) + (an external event) = (negative outcome such as
food insecurity or
malnutrition)

Economic Factors and Vulnerability. The work of Sen (1981) brought to the
attention of the food security community the importance of economic factors. These
include the purchasing power of households; the assets and strategies on which
households rely to give them purchasing power; the market relationships that
underpin access to food that is not produced by the household or individuals that
produce it (and the other legal means by which people acquire adequate food). As
the proportion of primary agricultural producers to total population drops, these
factors have become increasingly important, and explain a lot about the increasing
vulnerability of groups like the urban poor, the rural destitute, and the HIV/AIDS
affected.

When households accumulate surpluses above their basic food requirements, they
divert these resources into assets (both tangible and intangible) that can be drawn
upon in times of crisis. Access to employment opportunities and assets will
determine a household’s vulnerability. As the poorest households have the fewest
assets, they will be the most vulnerable (Maxwell and Frankenberger 1992).
Successive crises deplete the scale and depth of buffers available to a household.
Vulnerability will increase in relation to the frequency, intensity, and duration of
previous crisis exposure.

Although globalization can create more opportunities for the poor, it also increases
vulnerability due to greater exposure to the macro-economic conditions that
influence markets (Ellis and Seeley, 2000). Additionally, the poor may not have the
skills or the support of their communities to participate in these markets. The ability
to adapt quickly to changing market conditions, negotiate complex bureaucratic
structures, and deal with negative attention from local officials may act as hindrances

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

to participation. As globalization becomes more predominant, policies impacting the

poor are increasingly influenced by factors that extend beyond country borders.

Although entitlement theory has made great advances over traditional approaches to
vulnerability, it does not take into account long-term structural and historical
processes by which resources and rights come to be recognized and distributed. A
particular household’s vulnerability can be related to their socio-economic situation
that may include their particular religious, cultural or political affiliation.

Social Factors and Vulnerability. Social factors, including the way in which
households and communities cope with poverty and food insecurity, are a closely
related set of underlying factors, and also probably more weakly understood by the
development community than environmental or economic factors. Gender inequality
and the social position of women, the lack of widows’ inheritance rights, and lower
levels of labor and income underpin the continued vulnerability of women-headed
households—partly a function of socio-cultural factors and partly the result of weak
political institutions that could influence change.

The level of vulnerability will depend on a society’s social order and the relative
position of advantage or disadvantage that a particular group, household or
individual occupies (Bankoff 2001). It is important here to distinguish between the
vulnerability of an individual or group (a state that a person or population might be in)
and marginalization (a state that a person or population is put into by someone else).
Marginality and exclusion can be determined by class, caste, gender, age, ethnicity,
religion or disability. Social factors contributing to vulnerability are deeply entrenched
in hierarchical systems. Analysis must focus on the historical and social dimensions
of hazards, not just the physical. It is these structural conditions that maintain people
in a constantly vulnerable state because they can reproduce inequality, exclusion
and exploitation. Such processes impinge upon poor people’s choices and room to
maneuver (Seeley 2002).

In fact, some people, often the powerful in a community, can benefit from a risk or
disaster by turning a vulnerable situation to their advantage because of their
entitlement to scarce resources and their ability to gain access to benefits. For
example, richer households can accumulate assets at reduced prices because the
poor are forced to sell such assets to cope with the hazard. Similarly, the better off
households also gain access to cheap labor due to the increase in the number of
people competing for limited wage opportunities.

Political Dimensions of Vulnerability. Vulnerability can also be politically

determined, where people are powerless in their command over basic necessities
and rights (Watts and Bohle 1993). Political rights are central to the process by
which claims can be made over public resources. From this perspective, hunger and
food insecurity can be seen as major violations of basic human rights. To address
this dimension of vulnerability, it is important to determine how rules and rights are
defined, legitimized and contested.

The links between good governance and the reduction of child malnutrition has been
established by a cross-country study carried out by Smith and Haddad (2000). Good
governance, in this study defined as the strength of democratic political institutions,
contributes to the reduction of malnutrition by improving access to services and

14
 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

increased availability of food. Similarly, Gerring and Thacker (2001) show that
political and civil rights significantly and positively correlate with declines in infant
mortality. In situations where poor populations were denied their basic civil liberties
(Guatemala and South Africa), they suffered disproportionately from social injustices,
hunger related diseases, mortality and food insecurity (Heggonboughen 1995). In
recent participatory research carried out by the World Bank (2001 World
Development Report), the importance of political voice was highlighted as one of the
major factors contributing to the well-being of the poor.

B. A Comprehensive Approach to Understanding Vulnerability

From the previous discussion it is apparent that different people are vulnerable in
different ways to varying sources of vulnerability. Because vulnerability is multi-
faceted, approaches addressing vulnerability need to take into account this diversity.
In most cases, people can face multiple vulnerabilities at the same time. The model
(Figure 3.1), adapted from Watts and Bohle 1993, tries to capture the various
dimensions of vulnerability that need to be taken into account in designing
interventions.

Figure 3.1: Dimensions of Vulnerability

The model identifies three sources of vulnerability that affect a given population.
Vulnerability can be increased through economic (entitlement) failure, political
powerlessness or social exploitation and discrimination. Many poor people are
affected by a combination of these factors. In the face of a particular hazard, it is
important to determine how the particular hazard interacts with each dimension of
vulnerability. Response planning should be based on the manifestation of
vulnerability affecting communities in a particular context (McLean 2001). Economic
and social vulnerability are more important aspects in drought situations, whereas
political and social vulnerability take precedence in conflicts (McLean 2001). The
shock of HIV/AIDS can cut across all three dimensions (See below). The important
point to underline about Figure 3.1 is the compounding nature of vulnerability (an

15
Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

economic entitlement problem is exacerbated by being politically powerless, for

example).

It is the interactions between these different types of vulnerability that will determine
poor people’s capacities, access to resources, and ability to realize rights. In rights–
based programming, it will be important to take these aspects into account in
diagnosis and analysis to design appropriate programs.

Vulnerability Resulting from the HIV/AIDS Pandemic. HIV/AIDS is one of the

leading cause of death in Eastern and Southern Africa. Life expectancy has dropped
to 47 years. There are seven countries in the region where more than twenty percent
of the adults are infected with HIV, and a further nine countries where the infection
rates exceed ten percent. Poorer households are especially impacted by HIV/AIDS.
Eastern and Southern Africa is one of the poorest regions in the world, where half of
the 16 countries in the region rank among the lowest on the Human Development
Index. As impoverished families try to cope with the morbidity and mortality
associated with the disease, a significant divestment of assets usually occurs,
threatening the dissolution of the family unit itself. Community safety nets are slowly
breaking down due to the number of households that need assistance in meeting
care, food, cash and labor needs and their inability to repay assistance in kind.
Community members that are left caring for a large number of orphans are poor
themselves, making care for these a children a heavy burden.

HIV/AIDS and food insecurity are intertwined in a vicious cycle. HIV/AIDS

precipitates or exacerbates food insecurity and malnutrition, as sickness and death
cause declines in work, in income, in food availability, and in time available for care
of younger children at a time when more money is required for health care. As food
insecurity worsens, the risk of HIV transmission is likely to increase as households
are forced into riskier livelihood strategies. Malnutrition increases the likelihood of
opportunistic diseases associated with HIV/AIDS and hastens the onset of full-blown
AIDS and ultimately death.

Why HIV/AIDS is different. HIV/AIDS is not just another problem of health and
under-development. It is unique by its nature and effects for the following reasons:

• It kills the most productive – and reproductive – members of society in the 15-49
year age bracket, thus increasing household dependency ratios, reducing
household productivity and caring capacity, and interrupting the transfer of local
knowledge and skills from one generation to the next. The effect on the
household may be permanent. Loss of the productive younger generation can
have severe economic impact/livelihood insecurity issues for the country as a
whole. According to UNAIDS, heavily affected countries could lose more than
20% of GDP by 2020 as a result of the pandemic.

• It is hidden. The private nature and complex cultural attitudes towards sex lead to
silence, denial, stigma, and discrimination at many levels.

• It has a long incubation period between infection and major illness, although the
virus can be transmitted during this time. This, coupled with the fact it is hidden,
significantly increase the chances of HIV transmission. There is no cure, and
drugs to combat AIDS are expensive and difficult to obtain.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

• It has both rural and urban dimensions. For example, many migrant workers who
become infected in cities come back home to their village to die, while the death
of one or more income-earners in rural households often forces survivors to
migrate to seek work in cities.

• It affects both the rich and the poor, though it is the poor who face the most
severe impact. Poverty drives HIV epidemics, while AIDS in turn prolongs and
deepens poverty, making it harder to escape from deprivation.

• It affects both sexes but is not gender-neutral. To the extent that women are
marginalized and powerless, they are more at risk of being exposed to HIV and
less likely to seek health care. Women, especially younger women, are also more
biologically vulnerable than men to being infected in a given sexual encounter.
Moreover, women are often left with few assets following the death of the
husband.

• HIV/AIDS impacts at the individual, society/community and national levels with

serious bearings on the economic, social and other sectors.

• HIV/AIDS has multiple “accelerating” effects on other risk factors (economic,

social, and political).

• Finally, one of the most disturbing aspects of the pandemic is the fact that, as it
intensifies, the local and national capacity to respond is decreasing.
Organizations that are located in areas with high HIV/AIDS prevalence are
characterized by high absenteeism, high turnover, a loss of institutional memory,
and reduced innovation. As individuals in government and non-governmental
organizations continue to die, the capacity gap—between what is needed and
what can be delivered—is becoming an abyss (see Annex III).

Vulnerability in Situations of Chronic Political Instability. Conflict or complex

political emergencies are a pervasive threat to life and livelihood in the Greater Horn
of Africa. In the past two years alone, one major inter-state war has occurred in the
region; civil wars have raged in at least three countries; low-level conflict between
competing groups has affected at least four more; and virtually every country in the
region plays host to refugees from a conflict in another country. Conflict factors thus
explain the rapid increase in refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs). But
conflict also has more broad reaching impacts: it hampers economic growth and
investment; it has led to fragmented national politics and the rise of a set of
economic actions based on plunder rather than production; and it directly destroys
people’s livelihoods, assets and institutions—sometimes deliberately, sometimes as
a by-product. Conflict is often related to food security in that competition for scarce
resources underpins some of the local conflicts—particularly in pastoral areas;
competition for other resources (oil, mineral wealth) underpins larger scale conflict.
In addition, conflicts in the Greater Horn Region have resulted from ethnic and
religious differences, political exclusion, and the phenomenon of “failed states.”

Conflict is one example of a political factor; others include policy factors and
institutional failures. Poor institutional capacity and inappropriate policies, particularly
agricultural and financial policies, were widely blamed for the food shortage crises of

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

the 1980s. Structural adjustment (liberalization) policies, largely aimed at the earlier
deficiencies, were blamed for much of the “new” poverty and food insecurity seen in
the 1990s. Broader institutional and policy failures—up to and including “failed
states” have been implicated in many of the problems outlined above. In addition to
policies that have either undermined development or failed to create conducive
conditions for it, an entire set of institutions and policies were set up—largely in the
wake of the catastrophic famines in the mid-1980s in the Greater Horn of Africa—to
improve preparedness and response capacity for large-scale disasters (related to
both food and diseases). While famine early warning and information systems
generally are now much improved, there remain large-scale gaps in the linkage
between information and the institutional response required to prevent disasters, with
severe malnutrition and excess mortality virtually always preceding major responses
to disasters.

To strengthen a livelihood analysis to take into consideration power relations and

politics, a political economy analysis–looking and who “wins” and who “loses”—
should be incorporated into the design process. This can help to determine who
gains and who loses in a war economy and resulting instability. The analysis would
help specify who is doing what to whom and why (Schafer 2001). A political
economy approach also helps to analyze what patterns of incentives have to change
in order for the group benefiting from and sustaining conflict to be convinced to
accept peaceful alternatives. This will enable a more complete analysis of the
structures of exploitation that deprive others of livelihoods.

Vulnerable Groups in Urban Areas. Currently, over 40 percent of Africa’s poor live
in urban areas. Because people’s livelihoods in urban areas are tied to employment
opportunities generated by the market, they are particularly vulnerable to market
fluctuations. This is especially true for those that are working in the informal sector
(Bonnard 2000). During periods of inflation, upward surges in food prices seriously
compromise household income and food security. In addition, because households
are more economically independent, the risk of shocks and food insecurity are more
unevenly distributed throughout the urban population. This diversity makes targeting
interventions more difficult.

Although mortality rates tend to be lower in urban areas, morbidity tends to be

higher. This is primarily due to the fact that urban slums can have very poor hygienic
conditions that lead to the spread of disease. In addition, HIV/AIDS deaths are more
common in cities, and infection rates tend to be higher. Acting as shock absorbers,
households are taking on a rapidly growing number of orphaned and abandoned
children from extended family members, increasing their vulnerability through time.

In the face of high unemployment and resulting high rates of crime, women are very
vulnerable. Due to these risks, women’s opportunities for group formation, training
and participation in credit and savings associations is seriously curtailed.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Resources

To access documents on the CD, click the text next to the Acrobat Reader
symbol.

Tools

The Political Economy of War: What Relief Agencies Need to Know

Philippe Le Billon, et. al. 2000. Humanitarian Practice Network

CARE Household Livelihood Security Assessments Toolkit

CARE USA. 2002.

Concept Papers

Assessing Urban Food Security: Adjusting the FEWS Rural Vulnerability

Assessment Framework to Urban Environments
Patricia Bonnard. 2000. FEWS-NET and USAID

Effective Food and Nutrition Policy Responses to HIV/AIDS: What We Know and
What We Need to Know
Lawrence Haddad and Stuart Gillespie. 2001. IFPRI

HIV and Conflict: A Double Emergency.

Andrew Lawday. 2002. Save the Children UK.

Can’t Get Ahead for Falling Behind: Development Policy, Poverty and Relief
Traps
Chris Barrett and Michael Carter

“HIV/AIDS and Food Security.” Greater Horn of Africa Food Security Update, April
2001.
FEWSNET and CARE

The Space of Vulnerability. The Causal Structure of Hunger and Famine.

Watts, M., and H. Bohle. 1993. Progress in Human Geography

A Measure of Uncertainty: The Nature of Vulnerability and its Relationship to

Malnutrition
Webb, P. and A. Harinarayan. 1999. Disasters

Case Studies

State of Disaster: Causes, Consequences and Policy Lessons from Malawi

Stephen Devereaux. 2002. ActionAid.

CARE Case Studies in Africa: Sudan (Tambura, Unity State), Southern Somalia,
Northeastern Kenya.

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

CARE’S Experience With Adoption of a Rights-Based Approach: Five Case

Studies
Jude Rand. 2002. CARE USA

Bibliography

Bankoff, G. 2001. Rendering the World Unsafe: ‘Vulnerability’ as Western Discourse.

Disasters Vol. 25 (1)

Bonnard, P. 2000. Assessing Urban Food Security: Adjusting the FEWS Rural
Vulnerability Assessment Framework to Urban Environments. USAID, FEWS
Project/ARD Inc.

Boyce, J. 2000. Let Them Eat Risk? Wealth, Rights and Disaster Vulnerability.
Disasters Vol. 44 (3).

CARE. 2002. Household Livelihood Security Assessments Toolkit. CARE, Atlanta.

Chambers, R. 1989. Vulnerability, Coping and Policy. IDS Bulletin No. 20

Devereaux, S. 2002. State of Disaster: Causes, Consequences and Policy Lessons

from Malawi. ActionAid.

Dilley, M. and T. Boudreau. 2001. Coming to Terms with Vulnerability: A Critique of

the Food Security Definition. Food Policy Vol. 26.

Gerring, J. and Thacker, S. 2001. Infant Mortality in Crossnational Perspective: The

Primacy of Politics. Annual Meeting of the International Studies Association,
Chicago, IL. February 20-4.

Haddad, L. and S. Gillespie. 2001. Effective Food and Nutrition Policy Responses to
HIV/AIDS: What We Know and What We Need to Know. FCND Discussion Paper.
No. 112. IFPRI. Washington, D.C.

Heggenhoughen, K. 1995. The Epidemiology of Functional Apartheid and Human

Rights Abuses. Social Science and Medicine. 40(3):181-4.

Lawday, A. 2002. HIV and Conflict: A Double Emergency. Save the Children UK.

Le Billon, P. et al. 2000. The Political Economy of War: What Relief Agencies Need
to Know. Humanitarian Practice Network. Vol. 33. Overseas Development Institute.
London.

McClean, C. 2001. Community-Based Emergency Preparedness: A Review of

Practice and a Model for Piloting. Livelihood Security Best Practice Papers Series.
CARE East Africa/Middle East Regional Management Unit. Nairobi

Maxwell, D. and Wiebe, K. 1999. “Land Tenure and Food Security: Exploring
Dynamic Linkages.” Development and Change. Vol. 30(4), pp. 825-849.

20
 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Maxwell, S. and T. Frankenberger. 1992. Household Food Security: Concepts,

Indicators, Measurements, A Technical Review. New York and Rome, UNICEF and
IFAD.

Rand, J. 2002. CARE’S Experience With Adoption of a Rights-Based Approach: Five

Case Studies. CARE USA. Atlanta.

Schafer, J. 2001. Supporting Livelihood in Situations of Chronic Political Instability.

Overseas Development Institute. London.

Seeley, J. 2002. Taking Forward the Vulnerability Strand of DFIDB’s Rural Livelihood
Strategy. In Press. Department for International Development. Bangladesh.

Sen, A. 1981. Poverty and Famines: An Essay on Entitlement and Deprivation.

Oxford, Clarendon Press.

Sen, B. nd. Risks, Vulnerability and Poverty in Bangladesh: Issues and Evidence
(Variations on a Theme). Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies. First draft.

Sharp, K. 2001. An Overview of Targeting Approaches for Food-Assisted

Programming. CARE, PHLS Unite. Atlanta.

Smith, L.C. and L. Haddad. 2001. Overcoming Child Malnutrition in Developing

Countries: Past Achievements and Future Choices. Chapter 3 in P. Pinstrup-
Andersen and R. Pandya-Lorch (eds.) The Unfinished Agenda: Perspectives on
Overcoming Hunger, Poverty and Environmental Degradation. IFPRI. Washington,
D.C.

Watts, M., and H. Bohle. 1993. The Space of Vulnerability. The Causal Structure of
Hunger and Famine. Progress in Human Geography Vol. 17 (1).

Webb, P. and A. Harinarayan. 1999. A measure of uncertainty: the

nature of vulnerability and its relationship to malnutrition. Disasters
23(4): 292-305.

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Section 4
Information Requirements and Chronic Vulnerability:
Components of an Information System and Linkages to Programs

Chronic vulnerability is defined in terms of a variety of categories of information and

in turn, programmatic responses are driven by information. But often the kind of
information sought may simply not be available or the available information is poor in
quality, methodologically ad hoc, spotty in coverage, and interpreted out of context
by external analysts. Inadequate information systems therefore constitute a major
constraint to effectively dealing with chronic vulnerability. And insofar as chronic
vulnerability and recurrent shocks are a constraint to sustainable development,
information systems are a constraint to development as well. The catalogue of
complaints against information systems in chronically vulnerable areas is long:
Many approaches and methods exist, with few tools for integrating them; terminology
may be ill-defined and confusing; many of the existing tools and methods are used
ineffectively or inefficiently because they were designed for one particular application
but are used in many others; existing information is difficult to access; and in
general, humanitarian information systems are poorly equipped to analyze political
causes or deal with political constraints to response and very few if any have yet to
take the HIV/AIDS crisis fully into account. Similarly, information systems are often
poorly linked with response planning, making response too late or inappropriate for
serving the most basic of objectives (saving human lives, and protecting livelihoods
and assets).

