Defining Disaster Resilience:
A DFID Approach Paper
Ethiopia: camels replacing cattle
While cattle and goats become emaciated in times of drought and no longer produce milk,
camels are capable of surviving long periods without water and their milk provides a crucial
source of nutrition. By herding camels, pastoralists are adapting and maintaining their traditional
way of life.
Picture: Tim Waites/DFID
2
Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
CONTENTS
Contents
Foreword
4
1. Introduction
5
2. What is disaster resilience?
6
2.1 Defining resilience
6
2.2 How resilient is a country, community or household?
7
3. What do DFID disaster resilience programmes look like?
10
3.1 Conflict and fragility
10
3.2 Resilience-building interventions
11
3.3 Cost-effectiveness of building resilience to disasters
13
4. How will DFID take disaster resilience forward?
14
5. What can DFID contribute to the disaster resilience agenda?
16
Annex 1: Useful reading
18
Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
3
FOREWORD
Foreword
In 2010 natural disasters affected more than 200 million, killed nearly 270,000 people and
caused $110 billion in damages. In 2011, we faced the first famine of the 21st Century in
parts of the Horn of Africa and multiple earthquakes, tsunamis and other natural disasters
across the world. The World Bank predicts that the frequency and intensity of disasters will
continue to increase over the coming decades.
The June 2011 UK Government Response to the Humanitarian Emergency Response
Review presented disaster resilience as ‘a new and vital component [of our] humanitarian
and development work.’1 Building on this, the UK Government’s Humanitarian Policy,
Saving lives, preventing suffering and building resilience, puts resilience at the centre of
our approach to addressing disasters, both natural and man-made. This includes
commitments to embed resilience-building in all DFID country programmes by 2015,
integrate resilience into our work on climate change and conflict prevention and improve
the coherence of our development and humanitarian work.
Bangladesh: small changes make a big difference
The women in this photo are trained in how to feed, house and prevent disease among their ducks.
Small changes, like rearing ducks instead of chickens, will help families to maintain a livelihood during
the monsoon season.
Picture: Zul Mukhida/Practical Action.
1
www.dfid.gov.uk/Documents/publications1/hum-emer-resp-rev-uk-gvmt-resp.pdf?epslanguage=en
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Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
INTRODUCTION
1. Introduction
Adopting resilience as our core approach to tackling disasters means identifying where
different areas of our work can complement and enhance one another. This includes
disaster risk reduction, climate change adaptation, social protection, working in fragile
contexts and humanitarian preparedness and response. We will start by focusing on the
key challenges: the need for common analysis that supports a coherent approach to risk;
financing mechanisms that allow early, predictable and sustained commitments; early
warning systems that lead to early action; political commitment among governments in
countries at risk of disasters and donor agencies; and a stronger interface between
development and humanitarian actors.
Disaster resilience draws together several strands of DFID’s work, and in the wake of the
ongoing global financial crisis has become a concern at the highest level. Increasing efforts
are being made in social protection, disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation,
aiming to build the resilience of poor and vulnerable communities in developing countries.
There is increasing attention being paid to issues such as the resilience of macroeconomic
growth2 and ‘crisis-proofing’ progress towards the MDGs3. At the same time, there has
been a growing interest in how principles of resilience can be employed in conflict-affected
and fragile states.4
This Approach Paper is intended to inform the next phase of DFID’s work on resilience to
both natural and man-made disasters,5 by providing a starting point for discussion within
the Department and with our partners. Although the focus is on disasters, this is part of a
wider process to mainstream resilience across all of DFID’s work which is being led by
Policy Division.
The paper begins with an outline of what resilience is and sets out a framework to improve
understanding of the different elements to be considered in building resilience through
DFID’s country operations. It then looks at a range of existing DFID resilience interventions
at country and regional levels. The paper concludes by providing suggestions for what
DFID can do to strengthen its work in this area and how it can provide strategic leadership
across the international system.
2
www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/survey/so/2010/car051710a.htm
ec.europa.eu/development/icenter/repository/COMM_NATIVE_SEC_2009_0445_4_MDGS_EN.pdf
4
See 2009 European Development Report Background Paper:
erd.eui.eu/media/BackgroundPapers/ERD-Background_Paper-Kaplan.pdf
5
This Approach Paper is based on a small-scale research process conducted in July 2011, with some 30 DFID staff
and representatives of external partners consulted, and over 50 documents, books and reports reviewed. Details of
external experts and essential documents can be found in Annex 1.
3
Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
5
WHAT IS DISASTER RESILIENCE?
2. What is disaster resilience?
2.1 Defining resilience
Resilience is the focus of a large and growing body of research. This work has sought to
understand what the properties are that make a country, community or household resilient,
to establish the principles and processes which strengthen resilience and to build the
evidence for what projects and programmes really make people better able to withstand
and recover from disasters. As a result of the research and its applications, the term
resilience has acquired a range of definitions. Three widely cited examples are set out
below6.
Definitions of resilience
“The ability of a system, community or society exposed to hazards to resist, absorb,
accommodate to and recover from the effects of a hazard in a timely and efficient manner”
United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction
“The ability of a social or ecological system to absorb disturbances while retaining the
same basic structure and ways of functioning, the capacity for self-organisation, and the
capacity to adapt to stress and change”
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
“The capacity of a system to absorb disturbance and reorganize while undergoing change”
The Resilience Alliance
DFID has adopted a working definition:
Disaster Resilience is the ability of countries, communities and households to
manage change, by maintaining or transforming living standards in the face of
shocks or stresses - such as earthquakes, drought or violent conflict - without
compromising their long-term prospects.
This has been designed to support our latest thinking on resilience. It is intended to
provide part of the basis for discussion, both internally and with our partners.
Consequently, we are open to it developing and changing as these discussions progress.
6
For a more detailed discussion of different definitions and implications see the 2010 DFID funded report:
The Resilience Renaissance community.eldis.org/.59e0d267/resilience-renaissance.pdf
6
Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
WHAT IS DISASTER RESILIENCE?
2.2 How resilient is a country, community or
household?
Determining levels of resilience is an important part of understanding the concept. And
most definitions of resilience share four common elements which can be used to do this:
context; disturbance; capacity; and reaction. Together these elements form a resilience
framework (see below) which can be used to examine different kinds of resilience (for
example, of growth or of governance systems) and help determine the level of resilience
that exists.
The four elements of a resilience framework
1. Context
2. Disturbance
e.g. social group,
region, institution.
e.g. natural
hazard, conflict,
insecurity, food
shortage, high fuel
prices.
Shocks
3. Capacity
to deal with
disturbance
Exposure
4. Reaction to
disturbance
e.g. Survive, cope,
recover, learn,
transform.
Bounce
back
better
Bounce
back
System
or
Process
Sensitivity
Stresses
Adaptive
capacity
Recover
but
worse
than
before
Collapse
Resilience of
what?
Resilience to
what?
The framework above is a simplified representation of the elements to be considered when
examining resilience. In practice the picture is more complex: the response curve could be
slow and uneven due to, for example, the political context, secondary shocks or lack of
information. Stresses can be cumulative, building slowly to become a shock, and both
shocks and stresses may result in a number of different reactions.
Each element of the resilience framework is explored below with specific reference to
disaster resilience.
Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
7
WHAT IS DISASTER RESILIENCE?
Context
Resilience should always be clearly contextualised – allowing a coherent answer to the
question ‘resilience of what?’ Resilience can be identified and strengthened in a social
group, socio-economic or political system, environmental context or institution. Each of
these systems will display greater or lesser resilience to natural or man-made disasters.
More work is needed to differentiate the significance of resilience for different social
groups, resources and institutions across a range of different contexts.
Disturbance
Once the system or process of interest is determined, the next stage is to understand the
disturbances faced, addressing the question ‘resilience to what?’ These disturbances
usually take two forms:
Shocks are sudden events that impact on the vulnerability of the system and its
components. There are many different types of disaster-related shocks that can strike
at different levels. These include disease outbreaks, weather-related and geophysical
events including floods, high winds, landslides, droughts or earthquakes. There can
also be conflict-related shocks such as outbreaks of fighting or violence, or shocks
related to economic volatility.
Stresses are long-term trends that undermine the potential of a given system or
process and increase the vulnerability of actors within it. These can include natural
resource degradation, loss of agricultural production, urbanisation, demographic
changes, climate change, political instability and economic decline.
Of course, countries will often face multiple interconnected shocks and stresses.
Capacity to deal with disturbance
The ability of the system or process to deal with the shock or stress is based on the levels
of exposure, the levels of sensitivity and adaptive capacities.
Exposure to risk is an assessment of the magnitude and frequency of shocks or the
degree of stress. For example, exposure to conflicts could be measured by the size
and frequency of violent events caused by conflict or fragility, or the extent of political
instability in other factors such as rule of law or human rights.
Sensitivity is the degree to which a system will be affected by, or respond to, a given
shock or stress. This can vary considerably for different actors within a system. For
example, women accounted for up to 80% of those who died during the 2004 Indian
Ocean tsunami, and death rates among women were almost four times higher than
those among men in the 1991 Bangladesh cyclone. Limited mobility, skills set and
social status exacerbated sensitivity to the shock.
The adaptive capacities of actors – individuals, communities, regions, governments,
organisations or institutions – are determined by their ability to adjust to a disturbance,
moderate potential damage, take advantage of opportunities and cope with the
consequences of a transformation. Adaptive capacities allow actors to anticipate, plan,
react to, and learn from shocks or stresses.
