This paper analyses how inequalities, violent conflicts, and the relation between them, are holding back development, adding to the arguments for addressing them in the post-2015 framework.
The paper reviews evidence that various inequalities – economic, political, cultural, gender and those related to security, justice and social services – can heighten group grievances and lead to conflict in diverse contexts around the world.
Key findings:
- Various inequalities – economic, political, cultural, gender and those related to security, justice and social services – can heighten group grievances and lead to conflict in diverse contexts around the world. There is considerable consensus among different policy communities that not only providing social services, but also and crucially ensuring fair access to them among different groups in society, is a key priority for conflict prevention, violence reduction and sustainable peacebuilding.
- “Horizontal inequalities,” as defined by Frances Stewart refers to “severe inequalities between culturally defined groups”. These types of inequalities are different from the “normal definition of inequality which lines individuals up vertically and measures inequality over the range of individuals”. There are several types of horizontal inequalities (HIs). The first is economic, which includes “inequalities in access to, use of and ownership of assets – financial, human, and social or natural resources – and inequalities in income levels and employment opportunities”. The second is social, which consists of inequalities in access to a range of services, such as education, health care and housing. The third type is political, which considers the distribution of political power and access to political participation. Fourth, horizontal inequalities can relate to cultural aspects and disparities in the recognition and standing of different groups’ language, religion, customs, norms and practices and finally, there can be inequalities in access to security and justice.
- There are important reasons to include inequalities into the post-2015 framework, including the strong evidence that horizontal inequalities are important drivers of violent conflict. Horizontal inequalities increase the risk of violent conflict, and violence and conflict can worsen inequalities. Ways in which inequalities can be included into the post-2015 framework include: equality can be recognized as one of the guiding principles underpinning the whole framework; one or more goals can specifically focus on inequality, for example by type of inequality (social equality, economic equality, political equality), similar to MDG3 on gender equality; inequalities could be integrated as a concern into goals and targets on different sectoral/thematic issues (politics, security, justice, health, education, poverty), through language that upholds inclusion, fairness, responsiveness and accountability to all social groups throughout the framework; indicators can be better disaggregated by more categories to show attainment of development benefits by different groups within society, and an inequality measure could be added for each indicator; progress towards goals can be weighted to ensure that progress on inequality scores higher.
- To overcome the paucity of disaggregated data in existing measurement frameworks, civil society organizations have argued that one way to prioritize cross-sectoral progress on inequality within the post-2015 framework would be to ensure any indicators used to measure progress are disaggregated (by sex, age, geography, identity and income), to analyse the fairness of access to resources, services and benefits. Examples of quantitative surveys that are disaggregated in this way in conflict-affected and fragile-contexts demonstrate that it is practically possible to extend disaggregation and that costs need not be prohibitive.