Part of the problem stems from the lack of an organizing framework for information
systems, and partly from a lack of understanding of the linkages between information
and programs or policies. As a result, information systems that are put in place to
help meet emergency program requirements may be very incomplete, ineffective or
inefficient.

The conventional components of a system are early warning and response

monitoring. The former monitors the processes that might trigger an emergency. The
latter supports the management and delivery of relief supplies. Increasingly,
emphasis on needs assessment means that this component has been slotted into
information systems between early warning and response. To deal with the chronic
vulnerability and recurrent emergencies that characterize the Greater Horn region, a
much broader set of components is needed and a more comprehensive
understanding of their linkages.

Key to an information system that is tracking vulnerability is the requirement for

differentiated and disaggregated data and information—to differentiate different
types or grouping of households (by demographic or livelihood factors) and to
disaggregate groups (such as gender and age) that likely face different risk factors,
but cut across household groupings. A second key point—often over looked in
situations of chronic vulnerability—is participatory information collection and
analysis. For more on this, see Section V).

This Section of the Chronic Vulnerability Guidelines outlines the components needed
for an adequate information system to deal with chronic vulnerability, and the links
between the components. The following section deals with linkages between

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

information and programs. This section is based on a much longer paper (Maxwell
and Watkins, 2002), which is included on the CD-ROM. While the model presented
here is an ideal, the argument is that effective programming in a state of chronic
vulnerability requires all the components or types of information discussed below. If
systems do not provide this kind of information, such information must either be
sought elsewhere, or else simply presumed. There are costs of improving
information systems but the cost of poor or inadequate information is higher.

A. Minimum Components of an Information System

The components of any information system have to be understood logically (what

purpose each is intended to serve) and temporally (how they relate to each other—
and to real events on the ground—over time). Such a system is sketched out here.
For presentation and logical purposes, the components are described as if the
process of information gathering and analysis—and the actions that follow from
analysis—were both sequential and linear. In actual fact, of course, the process is
rarely either. The framework presented here is neither a consensus view of an
information system, nor does it represent an empirical norm. Rather, it specifies a
minimum configuration of the components necessary for kinds of information needed
to responsibly predict, mitigate, respond to and transition from the range of shocks
expected in the Greater Horn of Africa, while maintaining information on long-term
trends and long-term program objectives.

Table 4.1 sketches out the logical components and flow of a Humanitarian
Information System (HIS), the frequency of information collection and analysis
required, and the information each component logically must provide. Table 4.2
describes linkages among the components of the information system. Table 4.3
notes the links between components of the information system and programmatic
response. Briefly, the components of a HIS include:

1. Baseline Vulnerability and Poverty Analysis (BVPA). Baseline analysis is the

process of understanding existing conditions and livelihoods, existing risks, and
capacities for dealing with risk. Although frequently an ignored component of HIS,
BVPA is the fundamental building block of a rational information system. The
conventional purpose of poverty assessment is formulating and targeting poverty
reduction and social safety net programs. Combined with vulnerability analysis,
BVPA provides the basic information against which information generated by the rest
of the system can be judged—the basic indicators for early warning systems, and an
overall understanding of livelihood systems and constraints. Baseline analysis is
expensive and need not be repeated frequently. But it not only informs the rest of
the information system, it also informs long-term development planning, and a broad
range of mitigation and emergency preparedness planning. Generically, Baseline
Vulnerability and Poverty Analysis is very similar to what CARE refers to as a
Household Livelihood Security Assessment, described in the next section—but with
some extra emphasis on identifying specific indicators for tracking the onset and
impact of shocks.

23
Table 4.1 Components of Humanitarian Information System, Frequency of Analysis, and Major Questions Addressed
Logical Frequency of Information Categories/Questions Addressed
Component
Sequence Analysis

1. Baseline Vulnerability Infrequent • What are the basic livelihoods of groups?

and Poverty (Every 5 years, or • What are known or likely hazards: natural, social, economic and political? HIV prevalence?
Assessment when context • What is the likelihood of these occurring, and what indicators would predict?
(BVPA) changes) • Who are the most vulnerable groups?
• What capacities, services and resources (physical, human, social) exist to mitigate vulnerability?
• What are coping and risk minimization strategies?
• What baseline information is available against which to analyze trends?
2. Early Warning Continuous • Indicator trend analysis: is there a problem shaping up?
(EW) • Where and how quickly is it developing?
• What are the geographic dimensions of the problem?
• In what areas should an in-depth assessment be concentrated?
3. Emergency Needs As needed • What are the nature and dimensions of the problem?
Assessment • How long is it going to last?
(ENA) • Who are the most vulnerable groups?
• What and how much is needed; what is the best response?
• To what extent is local coping capacity and provision of services overwhelmed?
• What are major logistical and resource considerations?

<< Programmatic Intervention (based on information generated, but not part of Information System per se) >>
4. Program Monitoring Continuous • Are inputs accounted for (logistical accounting)?
(PM) (While program is • Are outputs achieved (end-use monitoring)?
on-going) • Pipeline analysis: is the pipeline “flow” adequate for meeting upcoming requirements?

5. Impact Evaluation Regular Intervals • Is the intervention achieving the intended result?
(IE) (While program is • What adjustments are necessary (response, quantity, targeting)?
ongoing)

6. Context Monitoring Continuous • What are the possibilities for exit, recovery, or transition for longer-term responses?
(CM) • What are institutional capacities and vulnerabilities?
• What are the risks of transition?
• Does situation require re-assessment?
7. Program Evaluation Periodic • How can overall program (information system, preparedness, response) be improved?
and Lessons Learned • Are humanitarian principles being upheld by programs?
(PE/LL) • What lessons can be learned from experience and mistakes?

24
Table 4.2 Information Linkages Among Components of HIS
Component Forward Linkages (in the logical sequence) Backward Linkages (in the logical sequence)
1. Baseline Vulnerability • Defines critical hazards, and therefore defines contents of EW • Must incorporate previous lessons learned
and Poverty • Provides the information against which EW trends can be analyzed
Assessment • Provides analysis of livelihood systems, strategies and assets for both
contingency planning and development planning

2. Early Warning • Provides the basis for geographic targeting and deployment of NA • Must be linked to baseline information (see Ethiopia case
• May provide direct information to program design and Context study)
Monitoring

[Link] Needs • Information to intervention (program design) and targeting, therefore • Must be informed by good EW, though is often informed
Assessment directly linked to both Program Monitoring and Impact Evaluation. by a variety of other sources of information (see Burundi
• May also provide information that serves as a baseline for Context case study)
Monitoring

<< Programmatic Intervention >>

4. Program Monitoring • Program input and output information is a pre-requisite to evaluating • Must ensure that assessed needs are fulfilled by program
the impact of interventions outputs
• Must cross-check on targeting criteria and efficiency, and
thus feed back into reformulating NA

5. Impact Evaluation • Information about the impact of specific interventions is a critical input • Impact cannot be evaluated in the absence of good
to overall Program Evaluation information about program activities and outputs
• If programs do not achieve the desired impact, the implications of • IE ultimately determines whether assessed needs have
Context Monitoring for transitions are changed been met
• Impact indicators can be systematized to become EW
indicators in the absence of interventions (food security
indicators, for example)

6. Context Monitoring • Informs the possibility of transition, and thus informs the rest of the HIS • Must be predicated on assessment of impact
cycle • Strong backward linkages to EW—much of the same
• Systematic exploration of institutional structures provide context for information requirements
understanding conflict risks • Must inform the requirement for on-going NA

7. Program Evaluation • Reformulation of the Inf ormation System itself • Should examine each of the components of entire system
and Lessons Learned for both accuracy of information and relevance of
information

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Table 4.3 Linkages of HIS Components to Programs and Policy

Component Linkages to Program and Policy

1. Baseline • Long-term development/vulnerability reduction planning

Vulnerability and • Emergency Preparedness planning
Poverty Assessment • Mitigation planning
(BVPA) • Community-based preparedness activities
2. Early Warning • Activates and focuses needs assessment
(EW) • Contingency and scenario planning
• Activates mitigation plans
• Geographic targeting
• Mobilizes community/public awareness
3. Emergency Needs • Detailed emergency response plans and programs
Assessment • Detailed targeting
(ENA) • Mobilizes resources
• Mobilizes public awareness
<< Programmatic Intervention >>
4. Program Monitoring • Adjusts inputs or logistics
(PM) • Adjusts targeting
• Adjusts pipeline

5. Impact Evaluation • Increases or decreases levels of delivery

(IE) • Changes targeting criteria
• Changes activities
6. Context Monitoring • Transition to rehabilitation/development programming
(CM) • Re-assesses situation
• Institutional capacity building
7. Program Evaluation • Improvements to overall system:
and Lessons Learned • Preparedness • Protection
(PE/LL) • Response • Basic Needs and Rights
capacity • Benefits and Harms
• Program

2. Early Warning (EW). Early warning systems provide the information needed to
predict and mitigate the impacts of shocks in order to prevent the shock from
resulting in a humanitarian crisis, or failing that, to enable a rapid response to that
crisis. Early warning is a continuous activity that by definition has to cover all
geographic areas potentially affected by shocks, and to be useful it must be
disseminated and digested in a timely manner. Because coverage has to be broad,
EW has tended to consist of trends analysis in a few specific indicators, in
comparison with baseline information. Traditional indicators include rainfall and
vegetation mapping, crop production estimates, markets, and prices. Over time, EW
has come to include measures of human welfare and livelihood indicators, and more
recently indicators of conflict, political, and macro-economic shocks. EW is directly
linked into activating emergency needs assessment, to targeting, and to activating
contingency plans, set up in response to baseline vulnerability information.

3. Emergency Needs Assessment (ENA). The primary purpose of ENA is to

quantify immediate needs for emergency assistance, so that response programs can

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

be quickly designed. This quantification entails the estimation of beneficiary

numbers, duration of assistance, type of assistance, targeting, and quantities
required. More in-depth approaches consider both an assessment of basic needs
and an analysis of causal factors with a focus on both immediate life-saving
interventions, and interventions that protect livelihoods and assets. Particularly in
the later stages of an emergency, assessments may explore options for post-
disaster recovery, reconstruction, and rehabilitation. Logically, ENA should be
triggered and geographically focused on the basis of early warning information, but
in the absence of EW information, may be based on a host of other criteria. ENA
also logically feeds information into the design of programs and of monitoring and
evaluation systems.

Note: Between Assessment and Program Monitoring there is an assumption that

program activities—described in later chapters—will be designed and implemented.

4. Program Monitoring (PM). Program monitoring is meant to ensure that the

outputs of humanitarian interventions reach the intended target group in quantities
that reflect assessed requirements. The emphasis on commodity tracking is
understandable, as broader issues of cost-efficiency and impact are often seen as
secondary in an emergency situation. The primary issue is whether assistance is
reaching the people it was intended for, and thus the information linkages have been
seen mainly as backward links to ENA. However, while it is unrealistic to expect
program monitoring to achieve any higher objectives than accounting for inputs and
outputs in the early phases of an acute emergency response, this argument does not
hold in the prolonged operations in chronic emergencies in the Greater Horn region.
Programs must also begin to track a broader range of indicators of efficiency,
performance and impact, which is logically the next component of a logical system.

5. Impact Evaluation (IE). Impact evaluation is the measurement of the outcomes

of an intervention in comparison to its objectives. The purpose of good evaluation is
to ensure that programs are managed in such a way as to maximize positive
outcomes. In that sense, evaluation under emergency circumstances is no different
than evaluation under “development” circumstances—only the time frame is shorter.
However, there is often little actual evaluation carried out to measure the impact of
emergency programs (with the exception of monitoring, for example, the status of
individuals in an intensive program such as therapeutic feeding, for example). Some
practitioners argue that the need for impact evaluation is diminished by both the
urgency of response in emergency situations, and the presumption of a
straightforward link between service delivery and impact.

However, the lack of evaluation information—and the critical feedback loop to

program management that this provides—constitutes a significant gap in the
information needed to deliver and manage an effective, rational response to shocks
or emergencies. And as noted above, much of this kind of programming in the
Greater Horn region is actually carried out in the context of response to long-term,
chronic emergencies.

6. Context Monitoring (CM). Context monitoring during an emergency is little

different than early warning prior to the onset of a shock. The main purpose is to
monitor trends in the operating environment, so as to be able to adequately foresee

27
Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

transitions—in this case toward rehabilitation and development. Thus the information
content of CM is similar to EW (which, in any case, does not stop when an
emergency begins), but with one important difference. Emergency operations are
necessary when institutional and organizational structures, whether household,
community, or government, collapse and/or fail to cope with negative external
events, so some monitoring of local institutional capacity is the added component.
There is considerable debate on whether the “relief development continuum” is—or
should be—applicable in the kinds of chronic emergencies that characterize the
Greater Horn region, but there is little question that the capacity of civil society
organizations constitutes a critical resource for both recovering from crises and
overcoming chronic vulnerability. At times in the past, emergency operations have
undermined the development of self-reliant local organizations. Thus, in addition to
monitoring the same trends as EW, CM must take into account the capacity of local
institutions, and causal factors that explain this.

7. Program Evaluation/Lessons Learned (PE/LL). Program evaluation is broader

than impact evaluation in two senses: First it attempts to measure the impacts of a
whole range of interventions, rather than a specific one. Second, there is increasing
emphasis on measuring both the intended (presumably positive) impacts of a
program, as well as the unintended (and often negative) impacts. Traditionally, little
emphasis was put on post-hoc evaluation, particularly of the type that could increase
the effectiveness of future interventions. However, studies of “lessons learned” are
increasingly common in the environment of contemporary emergencies. Taken
broadly, this kind of activity—often undertaken after an emergency program has
wound down, or in some other way outside of the immediate “project cycle”—
constitutes the final component of HIS, and is the critical feedback loop for the whole
programmatic response, including HIS.

B. Information-Program Linkages

Information is not an end in itself—information systems exist to enable good quality

programs that both mitigate or respond to the short-term impact of shocks and
emergencies, and deal with the longer-term underlying causes of these. In fact it is
unrealistic to have cost-effective targeting and an adequate program response
without reliable information. Maintaining a reliable IS will help in reducing the cost of
program response and the timeliness of response, to make better utilization of
scarce resources. The bottom line is that program response must be linked to an
effective IS output in order to have timely and adequately designed interventions that
help addressing chronic vulnerability and pressing livelihood needs. Often however,
responses are not adequate to either alleviate the short-term consequences of
shocks, or deal with the long-term underlying causes—the so-called
“information/response gap.” The remainder of this section discusses this gap, and
suggests means of pro-actively dealing with it.

C. The Information/Response Gap: What is it and why does it happen?

The information/response gap occurs when adequate and timely information is

generated and disseminated to decision makers but very little and/or very late

28
 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

response or actions is taken to address the identified livelihood problems. It

basically means the gap between the identified quantity, quality and timing of
livelihood needs and the actual assistance provided to meet these needs—if any. In
acute emergencies, the gap is between the vulnerable groups and their needs on the
one hand, and the response from both donors and governments. Often the latter is
well below the identified needs and often arrives late, leaving a large portion of the
need unmet. This leads to both short-term human suffering, and increases long-term
vulnerability as affected populations are forced into coping strategies that often
involves the forced sales of assets, increased environmental destruction, and other
unsustainable practices.

The inadequate response happens for several reasons the most important of which
are scarcity of resources, “donor fatigue,” political constraints, inadequate
infrastructure, logistical constraints, unnecessary bureaucratic procedures,
inaccessibility of the affected areas/groups, lack of confidence and/or political will to
respond.

Buchanan-Smith and Davies (1995) analyzed the classic “missing links” between
early warning (which they would define broadly to include both baseline assessment
and assessment) and response. Their analysis includes examining the information
system itself; the institutional context into which the early warning information is fed;
the political actors and political environment; and, logistical constraints. Their
analysis suggests two major questions:

• Can the system respond to genuinely early warning, or does it have to wait until
there is a serious problem before it can mount a serious response?

• What are the relations between international donors and national governments,
and what are the implications of the relationship for EW and emergency
response?

Very often, while logistical and capacity constraints affect delays, the major reasons
for the slow response are primarily to be found in the institutional context and the
political environment.

Implications of the response gap. Several major implications of the response gap
must be highlighted: First, in most cases limited or late responses will have less
impact on saving lives of vulnerable groups and often will not protect their
livelihoods. Therefore, the amount of resources put into HIS and follow-up action
planning are not invested well if the response is far below the expected and the
impact on people livelihoods is very limited if at all. However, there are some other
views which see that the HIS have to be a separate entity with its objective limited to
generating information only but not necessary linked to triggering response.
However, inadequate response, in fact, raises a critical question of spending on HIS
if it does not lead to an adequate and timely response to the identified livelihood
problems.

Second, given that most information is collected from or with vulnerable groups,
raising expectations of a response. Slow responses negatively affect the relationship
and mutual trust between communities and field staff.

29
Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Third, the morale of field staff can be affected as community members start
suspecting and questioning the importance of data collection that result in no action
and bring no benefit to them. Often, field staff may feel embarrassed when they
have to visit frequently communities that have already been identified as chronically
vulnerable, but which have received no assistance.

Lastly, organizations have built credibility with both the government and communities
they are working with through effective IS and program response. As the
organization continues to collect and provide regular information with no or very
limited response, this will further reduce its credibility.

How to address the response gap problem. Some of the important factors that
help in addressing response gap problem are the following:

1. Create trust and confidence between the different partners, especially donors and
governments and establish mechanisms that enable them to interact more often
in terms of ownership of the system, exchange of information and discussion of
response issues. For example, to ensure the ownership of information by all
partners, it is important to involve all partners (including donors and the affected
communities) in the information generation and recommendation processes.

2. Utilize local and national networks to make alliances and to lobby and advocate
to donors and governments on behalf of vulnerable groups. Provide as much
information and awareness as possible to all stakeholders and utilize media to
raise the profile coverage of the vulnerable population as necessary.

3. Promote preparedness and contingency planning, especially in case of response

to disasters, with clear accountability lines. Extensive contingency planning
should include ways and means of how to overcome all the perceived constraints
during the implementation process and how to account for any possible times of
delays due to bureaucracy or logistic constraints.

4. Encourage local communities to take more proactive role with their respective
governments or with donors. This has to be undertaken carefully in such a way
that it will not reflect negatively on the community or agency.

Networking with other agencies. Networking is a mechanism/forum that involves

a number of institutions/entities who may share a common goal and work towards
achieving similar objectives, working in collaboration and sharing information,
learning, experiences, resources, systems/equipment to complement each other and
to achieve target objectives. Networking can go beyond this to making alliances
and/or advocacy on behalf of vulnerable and marginalized groups.

Networking is a crucial element of HIS sustainability. To establish and maintain a

sustainable system that is capable of generating reliable and timely information to
meet adequate response, a functional inter-agency and government networking and
collaboration mechanism will be very helpful. Such a mechanism serves as a
framework for collaboration; a means to exchange of information and experiences,
and to share resources, systems and methodologies. It serves to complement each

30
 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

other’s efforts. This mechanism has been found useful in optimizing the utilization of
resources and promoting trust and cooperation among concerned partners. It is
also found to be helpful and important in stimulating donors and government
counterparts in moving forward in response to identified needs.