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Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
WHAT IS DISASTER RESILIENCE?
Sensitivity and adaptive capacity are determined by the pool of assets and resources that
can be mobilised in the face of shocks and stresses. Assets and resources can be social,
human, technological, physical, economic, financial, environmental, natural, and political.
Whether a system or a process is resilient is a function of its sensitivity and adaptive
capacity. The other side to this is vulnerability - the degree to which a system is susceptible
to, or unable to cope with, the adverse effects of shocks and stresses.
Reaction to disturbance
In the best case, the reaction to a shock or stress might be a ‘bounce back better’ for the
system or process concerned. In this case capacities are enhanced or sensitivities and
exposures are reduced, leaving a system that is more able to deal with future shocks and
stresses (see below). An alternative reaction might be a ‘bounce back’ to a normal, preexisting condition, or to ‘recover, but worse than before’ – the latter resulting in reduced
capacities. In the worst-case scenario, the system or process might not bounce back at all,
but ‘collapse’, leading to a catastrophic reduction in capacity to cope in the future.
‘Bounce back better’
The Zambezi Floodplain Management programme in Mozambique supports vulnerable
communities to deal with persistent flooding of their farms. There has always been drought
and flooding in this area, but in the last 10 years weather patterns have become more
unpredictable. Instead of planting seeds in the main agricultural season in the lowlands,
irrigation projects encourage farmers to plant in the highlands away from the floods.
Alongside this, communities are helped to learn new skills which provide them with
alternative sources of income. Communities decide on the kinds of livelihoods they want to
develop and Save the Children provides training, technical support and funding to help
them get started. Helping communities to grow crops all year and reduce their vulnerability
to drought, whilst also diversifying livelihoods, increases their resilience to the effects of
climate change.
Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
9
WHAT DO DFID DISASTER RESILIENCE
PROGRAMMES LOOK LIKE?
3. What do DFID disaster resilience
programmes look like?
To date, many humanitarian and development interventions supported by DFID have
focused on individual elements of the resilience framework. For example, much disaster
risk reduction work has focused on reducing sensitivity and exposure to particular shocks
and stresses, while livelihoods work has focused on adaptive capacity, looking at assets
and diversification of income.
In DFID, and among its partner organisations, using resilience as a concept has enabled
stronger dialogue and cross-fertilisation of ideas between different disciplines and
programming areas. This has in some cases strengthened the harmonisation of different
kinds of programmes – especially between disaster risk reduction, social protection and
climate change adaptation (see below).7
Integration of disaster risk reduction, climate change adaptation and social
protection
Rwanda’s Vision 2020 Umurenge Program makes direct cash transfers to households
without labour, connects poor households with an able-bodied member to public works and
provides access to subsidised credit. The Vision 2020 Umurenge Program’s public works
projects are dominated by anti-erosive ditches and ‘radical’ hillside terraces which explicitly
aim at environmental protection. Such public works have clear disaster risk reduction, food
security and climate change adaptation impacts as they reduce exposure and sensitivity to
natural disasters – for example droughts and floods – improve soil productivity and
increase the amount of land that can be cultivated.
3.1 Conflict and fragility
Resilience has been applied more extensively in relation to natural disasters than to conflict
and fragility, areas to which DFID can usefully take a consolidated approach. Work by
International Alert indicates that the broader factors that enhance climate resilience are the
same as those that enhance conflict resilience – including effective governance, equity and
strong social contracts. A comprehensive approach to resilience across natural and
conflict-related areas requires a focus on strengthening institutions at national, regional and
local levels incorporating political, security, humanitarian and development considerations.8
This requires bringing together diverse disciplines, interests and groups to address the
question: “What does disaster resilience look like in our context?”
7
The view of one external expert was frequently repeated: ‘resilience can act as a boundary term which facilitates
cross-institutional and disciplinary dialogue and learning’.
8
erd.eui.eu/media/BackgroundPapers/ERD-Background_Paper-Kaplan.pdf
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Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
WHAT DO DFID DISASTER RESILIENCE
PROGRAMMES LOOK LIKE?
3.2 Resilience-building interventions
A key determinant of exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity is the set of resources
and assets that can be utilised in the face of a stress or shock. As such, resilienceenhancing activities can be usefully classified using the ‘assets pentagon’ from the
sustainable livelihoods framework – social, human, physical, financial, and natural (see
below).
Types and levels of resilience building activities9
Social/
Human
Technological/
Physical
LEVELS OF INTERVENTION
Financial /
Economic
Global / regional
National
Municipal / local
Community / household
Political
Environmental/
Natural
However, the relationship between, for example, an environmental shock or stress and an
environmental resilience intervention is not linear. Instead, as in the livelihoods approach,
the full range of asset types needs to be considered when considering a resilience
intervention.
By classifying different interventions by type and level of operation, it is possible to map the
existing portfolio of disaster resilience activities in a country or a region.
DFID programmes that build resilience to disasters
DFID is already doing valuable work in this area across a number of country and regional
offices. This spans countries such as China, Bangladesh and Ethiopia and regions such as
the Caribbean. Examples on page 12 show a range of these projects and programmes,
ranging from rural livelihoods support to regional disaster insurance mechanisms and from
pre-disaster household asset protection to housing upgrades. Interventions can also vary
in scale, from global and regional level to that of communities and households. They can
also focus on building disaster resilience before the shock or stress reaches a tipping point,
during a disaster response, or after an event.
9
www.odi.org.uk/resources/download/2339.pdf
Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
11
WHAT DO DFID DISASTER RESILIENCE
PROGRAMMES LOOK LIKE?
Examples of DFID projects on enhancing resilience to disasters
DFID Ethiopia
The Productive Safety Net Programme covers 7.8 million vulnerable people and has
helped break the need for emergency food programmes by providing people with regular
and predictable cash and food transfers. A new Risk Financing mechanism allows the
Programme to expand in times of shock. This can for example increase the period of time
over which an individual receives transfers (beyond the normal six months) or add more
people to the programme. This mechanism is integral to protecting the asset base of
households in times of shock and helps to prevent the programme from being diluted by
beneficiaries sharing their transfers with non-participating households.
DFID Bangladesh
In 2008, the UK and Bangladesh signed a five year joint agreement to tackle climate
change in which the UK committed funds to strengthen resilience to climate change. This
included introducing enhanced early warning systems, raised plinths for villages to protect
them from flooding, renovated embankments and roads, multipurpose cyclone shelters
and climate-resilient crops. In the last six years, 66,000 homes on sand islands were raised
onto earth platforms, protecting more than 400,000 people and their possessions from
severe monsoon floods.
DFID Africa Regional Department
DFID is supporting the design and implementation of the Africa Risk Capacity, which will
establish a pan-African disaster risk pool for food security. The initiative will provide
participating countries with effective financial tools and funds to manage the risk of and
respond to extreme weather events. The mechanism is being led by the Africa Union and
the design phase managed by World Food Programme.
DFID Pakistan
DFID is supporting the mainstreaming of disaster risk reduction in school recovery
programmes by the Health and Nutrition Development Society, Save the Children and
others. This includes developing safety plans in schools, direct work with communities on
awareness and training for how to respond to disasters. It also includes working with
farmers to plant seeds resilient to flooding, mapping community vulnerabilities and
providing flood-resistant seed storage so that communities can maintain food selfsufficiency and support to CARE and the Agency for Technical Cooperation and
Development to build flood-resistant houses.
These examples indicate a range of interventions which aim to ‘reduce vulnerability to
disaster as a primary objective of the programme.’10 Many of these interventions are
specifically targeted at addressing resilience to particular kinds of shocks and stresses.
However, some programming – such as building education or health systems – might seek
to enhance resilience more generally.
10
Andrew Clayton, Africa Resilience Note
12
Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
WHAT DO DFID DISASTER RESILIENCE
PROGRAMMES LOOK LIKE?
3.3 Cost-effectiveness of building disaster resilience
Evidence on the cost-effectiveness of resilience-building activities is lacking in many areas.
While economic appraisals of some aspects of resilience, such as community- based
disaster risk reduction activities, have been carried out, other areas of resilience have had
less cost-benefit analysis. More research is needed on the complementarities between
strengthening disaster resilience and other development goals and on the costeffectiveness of individual investments, different financing arrangements and leveraging
private sector financing. More work is also needed to set out the wider economic and
financial evidence that could be used in support of more effective investment in disaster
resilience to incentivise donors, partner governments, multilaterals and implementing
agencies.
Kenya: cash for work
UK aid is helping provide a long-term ‘Safety Net’ programme to help people adapt and minimise
the impact of drought. This includes providing regular work and secure income so families and
communities can be better prepared to cope with future shocks and disasters.
Picture: Thomas Omondi.
Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
13
HOW WILL DFID TAKE DISASTER
RESILIENCE FORWARD
4. How will DFID take disaster
resilience forward?
Previous mainstreaming efforts in DFID suggest that the priority country approach, to
which the UK Government committed itself in its Response to the Humanitarian
Emergency Response Review, is an appropriate one. The first round of priority countries,
where work on resilience is already underway, consists of Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi,
Mozambique, Bangladesh and Nepal. In Pakistan, Niger, Chad, South Sudan, Zimbabwe
and Burma, work to incorporate resilience is important but may include working through
partners.
