The guide offers a set of basic guidelines on how to be accountable to local people and measure programme impact in emergency situations and contains a variety of tools on needs assessment and profiling. Its 'good enough' approach emphasises simple and practical solutions and encourages the user to choose tools that are safe, quick, and easy to implement.
This paper reviews emergency livelihoods assessment approaches in situations of chronic conflict and political instability (SCCPI). Approaches are reviewed using an adapted livelihoods framework and an analysis of what happens to livelihoods in chronic conflict and political instability. It also examines how a livelihoods analysis can add to the identification of appropriate interventions to address protracted risks to livelihoods. The overall aim is to contribute to better understanding of the problems faced by populations in chronic conflict and political instability, and to find ways of protecting livelihoods to more effectively save lives and reduce future vulnerability.
Research about children's lives conducted in the volatile setting of armed conflict places particular demands upon researchers. The suggestion that researchers should, whenever possible and appropriate, involve children as meaningful participants in that research may seem unreasonable or inappropriate. However, the production of this paper has been motivated by the conviction that participatory research is especially valuable because of the emergency context. Firstly, such an approach is likely to yield richer and more detailed data than a conventional, adult-led approach. These data can be invaluable to the design of interventions. Secondly, engagement in well-planned research activities can offer direct benefits for young participants by enhancing their skills and awareness. In settings of conflict where the young may be required to play an expanded role in their own protection and in the care of others, their personal development is especially important. Our aim here is to equip researchers to most safely and profitably pursue participatory research with children and, to that end, we explore the specific conceptual, ethical and methodological issues concerned.
This paper considers the situation of youth and adolescents affected by war and displacement throughout the world, and provides a summary of the key issues to be explored with regards to their protection. It draws upon insights and experience from researchers, practitioners and war-affected young people themselves in an attempt to better understand the challenges they face during war and the resulting implications for policy and practice.
The report: presents an analysis of vocational training (VT) programming and the actors involved in northern Uganda; offers VT providers concrete recommendations for programming at each stage in the VT cycle, including best practices and lessons learned; and guides VT programs and youth participants through a market-assessment and self-assessment to integrate market information into program design and create links between VT and the private sector.
Livelihoods programming is gaining increasing attention in Northern Uganda as the region transitions from an emergency situation to an early recovery environment. For many youth, vocational training is at the crossroads of livelihoods support, economic recovery, education, and rehabilitation and reintegration. Our report (forthcoming May 2008) will aim to provide program planners with relevant tools and concrete recommendations for incorporating economic planning into vocational training through thoughtful engagement of youth in decision-making about vocational training, market analysis, pre- and post-training market linkages and integration with the private sector.
This paper explores the nature of the violence that characterises complex humanitarian emergencies and the related implications for modelling livelihoods systems. While noting the importance of livelihoods approaches in complex humanitarian emergencies, it deliberates the limitations of sustainable livelihoods frameworks when applied in environments marked by protracted instability. Adaptations to the model are discussed, with a particular focus on the relationships among violence, assets and liabilities within livelihoods systems. Political economy of violence theories intimate that the assets on which livelihoods systems are constructed in peaceful times may instead become life-and livelihood-threatening liabilities in periods of conflict. Adaptations to livelihood systems in violent settings require that analysts consider violence from policy, institutional and process perspectives. It is suggested that vulnerability should be re-conceptualised as endogenous to livelihoods systems in violent settings. Building on the work of others, a livelihoods model adapted for complex humanitarian emergencies is presented.
This Progress Note explores the key ingredients to the success of microfinance programs in conflict and post-conflict environments.
Presents an update of the various research projects currently underway in the Feinstein International Center at Tufts University. Includes research on humanitarian assistance, impact assessment, conflict-affected regions, livelihoods, youth, and child protection, among other subjects
In complex humanitarian emergencies, the need to provide live-saving support often masks another essential need: to protect or restore livelihoods. This online discussion forum looked at the reasons for and role of a livelihoods approach in conflict and fragile states and address approaches to providing this support in a context of conflict or fragility.
