This study departs from the dominant understanding that weak state capacity, legitimacy or will to deliver basic services underpins fragility and argues that fragility is also about relationships between state and society and within society. These relationships occur in a non-linear continuum which, when understood, can inform interventions that can help prevent societies from slipping towards greater fragility and violent conflict. Evidence suggests social cohesion is key to improving state-society relationship, and ultimately into sustained development progress.
This study draws on background papers, political economy analyses for Liberia, Central African Republic, Yemen, Indonesia and Haiti and fieldwork. It involved donors, academics and expert practitioners. Social cohesion is understood as the overall quality of relationships across groups.
To address fragility, one has to look at both state capacity and the quality of societal dynamics. The state is not always the only, nor the most powerful, actor. A variety of societal actors, including the state, compete for power and authority in setting rules of behaviour, meeting the needs of the population, and exerting a monopoly on violence. Understood in this way, effective state institutions are the product of a high quality state-society relationship. In many countries, colonial history has complicated this relationship. In response states have attempted to create collective consciousness based on religion or development-related ideologies.
Building social cohesion is crucial for reducing fragility. However a number of factors threaten this:
- When groups perceive that they are being treated unfairly, they may feel little inclination to build any kind of relationships with other groups. These perceptions may correspond to measurable inequalities across groups and the feeling of being disrespected by other groups. The absence of the state can heighten societal fractions, however the state also has most direct influence through distribution of resources; evidence suggests that land- and water- related issues tend to be important for people, as are security and conflict resolution. How these resources are distributed can have significant ramifications for citizens’ perceptions of social justice.
- Rigid relationships in a society that cannot adapt to rapid social change, driven by globalisation, urbanisation and technological innovations, can create new perceived injustices between various groups in society.
- Quality of institutions matters more than their effectiveness. When institutions work well together, they can provide safe spaces for interests to converge across groups. Convergence between groups requires a need to believe that is better to collaborate than to compete, trust in the system and longevity.
Supporting growth and poverty reduction will not succeed if it does not also contribute to improved cohesion. Social cohesion should be a clear objective of social development policies and extend beyond donors to governments and civil society. This focus should:
- be grounded in contextual research that explores what is considered fair and just.
- involve integrated, rather than sectoral, approaches that can better address the macro-level complexity of societal dynamics. A problem-orientated approach that starts with the daily issues that people are facing.
- create positive interactions between institutions, and for healing inter-group tensions. For example, focusing less on service delivery and more on strengthening local governance and supporting local level institutions.
- understand CDD as an integral aspect of building trust and creating a sense of justice, rather than as a project implementation mechanism.
- recognise that using civil society organisations to deliver services can affect their ability to connect individuals and groups, and risks them being co-opted.
- accept a certain level of hybridity. The first question to ask when designing culturally appropriate measures is: What are the types of problems obtaining access to justice that people here face?