The commitment to embed resilience in all DFID country programmes by 2015 requires the
development of a timetable punctuated by measurable milestones. Implementation in
country programmes should build on current activity and capacities and be tailored to the
country context. In some country offices resilience will be mainstreamed through all sectors
and programmes, in others it may be more appropriate to initially limit resilience-building to
a particular sector or to embed resilience into specific projects and programmes. As better
awareness and experience is developed, offices will mainstream resilience more widely
and ensure that as a minimum requirement, no programming undermines resilience.
There are further measures to be taken to meet the commitment to embed resilience in all
DFID country programmes by 2015. We will:
1. Compile details of interventions that have successfully built disaster resilience in DFID
countries and regions;
2. Develop minimum progress indicators for embedding resilience which all countries
should meet as a 2015 objective. This process of determining appropriate indicators
should be led by Country Offices and supported by regional departments and head
office.
3. Share experiences and ideas across countries and regions. This will help to strengthen
and accelerate the process and build the evidence base and business case for
resilience-related investments. This might usefully include the establishment of a global
resilience network to make links at country and regional levels.
A set of principles, which can be expanded upon through dialogue within DFID and with
partners, should guide DFID in meeting its disaster resilience commitments.
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Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
HOW WILL DFID TAKE DISASTER
RESILIENCE FORWARD
Principles for enhancing disaster resilience
DFID’s resilience-building activities will:
Be anchored in national and local actors’ realities and contexts;
Be shaped by local understanding and priorities – taking a tailored approach to both
the specific Context and the Disturbance;
Be owned at country level, in accordance with the Paris Declaration;
Be iterative and flexible, with regular adaptations, revisions and check-backs;
Understand and plan for the fact that women, children, older and disabled people and
politically marginalised groups are disproportionally impacted;
Take multi-sectoral, multi-disciplinary approaches that bring together development and
humanitarian efforts and that establish common ground between climate change
adaptation, social protection, disaster risk reduction and work in fragile states;
Be long-term and collaborative, building on local relations and new partnerships;
Be consistent with international and national commitments such as Hyogo, state and
peace building;
Ensure that overall the intervention/response does not undermine resilience.
Nepal: barriers to disaster
Nepal is prone to natural hazards, of which flooding is the both the most common and most
damaging. Building flood barriers from local stones, reeds and wood helps communities control
the extent to which floods affect their lives in the future.
Picture: Shradha Giri Bohora/Practical Action
Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
15
WHAT CAN DFID CONTRIBUTE TO THE
DISASTER RESILIENCE AGENDA?
5. What can DFID contribute to the
disaster resilience agenda?
There are a number of opportunities for strengthening how disaster resilience is taken
forward by the international community. DFID can play a key role in the following areas:
Financing
Financing for disaster resilience work is inadequate and unpredictable. Recent evidence
suggests that disaster risk reduction-related investments amount to only 1% of the $150
billion spent in the 20 countries that received the most humanitarian aid over the past five
years - a ‘disastrously low’ amount.11 A coalition of interested donors, working through the
Good Humanitarian Donorship initiative, might be able to work towards better, more
consistent and more predictable funding for disaster resilience. This could have both a
global dimension (for example, pooled funds) and an operational dimension (to ensure
effective resilience leadership in different disasters).
Advocacy
There is currently significant interest in the concept of resilience – this should be capitalised
upon. In the humanitarian sphere, this means different actors need to make the case for
resilience in the context of both new and ongoing emergencies. In the development
sphere, resilience – both to disasters and more generally – should feature more strongly in
the build-up to post-2015 / post-Millennium Development Goal policies.
Networks
Effective resilience-building requires better relationships between a range of actors:
national governments, civil society, municipal and local authorities, communities, the
private sector, scientists and national military and civil protection bodies. International
actors such as United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction and the World
Bank Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery are also vital players, both as
actors in their own right and as convenors.
Knowledge and evidence
Improved understanding of the processes that help to strengthen resilience at different
levels is needed to inform methodologies for monitoring and evaluating impact and
effectiveness. Research and evidence products such as case studies of resilience-related
improvements and approaches to learning are needed. Studies that analyse the costbenefits of resilience and the value for money of different types of interventions are also
needed, particularly at institutional, national and international levels.
Integration
The activities that address different aspects of resilience-building currently do so in silos,
which limits the wider benefits. Work DFID has supported on adaptive social protection
illustrates that targeted support can help break down these silos. This requires (1) research
work on the benefits of bringing approaches together, (2) practical efforts on helping
different institutions adapt to challenges of programming resilience and (3) adjustments to
11
www.globalhumanitarianassistance.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/gha-report-2011.pdf
16
Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
WHAT CAN DFID CONTRIBUTE TO THE
DISASTER RESILIENCE AGENDA?
the funding streams to ensure that resilience work does not fall through the cracks of
different funding envelopes or donors’ organisational structures. It is also important that
institutions themselves work collectively and in a cross-organisational way on resilience.
Most importantly, this agenda needs to focus on uncovering how development and
humanitarian work can complement and enhance each other. To paraphrase one of
DFID’s partners in Bangladesh: ‘disaster resilience is everyone’s business’.
Bangladesh: the lifeline of cyclone shelters
The Government of Bangladesh has built local cyclone shelters in coastal areas. They provide a
vital lifeline to villagers – and their livestock, which shelter in the open area on the ground floor
during cyclones.
Picture: Rafiqur Rahman Raqu/DFID
Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
17
ANNEX 1
Annex 1: Useful reading
Adger W.N. (2000)
Social and ecological resilience: are they related? Progress in Human Geography 24(3):
347-364.
Bahadur, A et al (2010)
The resilience renaissance? Unpacking of resilience for tackling climate change
http://community.eldis.org/.59e0d267/resilience-renaissance.pdf
Côté IM, Darling ES (2010)
Rethinking Ecosystem Resilience in the Face of Climate Change.
PLoS Biol 8(7): e1000438
Dawson, T.P., Rounsevell, M.D.A., Kluvánková-Oravská, T., Chobotová, V. & Stirling, A
(2010)
Dynamic properties of complex adaptive ecosystems: implications for the sustainability of
service provision. Biodiversity and Conservation. 19(10) 2843-2853.
Folke, C. (2006) ‘Resilience: The Emergence of a Perspective for Social-Ecological
Systems Analyses’, Global Environmental Change 16: 253–67
Holling, CS 2001. Understanding the complexity of economic, ecological and social
systems. Ecosystems 4: 390–405
Kaplan, S (2009) Enhancing resilience in fragile states European Development Report
Background Paper http://erd.eui.eu/media/BackgroundPapers/ERD-Background_PaperKaplan.pdf
Ramalingam, B et al (2008) Exploring the Science of Complexity, ODI Working Paper 285
http://www.odi.org.uk/resources/download/583.pdf
Ramalingam, B (2011) The Globalisation of Vulnerability
http://aidontheedge.info/2011/01/11/the-globalisation-of-vulnerability/
Richard J.T. Klein, Nicholls R.J., and Thomalla F (2003) Resilience to natural hazards: how
useful is the concept? Environmental hazards 5: 35-45.
Rockefeller Foundation (2009) Building Climate Change Resilience, Rockefeller
Foundation White Paper
Twigg, J. (2007) ‘Characteristics of a Disaster-resilient Community’, a guidance note to the
DFID DRR Interagency Coordination Group
18
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Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
19
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20
Defining Disaster Resilience: A DFID Approach Paper
IDS WORKING PAPER
Volume 2015 No 459
Design, Monitoring and Evaluation of
Resilience Interventions: Conceptual
and Empirical Considerations
Christophe Béné, Tim Frankenberger and Suzanne Nelson
July 2015
Disclaimer
Support for this paper was provided by Technical and Operational Performance Support (TOPS), a U.S. Agency
for International Development (USAID) programme. The authors' views expressed in this publication do not
necessarily reflect the views of the TOPS programme, USAID or of the United States Government.
www.thetopsprogram.org/about-tops
Design, Monitoring and Evaluation of Resilience Interventions: Conceptual and Empirical Considerations
Christophe Béné, Tim Frankenberger and Suzanne Nelson
First published by the Institute of Development Studies in July 2015
IDS Working Paper 459
© Institute of Development Studies 2015
ISSN: 2040-0209 ISBN: 978-1-78118-248-2
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2
Design, Monitoring and Evaluation of Resilience Interventions: Conceptual
and Empirical Considerations
Christophe Béné, Tim Frankenberger and Suzanne Nelson
Summary
As resilience programming gains more and more prominence as an approach for addressing
chronic vulnerability of populations exposed to recurrent shocks and stressors, empirical
evidence will be needed for measuring how well households, communities, and systems
manage shocks and stressors and how interventions and programmes that are designed to
strengthen these capacities, perform. However, despite progress on the conceptual side,
academics, practitioners and donors are still struggling with pragmatic issues - in particular,
how to measure, and monitor and evaluate resilience interventions. Developing a robust
resilience measurement and Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) framework is therefore a
priority. The objective of this paper is to contribute to this agenda. After reviewing some of
the progress made recently in relation to resilience measurement, the paper adopts a logical
framework (logFram) and uses both theoretical and empirical examples to present the
different components that an project M&E needs to include in order to monitor adequately
resilience.
Keywords: resilience; monitoring and evaluation; measurement; impact; assessment.
Christophe Béné worked with the Vulnerability and Poverty Reduction team at IDS for five
years (2010-2014) before joining the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT)
based in Cali, Colombia. There he works as Senior Policy Advisor in the Decision and Policy
Analysis Program (DAPA). He has over 15 years of experience in inter-disciplinary research
and advisory work focusing on poverty alleviation, vulnerability and food security, initially
through the analysis of the socio-political economy of natural resources, more recently
through resilience analysis and evaluation of vulnerability reduction programmes in relation
to disasters and climate change.