Networking can be problematic if the various partners have no common goal and
each tries to divert the network efforts and utilize it for their own benefit. In fact in
such cases, networking mechanisms can be very damaging to partners’ relations
and may result in mistrust and misunderstanding.

A common objective of networking and a joint ownership of its output are the pillars
in the success of any network forum. Collaboration and coordinating activities will
reduce the effort duplication and will result in better resource utilization. Therefore,
networking in the area of IS and response is crucial and could be maintained on the
following basis:

1. An open, sharing approach to working together—networks fail if one party tries to

dominate
2. Identification of objectives, terms of reference, duration and membership of the
network
3. Determination of responsibilities and contribution of each member
4. Development of an agreed upon process and operation systems
5. Establishment of coordination mechanisms internally and externally
6. An agreed upon method for sharing, publication and utilization of outputs
7. An agreed upon system of assessment and evaluation of the network forum

The most challenging issue with networking is sustainability. Often, the networking
forums are established for tactical objectives and are rarely thought of strategically,
so they discontinued as soon as the tactical objectives are achieved. Therefore, it is
important to think carefully about long-term objectives of IS network forums so that
they become sustainable.

Resources

To access documents on the CD, click the text next to the Acrobat Reader
symbol.

Tools

Early Warning Primer: An Overview of Monitoring and Reporting.

Charles Chopak. 2000. FEWS-Net

FEWS Current Vulnerability Assessment Guidance Manual.

FEWS-Net. 1999.

The Food Economy Approach: A Framework for Understanding Rural Livelihoods.

Tanya Boudreau. 1998. Relief and Rehabilitation Network.

31
Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Handbook for Defining and Setting up a Food Security Information and Early
Warning System (FSIEWS).
FAO. 2000.

Household Livelihood Security Assessment Toolkit

CARE USA. 2002

Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance Field Operations Guide

OFDA. 1998.

Concept Papers

Humanitarian Information Systems and Emergencies in the Greater Horn of

Africa: Local Components and Logical Linkages.
Dan Maxwell and Ben Watkins. 2002. CARE International and World Food
Programme.

Food Security Assessments in Emergencies: A Livelihoods Approach.

Helen Young, et al. 2001. Humanitarian Practice Network. ODI.

Conflict Early Warning and Early Response for Sub-Saharan Africa. CERTI Crisis
and Transition Toolkit.
John Davies. 2000. Center for International Development and Conflict
Management.

Real-Time Humanitarian Evaluations: Some Frequently Asked Questions.

Arafat Jamal and Jeff Crisp [Link] Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees Evaluation and Policy Analysis Unit.

Case Studies

Development Planning: Some implications of the food economy baseline findings

in the Limpopo River Basin Complex, Mozambique
FEWS-NET, 2001.

Traditional Early Warning Systems and Coping Strategies for Drought Among
Pastoralist Communities. Northeastern Province, Kenya.
Christopher Pratt, 2002.

The Ethiopian Crisis of 1999-2000: Lessons Learned, Questions Unanswered.

Laura Hammond and Daniel Maxwell. 2002.

Pratt, C. (2002). Feinstein International Famine Center, Tufts University and

Northern Region Development Agency.

Ethiopia Drought Emergency 1999-2000: Lessons Learned, Questions Unanswered.

Hammond, L. 2001. Lessons Learned Study. Disasters, Vol. Vol. 26(3), pp. 262-279

32
 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Bibliography

Anderson, M. 1996. Do No Harm. Local Capacities for Peace. The Collaborative for
Local Development. Cambridge, MA.

Baker, J.L. and M.E. Grosh. 1994. Measuring the Effects of Geographic Targeting on
Poverty Reduction. World Bank Living Standards Measurement Study Working
Paper 99.

Bradbury, M. 1998. Normalizing in Crisis in Africa. Disasters, Vol. 22(4).

Bourdreau, T. 1998. The Food Economy Approach: A Framework for Understanding

Rural Livelihoods. Relief and Rehabilitation Network. ODI. London.

Buchanan-Smith, M. and S. Davies. 1995. Famine Early Warning and Response:

The Missing Link. IT Publications. London.

CARE. 2001. Benefits-Harms Handbook. CARE, Nairobi.

CARE. 2001. An Inventory of Civil Society Resources and Tools. Atlanta.

Chopak, C. 2000. Early Warning Primer: An Overview of Monitoring and Reporting.

FEWS

Cornia, G. and F. Stewart. 1995. Two Errors of Targeting in Public Spending and the
Poor: Theory and Evidence (edited by D. van de Walle and K. Nead), published for
the World Bank by The John Hopkins University Press. Baltimore and London.

Davies, J. 2000. Conflict Early Warning and Early Response for Sub-Saharan Africa.
CERTI Crisis and Transition Toolkit. Center for International Development and
Conflict Management. University of Maryland.

Dilley, M. and T. Boudreau. 2001. Coming to Terms with Vulnerability: A Critique of

the Food Security Definition. Food Policy, Vol. 26 (3).

Famine Early Warning System. 1999. FEWS Current Vulnerability Assessment

Guidance Manual. USAID and FEWS-NET. Washington, D.C.

Famine Early Warning System. 2001. Development Planning: Some implications of

the food economy baseline findings in the Limpopo River Basin Complex,
Mozambique.

Famine Early Warning System. 2000. Framework for Food Crisis Contingency
Planning and Response.

FAO. 2000. Handbook for Defining and Setting up a Food Security Information and
Early Warning System (FSIEWS). Rome.

33
Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Hallam, A. 1997. Cost Effective Analysis: A Useful Tool for the Assessment and
Evaluation of Relief Operations. RRN Network Paper No. 15. Overseas
Development Institute. London.

Hammond, L. and D. Maxwell 2001. Lessons Learned Study: Ethiopia Drought

Emergency 1999-2000: Lessons Learned, Questions Unanswered. Disasters, Vol.
26(3), pp. 262-279.

Jamal, A. and J. Crisp. 2002. Real-Time Humanitarian Evaluations: Some Frequently

Asked Questions. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Evaluation and
Policy Analysis Unit.

Maxwell, D. and B. Watkins. 2002. Humanitarian Information Systems and

Emergencies in the Greater Horn of Africa: Local Components and Logical Linkages.
CARE International and World Food Programme. Nairobi. Disasters, Vol. 27(1), pp.
229-248.

Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance. 1998. Field Operations Guide. OFDA,

Washington D.C.

O’Keefe, P. and J. Kirby. 1997. Relief and Rehabilitation in Complex Emergencies.

Review of African Political Economy. No. 74.

Pratt, C. 2002. Traditional Early Warning Systems and Coping Strategies for Drought
Among Pastoralist Communities. Northeastern Province, Kenya. Feinstein
International Famine Center, Tufts University and Northern Region Development
Agency.

Seaman, J., et al. 2000. The Food Economy Approach. Save the Children. London.

Sharp, K. 2001. An Overview of Targeting Approaches for Food Assisted

Programming. CARE USA. Atlanta.

Sphere Project. 2001. Humanitarian Charter and Minimum Standards in Disaster

Response. Geneva: The Sphere Project.

Young, H., S. Jaspars, R. Brown, J. Frize, H. Khogali. 2001. Food Security

Assessments in Emergencies: A Livelihoods Approach. Humanitarian Practice
Network. Overseas Development Institute. London.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Section 5
Program Strategies: Preparedness

Emergency preparedness entails being in the best possible position to predict and
respond appropriately to any emergency context – a food emergency, a complex
political emergency, an economic shock or a natural disaster. 2 In East Africa, and
other areas characterized by chronic vulnerability, the integration of emergency
preparedness into longer-term development programming can hardly be over-
emphasized.

Despite extensive experience in community-based approaches and emergency

response, these two programming areas are often viewed separately. A
commitment to a rights-based approach (RBA) requires attention to the process of
emergency programming, in addition to the outcome or service delivery side. The
principles of a rights-based approach require addressing the underlying causes of
vulnerability through participatory processes. In effect, the process of empowering
communities to prepare for emergencies is a more holistic programming approach
that integrates development and emergency initiatives within a common livelihoods
framework.

From an operational perspective, a number of linkages are central to this new way of
working in emergency contexts. First, preparedness requires the proactive
integration of emergency and development programming. Second, programmers
should understand and capitalize upon linkages between affected communities and
the various humanitarian actors at the local, national and regional levels.
Additionally, preparedness should be linked to early warning systems (EWS),
integrating information systems at all spatial levels. While humanitarian actors have
invested in building the capacity of agencies to prepare for and cope with
emergencies, it is equally important to build upon and develop the capacities of
communities.

Preparedness involves a number of inter-related activities, including vulnerability and

institutional assessments, the preparation of an emergency plan, and capacity
building. This section of the guidelines provides an overview of key concepts of
community-based preparedness, with particular attention to community-based
preparedness in chronically vulnerable settings.3 References to useful tools and
insights from case studies inform the underlying objective of improving country office
Emergency Preparedness Planning from a disaster management perspective.

2
The distinction between the words disaster and emergency is not clearly defined. Many in the field
use the words interchangeably. Both are defined as an event that overwhelms, at least for a time, the
capacity of the affected community to cope with the consequences of the event.
3
Concepts and methods related to community-based preparedness are drawn principally from a
longer paper included on the CD-ROM, Community-Based Emergency and Preparedness: A Review
of Practice and a Model for Piloting (CARE 2001).

35
Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

A. Preparedness: Concepts and Definitions

Preparedness is a process, not a single

activity. Preparedness requires more than Preparedness
A planning process that links an early
simply identifying the types of disaster
warning system to response(s). It
interventions the country office will involves the development and
implement and drafting an Emergency maintenance of all the systems that
Preparedness Plan document (CARE support the response including
2001). It involves the development and decision making, finance, logistics,
maintenance of all the systems that support transportation, staffing, information
the response including decision making, management and reporting.
finance, logistics, transportation, staffing,
information management and reporting at
many different levels. Many of these systems already exist to support ongoing
development programming, but will require adjustments during times of emergency
response; other systems will need to be created. Additionally, preparedness must
account for various emergency situations, characterized principally by timeframe
(slow vs. sudden onset), and by typology (e.g., natural disaster, political conflict,
economic shock) (see FEWS 2000).

Agencies involved with early warning and preparedness planning may also need to
advocate with agencies (government, donors, NGOs) to ensure that early warning
information is acted upon, and preparedness plans at community, national, and
regional levels are linked. This requires a number of inter-related tasks, outlined in
the first edition of these guidelines:

• Inter-agency coordination (during planning, assessment and response)

• Core-staff training in planning for emergency preparedness, assessment, and
rapid implementation of mitigation plans
• Annual review of preparedness plan
• Identification of local emergency response capacities within communities
• Understanding local coping strategies, and strengthening them where appropriate
• Planning to mitigate the loss of household and community assets in emergencies
• Ensuring project activities contribute to disaster mitigation

Levels of Preparedness: Regional, Country, and Community-Based

Regional level. Regional preparedness planning should examine the regional

context, taking into account the types of risks that populations are exposed to (i.e.
HIV/AIDS, conflict, natural disasters, unstable macro-economic conditions) and
attempt to articulate a coherent regional scenario and caseload. Based on this, the
regional planning exercise should evaluate best practices for regional office support
of country offices – through financial and human resource mobilization, assisting with
administrative needs, and the provision of training and ‘backstopping’. The regional
plan must also correspond with a realistic timeframe, one that accurately reflects the
complexity of the regional context and the potential for sudden change. Participation
of a broad range of humanitarian actors – representatives of country and regional
offices, UN and donor agencies, governments and NGOs – benefits the regional
planning process, rendering a more inclusive plan that facilitates coordinated action
among agencies. Planning at the operational level remains the responsibility of the

36
 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

humanitarian community in the affected country. District and community-level

preparedness feed into regional plans through country-level scenarios.

Country-office level. Comprehensive guidelines for emergency preparedness

already exist for the country-office level (CARE 2001). These guidelines state that
effective country-level planning requires, at minimum:

• an understanding of the disaster threats and impacts in a country;

• a clear definition of response;
• an ability to activate local, regional, and international resources; and
• a willingness to adjust priorities as needed in crisis situations (CARE 2001).

Only rarely do country offices have a full-time position dedicated to emergency

preparedness and response; rather, the responsibilities are often distributed to
existing staff. Even when such a position does exist, the range of input required to
develop the systems and plans is best shared by a group or ‘task force’ (CARE
2001, FEWS 2000). Alternatively, as emergency and development programming
moves towards greater integration, the activities associated with the preparedness
planning process will also become a more integral part of ongoing development
work.

Community level. Community-based preparedness (CBP) is an integral part of

sustainable livelihood development. CBP is a local capacity development and
community empowerment process through which communities are supported to
establish, own and manage an emergency preparedness system. In this way,
communities prepare for and respond to inevitable shocks in chronically vulnerable
situations.

CBP is a mechanism through which

communities respond to emergency Community-based preparedness
situations in a more structured and timely CBP ‘implies that the community, or their
way. More importantly, CBP provides an close representatives, has the major
opportunity for integrative planning of short- stake in generating and implementing
term responses in the context of longer- the preparedness plans, but also that
there are linkages to other actors
term development. This allows shifts of
including government, national/
emphasis in programming and operating international NGOs and donors and
systems rather than complete changes in donors that help to support responses.’
direction that often undermine longer-term
processes (CARE 2001). Figure 5.1 CARE 2001:1
presents a summary framework of CBP.
Table 5.1 provides a model that highlights primary steps, tools, and tasks associated
with community-based preparedness and response.

B. Components of Emergency Preparedness

An emergency preparedness system has six inter-linked components:

1. Early Warning Information Systems
2. Contingency planning: Scenario building and response options
3. Mitigation

37
Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

4. Managing resources: Community-based targeting

5. Implementation capacity and institutional linkages
6. Exit strategies

1. Early Warning Information Systems

Preparedness relies upon information and Early Warning Systems (EWS). The
various systems have different functions and operate at different complementary
levels. Early-warning systems range between initiatives such as FEWS-Net that
collate general information over a large geographic area, the national and district-
level programs such as Drought Preparedness Intervention and Recovery
Programme (DPIRP) of the Government of Kenya, and community-based EWS. In
preparedness planning, the key question is how these systems can be utilized to
provide the most appropriate response at the right time. Section 4 provides a
complete review of Information Systems and Early Warning Systems.

Community-Based EWS. Generally, communities situated in chronically food

insecure areas have developed their own warning systems, based on environmental,
social or market indicators and years of experience in their specific local context
(CARE 2001). However, the frequency and scale of emergencies have intensified.
Similarly, many communities now cope with a host of new hazards such as complex
political and economic emergencies and the HIV/AIDS pandemic. In some cases,
recurring disasters and conflict have undermined community structures and early
warning mechanisms. (Refer to Annex VI for a more detailed description of early
warning systems and preparedness in complex emergencies.)

Key findings on community-based EWS indicate the following:

• Community-based EWS must be articulated such that people outside of the

community will understand the situation and support community requests for
assistance.
• Community EWS must be linked to national/ regional information systems and
attached to a response.
• While Community-Based Preparedness (CBP) does not necessarily depend
upon a local EWS, the community does need to have access to EW information
from some source, in order to activate preparedness plans.
• Community-based early warning is particularly challenging in complex
emergencies due to the sensitive nature of the information; the biases and, in
some cases, involvement of community members; and the unpredictable and
rapid-onset nature of violent conflict and economic crises. However, community
level political economy analysis is imperative for understanding the local context
in conflict settings (see Annex VI).

Livelihood assessments allow better understanding of the level of household

vulnerability; baseline vulnerability assessments enhance understanding of the
nature of risks and emergencies and the capacity of various entities within
communities to cope; early warning information facilitates predictive ability and thus
improves response planning. At the community level, trends analysis, resource
mapping, gender analysis and wealth ranking are valuable tools for emergency
preparedness planning (refer to CARE’s Household Livelihood Security

38
 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Assessments Toolkit, 2002). The design phase of CARE Rwanda’s Community

Contingency Capacity Initiative (2002), for example, takes into account that different
households are affected in different ways during emergencies. Similarly,
incorporating gender analysis into project monitoring and evaluation activities will
ensure that increased responsibilities for community preparedness activities do not
place extra burdens on women. Participatory analyses at the information gathering
stage help to ensure that projects benefit community members without
discrimination.

Together, the various levels and types of information systems inform community and
household livelihood profiles, which in turn feed into preparedness and response
plans. As noted in Section 4, however, information systems that are put in place to
help meet emergency program requirements may be incomplete, ineffective or
inefficient. The challenge for EWS and preparedness plans is to provide the
humanitarian community with accurate predictive information that stimulates a
response that is both appropriate to community needs, capacities and resources,
and attempts to address causal factors of vulnerability (CARE 2001).

2. Contingency Planning: Scenario Building and Response Options

Contingency plans help to synthesize information into a formula for action.

Specifically, contingency planning refers to the identification of scenarios, objectives,
and actions to facilitate the design of interventions in an emergency situation
(UNHCR in CARE 2001). There are a number of useful resources that provide
guidance on contingency planning and assist programmers in thinking through the
inter-related stages and tasks involved in emergency preparation at the regional,
country and community levels.4 Scenario building and the development of a
response portfolio are specific to various levels (e.g., regional, national, local) and
contexts (e.g., rural versus urban).

Regional level. The Regional Contingency Plan for the Great Lakes highlights a
number of issues relevant to regional preparedness planning. The international
community recognizes that the various conflicts in the Great Lakes area have a
regional dimension. No single country exists in isolation, and developments in the
political and humanitarian situation have to be examined in a regional context. The
conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, for example, involves several
external state armies, internal factions and armed non-state forces. In formulating a
regional plan, the humanitarian community in the Great Lakes addressed three
primary constraints to effective emergency preparedness:

• Insufficient funding and resources to meet current and potential contingency

needs. Often, country offices perceive competition between funding allocated for
development versus emergency assistance. Other key funding issues include
limited flexibility in the application of resources, and the inability of donors to
release funds quickly.

4
Detailed steps for developing a conventional contingency plan (e.g., slow onset, natural disaster)
that can be adapted to other emergency contexts are presented in the Framework for Food Crisis
Contingency Planning and Response (FEWS 2000, pp. 5-14) included in the CD-ROM.

39
Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

• Problems of access to humanitarian assistance (security, political and

administrative limitations, lack of adequate infrastructure).
• Lack of coordination among the various humanitarian actors and with local
communities. Coordination is particularly difficult in complex emergencies when
information networks and local community structures may no longer exist or the
context is highly politicized.

Country-office level. New Emergency Preparedness Planning procedures for

Country Offices are currently being developed. Older tools may be found in
Operationalizing Emergency Preparedness and Planning at Country Office Level
(CARE, 2001) that offer guidance on a range of preparedness activities at the
operational and logistic level, such as Disaster Risk/ Threat Analysis Matrix (Tool 2);
External Agency Capacity analysis (Tools 3 and 4); Infrastructure and Logistics
Checklist (Tool 6); and Information Management Matrix (Tool 10). These are the
key steps to follow for contingency planning at the country-level:

Step 1. Identify scenarios. At minimum, ‘best case’ and ‘worst case’ scenarios
should be developed by each disaster type the country office has chosen to
prepare for. It is generally easier to focus on a specific geographic location
rather than the country as a whole.

Step 2. Establish sector objectives. In the early stages of emergency response,

there is little time for careful analysis and interventions tend to address
immediate needs rather than root causes. Therefore, it is important during the
contingency phase to identify objectives that key into underlying causes and are
strategically linked to longer-term programming.

Step 3. Identify possible activities to achieve objectives. At this stage, a list

should be generated of possible activities based on specific conditions of the
emergency, as well as a list of support requirements (e.g., monitoring and
reporting, financial control).

