This report reviews the relationship between social cohesion and state fragility – focusing on literature from 2010 onwards. There is no clear empirical understanding in the literature of how social cohesion contributes to state resilience or fragility, as it is very difficult to measure, and to assess independently other variables that impact on state fragility. Key points ...» more
State-society relations
Citizens’ role in political settlements
Political settlement literature focuses predominantly on elites, with citizens often seen as passive beneficiaries or potential spoilers. However, emerging literature on the role of civil society in peace processes identifies roles that citizens have played and can play, in creating and maintaining what are essentially political settlements. This report outlines the concept of ...» more
Democratic governance initiatives – policy advocacy
It appears that there are many descriptive case studies of civil society advocacy campaigns to strengthen democratic governance, but few publicly available evaluations of the international interventions to provide support to these campaigns and the civil society organisations (CSOs) involved. Some studies do mention links between the policy advocacy initiatives and poverty ...» more
Democratic governance initiatives civic education and media
This rapid review synthesises the findings of successful democratic governance interventions supporting civic education and a free and independent media. The choice of cases to include has been limited as not many evaluations of civic education and media initiatives are publicly available. Moreover it has been challenging to find evaluations that explore the link between these ...» more
Addressing high rates of public service absenteeism
Absenteeism affects a number of different sectors, but literature on public service absenteeism focuses predominantly on health and education. Notably, in recently published literature, there are a number of studies using randomised control trials to test interventions designed to address absenteeism. This helpdesk research report identifies and synthesises the findings of key ...» more