Tim Frankenberger is the President of TANGO International and a global expert on food
security, livelihood approaches and resilience. Tim has over 30 years of experience in
international development, with specialised skills in project design, M&E, and policy analysis.
He previously served as Senior Food Security Advisor and Livelihood Security Coordinator at
CARE and a farming systems research specialist at the University of Arizona. Tim has
published numerous articles on household food security and resilience. Tim’s graduate work
includes an MA as well as doctoral studies in Anthropology with a minor in Agricultural
Economics.
Suzanne Nelson is a Senior Research Scientist with TANGO International. Trained in
agronomy and plant sciences, she has many years of experience in developing countries
working in conservation and use of agro-biodiversity, natural resources management, and
community-level capacity building. Her current research focuses on resilience, adaptation to
climate change, food and livelihood security, vulnerability and poverty alleviation.
3
Contents
Summary, keywords and author notes
Acknowledgements
Acronyms
Introduction
1
3
5
5
6
What do we know about measuring resilience?
1.1 Resilience as a mean rather than an end
1.2 Resilience measurement integrated framework
1.3 Emphasis on shocks and stressors
1.4 Resilience as a combination of capacities
1.5 Certain responses can lead to undesirable outcomes
1.6 Combined effects of shocks/stressors and the responses employed to
deal with them
1.7 More than just vulnerability analysis
1.8 Resilience capacity is measured at multiple levels and scales
1.9 Building resilience capacities
7
7
8
9
9
10
2
Monitoring and evaluation of resilience interventions
2.1 Intermediate outcome indicators
2.2 Outcome indicators
2.3 Impact indicators
2.4 Shocks and stressors indicators
2.5 Data collection
2.6 Monitoring contextual changes
14
16
17
18
19
19
20
3
Conclusion
20
Annex 1 Resilience conceptual framework
Glossary
References
22
23
24
Figures
Figure 1
Figure 2
Figure 3
11
12
13
13
10
12
Figure 6
Generic theory of change of a resilience intervention
Resilience measurement integrated framework
Resilience as the result of absorptive, adaptive, and
transformative capacities
Conceptual representation of a resilience framework
Resilience capacity-mediated relationship between shock exposure
and household food insecurity (HFIAS)
Logframe for M&E of resilience programming interventions
Tables
Table 1
Coping Strategy Index (CSI)
18
Figure 4
Figure 5
7
8
14
16
4
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank Greg Collins (USAID), Mark Constas (Cornell University),
and Richard Longhurst (Institute of Development Studies) for their comments on earlier
drafts of this paper. We also thank Mark Fritzler and the Technical and Operational
Performance Support (TOPS) program for support. The paper was also informed by research
implemented under the project ‘Tangled in their own (safety)-nets? Resilience, adaptability,
and transformability of small-scale fishing communities in the face of the World fisheries
crisis’ funded by the UK DFID-ESRC joint scheme programme on Poverty Alleviation.
Acronyms
BRACED
Building Resilience and Adaptation to Climate Extremes and Disasters
CCA
Climate Change Adaptation
CES-D
Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale
CIAT
International Center for Tropical Agriculture
CSI
Coping Strategies Index
DAPA
Decision and Policy Analysis Program
DFID
UK Department for International Development
DRR
Disaster Risk Reduction
DRM
Disaster Risk Management
FEWSNET
Famine Early Warning Systems Network
FSIN
Food Security Information Network
HDDS
Household Dietary Diversity Score
HFIAS
Household Food Insecurity Access Score
HHS
Household Hunger Scale
IPC
Initial Planning Conference
M&E
Monitoring and Evaluation
NGO
Non-governmental Organisation
NSP
Nutrition Surveillance Programme
PRIME
Pastoralist Areas Resilience Improvement and Market Expansion
PTSD
Post-traumatic Stress Disorder
SIDA
Swedish International Development Cooperation
TOPS
Technical and Operational Performance Support
USAID
U.S. Agency for International Development
5
Introduction
Over the last three years, the commitment by various donors and development agencies to
support resilience-building initiatives in relation to their humanitarian and/or development
agenda has been substantial. Although a precise global figure is difficult to estimate, some
unofficial calculations suggest figures exceeding US$4-5 billion. The EU alone has
announced that it intends to mobilise €1.5 billion for resilience programming in the Sahel
between 2014 and 2020 through the 11th European Development Fund. The UK Department
for International Development (DFID) recently committed £140 million through their Building
Resilience and Adaptation to Climate Extremes and Disasters (BRACED) programme funded
under the UK's International Climate Fund. USAID, the Rockefeller Foundation, and Swedish
International Development Cooperation (SIDA) have jointly committed US$100 million
through the Global Resilience Partnership. In addition to these bilateral and multilateral
commitments, countries themselves are investing increasing amounts of their national
budgets in resilience programmes. The government of Kenya for instance has committed
US$1.6 billion (in addition to US$1.5 billion in donor commitments) through its National
Drought Management Authority. Non-governmental organisations (NGOs) are also getting
involved. More than 15 major international NGOs (including Action Aid, Christian Aid, Care
International, Concern Worldwide, Mercy Corps, Oxfam GB, Plan International, Practical
Action, Save the Children, Tearfund, and World Vision) have made resilience one of their
major programmatic priorities for the near future and have invested large amounts of human
and financial resources in interventions aimed at strengthening resilience.
Major progress has been made recently on understanding resilience in a development
context, and some consensus seems to be emerging at the international level regarding an
appropriate conceptual definition of resilience. The Resilience Measurement Technical
Working Group1, for example, defines resilience as ‘the capacity that ensures stressors and
shocks do not have long-lasting adverse development consequences’ (Constas,
Frankenberger and Hoddinott 2014a: 6). In other words, resilience is about the ability of
individuals, households, communities, institutions or higher-level systems to adequately deal
with shocks and stressors.
Despite progress on the conceptual side, academics, practitioners and donors are still
struggling with pragmatic issues - in particular, how to measure, and monitor and evaluate
resilience interventions (Vaitla et al. 2012; Béné 2013). Published highlights of the recent
international conference on resilience noted for instance: ‘questions of what to measure,
whom to measure, how often to measure, what methods to use, and at what scale are still
being debated’ (IFPRI 2014: 7). Yet the issue is important. Without being able to measure
resilience, policy-makers, donors, implementing partners and other stakeholders, will not be
in a position to identify and support interventions that have the most positive effect on
people’s ability to respond to and accommodate adverse events. Developing an operational
resilience measurement and M&E framework is therefore a priority. The objective of this
paper is to contribute to this agenda. The paper is aimed mainly at practitioners, scholars or
development agencies engaged in resilience-building interventions.
1
The Resilience Measurement Technical Working Group is an FAO-WFP-IFPRI joint-coordinated effort under the Food
Security Information network (FSIN) and funded by EU and USAID.
6
1. What do we know about measuring
resilience?
This section summarises some of the recent progress that has been made in relation to
resilience measurement in the last three years, and highlights the implications of this
improved understanding for resilience programming.
1.1. Resilience as a means rather than an end
Resilience should not be seen as the final goal of a development programme. Instead
resilience should be seen as an intermediate outcome required for achievement of a more
fundamental goal related to a longer-term developmental ambition (Béné et al. 2014; Brown
2013; UNDP 2014), typically a measure of wellbeing (e.g., food security, health/nutrition
status, poverty) (Constas et al. 2014a). Understanding resilience as a means rather than an
end is increasingly acknowledged in the literature and several development agencies have
already structured their resilience frameworks to reflect this approach (see, e.g., DFID 2012).
As such, this means that programmes cannot have resilience as a primary objective. Rather,
this conception emphasises the importance of wellbeing as the ultimate goal of
programming.
Framed into a theory of change, this new understanding of resilience implies that programme
interventions that focus on resilience strengthening should be designed and implemented so
that they lead to an intermediate outcome (e.g., strengthened resilience capacity of the target
population), which itself should then lead to an appropriate response outcome (e.g.,
improved resilience of the target population), which should eventually lead to the
programme’s ultimate goal, that is, improving the wellbeing of the target population. This
generic theory of change for resilience interventions is represented in Figure 1.
Figure 1. Generic theory of change of a resilience intervention
Programme
activities
Resilience
capacity
strengthened
Effective
resilience
response
Individual
wellbeing
improved (or
maintained)
Source: authors’ own.
An important element illustrated by Figure 1 is the recognition that the process of formulating
a theory of change also brings measurement requirements into focus. In particular, it
highlights some of the key components that will need to be included in the M&E system.
These will be discussed in detail in Section 2 below.
7
1.2. Resilience measurement integrated framework
To measure improvements in resilience, empirical evidence is needed on what factors
contribute to it, under what contexts, and for what types of shocks. The ability to measure the
relationship between the different components that constitute a resilience analysis (i.e., the
relationship between shocks, responses, and future states of wellbeing) depends on the
analysis of a number of substantive dimensions and structural features (Constas et al.
2014b). Those highlight the specific indicators and data that need to be collected so that
insights related to resilience dynamics can be measured.
In this context, causal frameworks are useful because they focus measurement activities and
provide a potential link between the structure of interventions and the organisation of data
analysis that follows measurement. The resilience causal framework presented in Figure 2
provides a further organisational scheme in which the task of developing resilience measures
can be conceptualised and implemented (Constas et al. 2014b).