Step 4. Determine necessary staff, equipment and materials. When dealing

with abstract planning (e.g., based on scenarios), it is best to determine logistic
needs in terms of ‘modules of service’, on a population basis for each scenario
(see CARE 2001, Tool 7).

Community level. Community-based planning assists communities in responding

to emergencies and protracted vulnerability in the context of a longer-term
livelihoods framework. The first stage in community contingency planning is
‘scenario building’. The scenarios typically describe a potential crisis, rather than the
underlying causes of vulnerability. Thus, the second stage entails identifying and
addressing root causes.

40
 Figure 5.1 Community-Based Preparedness: Conceptual Framework (CARE 2001)

Community-based analysis
of underlying causes, Community-based
vulnerabilities and existing Assessment
capacity

EWS Community-Based Program Livelihood

Information Preparedness Emergency Work Strategies
Response(s)
Planning Process

Policy
Influencing

Capacity
Analysis,
Skills Audit
and Capacity
Long-term
building Portfolio of Responses Development
Strategies

Long-Term Development
Work Plans

41
 Table 5.1 Community-Based Preparedness and Response Model – Steps, Tasks, and Issues to be Resolved
(Developed by CARE Rwanda)
Phase

Preparedness Response
Steps

Baseline Scenario-Building Early Warning Community Response Partnership for External

Vulnerability and Response and L-T Response
Analysis Planning Programming
Task

Identify hazards, Ask “what might Monitor indicators Mobilize community- Manage externally-based

On-set of shock
risks, and happen if…?” and of hazards; based resources resources
vulnerable groups “what should the implement
response be?” programs
Vulnerability Strategic Community Behavior change Advocacy, partnership
Tools

analysis, planning tools, based monitoring tools (with (institutional mapping)

HLS/RBA PRA tools monitoring and regards to emergency tools)
assessment (social mapping, evaluation tools preparedness)
tools (causal Venn diagram,
analysis, historical
responsibility trends…)
mapping)

42
 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Table 5.2 Scenario building for a drought EWS

Alert Level Description (fictitious example) Actions
Normal Normal rainfall, pasture available, On-going vulnerability
water available, milk yields normal, reduction and livelihood
normal migration patterns, animal development work
condition good and stable, human
welfare good.
Alert One year failed rainfall, pasture Review preparedness plans
scarce around permanent water, with community; conduct
milk yields declining, normal assessment with community
migration patterns, animal condition members; intensify
declining, human welfare declining, monitoring; prepare
but no malnutrition, market prices of proposals for funding; and
EWS livestock declining. link with national level
planning.
Alarm Second season rain failure, pasture Mitigation responses kick in,
scarce and non-existent around such as livestock off-take,
permanent water, water resources market interventions, cash-
under stress; no milk, migration based projects as per the
patterns abnormal, animal preparedness plan.
conditioning worsening, market Continue dialogue with
prices very low for livestock, some community and develop
sign food stress among herders plans for larger level
assistance. Links with
national level important
here.
Emergency Third season rain failure, no pasture, Coping strategies and other
water sources stressed, no milk, assistance not enough
large numbers of animals dying, maintain lives.
market prices collapsed, women and Full scale food relief
children settling around settlements, distribution, especially to
malnutrition and mortality among drop-outs.
young and elderly etc.
CARE 2001: 20

Often, the causes of vulnerability are linked to wider policy issues that need to be
incorporated into an advocacy strategy (see Section 9) and linked to longer-term
development programming. At the third stage, it is possible to elaborate on each
phase of a scenario and describe the existing coping strategies of various
community members, as well as alternative livelihood options. Finally, communities
can develop and prioritize a portfolio of response options (discussed below).
Responses will vary according to community-based criteria, resources and long-term
objectives. Table 5.2 presents a model of the process for a drought EWS.

Community-based plans must reflect the needs, aspirations and capacities of the
community (as the primary stakeholder). Implementation of the community approach
requires that locally-generated plans are linked to the wider development and
humanitarian community; other actors such as the government and support agencies
must be aware of the plans and their respective roles, and committed to support the
community plan. Community planning and capacity building is more difficult in

43
Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

complex emergencies than in natural disaster situations. While the same general
model applies to communities situated in conflict-prone environments, there are
differences in the process and the complexity of responses (see Annex VI for a
detailed description).

Preparedness in Urban Settings. Emergency preparedness in urban areas is

particularly challenging, due to the heterogeneity of urban settings and the high
mobility of urban dwellers. Vulnerable populations in urban areas may be difficult to
identify, as the urban poor are often distributed in pockets throughout urban centers,
and many are homeless that may be overlooked by formal safety net programs.
Certain shocks are more likely to adversely impact urban populations – or more
immediately – than rural communities, such as market fluctuations and economic or
political crises. Scenario building and response portfolios in urban settings must
account for shocks that are specific to urban populations as well as the
heterogeneity of urban areas. (See Annex IV for a summary of targeting issues in
urban areas.)

3. Mitigation

In developing a contingency plan, an agency or community generates a portfolio of

responses, some of which can be implemented as preventive or mitigative response
interventions designed to protect assets and support social safety nets (see Section
6). Households generally seek to protect their livelihoods wherever possible;
therefore, the most appropriate responses to crisis situations will facilitate this
process within a longer-term livelihoods framework. Timing is a crucial consideration
for effective mitigation responses. Four main types of response include the following
(summarized from CARE 2001):

• Market interventions. Aimed at maintaining or restoring purchasing power

with the objective of reducing asset depletion. One example is the
establishment of a grain bank that reduces the price of grain and increases the
capacity of people to access food.

• Cash-based inputs. Involves a ‘cash injection’ into a community that has

access to basic commodities through local markets, such as cash-for-work
schemes. Recent variations involve communities choosing their own projects
and organizing their own labor (see Oxfam-Uganda Mid-term Review 2001,
cited in CARE 2001).

• Resource protection and development. Mitigating the effect of a crisis on

productive assets, or other assets such as housing. One example is flood-
proofing programs in Bangladesh.

• Food-based inputs. Direct food assistance, either as emergency relief or as

monetized development assistance. A review of current practice suggests
that communities seek food assistance after other coping strategies and
response mechanisms give out.

44
 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Preparedness plans should incorporate a range of possible scenarios and mitigation

responses that take into account the array of vulnerabilities present within a region or
community.

4. Managing Resources: Community-Based Targeting

Identifying vulnerable populations is most possible in the case of slow-onset natural

disasters, caused in particular by drought and related factors (FEWS 2000).
Similarly, community-based targeting is more successful in stable political
environments, where the crisis is relatively slow to onset. In community-based
targeting, household or individual beneficiaries are selected by community members
themselves. During this process, it is important to ensure that communities are not
excluding anyone based upon social position (i.e. marginalized households that
community members do not consider to be part of the community).

Participatory tools such as wealth ranking are often used as a basis for targeting
criteria, though the processes vary widely. In the case of a community-based
monitoring system for food security in Ghana, the community targeted different
interventions for different wealth categories, inclusive of all community members
based on difference levels of need (ActionAid in Bawku, Ghana, cited in CARE
2002).

While community-based targeting plays an important role in preparedness planning,

it is notably difficult to achieve whether targeting criteria and selection are
determined by the community or an outside agency. Other targeting mechanisms
include market-based targeting, self-selection, and administrative targeting. [Annex
IV provides an overview of targeting approaches adapted from Sharp (2001) and
CARE (2001).]

5. Implementation Capacity and Institutional Linkages

Supporting communities to implement and manage interventions is a complex and

long-term activity that must begin with the community’s existing capacity. A
participatory analysis of current capacities as they correspond to the various skills
required to plan and manage emergency interventions will highlight strengths and
weaknesses. Community-level training, coupled with regular updates of the
community plan and resource requirements will inform capacity building needs.
Because local stakeholders may become threatened as communities gain a voice,
Advocating with local communities to address this vested interest can help to ensure
that resources are distributed to the intended recipients.

Community capacity is inextricably linked to external institutions and stakeholders,

such as local governments or NGOs. Stakeholder analysis and institutional
assessments are key components of conventional preparedness planning. Adapted
to a community approach, such assessments will allow communities to critically
evaluate the interests and capacities of other humanitarian actors to influence the
livelihood systems of a given community. Experience to date indicates effective CBP
planning is correlated with the long-term and active presence in an area (CARE
2002). There are a number of tools available to facilitate assessments of both

45
Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

community implementation capacity institutional linkages. A primary resource is

CARE’s Household Livelihood Security Assessments Toolkit (2002).

6. Exit Strategies

Preparedness planning must take into account realistic criteria for determining when
it is necessary or appropriate to ‘exit’ a situation or a program intervention. As part
of the planning process, staff and community representatives should establish firm
guidelines, or ‘bottom lines’, on when and how to exit from an emergency response
situation. Exit criteria are also necessary to indicate when to initiate a transition from
emergency programming to rehabilitation and the withdrawal phase of a longer-term
integrated development program. This involves defining the terms under which
programs will operate, and include staff security, humanitarian consent and access,
the ability to program, non-interference and non-harassment (by combatants), and
protection of assets. In CBP, there should be clear and mutually agreed upon
expectations as to the level of external assistance and criteria for withdrawal. Each
response option written into a contingency plan should include an exit strategy.

Resources

To access documents on the CD, click the text next to the Acrobat Reader
symbol.

Tools

Contingency Planning Guidelines: A Practical Guide for Field Staff

UNHCR-Division of Operations Support (1996).

Framework for Food Crisis Contingency Planning and Response.

FEWS. 2000.

Household Livelihood Security Assessments Toolkit

CARE USA. 2002.
Operationalizing Emergency Preparedness and Planning at Country Office Level
CARE Emergency Group. 2001. CARE USA.

Guidelines for Country Office Disaster Planning

CARE USA. 1997. Emergency Group.

The Community Planning Website: [Link]

Concept Papers

Community-Based Emergency Preparedness: A Review of Practice and a Model

for Piloting.
CARE. 2001. CARE East Africa / Middle East Regional Management Unit.

46
 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

An Overview of Targeting Approaches for Food-Assisted Programming

Sharp, K. 2001. CARE USA, PHLS Unit.

NGO Initiatives in Risk Reduction: Disaster Mitigation and Preparedness.

Chapters: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 References
British Red Cross and DFID. 2001.

CARE Rwanda SCORE-AIDS Concept

CARE Rwanda

Case Studies

USAID/Ethiopia Contingency Plan for 2003 Drought Emergency

Laura Hammond, 2002

CARE Rwanda Community Contingency Capacity Initiative (Community-based

Emergency Preparedness)
CARE Rwanda

CCC-Rwanda Evaluation. August 2002.

CARE Rwanda

Regional Contingency Plan for the Great Lakes Region

Proceeding from NGO/UN Agency Workshop in Nairobi. 2001.

Bibliography

British Red Cross and Department for International Development. 2001. NGO
Initiatives in Risk Reduction: Disaster Mitigation and Preparedness.

CARE Ethiopia. 2002. REVIVE DAP Proposal: Reducing Village Vulnerability in

Ethiopia. 4 March 2002.

CARE USA. 1997. Guidelines for Country Office Disaster Planning. Emergency
Group.

CARE USA. 2001. Operationalizing Emergency Preparedness and Planning at

Country Office Level. CARE Emergency Group, September 2001.

CARE. 2002. Household Livelihood Security Assessments: A Toolkit for

Practitioners. In Press. CARE PHLS Unit. Atlanta

FEWS. 2000. Framework for Food Crisis Contingency Planning and Response.
Washington, D.C.

FEWS. 2001. Food Aid Targeting, Preparedness, & Response Planning:

Implications of food economy baseline findings in the Limpopo River Basin Complex.
USAID.

47
Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Hammond, L. 2001. When donors plan for contingencies: an opportunity for early
response to emerging crises. In Humanitarian Exchange (3/2001) 42-44.

CARE, C. 2001. Community-Based Emergency Preparedness: A Review of

Practice and a Model for Piloting. In Livelihood Security Best Practice Papers
Series, No. 3, February 2001. CARE East Africa / Middle East Regional
Management Unit.

Mitchell, J. 1994. Discussion Paper on Emergency Preparedness and Response.

ActionAid Emergency Unit. Cited in CARE 2001, p. 1.

Regional Contingency Plan for the Great Lakes Region. Nairobi, 7-8 June 2001.

Sharp, K. 2001. An Overview of Targeting Approaches for Food-Assisted

Programming. CARE USA, PHLS Unit.

United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.1996. Contingency Planning

Guidelines: A Practical Guide for Field Staff. Division of Operations Support.

United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction. Nd. Mobilizing Local
Communities in Reducing Disasters: The Emergence of Community Based
Approaches to Disaster Management.

48
 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Section 6
Program Strategies: Social Protection and
Approaches to Mitigating Shocks

The Risk Management Framework for chronically vulnerable populations (Figure 1.4)
situates mitigation after emergency response and in parallel with rehabilitation.
Social protection encompasses those activities that address (1) the causes of
vulnerability through mitigation by protecting household assets and (2) the effects of
shocks through the strengthening and supporting of formal and informal safety nets.
This section discusses the short and medium term programmatic approaches to
dealing with vulnerability by addressing both the causes (mitigation) and effects
(safety nets) of shocks.

This chapter recommends that interventions designed to mitigate shocks by

addressing the causes of vulnerability should protect assets and should emphasize
livelihood diversification. In addition, formal and informal safety nets should be
strengthened and supported, because they offer essential kinds of insurance to
buffer households against shocks. Social safety nets include short-term response
mechanisms designed to deal with quick-onset shock-related events, and long-term
responses that address crisis events with an ongoing dedication of resources for
extended periods of time.

A. Social Protection

“Social Protection refers to the public actions taken in response to levels of

vulnerability, risk and deprivation which are deemed socially unacceptable within a
given polity or society” (Conway et al., 2000). Social protection can also be viewed
as “a collection of measures to improve or protect human capital, ranging from labor
market interventions, publicly mandated unemployment or old-age insurance to
targeted income support. Social Protection interventions assist individuals,
households, and communities to better manage the income risks that leave people
vulnerable” (World Bank, 2002). The primary goal of social protection is to assist
poor individuals, households, and communities to reduce their vulnerability by
managing risks better.

Social protection is designed to proactively help the poor invest in higher return
livelihood activities that make them less vulnerable to risk. This approach allows
people to move out of poverty while still providing support for those in most severe
need (World Bank, 2002). This framework is particularly useful when addressing
asset protection at the household and community levels. The objectives of social
protection are to:

• reduce the vulnerability of low-income households with regard to basic

consumption and services;
• allow households to shift income efficiently over the life-cycle, thus financing
consumption when needed; and

49
Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

• enhance equity particularly with regard to exposure to, and the effects of adverse
shocks.

B. Programming Considerations in Social Protection

Incorporating a Broader Definition of Household Vulnerability. Approaches to

programming need to respond to a wider array of shocks than what has traditionally
been done. Programs need to broaden their awareness of how shocks
fundamentally impact the social, political, and economic aspects of the household
that lead to increased vulnerability. The kinds of crises that have become especially
relevant include economic and political instability, ethnic and religious conflict, and
HIV/AIDS. AIDS is a particularly complex shock, because its effects can be observed
in health, nutrition, and livelihood both immediately and in the long term. Cross-
border and urban migration deserve increased attention in situations where
populations are being displaced. Urban population growth and the contribution of the
rural exodus demand increased attention to the needs of the urban poor and the
socioeconomic variations of this category in terms of livelihood systems and
responses to crises. A broader definition of vulnerability also calls for the
incorporation of a rights-based approach to targeting populations and defining the
importance of mitigation as a human rights issue.

Duration of Shock Events. Besides the type of shock event, programming needs
to account for that fact that some shocks are quick-onset while others take place
over the long-term. It is critical that programs make important distinctions between
immediate disasters, seasonal shocks, and longer-term trends. Shocks can be
recurrent, such as recurring droughts or annual short-falls in food stocks of poor
households prior to harvests. Others are singular events, such as old age and death.
The more severe, prolonged, or repeated the shocks are and the fewer the assets
owned by the household, the less the household can protect its consumption level or
avoid divesting itself of its assets to counter the drop in its income. The severity and
duration of AIDS is another reason why it has become such a serious obstacle to
household livelihood security (World Bank, 2001b).

For instance, policies and programs that prove effective in dealing with the effects of
quick onset hurricanes or floods may not be adequately designed to address the
labor surpluses and food shortages associated with seasonal variations or political
instability. Similarly, family nutrition programs and micro credit associations must be
responsive to longer-term needs and account for the activities of their borrowers by
evaluating environmental and economic sustainability.

Cyclical and Deteriorating Economic Effects of Shock. Programming needs to

recognize that for chronically vulnerable populations, shock events tend to be
cyclical and have a deteriorating effect on household livelihood security over the long
term. The debilitating effects of shocks and the recurrence of shock events lead to
the loss of productive assets over time. This inevitably makes the households
increasingly vulnerable to the effects of future shock events. Households or
communities threatened with repeated shocks face greater risks of destitution,
because they have less time and fewer resources that enable them to recover from
shocks.

50
 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Programs need to act quickly to prevent the initial loss of assets in a timely and
equitable manner. The best approach is to provide resources that can buffer a
household’s productive asset base so that it can continue to meet its basic needs in
a sustainable manner. The goal of these asset protecting efforts is to address the
causes of shocks by increasing the preparedness and resiliency of households. The
social protection framework discussed below is especially equipped to address the
issue of divestment.

Social Variations in Vulnerability and Resilience to Shock. Programs should

take into account the significant variations among households and communities
regarding their relative degrees of social, economic and political vulnerability.
Assessing vulnerability needs to examine the relationship between specific shocks
and the kinds of factors that generate vulnerabilities among households. For
example, minimizing vulnerabilities against AIDS should account for the variations in
socioeconomic status and exposure to risk. The shock of AIDS may have a greater
effect on women whose husbands die of AIDS, because their economic entitlements
are at risk. These women may loose their resource base to their in-laws, because of
patriarchal inheritance rights. The vulnerability to economic destitution can leave
many women widowed by AIDS without a means of pursuing their livelihood.
Programs need to make a concerted effort to address the needs of marginalized
populations through processes of empowering and capacity building. Given the large
numbers of poor and the scarcity of public resources, policymakers and development
institutions need to target the most severe risks faced by vulnerable populations. If
interventions efforts are not appropriately targeted to specifically incorporate
marginalized populations, the level of poverty and destitution is likely to increase
(World Bank 2001).

Political Empowerment and a Rights-Based Agenda. A third aspect of

vulnerability that programs should account for is political, encompassing
empowerment issues, and usually involves promoting a rights-based agenda. Based
on work in Burundi with integrating rights into a household livelihood security
assessment, Rand (2002) suggests that programs seeking to reduce vulnerability
need to investigate the reasons why certain households are in a chronic state of
poverty. Getting participants to talk freely about political disempowerment and social
oppression as causes of poverty can be difficult. Programs seeking to reduce
vulnerability should account for the effects of political disempowerment that often
become manifest through human rights abuses and bad governance. The assets
preserved through mitigation activities need to be protected from capture by elites or
other social groups by attending to the political vulnerabilities of the poor.

