The failure of livelihoods can contribute to conflict by weakening society’s social fabric and forcing people to resort to violence in order to obtain necessary resources. This toolkit, published by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), examines the relationship between conflict and livelihoods and presents lessons learned from programmes promoting sustainable livelihoods. Rebuilding infrastructures and agricultural inventories, fostering market linkages and rebuilding trust among agricultural communities all constitute legitimate livelihood programmes.
Livelihoods are the means by which households obtain and maintain access to resources for survival. These resources include physical, natural, human, financial, social and political. Households use these assets to increase their ability to withstand shocks and manage risks that threaten their well-being.
Conflict can be triggered by competition for scarce resources, ethnic/religious tensions, competition over political power and dissatisfaction on the part of marginalised groups. Other factors include attempts by the state to subjugate groups or extract resources from areas where there are competing claims. People affected by conflict have two overriding concerns: surviving immediate physical threats and overcoming long-term threats to their livelihoods.
Effective livelihood programming in conflict situations requires creative thinking, flexibility, an understanding of specific conflict dynamics and recognition of the conflict’s local impact. The following recommended initiatives offer lessons for action on promoting livelihoods during conflict:
- Promote resilience at the local level. Find ways to support individual household survival strategies before households become destitute. Production of a programme-specific livelihood analysis is an important first step.
- Promote peacebuilding and reconciliation. Building on people’s efforts to protect and strengthen their livelihoods complements conflict resolution efforts.
- Use livelihood support to identify and counteract state weakness. Livelihoods analysis can reveal areas where institutions and services are not functioning or are absent. Consider providing assistance to supply livelihoods services the state is not providing.
- Where state legitimacy is absent, work with trusted local actors. Religious groups, parent-teacher and women’s associations, local chambers of commerce and non-governmental organisations are often better vehicles for livelihood support than state institutions.
- Develop gender-focused programming to support women, who often assume the role of primary breadwinner in times of conflict.
- Build linkages through the informal economy to support economic activity that emerges in unstable settings when formal markets collapse. Support livelihood efforts for populations displaced by conflict.
The following programmes illustrate the variety of programmes that help provide sustainable livelihoods:
- Programmes in Bosnia, Sierra Leone, Angola, Kosovo and Somalia helped restock livestock inventories and re-build trust and dialogue among agricultural communities.
- Programmes in Colombia and Tajikistan restored health and educational services to displaced communities and rehabilitated physical infrastructures.
- A gender relations project in Rwanda helped rebuild post-genocide communities.
- A project in Southern Sudan fostered economic and market linkages by improving seed production and reconstructing market roads.
- Projects in Northern Iraq, Kosovo and Colombia provided livelihood support to displaced populations by providing food and shelter and reconstructing villages destroyed by war.