Figure 2. Resilience measurement integrated framework
Source: Constas et al. (2014b). Reproduced with kind permission of FAO, IFPRI and WFP.2
Substantive features comprise initial- and end-state measures, disturbance measures, and
capacity measures. The indicators required to measure resilience fall under the following
components: i) ex ante component (i.e., initial states and capacities), ii) disturbance
component, which represents shocks and stressors, and iii) ex post component that
represents subsequent states and trajectories (Constas et al. 2014b). Resilience
measurement should be focusing on multiple scales (e.g., individuals, households,
community, district/provincial, national and larger systems).
2
FAO, IFPRI and WFP 's endorsement of users’ views, products or services is not implied in any way.
8
There are four key factors to consider in measuring resilience:
Identify the wellbeing outcomes to be achieved, and measure resilience in relation to
these outcomes.
Identify the shocks and stressors that individuals, households, communities and larger
systems are exposed to and the severity and duration of these shocks and stressors.
Measure the absorptive, adaptive and transformative capacities in relation to these
shocks and stressors at different levels.
Identify the responses of individuals, households, communities and larger systems to
these shocks and stressors and trajectories of wellbeing outcomes.
The following categories of indicators need to be measured:
Ex ante component: resilience capacity; initial wellbeing outcomes; and initial
vulnerability level.
Disturbance component: natural disasters; pest/disease outbreaks; political conflicts;
and economic shocks/stressors.
Ex post component: resilience capacity; wellbeing outcomes; and vulnerability level.
All three components must be understood in relation to contextual factors. These contextual
factors include a wide range of political, agro-ecological, and cultural conditions that are
generally recognised to have a strong influence on households and communities. Agroecological conditions can be considered as both context (from the view point of household or
community resilience) as well as part of the resilience system itself (i.e., when higher-level
systems are considered).
Structural and methodological features highlight the way in which data will be collected in
terms of scale, timing, and types of measurement employed to measure resilience
(Frankenberger et al. 2014). Annex 1 illustrates how these dimensions of measurement
interact.
1.3. Emphasis on shocks and stressors
Resilience interventions are about improving (or at least maintaining) the wellbeing of people
in the context of shocks and/or stressors. Thus, analysis of programming designed to
strengthen resilience cannot be done without assessing the shocks and stressors (both
covariate and idiosyncratic) that affect people’s lives. To some extent, a resilience analysis
could be seen as a livelihoods analysis, but with a stronger emphasis on the
shocks/stressors context3 and on the capacities and responses of individuals, households,
and communities to deal with these shocks/stressors. In that respect, adopting a resilience
lens means recognising the importance of uncertainty, risks, shocks and changes (Berkes,
Colding and Folke 2003). It also means recognising that shocks, stressors and trends affect
not only individuals and households but also communities, institutions, infrastructures and
higher-level systems (e.g., agro-ecological systems, market systems, governance systems).
Thus, the unit of analysis and the level of intervention cannot be implemented at the
household level only, even if the programme's ultimate goal is to improve or maintain
household wellbeing. The M&E plan must include analysis and measurement of intermediate
outcomes (resilience capacity) and outcomes (resilience response) at multiple levels as well.
1.4. Resilience as a combination of capacities
Resilience reflects how people or systems (or parts of a system) respond to shocks and
stressors. More specifically, it is the ability or the capacity of individuals, groups of people,
3
The original version of the sustainable livelihood framework (Frankenberger 1995; Scoones 1998) or the subsequent
DFID version (DFID 1999) already includes a vulnerability element in their framework.
9
organisations, institutions, or systems to deal effectively with shocks/stressors. It is useful to
conceptualise resilience as a property that combines three dimensions (Figure 3): (1) an
absorptive capacity that includes all the various risk management strategies by which
individuals and/or households moderate or cope with the impacts of shocks on their
livelihoods and basic needs; (2) an adaptive capacity that reflects the ‘capacity to learn,
combine experience and knowledge, adjust responses [in a pro-active way] to changing
external drivers and internal processes, and continue operating’ (Berkes et al. 2003); and
(3) a transformative capacity, i.e., the capacity to create an enabling environment through
investment in good governance, infrastructure, formal and informal social protection
mechanisms, basic service delivery, and policies/regulations that constitute the necessary
conditions for systemic change.
Figure 3. Resilience as the result of absorptive, adaptive, and transformative
capacities
Resilience
Change
Stability
Intensity of responses
Flexibility
Transformative
capacity
(transformational
responses)
Adaptive
capacity
(incremental
adjustment)
Absorptive coping
capacity
(persistence)
Intensity of shock/stressor impact
Mild
Moderate
Severe
Source: authors’ own; Béné et al. (2014).
Note that absorptive, adaptive and transformative capacities can occur simultaneously and
are not strictly dependent on the severity of a shock or stressor. For instance, transformative
capacity can be built during less stressful times. Furthermore improving enabling
environments (e.g., service delivery, governance, infrastructure, policies, access to social
protection) can also have a positive synergistic effect on the absorptive and adaptive
capacities of households, communities, and higher-level systems.
1.5. Certain responses can lead to undesirable outcomes
It is important to realise that not all responses to shocks and stressors necessarily result in
positive wellbeing outcomes, either in the short- or longer-term. It is well documented that
certain risk management strategies (e.g., distress selling of assets, reduction of expenses or
food consumption) can have very detrimental effects on the immediate or long-term
wellbeing of households (e.g., nutritional status, food security) (Dercon, Hoddinott and
Woldehanna 2005; Hoddinott 2006; Kazianga and Udry 2006; Sinha, Lipton and Yaqub
2002). This detrimental long-term outcome, however, can also be observed in the case of
adaptive (or even transformative) responses, leading to what is referred in the climate
change literature as "maladaptation" (Barnett and O'Neil 2013; Macintosh 2013). A pertinent
example in the context of this discussion would be the case of a household living in the
10
coastal belt of Bangladesh (where saline intrusion makes life increasingly difficult), who
decides to migrate to Khulna or to Dhaka (provincial and country capitals, respectively). This
adaptive/transformative response4 could turn out to be positive: the family is taken care of by
a wealthy uncle living in Dhaka who manages to provide support for the family to settle and
start a new life. But the same decision (to migrate) could lead to negative outcomes: the
head of the household fails to find a new job, leading him to engage in some illegal activities
while the family, which has no connections and no support, rapidly falls into destitution.
What this particular example tries to convey is that resilience strengthening is not simply
about avoiding/preventing negative coping strategies and promoting adaptive or even
transformative strategies – as if coping strategies were intrinsically ‘bad’ and adaptive or
transformative responses were naturally ‘good’. This polarised view is too
simplistic/mechanistic and incorrect (see Béné et al. 2012: 23-25). This Bangladeshi story
was chosen precisely to illustrate this point: the strategy adopted by the family is not a coping
strategy but an adaptive/transformative response (i.e., they decided to shift livelihood base).
Yet, as suggested here, an adaptive response can still lead, in some circumstances, to
negative long-term outcomes. In fact the term maladaptation is precisely the recognition of
this reality. As documented in the literature (Black et al. 2011), migration can lead to positive
changes but can – and does – also lead to negative outcomes.
What this implies is that, fundamentally, resilience interventions are about strengthening the
ability of households (or society) to choose – from a whole ‘portfolio’ of options – what they
perceive at that time as the “right” response(s), rather than be forced by circumstance to pick
the only option they have at their disposal at that moment, which might be detrimental overall
(e.g., selling assets). This is referred to as the ‘capacity [to avoid] long-lasting adverse
development consequences,’ or resilience (Constas et al. 2014a).
1.6. Combined effects of shocks/stressors and the responses employed to deal
with them
It is also critical to realise that the final wellbeing state (e.g., food security) is not merely the
result of an initial shock or stressor (e.g., destruction of assets, loss of livestock), but is rather
the combined result of the effect of the shock, the capacities that people drew on, and the
response(s) that individuals, households or communities used in an attempt to deal with the
shock. That is, when a flood hits a community for example, the observed effect on food
security and nutrition – at least in some households – is not the result of the flood event per
se, but is rather the result of the effect of the flood event (e.g., destruction of property, loss of
crops) and how households used their capacities and responded – or not – to that event. An
appropriate response (e.g., using social capital, accessing savings) increases the chance to
lead to positive outcomes, while an inappropriate or ill-chosen one often leads to
vulnerability. In the present example of a flooded community, some households are likely to
be less affected, particularly in the long-term, even if they were equally or more exposed to
the initial shock, simply because they drew on their capacities and responded in a different
(e.g., more appropriate) way than other households to the shock. This combined nature of
the effect of the shock, capacities and the response(s) that individuals, households or
communities adopt is represented graphically in Figure 4.
4
We consider this response as partially “transformative” because it is in line with the initial definition of transformation as
presented in Walker et al. (2004: 5): ’to create a fundamentally new system when ecological, economic, or social
structures make the existing system untenable’.
11
Figure 4. Conceptual representation of a resilience framework
trends
community and wider context
stressors
shocks
shock/stressor effect
ability to
handle
household
characteristics,
capacities and
wellbeing
response
recovery
impact
(e.g. food security restored or
deteriorated further )
decision
state t
state t+1
time
Source: authors’ own.