Minimizing Harm and Protecting Sustainability. Since the health of the natural
resource base is essential to most rural livelihoods, interventions should strike a
balance between fulfilling the immediate needs of at-risk populations and ensuring
the environmental quality necessary to reduce vulnerability, and enable recovery in
times of post-disaster stress (WFP 1998). Environmentally unsound practices built
into short-term responses can have long-term negative impacts especially when
these responses involve the utilization of natural resources. Programming responses
should be thought out in advance to adequately consider these impacts so that the
work during the rehabilitation phase to rebuild the natural resource base can be

51
Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

reduced (CARE 1998). Interventions directed toward specific sectors can easily
exacerbate a pending crisis in other sectors. For instance, distributions of food aid or
subsidized food may improve the immediate nutritional security of individuals,
however, in the long-term it can have a detrimental effect on the agricultural sector.

C. Mitigating the Causes of Vulnerability: Protecting Household Assets

Ideally, mitigation should help people affected by shock to protect their productive
assets in the short and medium-term while promoting measures to ensure continued
security in the likelihood of a future crisis. While the long-term objective is to diversify
both assets and income, the emphasis of immediate measures is on preventing or
minimizing the divestments of productive assets (WFP 2000; OFDA 1998).

The poor typically depend on a range of existing strategies to manage risk.

Households try to anticipate the occurrence of different types of shocks and engage
in mitigating behaviors in which they forego some income in exchange for an
insurance payout for a shock that occurs in the future. These mitigation strategies
are all an attempt to sustain consumption levels in the face of a sudden income
shock or persistent poverty.

Certain mitigation responses designed to improve household resources so that they

may better be able to respond to future shocks may have unforeseen consequences
that can lead to increased vulnerability. Labor migration is a common strategy
employed by households coping with shock. However, the risk of contracting HIV
may be greater for migrating individuals and this risk is subsequently passed to
individuals who comprise the sexual network of the returning migrant. Women are
the ultimate victims of this risky coping strategy, because they are vulnerable to
contracting the disease.

Populations in disaster-prone areas are less capable of recuperating from recurrent

shocks. For agro-pastoral households, a typical response to famine, drought, or
HIV/AIDS may be to sell off livestock, land, or other productive assets. In the face of
repeated shocks, these households face a difficult choice between short-term
survival needs and long-term livelihood protection. Therefore, it is important,
particularly for the rural poor, to develop mechanisms that encourage increased
investment in durable assets as well as in human and social capital necessary to
secure diverse, non-agricultural income strategies.

Protecting critical productive household assets is an important way in which

programs can help mitigate shocks. Interventions should focus on diversification of
both assets and livelihood options while paying close attention to inherent rights and
responsibilities of at-risk populations. Reducing the causes of vulnerability to shock
entails the construction and maintenance of structures to protect productive assets,
limit the accumulation of debt, as well as measures that strengthen existing informal
mitigation strategies (World Food Program, 2000):

• Flood control, small dams, dikes, irrigation systems;

• Measures to combat deforestation, soil depletion, desertification;

52
 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

• Establishment of grain banks managed by local communities to reduce storage

need and assist needy households during crop shortfalls;
• Accumulation of small livestock (proven particularly effective in protecting female-
headed households); and
• Education of community leaders, officials and vulnerable populations concerning
precautionary measures to reduce vulnerability.

D. Addressing the Effects of Shocks: Safety Nets

Formal and informal safety nets are important mechanisms for reducing the effects
of shocks on the household by utilizing outside resources to buffer the negative
outcome of crisis situations. It is important for social protection programs to
recognize early on that programs should seek to strengthen linkages between
informal and formal safety nets, drawing on the knowledge that both are critical to
protecting vulnerable populations throughout the region. In particular, strategies
should support safety net measures that respond to shocks by allowing households
to maintain their productive assets. It is critically important to (1) identify safety nets
that ‘do no harm’ to the future of household livelihood security, and (2) strengthen
and support those safety net structures.

To ensure that interventions are appropriate to highly variable local contexts,

programs should focus first on strengthening household and community coping
strategies rather than supplanting them with externally derived initiatives that are not
based on local needs, capacities and resources. It is important to understand the
coping mechanisms of people who have lived in disaster-prone areas and to support
those mechanisms that have a positive impact and to reduce reliance on strategies
that have a negative long-term impact on livelihood security and the environment
(WFP 2000).

However, there is a growing concern in that informal household and community

short-term safety-nets tend to sacrifice long-term sustainability in favor of immediate
security. For example, households may cope with quick-onset risks through short-
term safety net measures such as removing children from school or selling off
livestock, both of which have the unintended long-term consequence of leading
households into a ‘poverty trap’. Additionally, recurring shock events and the high
demand for assistance created by multiple households or entire communities
commonly cause informal short-term safety net strategies to become strained to the
point of collapse. For instance, communities with high a prevalence of HIV/AIDS will
experience a burdening of informal safety nets. The demands of care, both time and
economic expense, which are widespread in the community will quickly consume the
resources available through informal safety nets. As these safety nets begin to
shrink, vulnerability among infected households will increase and inevitably crisis will
set in.

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Formal safety net measures commonly Advantages of Public or Formal

used to mitigate risks usually fall into either Safety Nets
employment programs or cash/food
transfers. Most often, these measures are • State/public programs are more
targeted at the ‘ultra-poor’ as a temporary effective than both self-insurance
cushion in the aftermath of severe shock. and informal insurance in dealing
An example may be a public works program with concurrent shock in that they
that sets the wage rate for created jobs can spread risks throughout wider
below the market rate, thereby discouraging constituencies.
the non-poor from applying. A distinct • Social protection programs can
provide the marginal security
advantage of a poverty alleviation program necessary for poor households to
associated with infrastructure development make long-term investments in
would be that emergency assistance could productive assets and human
be provided without creating a dependency, capital.
a problem encountered by many social • Through proper targeting, social
protection measures. safety nets can take a rights-based
approach that provides for
Formal safety net programs are subject to marginalized populations
both technical and political constraints. (HIV/AIDS afflicted, women,
There are important challenges in designing landless, unemployed) that are
programs that utilize administrative, often excluded by informal
community and self-targeting mechanisms networks.
efficiently and effectively. Safety nets will
Disadvantages
only succeed if the government is
committed to assisting the poorest groups • Public and/or private risk
and engaging in debates necessary to build management measures (insurance
political support for focusing assistance on programs) run the risk of
vulnerable groups rather than on the non- undercutting or displacing self-
poor or political allies (World Bank 2001a). insurance and informal insurance
structures.
• Inappropriate targeting of social
The provision and support of safety nets safety nets may actually leave
presents numerous opportunities to further some vulnerable households in
define development initiatives built on worse situations than they were
respect for the rights of marginalized previous to the intervention.
individuals and communities. For instance, • Public resource allocation
necessarily involves competing
formal (government promoted) safety nets
demands from different sectors of
often reflect the norms of gender, class and society. Inappropriate or misguided
ethnic privilege. In so doing, they are social protection measures can
frequently influenced by factors that exclude contribute to political instability and
many of those most in need of public allow for government corruption.
assistance (women, orphans, HIV/AIDS • States often cannot afford to
afflicted). Informal safety nets, based on finance formal systems, or justify
traditional associations or reciprocal the lack of systems on the basis of
exchange networks, can guarantee resource constraints.
preparedness at the community level and
are critical to protecting vulnerable families.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

E. Exit Strategies and the Transition to Rehabilitation

Transition and exit strategies are important to map out from the beginning. Transition
strategies should include partnerships with local organizations and be prepared to
make internal changes in terms of personnel, objectives and capacities. The
rebuilding of trust and civil society may be the first major step toward transitioning
into rehabilitation.

Well-defined exit strategies provide programs with an approach to making the

transition from safety-net to more long-term programming interventions. Exit
strategies need to be implemented after a crisis has subsided and households begin
to resume thinking about the future.

Exit strategies are also important to consider to prevent long-term dependency on

short-term relief responses. If a situation begins to deteriorate beyond the point of
relief intervention, exit strategies with a ‘bottom-line’ on when and how to withdraw
are essential to ensuring the protection of personnel and assets.

Resources

To access documents on the CD, click the text next to the Acrobat Reader
symbol.

Tools

Guidelines for WFP Assistance to Disaster Mitigation

World Food Programme. 2000.

Mitigation Practitioner’s Handbook.

USAID. 1998. Office of US Foreign Disaster Assistance. Prevention,
Mitigation, Preparedness, Planning Division.

Crisis and Transition Toolkit. Strategic Framework for Crisis Prevention, Mitigation
and Transition: Linking Relief to Development in Africa
USAID. 2000.

Concept Papers

Social Protection Concepts and Approaches: Implications for Policy and Practice
in International Development
Andy Norton, et al. 2001. ODI

Social Protection for the Poor: Lessons from Recent International Experience.
Stephen Devereux. 2002. IDS.

Dynamic Risk Management and the Poor: Developing a Social Protection

Strategy for Africa
World Bank. 2001

55
Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

World Development Report 2000/2001: Chapter 8: Helping Poor People Manage

Risk.
World Bank. 2000.

Time for Change: Prevention and Preparedness- Mitigating the Effects of Natural
Disasters.
World Food Programme. 1998.

Case Studies

Livestock and Livelihoods in Emergencies: Lessons Learnt from The 1999-2001

Emergency Response in the Pastoral Sector in Kenya
Yacob Aklilu and Mike Wekesa. 2001.

Safety Nets and Opportunity Ladders: Addressing Vulnerability and Enhancing

Productivity in South Asia.
Nalia Kabeer. 2002. ODI

Central America Mitigation Initiative (CAMI) Pilot

Bibliography

Aklilu, Yacob and Wekesa, Mike. 2001. Livestock and Livelihoods in Emergencies:
Lessons Learnt from The 1999-2001 Emergency Response in the Pastoral Sector in
Kenya. June.

Conway, T.; de Haan, A.; and Norton, A. 2000. Social Protection: New Directions of
Donor Agencies. London: DFID.

Devereux, Stephen. 2002. Social Protection for the Poor: Lessons from Recent
International Experience. IDS: Sussex, UK. IDS Working Paper No. 142

Hannan, Carolyn. 2002. Mainstreaming gender perspectives in environmental

management and mitigation of natural disasters. Roundtable Panel and Discussion
organized by The United Nations Division for the Advancement of Women and the
NGO Committee on the Status of Women in preparation for the 46th Session of the
Commission on the Status of Women on the disproportionate impact of natural
disasters on women. 17 January 2002. United Nations Conference Room 5.

Norton, Andy; Conway, Tim and Foster, Mick. 2001. Social Protection Concepts and
Approaches: Implications for Policy and Practice in International Development. ODI:
London. Working Paper No. 143.

Rand, June. 2002. CARE’s Experience with Adoption of a Rights-Based Approach:

Five Case Studies. June 21. CARE: Atlanta.

USAID. 1998. Mitigation Practitioner’s Handbook.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Office of US Foreign Disaster Assistance. Prevention, Mitigation, Preparedness,

Planning Division.

USAID. 2000. Crisis and Transition Toolkit. Strategic Framework for Crisis
Prevention, Mitigation and Transition: Linking Relief to Development in Africa.
Washington, D.C.

World Bank. 2002. Social Protection Sector Strategy: From Safety Net to
Springboard. Washington, D.C.

World Bank. 2001a. World Development Report 2000/2001. Washington, D.C.

World Bank. 2001b. Dynamic Risk Management and the Poor: Developing a Social
Protection Strategy for Africa. Washington, D.C: World Bank, Africa Region Human
Development Series.

World Bank. 2000. World Development Report 2000/2001. Chapter 8: Helping Poor
People Manage Risk. Washington D.C.

World Food Programme. 1998. Time for Change: Prevention and Preparedness-
Mitigating the Effects of Natural Disasters. Rome.

World Food Programme. 2000. Disaster Mitigation: A Strategic Approach. Rome

World Food Programme. 2000. Guidelines for WFP Assistance to Disaster Mitigation
Rome.

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Section 7
Program Strategies: Transition and Rehabilitation

Rehabilitation programming is about rebuilding and reinforcing people’s capacity to

resume pursuing their livelihood activities. This phase of intervention commonly
overlaps with mitigation and long-term development. In chronically vulnerable
situations, it is typical that a recurring crisis could move an intervention from the
rehabilitation stage back to emergency response or mitigation. Rehabilitation is part
of a process of protecting and promoting the livelihoods of people enduring or
recovering from crises. Where complex emergencies and/or natural disasters are
recurrent, households are perpetually vulnerable to periodic shocks and the
boundary between relief and development is blurred. The best-designed
rehabilitation programs are those which combine emergency relief responses,
intended to rebuild lost or damaged natural and social assets, with an approach that
addresses the fundamental social, economic and political causes of vulnerability.
Therefore, rehabilitation should be a strategic or proactive process whose success is
measured by its ability to protect household livelihoods by lessening vulnerability
roughly in the period after relief has been delivered and before the process of
development has begun.

The framework outlined above differs from the model of rehabilitation traditionally
employed before the 1990s when rehabilitation was viewed as a quick and short-
term transitional step from natural disaster relief to development. Rehabilitation was
typically limited in its scope to infrastructure repairs and the typical timeframe did not
exceed one or two years. The objective was to bring about short-term stability,
however, its limited perspective often led to changes of the physical landscape
without creating positive fundamental social or economic changes in the ability of
households to protect their livelihoods from future crises.

The purpose of current rehabilitation programming should be to promote vulnerability

reduction within a two to three year timeframe. Rehabilitation “provides short-term
income transfers, rebuilds household and community assets, and rebuilds
institutions” (CARE 2000:1). Basically, rehabilitation programming serves to
strengthen the recovery potential of an affected population by empowering
households with the means to stabilize their livelihood systems. Rehabilitation lays
the foundations for future development initiatives, notably those involving the
improvement of household livelihood security. The vision of rehabilitation
programmers should recognize the value of a diverse range of activities and
operating principles in their programming to include conflict resolution, human rights
and gender equality among others.

A. Post Conflict Situations and Transitional Programming Strategies

Post-conflict situations require a unique transitional programming approach that

recognizes the importance of political empowerment in reducing household
vulnerability through initiatives that address human rights and governance. There are
several critical aspects of working in post-conflict situations. First, conditions
following a war do not usually accommodate much deliberation, as the pressures to

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

address humanitarian issues and establish Rebuilding Livelihood Security through

a context in which peace can prevail are Economic Entitlements in Tambura,
intense. The media, funding parameters, South Sudan
the extensive needs of the population,
An ongoing civil war between the
donors, constituents, and organizational government of Sudan and the Sudanese
protocols all demand that programs respond People’s Liberation Army creates a
quickly and demonstrate a positive effect. situation of chronic violence, displacement
Thus, the fast-paced, emergency and livelihood disruption amid an
environment necessarily limits the time and atmosphere of human rights violations and
widespread insecurity. CARE’s work in
details that might otherwise be incorporated Southern Sudan demonstrates the
into conducting an initial appraisal of transition from relief to rehabilitation, and is
community needs. Also, areas recovering an example of how these activates are
from extreme violence are politically and structured within chronically vulnerable
socially unstable, and tend to experience situations.
continued retributions from the conflict and In 1993, CARE opened an emergency
a rising crime rate. Working under mitigation program to care for civil war
conditions of instability can constrain a refugees and to deliver relief packages that
program's geographic access, reduce the included food and household kits. The aim
amount of time available for working in was to act quickly to save lives and prevent
further humanitarian abuses.
communities due to imposed curfews, and
limit access to certain individuals. By 1994, the emergency situation eased
Communities recovering from violent and the refugees resettled to rebuild their
conflict also suffer from serious agricultural livelihoods. CARE redirected its
infrastructure damage, psychological mitigation work to begin a rehabilitation
program. A CARE ‘barter shop’ was
trauma, severe mistrust, and social established where agricultural produce
divisions within the community. Added to could be exchanged for essential goods
this context may be the burden of large procured with relief money. The purpose
numbers of internally displaced families, a was to develop local capacities and restore
condition that may continue for an extended household livelihood security. Despite
chronic war conditions, the goals of the
period of time. Working in post-conflict CARE program include:
settings, programs face the difficult task of
attempting to gather this troubled, • Enhancing household livelihood security
dispersed, and disunited membership into a of the population, both directly and
viable decision making body. Additionally, indirectly at the community level, by
rebuilding economic entitlements through
attempts to build local capacity to make access to food and essential resources.
decisions and advocate for community • Encouraging the overall resiliency of
needs can be threatening to authorities and project participants against stresses
the elite still responding to a conflict caused by personal and economic
situation (USAID 2000). insecurity and adverse political, social
and environmental conditions.
• Strengthening the community network by
USAID has made transitional programming encouraging community involvement in
a critical focus of their rehabilitation all programs.
programming in chronically vulnerable • Supporting the community to produce a
situations and have developed a set of constant and reliable source of food
useful recommendations: beyond domestic consumption, so that a
marketable surplus can be traded
thereby providing the economic means to
• Allow for flexibility within community- obtain resources beyond the farm level.
based programs.
• Define the objectives of community
engagement, whether reconciliation and

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

political empowerment, or community engagement and project development.

• Plan for longer-term engagement with communities.
• Plan for consistent funding and program approaches to post-conflict community
programming - a more coherent and continuous commitment to using local
structures, supporting local capacities, and building on them through advocacy
development, training, and capacity building.
• Recognize the influence of international organizations on the community.
• Understand local cultures - conduct a conflict analysis to include an examination
of specific, local issues and relationships prior to, or at the early stage of project
design. Work towards a greater understanding of regional politics and influences,
as well as a deeper recognition of the root causes of the conflict.
• Promote better donor coordination - create a common, country- or region-wide
vision that can help to direct resources, diminish the funding and programmatic
gaps, and influence the central/local government (USAID 2000).

B. Social and Political Challenges for Rehabilitation Programming

One of the greatest challenges of rehabilitation programming in chronically

vulnerable situations is the imminent threat of future complex emergencies. The
potential for resumed crisis raises the question about the long-term durability of
assets, infrastructures, and institutions that are being rebuilt and transformed during
rehabilitation projects. Frequent periods of instability plague rehabilitation projects
and threaten the ability of these operations to function. It is difficult for agencies to
accept that fact that their efforts could be destroyed and continue to make
substantial commitments of time and resources.

The conditions of unrest, recurring crisis and general lack of security present
rehabilitation programming with additional obstacles not normally encountered in the
course of livelihood rebuilding. “Humanitarian access has been hampered by general
insecurity arising from the conflict, an inability or unwillingness on the part of the
State or non-State actors to allow such access and in some cases by deliberate
attempts to obstruct humanitarian assistance. Frequent interruptions of assistance to
victims in Sudan and Afghanistan reflect the difficulties of maintaining humanitarian
access even where the parties have agreed on the need for humanitarian
assistance” (WFP 1999:5). In countries where conflict makes humanitarian
assistance difficult, successful rehabilitation programming may be possible in
pockets of relative peace (i.e., northern Burundi).

When established government structures and service delivery programs designed to

respond to public needs become incapacitated during times of crisis, “international
organizations or ad hoc bodies representing the international community have to
take responsibility for many policy-making and coordination as well as operational
aspects which, in a ‘normal’ emergency, would be the responsibility of the
government” (WFP 1999:6). In areas of armed conflict, the status of humanitarian
groups has not always been respected and has resulted in the targeting of
development workers for acts of violence.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Assessment and monitoring during conditions

of constant social upheaval and population Reducing Economic Vulnerability in
disruption create difficulties in collecting data Northeastern Kenya through Food
and assuming these data are reliable enough for Work (FFW)
to make programming decisions. Estimating
In 1995 CARE designed and implemented
the numbers of people requiring rehabilitation a transitional emergency-to-development
assistance is particularly difficult because of program. Designed to take one year,
limitations on collecting demographic populations that had been affected and
information. displaced by the drought would be re-
established back into pastoralism. The
program focused principally in rehabilitating
Targeting and distributing rehabilitation infrastructure, like roads, bridges and
resources is especially problematic in schools, through food for work.
situations where insecurity is high and where
resources can be captured by a local elite for Three pastoralist groups were targeted by
personal profit. A compromised ability to the program: those who had dropped out of
pastoralism and were destitute and living
deliver resources inevitably leads to
primarily on handouts from the
misappropriation. Direct distribution of development community; those who had
resources is sometimes an option, but can be taken up alternative means of livelihood;
complicated due to a lack of reliable and and those who were still in the pastoral
willing partners. system but were deemed vulnerable.