Note, however, that this framework, which is conceptually useful to highlight the distinction
between the direct effect of an event and a response, is nevertheless slightly reductionist in
the sense that it assumes that events and responses occur within distinguishable cycles (one
event → one response → recovery → measurable impact). The reality faced by households
living in risk-prone areas or in zones of recurrent crises such as droughts is one where the
continuous effect of recurrent and/or permanent shocks often results in failure to recover
before the next shock strikes, which can ultimately lead to a downward spiral of divestment,
destitution, and increase reliance on humanitarian assistance – either seasonally or
permanently.
1.7. More than just vulnerability analysis
Another important progress that was made in recent years is that resilience analysis should
include – and go beyond – a vulnerability analysis. Typically, a vulnerability assessment
focuses on the (participative) identification of the shocks, risks and stressors that affect
people’s livelihoods at multiple levels. As such vulnerability is useful for understanding how
people are exposed to a hazard or longer-term disturbance, how this differs between
different groups, and ideally what the root causes of this vulnerability are. Resilience analysis
adds to vulnerability analysis in at least two domains. First, resilience analysis considers two
elements that are not usually included in vulnerability analysis: (i) the identification of existing
absorptive, adaptive and transformative capacities and (ii) the analysis of the responses that
individuals, households and communities put in place following (or in anticipation of) the
shocks and stressors identified through the vulnerability assessment. Second, resilience
analysis shifts emphasis from a perception of passive, vulnerable “victims” of an
event/disaster, to an “active” agent reacting to that event. Indeed, acknowledging that
resilience is about the capability of individual, households or community members to adapt,
change, anticipate, or respond—in this case to shocks and (future) uncertainty—is also
recognising that resilience is about agency and about the ability of people to make informed
decisions that have an effect on their own lives (Béné et al. 2014).
12
1.8. Resilience capacity is measured at multiple levels and scales
Much has already been said about the necessity to recognise the multi-scalar and multi-level
nature of resilience (see Constas et al. 2014a: 11; Béné 2013, Fig.3). In particular, the
literature stresses the central importance of the intimate links between resilience at
household and community levels and the condition of the agro-ecological system (i.e., higher
level systems) on which they depend. Although these links are yet to be rigorously
demonstrated, there is a wide consensus amongst academics and practitioners that such
links exist and are critical.
What we argue here is that acknowledgement of the need for a multi-scalar, multi-level
approach to measuring capacity also applies to measuring the responses put in place by
individuals, communities or even societies. Current resilience measurement practices focus
on the “recipients” (i.e., targeted households and communities) of the intervention(s).
However, the ultimate effect of a shock or stressor – on the targeted population – does not
depend only on their responses. Rather, the effect of a shock or stressor on a target
population also depends on how other – non-direct beneficiary – actors respond to the shock
or stressor and at what level (e.g., local, district, provincial). For example, local authorities
may implement responses that reduce the ultimate effect of a shock or stressors for certain
groups within a community, but may increase it for others. The 2011 flood in Bangkok serves
as an example. As the flood threat continued to increase in October 2011, efforts to build
additional sandbag flood walls were undertaken by the municipal authorities in order to
prevent the Chao Phraya River from overflowing into the city. While the flood walls were
successful at keeping the centre part of Bangkok dry, they essentially diverted the flood of
the Chao Phraya River to several districts in eastern Bangkok that were located outside the
flood wall and were thus severely affected by flooding that resulted from the diversion.5
Resilience analysis should include therefore an evaluation of the effect of different resilience
responses at multiple levels (i.e., households, communities, local, provincial and national
authorities). This is particularly important in terms of power dynamics and political willingness
(or lack thereof) to ensure equitable responses to shocks and stressors. Thus, the trade-offs
between different resilience-building approaches need to be assessed in terms of their
effects not only on target populations but on other components of the system (Leach 2008).
1.9. Building resilience capacities
If resilience is about the ability of individuals, households, communities, or local/national
authorities to adequately deal with shocks and stressors, then resilience interventions should
be designed around capacity building activities that reduce engagement of those individuals,
households, communities and local/national authorities in detrimental responses while at the
same time increase their ability to adopt appropriate responses to shocks and stressors
through improved absorptive, adaptive or transformative capacity.
The relationship between shock exposure, resilience capacity, and wellbeing outcomes was
recently examined in a study of the Pastoralist Areas Resilience Improvement and Market
Expansion (PRIME) project in Ethiopia (Smith et al. 2014). Results suggest not only that
increased resilience capacity has a positive impact on household food security (even after
controlling for wealth), but that transformative capacity has a greater impact than adaptive
capacity, which has a greater impact than absorptive capacity. Households with greater
resilience capacity are likely to have greater food consumption, higher dietary diversity,
reduced food insecurity overall (as measured using the Household Food Insecurity Access
Score (HFIAS)), and reduced hunger. These results suggest that households with higher
resilience capacity are better able to withstand and recover from shocks through not only
improved absorptive, adaptive or transformative capacity, but also through improved
5
Bangkok Post (2011) Govt moves to protect inner city, 12 October, (accessed 9 December 2011).
13
responses. Although shock exposure increases household food insecurity, resilience
capacity helps to reduce the negative impacts of shocks.
The resilience capacity-mediated relationship between shock exposure and household food
insecurity is illustrated in Figure 5 (Smith et al. 2014). It shows the implied impact of shock
exposure on the HFIAS at three values of the resilience capacity index: the mean, the mean
minus ten points, and the mean plus ten points. The smaller is the slope of the line, the
higher is the level of resilience capacity. Further, as resilience capacity increases, food
insecurity decreases for any given level of shock exposure.
Household food insecurity access scale
(HFIAS)
Figure 5. Resilience capacity-mediated relationship between shock exposure and
household food insecurity (HFIAS)
22
RC=39.2
20
RC=49.2 (mean)
18
16
RC=59.2
14
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
Shock exposure index
NOTE: The figure shows the relationship between the shock exposure and the HFIAS implied by regression results at three
different values of the resilience capacity index, the mean (49.2) +/- 10 points. RC==Resilience Capacity.
Source: authors’ own; Smith et al. (2014).
2. Monitoring and evaluation of resilience
interventions
To structure the discussion and in particular identify the appropriate indicators to be
measured as part of the M&E system of a resilience intervention, we propose to start with a
logical framework approach (i.e., logframe) as currently adopted in the majority of
development programmes. A conventional logframe would include the following components:
input => activities => outputs =>intermediate outcome => outcome => impact. Figure 6
summarises these components for a resilience programme, including the nature of
indicators, levels of interventions, and frequency of data collection. Illustrative examples of
indicators are also presented.
14
Figure 6. Logframe for M&E of resilience programming interventions6
Activities/
outputs
Interm.
outcomes
Input
measurable
indicators
Activity /
outputs
measurable
indicators
Resilience
capacity
indicators
Effective
resilience
response
indicators
Level of
intervention
Programme
level
Programme
level
Individual,
household,
community
or system
levels
Individual,
household,
community
or system
levels
Data
collection
frequency
As required
As required
baseline-endline
High
Frequency
Input
Nature of
indicators
Examples of
indicators
Outcomes
Impact
Wellbeing
indicators
Individual
level
High
Frequency
Donor payments Training workshop Social cohesion Reduction of
CHANGE in
organized in time
Women
made in time
coping strategies
Nutrition or food
(activity)
empowerment Adoption of
Number of
security indicators
Number of
Access to
fieldtrips
sustainable
• z-scores
information
Number of NGO households
adaptive strategies CHANGE in
attending (activity) Collective action Adoption of
workers, etc.
wellbeing indicators
Kilometres of road Innovation
sustainable
• asset/income
constructed (output) taking up
transformative
level
Number of kits
strategies
• Quality of Life
distributed (output)
indicators
shock /
Stressor
Shock
stressor
indicators
Individual,
household,
community
or system
levels
High
Frequency
Early warning
system
Environmental
indicators
• River flood data
• Rainfall data
Source: authors’ own.
Some of the indicators to be used in an M&E plan for a resilience-building programme do not
necessarily differ from the types of monitoring data that are currently measured in any
programme being properly monitored. These include:
Indicators of programme inputs such as the number of field staff involved in programme
implementation or percentage of the total budget allocated to different activities.
Indicators of programme activities/outputs such as number of training workshops
delivered, percentage of women attending from targeted households or communities,
kilometres of roads built, dykes constructed, people trained.
These indicators should be collected at the programme level and the frequency of monitoring
should be based on the deliverable schedule.
2.1. Intermediate outcome indicators
As indicated above, resilience can be conceptualised as the combination of three types of
capacities: absorptive, adaptive, and transformative capacities. These capacities are
interconnected, mutually reinforcing, exist at multiple levels (e.g., individual, household,
community, district, national, ecosystem) and are built or strengthened through project
6
Note that although the shock module is represented on the right hand side directly opposite wellbeing, shocks and
stressors can affect every component, from inputs through to wellbeing.
15
interventions. In this sense, they represent intermediate outcomes in that they are necessary
results along the pathway to achieving the project’s overall goal or impact (i.e., improved
wellbeing).
Absorptive capacities - Improving the absorptive capacity of households and communities
facilitates their ability to cope with the impacts of shocks and stressors without incurring
permanent, negative effects on their longer-term livelihood security. Interventions should
consist of preventative measures and coping strategies that allow for quick recovery while
avoiding permanent, negative impacts. Interventions often also include Disaster Risk
Reduction/Disaster Risk Management (DRR/DRM) approaches, risk-financing mechanisms
(e.g., crisis-modifiers) to trigger early response, improved access to savings, and informal
safety nets (i.e., bonding social capital). Additionally, cash or in-kind transfers contribute to
absorptive capacity by helping protect household assets and food security in the face of
shocks and stressors.
Adaptive capacities - Adaptive capacities of households and communities are strengthened
by improving their ability to make pro-active and informed decisions about alternative
livelihood strategies based on an understanding of changing conditions (Levine, Ludi and
Jones 2011). Interventions may include both humanitarian and development activities, and
typically focus on livelihoods diversification, climate change adaptation (CCA), human capital
(e.g., skills building, health and nutrition status, education), asset accumulation and
diversification, climate-smart agriculture, and access to financial services (e.g., credit).
Transformative capacities - Long-term and sustainable resilience building is not possible
without building transformative capacity, which addresses the underlying drivers of risk and
vulnerability, and promotes social cohesion through public assets and human capital
(TANGO 2015). Transformative capacity refers to system-level changes that enable more
lasting resilience and often challenge the status quo in a substantial way (O'Brien 2012). It is
enhanced through investments in good governance, infrastructure (e.g., markets, roads,
communications systems), formal and informal social protection mechanisms, basic service
delivery (e.g., health, education, sanitation, water), and policies/regulations that constitute
the enabling environment necessary for systemic change (i.e., enable households to
maintain good health and nutrition, diversify or even change their livelihoods, and to exercise
their individual and collective rights).7
Empirical evidence on what factors contribute to resilience capacities and under what
contexts is limited – though growing. At the present time, many implementing partners,
practitioners, and academics rely on “logical” (or gut-feeling) assumptions – some of which
may still need to be more systematically tested and/or verified. For example, it may be
reasonable to assume that social capital or social cohesion would have a positive effect on
resilience capacity (Boyd et al. 2008; Schwarz et al. 2011), and social capital was shown for
instance to have a strong impact on resilience capacity in the PRIME Impact Evaluation
study (Smith et al. 2014). Yet other empirical studies suggest that this is not the case in all
circumstances. Rather, there may be cases where forms of social capital (e.g., social
cohesion) can in some specific circumstances be non-adaptive and jeopardise long-term
wellbeing. Coulthard (2011) shows how fishing communities in India that are characterised
by a very strong social identity associated with their traditional customary management
system (called the Padu system) turned out to be less resilient than groups that have less
loyalty to these customary systems; ‘the high social values attributed to the Padu system,
alongside complex power structures, [had] hinder[ed] institutional adaptation’ and prevented
the community from engaging in the transformation of their livelihood basis that was
necessary to “survive” the drastic changes they were facing (Coulthard 2011: 405). Thus,
7
In that regard, the potential link between transformative capacities and transformative social protection (Devereux and
Sabates-Wheeler 2004) is worth noting; see Béné et al. (2012) for a discussion of this point.
16
although certain assumptions (e.g., social capital contributes positively to resilience) seem
reasonable, supposing a strict linear relationship is over-simplistic and more nuanced
analyses is still required.
Notwithstanding the potential for a negative relationship between resilience and certain
“assumed” resilience-enhancing factors, intermediate programme outcomes should be
measured through changes in resilience capacities, i.e., the factors that make up absorptive,
adaptive, and transformative capacities. For instance, if women’s empowerment is
recognised to contribute to strengthened resilience capacity in the target group, specific
intermediate outcome indicators that capture changes in the level of women’s empowerment
should be included in the M&E plan. All these changes are linked to the programme’s
activities (e.g., training) and these different resilience capacity indicators should be monitored
as part of the follow-up of the programme baseline (prior to the start of programme activities)
and in the endline survey.8
2.2. Outcome indicators
The next important group of indicators to be considered are the outcome indicators (i.e.,
results). These correspond to effective resilience response indicators which need to be
monitored through high frequency data collection activities. There is currently much on-going
discussion in the literature regarding what these indicators are or should be (e.g., Barrett and
Heady 2014). Following the logframe approach presented above, a resilience outcome
indicator should confirm that the targeted group (individuals, households, communities) is
able to effectively respond to and recover from a shock or stressor in an appropriate manner.
These outcomes are effectively the responses implemented by stakeholders as an attempt to
deal with a shock or stressor (cf. Fig.4 above). In essence, these represent the results of
programme interventions designed to improve resilience capacity response of the targeted
group.
In the context of food security as the measure of overall programme impact, the Coping
Strategies Index (CSI) (CARE and WFP 2003; Maxwell and Caldwell 2008) represents a
viable outcome indicator as it measures the occurrence of specific detrimental coping
strategies (Table 1). Thus, resilience-building interventions should include activities that aim
at reducing the occurrence of these detrimental coping strategies in the aftermath of a shock
(i.e., households' CSI should go down if the project has been successful).
Note however that the CSI focuses on short-term consumption-related behaviour after a
shock or stressor. Other short-term ex-post responses might also be relevant such as these
focusing on cash or money-borrowing strategies, easily measured by indicators that capture
access to or utilisation of financial services (e.g., savings groups, credit). The long-term
impact of accessing credit could potentially have a detrimental effect, depending on where
(or from whom) the money is borrowed.
8
Measuring resilience capacities provides a measure of progress that can be particularly useful (at least once their
mediating effect between shocks on one hand and wellbeing outcomes on another have been empirically established) in
the event shocks do not occur during the span of the programme.
17
Table 1. Coping Strategy Index (CSI)
1 Dietary change
a. Rely on less preferred and less expensive foods
2. Increase short-term household food availability
b. Borrow food from a friend or relative
c.
Purchase food on credit
d. Gather wild food, hunt or harvest immature crops
e. Consume seed stock held for next season
3. Decrease number of people
f.
Send children to eat with neighbours
g. Send household members to beg
4. Rationing strategies
h. Limit portion size at mealtimes
i.
Restrict consumption by adults in order for small children to eat
j.
Feed working members of household at the expenses of non-working
members
k.
Reduce number of meal eaten in a day
l.
Skip entire days without eating
Source: Maxwell and Caldwell (2008).
Improved resilience capacity, however, is not simply about avoiding detrimental short-term
response strategies that undermine absorptive capacity in particular. It is also about nurturing
or fostering the ability of actors to engage in positive and sustainable responses that improve
all three resilience capacities, i.e., absorptive, adaptive, and transformative capacity. A good
example of effective resilience behaviour would be the increased use of early warning
system information amongst nomadic communities in arid or semi-arid regions for making
decisions on livestock movement or destocking, or, in the context of the typhoon-prone
coastal areas of many South East Asia countries, the increase in percentage of population
that are aware of, have access to, and effectively use typhoon shelters.
2.3. Impact indicators
If we accept that the ultimate goal of resilience programming is not achievement of resilience
per se, but rather improvement (or at a minimum non-deterioration) of long-term individual or
household wellbeing in the face of shocks and stressors, then the indicators used to measure
programme impact should be capturing the change in an individual’s or household’s
wellbeing. Appropriate indicators could include nutritional indicators (e.g., child weight-forage z-score), food security indicators (e.g., HFIAS) (Coates, Swindale and Bilinsky 2007),
monthly expenditure per capita, subjective wellbeing indicators (OECD 2013), or
psychological indicators such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or the CES
Depression Scale (CES-D) (Kohn et al. 2005).
However, the critical point to understand is that the absolute value of these indicators is not
informative with regards to individual or household levels of resilience. The absolute value of
a z-score tells us about the actual severity of malnutrition, but does not tell us about the
degree to which that level of malnutrition results from a particular shock or stressor; nor does
it tell us about the connection between exposure to a given shock or set of shocks that might
18
be mediated by a given resilience capacity or combination of capacities. It is only the change
observed in the value of the indicator following the event (compared to its value prior to the
event) that indicates the relative impact of that event on the indicator.9
One direct implication of this is that resilience measurement will only be possible if the
wellbeing indicators are measured with a high enough frequency to capture these changes.
For instance, the Ethiopia’s PRIME Impact Evaluation is utilising a real-time recurrent
monitoring system to capture exposure (incidence and severity) to shocks and stressors as
well as real-time responses by households (TANGO 2015). Triggered by a shock or stressor,
monitoring involved interim panel surveys (i.e., using a subset of households surveyed at
baseline) conducted every two months over a 12-month period. The brief (20-minute) interim
survey included modules on shocks and recovery, productive assets, access to and use of
services, Household Hunger Scale (HHS) and Household Dietary Diversity Score (HDDS),
coping strategies, and confidence and risk tolerance.
2.4. Shocks and stressors indicators
The last specific component that also needs to be monitored regularly in a resilience
programme is the shocks/stressors component. Although an increasing number of living
standard household surveys propose some form of module for measuring shocks, a lack of
standardisation and uniformity (e.g., in definitions and terms) across surveys would need to
be addressed in order for accurate and comprehensive resilience measurement to occur
(Carletto, Zezza and Banerjee 2015). Perhaps even more limiting is the low frequency at
which these surveys are typically conducted, making it difficult to capture how resilience
responses – particularly to different types of shocks – may change over time.
To monitor shocks and stressors, indicators expected to reflect sudden changes – or slower
trends – in the risk landscape (e.g., river water level, rainfall) should be regularly recorded at
the relevant spatial scale and at frequencies that are appropriate to capture their dynamics
(e.g., variability, seasonality). Ideally three levels of indicators could be considered: at the
national (or higher) level through national early warning systems (e.g., IPC, FEWSNET); at a
local level through community-based early warning systems; and at the household level to
capture household perceptions of shocks and their ability to recover.