Different interventions were put in place to

Rehabilitation without transformation address the three groups. Infrastructure
inevitably leads to a return of the traditional rehabilitation aimed at pulling people out of
status quo and may serve to reproduce the the feeding centers established by
same conditions of power that led to the development organizations. Food for work
was established as the only mechanism to
original emergency. For a rehabilitation get food and therefore only those who were
project to be transformative it must challenge willing to work in FFW programs had
the status quo. Challenging the status quo access. Rehabilitation focused on de-
has transitional costs associated with it. silting dams and other livestock-supporting
Challenges to the status quo may infrastructure. It also aimed to rehabilitate
or establish social services infrastructure.
compromise the security of projects and
personnel during an emergency as they The government established disaster
become targets for reprisals from enforcers of management committees at the district
the traditional status quo. The human and level. They took the primary responsibility
material costs of transformation during the of coordinating relief efforts in their
respective districts. They were however
rehabilitation process raise important issues
understaffed and inefficient, and inter-
about accepting loss and assuming agency committees were formed to bolster
responsibility for loss that are difficult for their efforts.
humanitarian agencies to deal with.
Local communities were organized into
food distribution committees to facilitate
food distribution at the household level.
C. Important Principles for Rehabilitation The committees served primarily as a
Programming conduit for food rations rather than
decision-making units. Leadership at the
The following set of principles is drawn from local committees actually came mainly
from government administration officials at
agencies working on rehabilitation projects in the local level.
chronically vulnerable situations and may
help to better identify important factors to
consider.

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Identifying the Social, Political and Economic Causes of Vulnerability

• Review government policies with regard to rehabilitation and other stakeholders’

involvement.
• Assess damage to social, natural, and physical resources and the implications for
scope of rehabilitation interventions.
• Analyze the structure of vulnerability of the communities (exposure, capacity,
potentiality) and the implication to rehabilitation strategies.
• Analyze the priorities of the affected people and the commitment to strengthen
civil society.
• Plan and implement activities including short-term income transfers, rebuilding
lost household assets, rebuilding lost community assets, and rebuilding
institutions.
• Monitor and evaluate to measure the outcome and effectiveness of rehabilitation
measures.

Understanding Social and Political Transformation

• A comprehensive view that considers the full range of political, social and
economic factors in the rehabilitation spectrum is important (see practical
applications and tools).
• The process of reconstruction should go beyond rehabilitation in its scope.
Rather, it should be designed to transform the response mechanisms of an area
to ensure that lessons learned today can improve the capacity to respond to
future disasters (Maxman 1999).
• This transition can be hindered by bureaucratic inertia as well as corruption that
drains rehabilitation resources. Capture of resources and trade-offs in the
investment process can present obstacles. There are transitional costs
associated with challenging the traditional status-quo.
• Rehabilitation in chronically vulnerable situations should accept the likelihood of
future crises and therefore need to include elements of early warning and
emergency preparedness.

Sequencing of Project Phases

• There are minimal conditions for the transition from relief to rehabilitation to take
place. These include the cessation of conflict, increased political accommodation
to guarantee a reasonable level of security, respect for human rights and
accommodation of humanitarian groups, and acceptance of the controlling
political authority by donors (Maxwell 1999).
• Complex emergencies require interventions that begin early and provide inputs
(material and social) to assist a population to cope with and adapt to their new
situation (Maxman 1999).
• It is important to seek a ‘window of opportunity’. In complex emergencies, these
windows of opportunity may intensify as conflict subsides.
• Programs should stress principles of flexibility and process planning in their
sequencing of activities.
• Always have a contingency plan in the event of insecurity. Reversals during
complex emergencies need to be anticipated.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Resource Utilization and Allocation

• Rehabilitation projects with long-term perspectives are often handicapped by

short-term funding constraints. Agencies can overcome this by breaking down
long-term programs into fundable components while still making their long-term
visions clear to donors.
• Small-scale, low-cost interventions may be more appropriate in order to prevent
exacerbating conflicts over resources and to protect the security of investments.
• One of the aims of rehabilitation should be to minimize the dependence on
continued relief resources from donors and to feed local level interventions into
national level policy to ensure a continued flow of resources.
• Food-for-work projects have provided an important additional coping strategy for
vulnerable households that have helped to reduce the pressure to sell productive
assets to meet immediate consumption needs.
• Projects should aim for equitable rehabilitation among different household types.
Although crises affect households differently, distributing resources evenly and
providing equal access will help reduce jealousy and stigmatization.

Institutional Networking

• Cooperation and coordination are needed between specialized agencies. An

integrated macro-micro framework is ideal for addressing the discontinuities
within the relief to development continuum.
• Agencies should seek to collaborate with governments in order to influence
policy, legitimize and facilitate programming, to avoid marginalizing government
agencies, and to help develop capacity.
• Agencies should form strategic alliances with other NGOs, local government, the
private sector, and/or national level institutions.

Strengthening Civil Society through Community Participation

• The destruction of civil society is a major constraint to rehabilitation. The

rebuilding of trust, a fundamental element of social capital, within civil society is a
significant first step towards rehabilitation and essential for social transformation
(Maxwell 1999).
• Participatory measures play a critical role, especially if individuals have been
traumatized by conflict and self-confidence and trust needs to be rebuilt.
• Foster community ownership by ensuring that the community’s priorities take
precedence over donor priorities to promote a sense of ownership.

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Rehabilitation for Complex Political

Social Priorities: Gender Equity and Emergencies
Human Rights
• Unique opportunities for rehabilitation
often arise as conflict abates, while
• At the very minimum, rehabilitation operating in the midst of conflict creates
projects should not cause additional problems of security.
harm and should aim to strengthen the • Avoid introducing large-scale
processes of social rebuilding facilitated development programs before
by the security of human rights. This ‘do communities are ready or able to absorb
them.
no harm’ principle should be
• Major programming challenges include
incorporated into the planning process identifying legitimate political partners,
through a benefits/harms analysis. working with incapacitated state
• Build on the capacities of women that institutions, determining how to deal with
may have been extended by the crisis, the emergence of parallel economies,
targeting the most vulnerable groups,
or, conversely, may have worsened.
prioritizing and sequencing interventions
• Human rights principles of equity should based on the state of the emergency,
be followed, promoted and never and minimizing risks of working while
compromised. Agencies should consider conflict is ongoing.
suspending projects and withdrawing on • Rehabilitation for refugees should consist
of discrete short-term activities for people
matters of human rights. who wish to return home and resume
• While women may be a particularly their livelihoods.
vulnerable group in some situations, • The major challenges in a resettlement
they may also have special capacities context are how to avoid perpetuating the
and dynamic abilities that should not be dislocation of a population from their
homes and livelihoods.
overlooked. • Consider the environmental sustainability
• During complex emergencies, safeguard and potential damage of relocating large
the physical security of agency staff and numbers of refugees in areas that are
assets and to ensure that humanitarian limited in resources such as water and
principles are made explicit and never arable land (CARE 1998).
compromised.

Incorporating Peace Building and Conflict Resolution

• While underlying causes of conflict must be dealt with in the long term,
empowering communities to deal internally with conflict is extremely important in
transition period when small misunderstandings can easily erupt into conflicts.
• These activities may involve the introduction of outside methods, but often are a
matter of rediscovering or valuing traditional processes that may have been lost
or marginalized as a result of a larger conflict.

Political Empowerment through Civil Society and Institutional Rebuilding

• The importance of strengthening civil society is that it serves as a counterweight

to the human rights abuses of a powerful predatory militia and government
structure, it can support peace building, encourages popular participation and
institutional capacity building, and is a source of social capital that serves to
empower individuals and households in their livelihood activities.
• As programs transition out of emergencies, the building of community
partnerships is essential. This first requires the strengthening institutional
capacities of civil society.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

• The investment in civil society requires a substantial investment of time and

resources that may continue well into the development phase once rehabilitation
work is complete.
• Absorptive capacity is a critical constraint. Avoid introducing large-scale projects
before an area is ready. Some rehabilitation efforts can be incapacitating for local
institutions if civil society is not involved from the beginning.
• Building human capital with training and skill transfer is critical. Whereas
institutions can collapse, individual skills are more durable. These individuals
become community leaders and can lend to support to different projects over
time.

Investing in Social Capital

• The health of civil society, improving its ability to participate in rehabilitation and
to contribute to social transformation can be done by strengthening social capital.
• A social capital analysis will help programs to work more effectively with existing
institutions.
• The kinds of diagnostic questions that need to be asked include (1) what types of
social capital exist, (2) who is participating in those civil society institutions that
generate social capital, (3) how have social networks changes since the onset of
crisis, and (4) if social capital has eroded, what other resources are available?

D. The Rehabilitation Spectrum

The Rehabilitation Spectrum (Campbell and Maxwell 1997) (Table 7.1) is conceptual
scheme for categorizing the types of rehabilitation projects that can be implemented
to address different thematic spheres and levels of social organization. Projects tend
to fall in the social and economic spheres and are targeted toward the household
and community levels. However, a holistic approach that accounts for each sphere
and level is probably the best approach towards effective and sustainable post-crisis
rehabilitation.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Table 7.1 Political, Economic and Social Rehabilitation Interventions

by Area and Level of Organization
POLITICAL Household Community District National/International

Electoral Technical assistance in

reform elections.
Monitors.
Human rights Promote gender Rights education and INGO cooperation. Commissions.
equity promotion Support to human rights
organizations.
INGO lobbying.
Conflict Training community Support for traditional Radio and other media
resolution leaders. mechanisms. services promoting peace.
Regional initiatives.
Security Cash or in-kind Support for police
grants. force.
Training.
Government Support to local Salary support. Training.
capacity- government. Technical assistance to
building ministries.
ECONOMIC Household Community District National/International
Macro- Program aid.
economic Liberalization.
reform Advocacy on structural
adjustment.
Demining Mine removal. Public awareness.
Build local capacity.
Agricultural Seeds. Irrigation. Grain Extension veterinary Land rights and land
production Tools. banks. services EWS. reform.
Restocking.
Income Income generation Public Works. Barter shops.
generation projects. FFW & CFW
market Credit. environment.
access and
environment
Physical Shelter. Sewage. Energy. Airports.
infrastructure Housing. Water. Telecommunications.
Roads.
SOCIAL Household Community District National/International
Refugees Psycho-social Repatriation programs.
and counseling. Property rights.
displaced Seeds.
Tools.
Social Schools. Regional hospitals.
infrastructure Health Centers.
and services Training.
EPI.
Vulnerable Income transfers. Feeding projects.
group Food distribution.
assistance
Gender Support for sexually Support to women’s
projects abused. groups.
Social capital Support for clubs . Encouragement for
building Local NGOs. local NGO
Elders. networking
Adapted from Campbell and Maxwell, 1997

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Resources

To access documents on the CD, click the text next to the Acrobat Reader
symbol.

Tools

Program Considerations for Rehabilitation.

CARE 1999.

Guide to Program Options in Conflict-Prone Settings.

Office of Transitional Initiatives. 2001. USAID.

Concept Papers

Roundtable Report: Community Based Reintegration of and Rehabilitation in

Post-Conflict Settings.
USAID/Office of Transition Initiatives and UNDP/Emergency Response
Division. 2000

Thematic Study of Recurring Challenges in the Provision of Food Assistance in

Complex Emergencies.
World Food Programme.1999.

Case Studies

USAID. 2000. Contingency Plan for Rehabilitation of Conflict-Affected Populations

& Areas in Northern Ethiopia.
Office of Food and Humanitarian Assistance. Washington, D.C.

Rehabilitation and Greater Horn Project: Rehabilitation in Ethiopia.

Campbell, W. 1997. CARE, Institute for Development Studies at the University of
Sussex.

Rehabilitation in the Greater Horn: A Report to CARE.

Harvey, P.; W. Campbell; and S. Maxwell. 1997.

Bibliography

CARE. 2001. Benefits-Harms Handbook and Facilitation Manual. CARE: Nairobi.

Campbell, W. 1997. CARE, Rehabilitation and Greater Horn Project: Rehabilitation in

Ethiopia. Institute for Development Studies at the University of Sussex: Brighton, UK.
July.

CARE. 1998. Rethinking Rehabilitation in Complex Political Emergencies. Program

in Touch, News and Visions from CARE and the NGO Community issue 8, summer.

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Harvey, P. 1998. Rehabilitation in Complex Emergencies: Is Rebuilding Civil Society

the Answer? Disasters 22(3).

Harvey, P.; W. Campbell; and S. Maxwell. 1997. Rehabilitation in the Greater Horn:
A Report to CARE. CARE: Nairobi.

Maxman, A. 1999. Workshop on Rehabilitation: Summary of Framework, Tools,

Advocacy Messages and Country Office Outputs. CARE East Africa/Middle East
Region: Nairobi, Kenya and Atlanta, USA. May 15.

Maxman, A. and Maxwell, D. 1999. Program Considerations for Rehabilitation.

CARE: Nairobi, Kenya. February.

Maxwell, D. 1999. Principles and Guidelines for Programming in Chronically

Vulnerable Areas. CARE East Africa/Middle East Region: Nairobi, Kenya and
Atlanta, USA. April.

USAID/Office of Transition Initiatives and UNDP/Emergency Response Division.

2000. Roundtable Report: Community Based Reintegration of and Rehabilitation in
Post-Conflict Settings. October. Washington, DC

USAID. 2000. Contingency Plan for Rehabilitation of Conflict-Affected Populations &

Areas in Northern Ethiopia. Office of Food and Humanitarian Assistance.
Washington, D.C.

USAID. 2001. Guide to Program Options in Conflict-Prone Settings. September.

Office of Transitional Initiatives. Washington, D.C.

World Food Programme.1999. Thematic Study of Recurring Challenges in the

Provision of Food Assistance in Complex Emergencies. Executive Board, Third
Regular Session. Evaluation Reports, Agenda item 4. Rome 19-22, October 1999.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Section 8
Program Strategies: Development and Growth for
Long-Term Vulnerability Reduction

While much of the emphasis in the first edition of this document dealt with preparing
for and dealing with chronic vulnerability, this section deals with programming
approaches and considerations for household livelihood development and growth
initiatives that should be considered when designing interventions aimed at
decreasing long-term vulnerability. The relationship between poverty and
vulnerability depends upon the nature and severity of the risks being faced and what
assets are available to the household for use as insurance against risk or in coping
with shocks. This chapter identifies potential strategies that assist the poor to
overcome chronic vulnerability by managing risk and increasing income. It focuses
on improvement of productivity of assets and increase in their resilience and
predictability of benefit streams. Many factors contribute to high levels of chronic
poverty and vulnerability: AIDS and other epidemics, macro-economic shocks,
conflicts, repeated droughts and seasonal food shortages, all of which can
undermine the livelihoods of entire communities. This section lays out a strategy for
overcoming these factors, with emphasis on some proven strategies for dealing with
climatic and economic factors.

As a basic principle, development and growth interventions should be aimed at

improving household livelihood security by increasing and diversifying a household’s
asset base (land, labor, skills, etc.) and benefit streams (income—in-kind or cash).
Safeguarding and enhancing components of a household’s livelihood system
improves its ability to cope with shocks and adapt to changes. This basic principle
can be approached in a number of ways.

Development and growth initiatives should also work to strengthen and diversify
potential safety nets. Informal safety nets usually rely on social relations between
households, for example, reciprocal food exchange, gifts of cash, or collective labor.
Finally, this approach to programming should be dedicated to supporting a human
rights perspective by ensuring that interventions not only improve livelihoods, but
also enable people to live a life of dignity.

A. Traditional Approaches are Inadequate

In the context of chronic vulnerability situations, implementing effective and

sustainable development and growth projects, rather than long-term relief programs,
is made increasingly difficult by recurring crises that reduce a household’s asset
base and compromise the integrity of its benefit streams to a point where it is no
longer possible to maintain a livelihood system. Emergency response interventions
are not designed to address underlying vulnerability. They are intended to anticipate
and buffer temporary consumption shortfalls for the duration of a seasonal or short-
term crisis event. However, in situations where shocks have depleted productive
assets, relief interventions that mainly focus on consumption will not address future
vulnerability resulting from the loss of these assets. To prevent such future
vulnerability, the key strategy is to protect and enhance the asset mix available to

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

households. Interventions that replenish assets also must reach some minimum
threshold to sustain household livelihood in order to address future susceptible of
assets to shocks.

Investments that reduce vulnerability and safety nets that smooth out consumption
are both required. Social protection should be regarded as a development
investment rather than welfare or relief. To do so, however, requires that social
protection be linked directly to other interventions. This section outlines what some
of those “other interventions” might be.

Three basic concepts form the main thesis of this section: First, human beings are
vulnerable if the underlying asset base on which they rely for their livelihood is
vulnerable to shocks. Secondly, structural transformation is required to ensure
sustainable risk management. Thirdly, viable market-based interventions are
possible within contexts of chronically vulnerable households.

Strategies for growth initiatives under conditions of human chronic vulnerability must
address the productivity of assets on which chronically vulnerable households
depend. Households are vulnerable when there is systemic failure that adversely
affects the viability of assets: for example, when the production and marketing
system do not provide internally consistent risk management to guarantee a return
on investments.

B. General Programming Challenges and Components of a Strategy

Several challenges face any type of programming under conditions of chronic

vulnerability. These include:

• Designing programs that support livelihood diversification strategies goes in

such a way as to create a sense of ownership over programming through
participation.
• Stimulating rural micro-finance systems: credit, insurance, and savings.
Without widespread access to financial services, capital constraints will continue
to trap the poorest households into low-return, high-risk livelihood strategies.
• Protecting human capital in the face of the HIV/AIDS pandemic and recurring
violence in many chronically vulnerable situations. HIV/AIDS and conflict also
compete for scarce public funds with under-funded primary and secondary
education systems necessary to train students capable of taking on more
remunerative jobs in towns.
• Making non-farm opportunities accessible and attractive to the rural poor. This
includes not only the usual physical infrastructural improvements, but also
institutional innovations that help reduce entry costs through the introduction of
grades and standards and public price reporting systems, and the relaxation of
burdensome licensing and regulatory requirements on micro-enterprises (Barrett,
Reardon and Webb 2001). Such regulatory requirements can encourage
corruption.
• Developing program strategies with the long-term objective of overcoming
chronic vulnerability in contexts where donors are only willing to support
emergency (i.e. very limited-term) projects.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

General components of a strategy to overcome these challenges may include:

Building a viable asset base. A key reason for chronic vulnerability at the
household level is that repeated shocks or chronic poverty may have left households
with such a limited asset base that they cannot rebuild, and cannot take advantage
of new opportunities, or even renewed rainfall or a post-conflict transition. They lack
an asset base from which to work, and this is certainly a significant reason why
poorer households have less diversified portfolios. This may entail the full range of
livelihood assets:

• Natural assets: Land, water resources, grazing and forest access, etc.
• Physical assets: Tools, livestock, housing, etc.
• Financial assets: Savings, access to credit
• Human assets: Labor, ability to work (health) education and skills, etc.
• Social assets: Kinship or community networks for risk and asset sharing

Generally, lack of access to financial services—credit, savings, and business

management—is a major constraint to participation in the non-cropping sector.
Experience has shown that working with savings-led programs is a more appropriate
intervention in situations of chronic vulnerability because, in effect, credit is yet
another form of risk that many poor households don’t want to take on. Under
conditions of chronic vulnerability, the CLASSE approach—a model developed by
CARE Rwanda working with communities left highly vulnerable in the wake of the
genocide—develops savings and credit groups help to build financial assets as well
as social solidarity and trust (see case studies).