There are two distinct but related reasons for measuring shocks and stressors as part of
M&E for resilience programmes. First, it would be impossible to assess the success (or lack
thereof) of a particular resilience programme unless one can measure simultaneously the
occurrence of the shocks or stressors, the resilience responses adopted by the programme’s
beneficiaries as an attempt to handle the shocks and stressors (i.e., the outcome), and the
ultimate impacts of the combined effect of the shock and the response as measured by
changes in wellbeing indicators of the targeted population. Second, measurement of the
shocks and stressors, along with the programme’s intermediate outcomes, outcomes and
impact also enhances our own understanding about “resilience dynamics” by systematically
looking for emerging patterns and potential correlations between intermediate outcomes (i.e.,
capacities), outcomes (i.e., responses), and impacts (i.e., wellbeing indicators). Figure 5 is
an example of these types of potential correlations.
2.5. Data collection
The type of data, as well as the timing and frequency of its collection are key aspects of M&E
for resilience programming. In order to capture the dynamics of shocks (which are often
unpredictable), the types of responses employed, and the impact on individual or household
9
This is where the link to the more engineering interpretation of the concept of resilience can be useful. This literature
identifies broadly two key dimensions in the ‘measurement’ of resilience: the ‘depth’ or severity of the change (i.e., the
relative change in the indicator following the shock) and the time of recovery (i.e., the time it takes for the indicator to
return to its original values after the shock) (Ludwig, Walker and Holling 1997).
19
wellbeing, high frequency monitoring (e.g., monthly, bi-monthly, quarterly) is required. In
order to follow changes in response that occur at the household level, panel data should be
collected (i.e., from the same households) as the baseline. A sub-optimal option is to use
quasi-panel data, i.e., data collected from the same communities (as opposed to the same
households). In that case, however, the level of analysis would have to be the community,
not the household. Helen Keller International’s nutrition surveillance programme (NSP)
provides an example of using high frequency (bi-monthly) quasi-panel data sets (Bloem,
Moench-Pfanner and Panagides 2003).
In addition to the frequency and the panel-nature of the data, the length of time over which
data should be collected needs to be considered. The responses used to deal with a shock
may vary over time, potentially becoming more negative with a lack of recovery. A timesensitive component was included in the resilience model described by the Resilience
Measurement Working Group in order to capture how changes in the factors contributing to
resilience capacity change over time (Constas et al. 2014b). For example, long-term
wellbeing may be sacrificed in order to meet “more urgent” wellbeing needs. Thus, data
collected over a short period of time after a shock may not adequately capture response
dynamics. At a minimum, 6-9 months post-shock should be considered, although longer
might be even more informative.
2.6. Monitoring contextual changes
Finally, M&E systems for resilience programmes need to monitor changes in context in order
to determine if adjustments are needed to the programme’s theory of change for promoting
resilience. Contextual factors that need to be taken into account include a wide range of
political, agro-ecological, economic and cultural conditions that not only affect underlying
vulnerabilities but also influence how households, communities, and higher-level systems
respond to shocks and stressors.
3. Conclusion
As resilience programming gains more and more prominence as an approach for addressing
chronic vulnerability of populations exposed to recurrent shocks and stressors, empirical
evidence will be needed for measuring how well households, communities, and higher-level
systems manage shocks and stressors and how interventions and programmes that are
designed to strengthen their resilience capacities, perform. M&E systems measuring
outcomes and impacts of these interventions will become key in providing such information.
As argued in this paper, in order to do so, these M&E systems will need to focus on how to
measure the occurrence of the shocks or stressors, resilience capacities (intermediate
outcome), and the resilience responses adopted by the programme’s beneficiaries as an
attempt to handle the shocks and stressors (i.e., outcomes). These M&E systems will also
need to measure the ultimate impacts of the combined effect of shocks and responses
through changes in wellbeing indicators of the targeted population (i.e., impacts).
This paper explores the different steps necessary to monitor and evaluate a resilience
programme, the overall structure of which does not completely differ from that of other M&E
systems (i.e., for “conventional” programmes).10 In fact some of the steps and indicators are
quite similar (in particular monitoring of, and indicators for inputs, activities, and outputs). The
intermediate outcomes and outcomes components described in Figure 6, however, will differ
more significantly from a conventional M&E system in the sense that in a resilience
programme intermediate outcomes correspond to indicators of absorptive, adaptive or
10
With the exception, however, of the shock/stressor monitoring component, which is quite specific to resilience
monitoring.
20
transformative capacities. They are defined as intermediate outcomes in a resilience M&E
system because they measure whether individuals, households, communities or higher-level
systems have gained or strengthened one or more of these resilience capacities and whether
they are on a resilience pathway. In a “conventional” development programme (especially
those focusing on capacity building), changes in these capacities would more typically be
considered as (higher-level programme) outcomes, or even as impacts. M&E systems
designed for resilience programmes, however, should measure outcomes through indicators
of resilience response (i.e., how people responded). In that regard, appropriate resilience
response indicators include those that measure changes in both positive and negative
behaviours. For example, a reduction in the adoption of detrimental coping strategies (i.e., a
lower CSI) might serve as one universal indicator in resilience programmes. However,
resilience response indicators should also measure changes in adaptive and transformative
behaviour, such as increases in the adoption of appropriate responses by households or
communities as well as decreases in the prevalence of maladaptive responses. Those
indicators monitoring the occurrence of appropriate/inappropriate responses are expected to
have a strong local (spatial and temporal) connection that reflects the specific nature of the
initial event(s) to which the households/communities are responding. These responses also
have to be understood in relation to the specific social and ecological contexts and
constraints within which these households are operating.
Finally, the M&E system of a resilience programme also differs in the way the impact is
monitored. Regardless of what wellbeing measures are used as indicators of impact (e.g., zscore, household assets, HFIAS or PTSD), what is important to monitor is the change in the
value of that indicator. Only the change observed in the value of the impact indicator
following the event (compared to its value prior to the event) will inform us about the actual
success/effectiveness of the resilience intervention. The importance of this point cannot be
overemphasised. Too often measures of resilience proposed in the literature are wrongly
associated with the measurement of absolute values of wellbeing (or food security)
indicators. By definition, what matters from a resilience viewpoint is the relative change (or
absence of change) in these indicators in the face of shocks.
Last but not least, the M&E system of a resilience programme will finally differ from a
conventional M&E by one more aspect: the frequency of measurement. In order to capture
the dynamics of the change in the impact indicators, but also to monitor shocks, as well as
the responses employed (the outcome of the programme), high frequency monitoring will be
required.
21
Annex 1. Resilience conceptual framework
Resilience Framework
Context
e.g., social,
ecosystems,
political,
religious, etc.
Disturbance
e.g., natural
hazard, conflict,
food shortage,
fuel price
increase
Absorptive, adaptive
and transformative
capacities
Adaptive
state to
shock
Reaction to disturbance
e.g., survive, cope, recover,
learn, transform
Livelihood
Outcomes
(-)
Resilience pathway
Bounce
back
Sensitivity
Livelihood Strategies
Structures/processes
Stresses
Livelihood Assets
Shocks
Exposure
Level of aggregation
Context
Food Security
Bounce
back
better
Recover
but worse
than
before
Vulnerability pathway
Collapse
Adequate
nutrition
Environmental
security
Food
Insecurity
Malnutrition
Environmental
degradation
(+)
22
Glossary
Adaptive capacity - The ability to make proactive and informed choices about alternative
livelihood strategies based on changing environmental, climatic, social, political and
economic conditions.
Absorptive capacity - The ability of individuals, households, communities or higher-level
systems to minimise their exposure to shocks and stresses and to recover quickly when
exposed.
Conflict - Organised violence that includes the use or threat of physical force by a group or
groups. These include state actions against other states or against civilians, civil wars,
electoral violence between opposing sides, communal conflicts based on regional, ethnic,
religious, or other group identities or competing economic interests, gang‐based violence and
organised crime and international non‐state armed movements with ideological aims (World
Bank 2011).
Disaster - Severe alterations in the normal functioning of a community or a society due to
hazardous physical events interacting with vulnerable social conditions, leading to
widespread adverse human, material, economic or environmental effects that require
immediate emergency response to satisfy critical human needs and that may require external
support for recovery (IPCC 2014).
Exposure - The magnitude, frequency, and duration of shocks or stressors.
Hazard - The potential occurrence of a natural or human-induced physical event or trend that
may cause loss of life, injury, or other health impacts, as well as damage and loss to
property, infrastructure, livelihoods, service provision, ecosystems and environmental
resources (IPCC 2014).
Resilience - The capacity that ensures stressors and shocks do not have long-lasting
adverse development consequences.
Risk - The potential for adverse consequences of an uncertain event or trend on lives,
livelihoods, health, property, ecosystems and species, economic, social and cultural assets,
service provision (including environmental services) and infrastructure (IPCC 2014).
Shocks - External short‐term deviations from long‐term trends that have substantial negative
effects on people’s current state of wellbeing, level of assets, livelihoods, or safety, or their
ability to withstand future shocks (Zseleczky and Yosef 2014).
Stressors - Long-term trends or pressures that undermine the stability of a system and
increases vulnerability within it (Bujones et al. 2013).
Transformative capacity – The ability to create an enabling environment through investment
in good governance, infrastructure, formal and informal social protection mechanisms, basic
service delivery, and policies/regulations that constitute the conditions necessary for
systemic change.
Vulnerability - The degree to which a system is susceptible to, or unable to cope with, the
adverse effects of or harm due to exposure to a hazard.
23
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