However, with regard to asset transfers, there are critical thresholds, which, if not
met, generally mean that the assets are insufficient to pull a household up to a
higher level. For example, a pastoralist household might require a minimum of 20-25
units to survive, while a pastoral production unit might require 1,000 units, with a
ratio of one household for every 50 animals to attract private sector investments and
long term forward contracts. This analysis will need to be linked to the appropriate
economy of scale depending on the asset base and the context in which production
is being conducted.

Livelihood Diversification. Diversification of livelihood strategies stabilizes

incomes by taking advantage of counter-cyclical earnings from different activities.
Studies of diversification in Ethiopia shows that diversification is an effective
livelihood decision, because households surviving from famine with higher than
average income and food consumption levels also had more diversified benefit
streams and a more valuable assets base (especially livestock). Greater income
diversification (out of cropping) was positively associated with per capita income
level, higher dependency ratio, location in the highlands, and ownership of non-farm
assets. Most households believed that earning income outside of cropping (non-farm
employment and livestock activities combined) was a key to reducing risk. Yet, not
all households could reap the benefit of this insight (Block and Webb, nd).

The major point of diversification is to select alternative livelihood strategies that are
not subject to the same risks, or in the same time frame as primary livelihoods. For

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

example, a farming household that diversifies into livestock keeping, while having a
more diverse asset base, would find that both the asset base and the livelihood
strategy are subject to the same risks (climatic factors) in the same time frame (dry
seasons or drought). This is the source of much of the strategic impetus for rural
non-farm livelihood diversification—into such activities as trade and natural resource
extraction.

Accessing markets. Many times chronically vulnerable households potentially have

the means of dramatically increasing their income (and hence the ability to diversify
their assets) but are insufficiently organized to take advantage of markets. The
REAP Program developed by CARE Kenya facilitated small-holders in a chronically
drought-prone and impoverished area to form groups that could produce an
adequate quantity of horticultural crops to attract exporters, and then worked with
these groups to secure the necessary forward contracts to guarantee them a return
on investments and labor (see following section). This relatively simple combination
of factors enabled farmer groups to lease land, take on loans for investment in
irrigation and other infrastructure, and even hire the expertise to assist in production
planning and quality control—and enabled farmers to increase their earnings eight-
fold in a single year. The key was to analyze the market for potential sources of this
kind of earnings, and then plan systematically to address all the constraints facing
such groups.

Funding and Programming Strategies. One of the major constraints faced at the
agency level is that, in contexts of chronic vulnerability, it may be extremely difficult
to obtain funding for any kind of activity that is oriented at long-term improvements or
development. This has long been the case in drought-prone areas, and is
increasingly the case in conflict-affected and even HIV/AIDS affected communities.
Funding for humanitarian assistance may be readily available, and resources for
addressing the immediate effects of the HIV/AIDS pandemic may be available.
However as noted, humanitarian interventions alone are often inadequate to
addressing underlying vulnerabilities, and programs that deal with the immediate
effects of HIV/AIDS may not deal with the longer term vulnerabilities resulting from
the pandemic, at either the household or community level. Although, HIV/AIDS
programs are becoming more successful at incorporating the cross cutting impacts
of the pandemic.

In other circumstances, program staff are learning that having a clearly defined long-
term set of program objectives at the area or district level provide a framework for
both developing specific interventions—even if they may be labeled “emergency” in
terms of their funding. Program objectives also are a means to convince donors that
a coherent strategy exists for addressing vulnerability and that it is worth the
investment of their funds. CARE Kenya has developed one such approach to a
Regional Strategy in Northeastern Province (see case studies).

Policy and Regulatory Constraints. As always, there are some barriers to

overcoming chronic vulnerability that are a result of policies, or the regulatory
environment, in which livelihoods take place. Much of the urban informal economy in
Africa, for example, is in technical violation of municipal statutes dating from the
colonial era, which make certain activities illegal or confine them to certain areas.
But the legal areas or activities are often not the best sources of the limited income

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

available, and thus are not followed, leaving many informal workers—hawkers, street
food venders, petty traders, etc.—at the mercy of predatory urban officials. More
information on policy advocacy as an intervention strategy is offered in the following
section.

To effectively mobilize the poor to improve governance, there is a need to focus on

the enabling environment provided by government to production systems. This will
include tolerance of local government for poor people’s voice, the credibility of public
officials, the predictability of government programs, and the respect of poor people’s
rights (Moore and Putzel 1999). One of the main constraints related to governance in
chronically vulnerable areas is that the local participatory arrangements often fail to
include the poorest people. Aside from the fact that the poor often do not have time
to participate, the poor may be excluded or deliberately marginalized by the local
elites. Thus for true participation of the poor to occur, institutional mechanisms must
be in place to ensure these groups are included. This will involve mobilizing the poor
into networks of organizations and contributing to the economic and political
resources possessed by these groups.

C. Structural Transformations to Reduce Vulnerability to Climatic and

Economic Shocks: The REAP Program

Makueni District in Southeastern Kenya is the classic case of a subsistence

production system that depends on external resources to sustain each cycle of
production since the return is inadequate to fund the next cycle. Systemic failure is
also when production is structured in ways that skew entry into an industry because
of sub-optimal economies of scale (e.g. unsustainable herds or unviable land sizes);
lack of synchronization between production systems and market requirements
(products are neither the right quantity, quality or right production time required in
order to respond to market demand); production is under management and
technology regimes that cannot reduce production risks; inadequate protection of
financial input because of instability in returns.

The approach developed was not designed to address the symptoms of systemic
failure, for example, low and unstable prices for products, or marketing through
brokers who offer long-run average prices that are below return of assets. Neither
does it deal directly with vulnerability of assets to external factors. It approaches the
problem by creating the appropriate system that ensures internally consistent
mechanisms to contain risk management at each level of production. It also applies
a sector-wide approach to ensure that consistency. The premise is that the failure in
any system results in a threat to asset productivity and increases the risk of not
getting adequate returns.

A common theme across all households defined as chronically vulnerable is the low
and unpredictable return on assets that households depend on for their livelihood.
This is further compounded by high susceptibility of assets (land, labor, livestock,
etc.) to external shocks (disease, drought, insecurity, floods, etc.). The low return to
assets tends to be unattractive to long term investment. The chronic vulnerability
also tends to be compounded because with each cycle of shock, assets and their
productivity deplete further. CARE Kenya has developed a strategy of interventions

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

that could transform these environments into viable investment opportunities that
utilize the existing resources to meet household needs, while managing production
and other risks that make investments in such conditions unviable.

This is not about rehabilitation, or “long term development”, but rather

structural/system transformation to create conditions that make it possible for
households living under such conditions to be an attractive investment. Under the
“right conditions” investments in productivity, markets, skills, etc. have been shown
to provide stable and attractive returns (cash and in-kind) that give immediate results
and are sustainable over the long term. The strategy therefore necessarily
addresses the creation of these conditions.

Three hypotheses underpin this strategy: The first is that return on investments in
conditions that generate chronic vulnerability can be as high as that found in other
areas considered of “high potential” as long as the right conditions are established
that enable viable investment opportunities. The second is that achieving acceptable
levels of risk requires holistic interventions that address all structural problems by
transforming inappropriate systems and establishing the appropriate economies of
scale and return on investments at each level in the “production to market” chain.
The third is that households that can benefit from this system already supply/produce
for the markets but within unpredictable and unsustainable systems. The question
that this strategy proposes to answer is whether subsistence agriculture can be
structured viably and in ways that would reduce the impact of external shocks on
productivity of assets to predictable and manageable risks.

A market led-solution for vulnerable and food-aid dependent households.

The most vulnerable households/communities in the Horn of Africa (pastoralists,
resource-poor farmers) are linked to their primary markets through unpredictable
marketing systems characterized by brokers and marketing systems that skew terms
of trade against their products. Both face long run average prices for their products
below investment returns.

The REAP (Rural Enterprise and Agribusiness Promotion) Project is a

commercialization of agriculture project. It is currently targeting a district that was
ranked 40 out of 41 in a poverty index sample survey by Government and NGOs of
districts in Kenya in 1998. At least one third of the population receives food-aid for a
period each year. The land is semi-arid, low rainfall, which leaves the principle
asset—land—an unproductive and unreliable source of income. Even for
households with access to irrigation water, the returns have been sub-optimal and
families have continued to rely on food aid. The key to the intervention has been
solving systemic problems of production and marketing for households to increase
return on investments. The area is suitable for the production of non-traditional
agricultural export crops (particularly high value horticultural crops), but local farmers
had not been able to take advantage of this.

CARE conducted an analysis and found that the smallholder farmers played the role
of “buffer suppliers” – the export marketing firms only sourced from smallholders
through brokers when they could not meet their export contracts through their own
production. This resulted in a highly volatile price situation since the farmers tended
to plant the crops that fetched the highest prices in the last season, while the reason

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

for the high prices was a temporary shortfall in supply from the formal system. The
smallholders operated with minimum investments and therefore had erratic quality
and quantity that made them unviable as stable suppliers of the export market. The
farm units were also operating below the economies of scale that could not enable
exporters and service providers to work with them directly.

CARE Kenya designed an intervention that restructured the marketing, production

and transport economies of scale, irrigation and management technology, supply of
inputs and financing mechanisms. The target was to make each aspect viable. The
intervention is based on creating the economies of scale that have enabled exporters
to provide commercially viable forward market contracts. The intervention
reorganizes production at the farm level by assisting smallholders to assess land
units of between 30 and 60 acres, which is the viable land unit that attracts viable
forward market contracts.

CARE then loans the smallholder farmers against the forward contracts adequate
resources, using a venture capital investment model (shared financial risks with
smallholders) and the management capacity and technology to facilitate reliably
supply of forward contracts on time with the right quality and quantity. All the
interventions are tied to business plans based on forward contracts and market
requirements.

Inputs are contracted from suppliers in bulk, which has enable suppliers to reduce
prices while delivering at farm-gate. The exporters collect produce directly from the
farm gate and provide prices that are adequate to guarantee a very profitable return
on investments. The income for each household has increased from about US$150
a year to an average net income of US$1,000 per farmer per year. Within the first
four months the participating households have adequate income to eliminate the
need for food aid. This is a fully commercial model with no subsidies and therefore
all CARE resources, including the extension, is on commercial terms, and generates
income for the project.

In terms of growth, from an initial forward contract of US$150,000 the market has
increased to US$1million with options to take on capacity to about US$3 million
within the next two years. This has been generated from an initial investment of
US$300,000 by the project. This has established a predictable and consistent return
on investments, and has already gone through drought cycles without affecting
incomes of participating households. It is in the process of expansion to cover at
least 3,000 households in the next three years, with each household, guaranteed at
least US$1,000 with the ratio of one farmer to one acre.

How replicable is this example? Making this shift to a structural transformation of

sectors in order to promote viable and sustainable growth with returns on
investments requires interventions that overcome several constraints. Since
chronically vulnerable households by definition are dependent on highly vulnerable
assets, they do not lend themselves to immediate and easy solutions. There are still
very few examples of successful transformation of communities from chronic
vulnerability to a self-sustaining community/households. Most communities that are
vulnerable have only continued to become more so with time.

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Designing appropriate development and growth interventions depends on the

following:

• Identifying structural problems that hinder efficient and viable production and
marketing of products from a given asset base (e.g. distorted livestock or
agriculture marketing systems; poor terms of trade; poor economies of scale in
production/ transport/ technology and marketing; inappropriate policy framework).
• Ensuring the capacity to design interventions (by communities, government and
development agencies) that respond to both the structural problems and
production/ marketing problems in order to maximize returns.
• Maintaining ownership by poor households of the assets and production systems
once successful interventions are identified and benefits/returns from investments
are established.
• Providing viable commercial financing strategies that are sustained through
return on assets, and that are within the risk profile.

There are many challenges in designing sustainable interventions under these

conditions. The first is the skill base within the “development community.” Another
challenge is identifying a model for rural financing without trapping resource-poor
households into low-return, high-risk livelihood strategies that only increase their
debt. A third challenge revolves around human capital formation while maintaining
high productivity in challenging environments. The fourth challenge is how to tie on-
farm with off-farm opportunities to provide attractive options to different groups of
rural poor. Another problem is the ability to scale rapidly to have systems that cover
the national or affected populations/regions effectively within reasonable timeframes.
The lack of viable institutions to facilitate participation of resource-poor households in
productive systems as the sector evolves is another constraint. The fifth challenge is
identifying sources of funding for investment in new commercial models in areas that
have traditionally attracted relief interventions. Each of these has to be addressed in
a successful strategy.

D. Long-Term Social Safety Nets

Besides investing in the benefit streams and asset bases of households,

development and growth programs should consider how they could improve the
long-term durability of informal and formal social safety nets. Programs should
evaluate these systems to determine if lending support could help contribute to
reducing the vulnerability of chronically vulnerable groups. Safety nets fall into three
general categories (1) smoothing out consumption streams and protection and
rebuilding of assets for those who are vulnerable to shocks, (2) care for the
physiologically vulnerable (elderly, disabled), and (3) support for the chronically poor
(e.g. women and child-headed households). HIV/AIDS-affected households could
fall into any of the three.

Strengthening Informal Safety Nets to Manage Risk. In terms of strengthening

informal safety nets, programs should consider how to build on existing supplies of
social capital within the community. Adequate resources must be available and
evenly distributed within the community to provide the capacity for intra- and inter-
household community safety nets. Social capital is critical for generating social

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assistance as a direct response to help mediate risks and proactively can help create
opportunities for livelihood advancement by generating new benefit streams.

Strengthening Formal Protection Programs. The public sector with the

assistance of NGOs can help the poor manage risk more effectively by (1) reducing
or preventing the risk itself (2) insuring better coverage and lowering the cost of
insurance against risk (3) promoting low-cost coping mechanisms during their times
of need. To set priorities, development institutions need to focus on the most severe
community-wide risks affecting a region. In addition, they should concentrate on
preventing the need for informal risk coping mechanisms that reinforce social
inequality and future vulnerability (e.g. taking children out of school, having older
children take care of younger children). Another factor that needs to be taken into
account is to identify which groups are likely to be the most vulnerable so that
programs can be targeted to these groups. To ensure that public interventions are
used in cost-effective ways, there is a need to take into consideration effective
informal risk management strategies implemented by households and communities.
Public interventions should supplement or strengthen these informal strategies, not
replace them.

The HIV/AIDS Priority. HIV/AIDS is making a direct impact on rural people’s core
assets and is a major long-term threat to their livelihoods. It adversely affects human
capital (loss of labor, erosion of skills, curtailed access to education), social capital
(reduced mutual support, increased number of dependents, exclusion of the sick),
financial capital (loss of remittances, scarce labor directed to food production,
declines in savings, sale of assets), natural capital (increased use of common
property resources for cash, less sustainable land use practices) and physical capital
(reduced maintenance of housing, sale of capital goods, increased demand for water
and sanitation facilities). The key question becomes: Is rural or agricultural growth
possible given the effects of this epidemic? HIV/AIDS deeply affects the
vulnerability/livelihoods context and will exacerbate the affects of other calamities
such as drought, war and floods.

Resources

To access documents on the CD, click the text next to the Acrobat Reader
symbol.

Tools

Household Livelihood Security Assessments Toolkit

CARE. 2002.

Sustainable agricultural/rural development and vulnerability to HIV/AIDS

Topouzis and du Guerny 2000.

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Concept Papers

Social protection for the poor: Lessons from recent international experience.
Devereux, S. 2002. Institute of Development Studies.

Empowerment and Governance: Basic Elements for Improving Nutritional

Outcomes.
Frankenberger, T., R. Caldwell and J. Mazzeo. 2002.

Dynamic Risk Management and the Poor: Developing a Social Protection

Strategy for Africa.
World Bank. 2001. Africa Region Human Development Department.

Non-farm Income Diversification and Household Livelihood Strategies in Rural

Africa: Concepts, Dynamics, and Policy Implications.
Barrett, C., [Link] and P. 2001.

Case Studies

CLASSE MODEL: A community-based, savings-led, capital and social assets

building.
CARE Rwanda

Reducing Economic Vulnerability in Northeastern Kenya

CARE Kenya

Bibliography

Abdulai, Awudu and CroleRees. (nd) Determinants of Income Diversification

Amongst Rural Households in Southern Mali. Swiss Federal Institute of Technology,
Zurich.

Barrett, C., [Link] and P. 2001. Non-farm Income Diversification and Household
Livelihood Strategies in Rural Africa: Concepts, Dynamics, and Policy Implications.

Block, S. and P. Webb. (nd) The Dynamics of Livelihood Diversification in Post-

Famine Ethiopia.

Canagarajah, S., C. Newman, R. Bhattamishra (nd) Non-Farm Income, Gender, and

Inequality: Evidence from Rural Ghana and Uganda.

Devereux, S. 2002. Social protection for the poor: Lessons from recent international
experience. Institute of Development Studies. Sussex.

Frankenberger, T., R. Caldwell and J. Mazzeo. 2002. Empowerment and

Governance: Basic Elements for Improving Nutritional Outcomes. A report for the
ACC/SCN 5th Report on the World Nutrition Situation.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Lanjouw, P., J. Quizon and R. Sparrow. (nd) Non-Agricultural Earningsn Peri-Urban

Areas of Tanzania: Evidence from Household Survey Data.

Moore, M. and J. Putzel. 1999. Politics and Poverty: A Background Paper for the
World Development Report 2000/1. World Bank. Washington, D.C.

Owens, T. and J. Hoddinott. 1998. Investing in development or investing in relief:

Quantifying the poverty tradeoffs using Zimbabwe household panel data. Centre for
the Study of African Economics and International Food Policy Research Institute.

Rider-Smith, D., [Link], K. Meadows, and K. Zwick. (nd) Livelihood diversification

in Uganda: patterns and determinants of change across two rural districts.

Temin, Miriam. 2001. HIV/AIDS Presentation for Africa Advisers Meeting 2001.
Report on the Meeting. Rural Livelihoods and Environment Division. Department for
International Development. January

Topouzis, D. and [Link]. 2000. Sustainable agricultural/rural development and

vulnerability to HIV/AIDS. FAO/UNAIDS joint publication.

Woldehanna, T., and A. Oskam (nd) Income Diversification and Entry Barriers:
Evidence from the Tigray Region of Northern Ethiopia.

World Bank. 2001. Dynamic Risk Management and the Poor: Developing a Social
Protection Strategy for Africa. Africa Region Human Development Department.
Washington, D.C.

World Food Programme. (nd) Safety Nets in Malawi: How Much? For How Many?

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Section 9
Advocacy in Situations of Chronic Vulnerability5

A. Importance of Advocacy

CARE defines advocacy as the deliberate process of influencing those who make
policy decisions. Advocacy is a means for holding governments (at all levels) and
other institutions accountable. CARE’s use of advocacy will always attempt to
improve the livelihood of a significant number of people, including the most
vulnerable and marginalized, target policymakers and implementers at levels above
the household, and be rooted in CARE’s field experience and core values (Beckwith
2000). Advocacy is an approach that CARE uses to complement its efforts to
strengthen capacity for self help, provide economic opportunities, deliver relief in
emergencies, and address discrimination in all of its forms (Beckwith 2000). In brief,
advocacy is a very powerful tool for the implementation of a rights-based approach.

Advocacy is also important to livelihood analysis in the following ways. First, a

livelihood analysis facilitates the identification of a broad hierarchy of causes,
including the policy dimensions of poverty. Second, advocacy interventions can
expand the means and strategies for addressing policy-related root causes of
livelihood insecurity. Third, through the livelihoods framework, advocacy may
improve the support of donors towards investing in a holistic approach to solutions to
poverty. Through good problem analysis and program design, advocacy strategies
and activities may expand our options for finding solutions (Beckwith 2000).

B. The Rights-Based Approach

CARE’s adoption of the rights-based approach (RBA) encourages more effective

programming in chronically vulnerable situations because the underlying causes of
vulnerability, poverty and discrimination are addressed, rather than just the
symptoms. CARE has defined human rights as “entitlements [that] all people have to
basic conditions supporting their efforts to live in peace and dignity and to develop
their full potential as human beings.” Shifting from a basic needs approach (which
focuses on delivery of goods and services), to one that incorporates rights-based
perspectives brings in concepts such as empowerment, justice, accountability and
governance (Frankenberger and Cogill 2001). This is not to say that CARE’s
traditional on-the-ground programming won’t continue. Rather, CARE programs will
be deliberately broadened to work with communities and other relevant actors to
help individuals claim their rights as well as carry out their responsibilities (Jones
2002).

The rights-based approach recognizes that households’ ability to access assets and
entitlements are impacted to a great extent by power relationships that have political,
social and economic dimensions. Therefore, fulfillment of rights by households
5
This chapter is predicated heavily on CARE’s adoption of a Rights-Based Approach (See Annexes I and II), and
therefore its focus is much more on CARE as an organization and its own internal capacities, policies and
programs. While other organizations may find this material useful, this chapter is admittedly more CARE-
centered than the rest of this document.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

requires transforming power relationships among stakeholders and removing the

exclusionary mechanisms that prevent rights-realization by the poor (Frankenberger
and Cogill 2001).

In addition to developing programs that strategically address rights of the poor and
marginalized, the rights-based approach requires a higher level of participation by
CARE in policy advocacy. In order to do this, CARE must analyze and understand
the policy process and the stakeholders who influence, create and/or implement
policy. In CARE’s “Advocacy Tools and Guidelines: Promoting Policy Change,” (See
Tools at end of section) completing a policy analysis is the first step in choosing how
to advocate most appropriately in a given situation. Sprechmann and Pelton (2001)
indicate that the purpose of the analysis is to:

• understand the social and political context;

• identify policy causes of poverty and discrimination, or policy issues;
• identify key actors and institutions that make decisions about policies, as well
as those who can influence policy makers;
• analyze the distribution of political power among key actors; and
• understand the formal and informal policy making processes.

C. Understanding Policy Processes

Implementation of effective programs requires both the organizational ability to

distribute resources as well as the political ability to ensure those resources are
directed to the appropriate beneficiaries (Johnson and Start 2001). Many
governments are not pro-poor in their allocation of goods and services and therefore
are not adequately fulfilling their role as duty bearers. The poor are often viewed as a
hindrance to development rather than viewed as part of the solution. It is important to
recognize that changing government policy is not enough. Therefore, understanding
the policy process involves not only evaluating whether or not a policy is effective,
but also looking at how the policy is being implemented. Often times, there is a gap
between the two, the result of vested interests that various stakeholders have in
resource distribution.

A stake-holder analysis identifies the key actors and institutions that have a stake in
decisions about policies as well as those that can influence policy makers. From this
analysis, it is possible to identify allies with whom to work, as well as those
individuals or institutions that will resist advocacy efforts or actively oppose it, or
oppose the efforts of the poor to advocate for their own rights.

Capture. At the policy implementation level, one of the ways that advocacy can
promote change is through identifying and addressing the issue of capture. Johnson
and Start (2001) define capture as “the interception of resources” by powerful
stakeholders, or through resource distribution that does not benefit the poor and
marginalized.

Capture exists at many levels:

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

1. Within the household, gender inequity CARE Advocacy Case Study: Sudan
can undermine the impacts of poverty
programming through the redirection of CARE used advocacy to address
resources (intended to benefit females) conflict-based vulnerability is in Sudan.
to male members of the household. Over two million people have died in
2. At the regional level, resources and Sudan’s civil war over a thirty-year
programs may be allocated towards period. CARE and other international
more affluent areas where there are NGOs have provided humanitarian
large landholders or areas where there assistance to both sides of the conflict,
yet a devastating famine in 1998
is strong political support for the current prompted CARE to complete a policy
governmental regime. Another reason analysis to look at the root causes of
for regional bias of resource distribution the periodic famines. CARE
is the extent to which current determined that fundamental change in
infrastructure exists in an area. Areas of Sudan could not take place unless
chronic vulnerability may be seen as international policy makers made
“low potential” regions and therefore are increased efforts to end the civil war.
not allocated the necessary CARE, in collaboration with Oxfam
development resources to reduce Great Britain, Save the Children Fund
vulnerability and increase food and and Medecins sans Frontieres, met
with members of the UN Security
livelihood security.
Council to share their perspectives.
3. At the national level, economic priorities
also impact where resources are Over the course of a year, the coalition
concentrated, and often times particular issued statements and participated in
sectors will gain the majority of talks with Sudanese officials, UN peace
development resources (Johnson and negotiators and the U.S. Government.
Start 2001). In addition, CARE USA lead a coalition
of organizations in lobbying the U.S.
government, including a meeting with
D. Developing an Advocacy Strategy Secretary of State Madeline Albright,
urging her and other U.S. officials to
support the peace process. Despite the
CARE’s advocacy strategy in chronically
lack of progress in ending the civil war,
vulnerable situations will depend upon the the efforts of CARE and other NGOs
type of policy issues being addressed and brought increased awareness to the
the underlying causes of the vulnerability in humanitarian plight of the Sudanese
the area. Some advocacy strategies may be people. Importantly, it also
higher in profile and involve broad-based demonstrated the ability for effective
public awareness building or increasing coalition-building and action among
pressure on stakeholders to initiate NGOs6.
changes in policy or implementation. Other 6
strategies may be focused on working with From Bringing a new dimension to
CARE’s Programs: Advocacy Experiences
key officials and involve quiet diplomacy
in Nicaragua, Ecuador, Philippines and
(O’Brien 2002). Sudan. CARE USA Policy and Advocacy
Unit. 2000.
CARE’s advocacy strategies will work to
address social exclusion and assist
communities in gaining political recognition and realization of their rights. Strategies
at the regional, national or international level often involve coalitions between
organizations and institutions (see below). These strategies may work to advocate
for changes in macro-economic policy at the national and international level (e.g.

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

addressing the negative impacts of Examples of Advocacy Issues in

globalization) or encourage resolution of Chronically Vulnerable Situations
conflict situations (see CARE’s Advocacy
Case Study: Sudan). In areas where vulnerability is primarily
caused by climate-related hazards,
advocacy issues may center around:
Advocacy issues at the community level • implementing appropriate agro-
may be addressed largely through ecological systems,
participation by community members. For • programs focusing on investment in
instance, CARE can support communities in human capital,
addressing capture at the local level by • mitigation strategies,
working with them to gain a voice in how • strengthening informal safety nets,
• ensuring there are adequate social
resources are allocated and used. These
protection programs in place, and
efforts enable the poor to create their own especially
political capital by pressuring for the right to • creating the policy environment for
information, exposing discriminatory action overcoming chronic vulnerability.
to gain rights, and protesting against corrupt
In areas where conflict-based vulnerability
officials (Frankenberger and Cogill 2001).
is prevalent, CARE may choose to focus
on:
• conflict resolution,
E. Creating the Advocacy Message • mitigation strategies,
• security, and
Advocacy messages should capture the • social protection.
essence of what CARE is trying to say to a
A greater emphasis on Benefits/Harms
target audience. In a short format, the Analysis (see Tools) is also crucial to
message should communicate why the ensure that advocacy efforts or programs
issue is important and what CARE wants do not have unintended consequences that
others to do on behalf of the cause. The harm beneficiaries or increase their
message should also give the target vulnerability.
audience a clear choice of actions and
suggest the consequences of those actions. The message should also be
appropriate to the social and cultural context.

As CARE country offices develop the content of their advocacy messages,

knowledge of the target audience is critical. Each message should take into account
the interests, ideas, and knowledge of the people receiving the message. In addition
the message should be kept simple with focused supporting arguments.

When delivering the advocacy message, it is important to determine who will be the
most credible source in the eyes of the target audience. Usually a combination of
messengers might be useful—one person who knows the audience and one person
who knows the subject matter.

The following is a checklist to consider in creating advocacy messages:

• Pick the best format. What format is most likely to reach your target audience
and be the most effective at telling the story?
• Craft a good advocacy message. Has CARE staff addressed the what, why
and impact of the advocacy proposal? Has staff thought about how the
audience is likely to receive the message? Are there ways to simplify the
message?

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• Know the target audience. What does the audience already know and what
are their biases; what are their political interests?
• Check the message for clarity. Will the target audience know exactly what to
do next if they agree? Are the benefits of the proposal clear?
• Make sure that the message is credible. Does CARE have good
documentation supporting the message? Has the best messenger been
picked?
• Follow up. Respond to any concerns expressed by your audience. Has the
message been delivered more than once?

F. Building Coalitions
CARE Advocacy in Uganda
As CARE’s Advocacy Case Study on
Sudan illustrates, participation in coalitions As CARE Uganda began to
operationalize the rights-based
is one way for CARE to be more effective in approach, the mission was concerned
advocacy. By working cooperatively, each about how advocacy efforts would be
organization benefits from the others’ perceived and whether or not CARE
comparative advantage, avoiding staff would be put in harms way as a
duplication of efforts and more efficiently result of confronting corruption and
using limited resources (Johnson and Start, vested interest.
2001). Coalitions are particularly useful
when they bring together various groups CARE Uganda decided to design its
and constituencies for the first time, or in advocacy efforts by first working on
new ways. Coalitions can also help different issues that were “closer to home,” such
as promoting social and economic
groups agree on their positions before
rights in sectors that CARE had worked
approaching their target audiences.
extensively with in the past and
working in coalitions so as to not work
Coalitions, unlike partnerships, may be on confrontational advocacy issues
short-term arrangements. Typically alone.
coalitions form around a particular issue or From Rand, 2002
set of advocacy goals. When the issue has
been resolved, the coalition may dissolve,
or may choose to focus on other issues for which members have an interest in
working (Sprechmann and Pelton, 2001). It is important to keep in mind that
coalitions are not always the best strategies for advocacy. Coalitions are only
effective when their members can truly agree on their goals. Many coalitions fail
because they do not reach consensus on strategy, purpose, or how to share credit.

Before devising an advocacy strategy and building a new coalition, it is advisable to

see what others are already doing. The following are key questions for determining
whether CARE would want to join an existing coalition:

• Do the other member organizations have a good reputation? Will an

association with them hurt CARE in the eyes of the target audience?
• Who is in charge of the coalition? Do they have good leadership skills? Can
CARE work with them?
• What is the purpose, advocacy strategy, and approach of the coalition? Is
there a strong consensus on these members among the members?
• Do the members of the coalition have good relationships?

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• Does the coalition have the resources it needs to carry out its agenda? What
kind of resource requirement is required of CARE?
• What role is being offered to CARE as a coalition member? Who in CARE will
attend the meetings?

Building a new coalition is a considerable task. CARE country offices must first
consider whether or not they have the time, energy and commitment required to
undertake this endeavor.

When forming a coalition, make sure that careful thought is given to who is invited to
join but also who might be left out. It is all
Coalition-Building
too easy to make an enemy by excluding
someone from the group. When building a coalition there are a
number of actions that can help CARE
Linking Chronic Vulnerability and maintain coherence and success.
Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers These include:
(PRSPs). Working in coalitions with other
partners, CARE needs to advocate that risk • Seek opportunities to build trust and
and vulnerability issues need to be at the confidence among members.
core of the PRSP and Highly Indebted Poor • Decide how to share credit--agree on
Countries (HIPC) Initiatives. Such advocacy procedures that will allow members
efforts would include identifying the to participate and share in any public
potential livelihood gains from the creation benefits that result from the coalitions
activities.
and reform of social safety net programs
• Agree on goals immediately.
that reduce risk and vulnerability. Sector
• Stay focused on what forms the
strategies also need to mainstream issues
coalition’s common advocacy
of risk and vulnerability. In addition, inter- agenda.
and intra-sector expenditure allocations • Establish structure through creating
which protect public spending on basic roles and leadership responsibilities.
education, health and other services utilized • Be consistent concerning who is
primarily by the poor are important to authorized to speak on behalf of
building the asset base of the poor and CARE.
reducing risk in the future. Finally, for poor
households living in inadequately serviced rural areas of Africa, it has been
demonstrated that investments in infrastructure, communications, transportation and
storage strengthen market linkages and reduce transaction costs. Given the direct
and indirect risk reducing benefits of these investments, undertaking such rural
infrastructure projects is important even if unit costs are higher than for comparable
investments in areas that already have access to markets (World Bank 2001).

G. Operational Considerations for Advocacy and the Rights-Based Approach

In an effort to operationalize the rights-based approach and undertake advocacy,

CARE must be aware of both the opportunities and the risks associated with moving
towards this new paradigm.

Obtaining Information. In order to get at a contextual understanding of political

capital, discrimination, or marginalization, CARE will need different ways to collect
information since much of this information may be contentious and people will not

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always be truthful about it. Key informants that are knowledgeable about these
power issues may have to be interviewed in private settings so that their safety is not
compromised. Community participation may not get at the issues.

Risk of Conflict. Many of these power relationships will be threatened by the kinds
of empowerment activities that CARE will promote. Conflict and violence will likely be
possible outcomes in the transition process, especially if the status quo is being
challenged. How much conflict is acceptable to bring about changes in poor peoples
rights? The use of risk management tactics will be required to deal with potential
political sensitivities or backlash, and CARE needs to ensure that as a result of
advocacy efforts, beneficiaries are not met with undue harm.

Factoring in Corruption. Corruption is often not factored into project designs. To

take it out of the assumption box and actually create designs with corruption
explicitly acknowledged involves a good analysis of corruption, a topic that can put
CARE staff or consultants in harm’s way.

Inequality Among Poor. Much of the rights abuses involve poor people that have
allegiance to powerful elites attacking or abusing other poor people. Thus it is
important to understand this differentiation among the poor when doing program
design. Some poor are more equal than others. Additionally, poor people have
competing solidarities that may make it difficult to organize large groups (Johnson
and Start 2001).

Long-Term Commitment. Some of the rights-based issues will not change quickly,
especially if they are imbedded in cultural tradition. What are the constraints facing
CARE in the ability to do longer-range programming? Does priority go to those
advocacy issues that will result in more immediate change? How can CARE work
with donors to take into consideration the need for longer-term programming?

Resources

To access documents on the CD, click the text next to the Acrobat Reader
symbol.

Tools

CARE Advocacy Tools and Guidelines: Promoting Policy Change- A Resource

Manual for CARE Program Managers
Spechman and Pelton. 2001.
Chapters 1-4
Chapters 5-7
Chapters 8-10

CARE Benefits-Harms Handbook

O’Brien. 2001
Handbook Tools

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 Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Facilitation Manual
Workbook
Workbook Appendices

Institute for Development Research (IDR)

Charting Advocacy Impact
Guidelines for Developing Policy Advocacy Campaigns
12 Steps for Developing a Policy Advocacy Campaign.
Organizational Diagnosis for Advocacy

Concept Papers

Rights, Claims and Capture: Understanding the Politics of Pro-Poor Policy.

Johnson, C. and D. Start. 2001. Overseas Development Institute.

Improving Policy Analysis and Management for Poverty Reduction in Sub-

Saharan Africa: Creating an Effective Learning Community.
Bennel, P. et al. 2001. Poverty Reduction Learning Network Interim Steering
Committee

Case Studies

Bringing a New Dimension to CARE’s Programs: Advocacy Experiences in

Nicaragua, Ecuador, Philippines, and Sudan.
CARE. 2000. Policy and Advocacy Unit: CARE USA. Atlanta.

Bibliography

Beckwith, C. 2000. The integration of important dimensions embedded within the

household livelihood security framework. CARE memo. Atlanta, CARE.

Bennel, P. et al. 2001. Improving Policy Analysis and Management for Poverty
Reduction in Sub-Saharan Africa: Creating an Effective Learning Community.
CARE. 2001. Benefits-Harms Handbook. Nairobi.

CARE. 2000. Bringing a New Dimension to CARE’s Programs: Advocacy

Experiences in Nicaragua, Ecuador, Philippines, and Sudan. Policy and Advocacy
Unit: CARE USA. Atlanta.

Curry-Smith, C. 2000. 12 Steps for Developing a Policy Advocacy Campaign. School

for International Training.

Curry-Smith, C. 2000. Guidelines for Developing Policy Advocacy Campaigns.

School for International Training.

Ellis, F. and J. Seeley. 2001. Globalization and Sustainable Livelihoods: An Initial

Note. Department for International Development. Background Briefing.

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Managing Risk, Improving Livelihoods

Frankenberger, T. and B. Cogill. 2001. A New NGO Development Paradigm:

Combining Rights-Based Approaches with Livelihood Approaches to Address
Nutritional Insecurity. Paper presented at the 17th International Congress of Nutrition.
August 26-31, 2001. Vienna.

Institute for Development Research. Advocacy Handbook: Organizational Diagnosis

for Advocacy.

Institute for Development Research. Advocacy Handbook: Charting Advocacy

Impact- Version 1 and Version 2.

Johnson, C. and D. Start. 2001. Rights, Claims and Capture: Understanding the
Politics of Pro-Poor Policy. Overseas Development Institute. London.

Jones, A. 2002. Frequently Asked Questions About Adoption of a Rights-Based

Approach. (April, Draft). CARE. Atlanta.

Leonhardt, M. 1999. Improving Capacities and Procedures for Formulating and

Implementing Effective Conflict Prevention Strategies- An Overview of Recent Donor
Initiatives. Development and Peacebuilding Programme. International Alert. London.

O’Brien, P. 2002. Advocacy: Developing an Advocacy Strategy. PowerPoint

Presentation.

Offenheiser, R. and S. Holcombe. 2001. Challenges and Opportunities of

Implementing a Rights-Based Approach to Development: An Oxfam America
Perspective. Paper presented at the Northern Relief and Develop NGOs: New
Directions in Poverty Alleviation and Global Leadership Transitions. July 2-4, 2001.
Oxford.

Rand, J. (2002). CARE’s Experience With Adoption of Rights-Based Approach: Five

Case Studies. CARE USA. Atlanta.

Schafer, J. 2001. Supporting Livelihood in Situations of Chronic Political Instability.

Overseas Development Institute. London.

Sprechmann, S. and E. Pelton. 2001. Advocacy Tools and Guidelines: Promoting

Policy Change. A Resource Manual for CARE Program Managers. CARE. Atlanta.

World Bank. 2001. Dynamic Risk Management and the Poor: Developing a Social
Protection Strategy for Africa. Africa Region Human Development Department.
Washington, D.C.

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