Assessing the Role of Social Capital in Agro-pastoral Resilience in the
Sahel: A Systems Perspective
In coordination with Mercy Corps and the Elliott School of International Affairs
Morgan Blackburn, Alejandro Guzman, Jeff Lieberman and Anne Sprinkel
April 25, 2014
Acknowledgements
The capstone team would like to express a deep appreciation for the many supporters and facilitators of
this project. We owe a great deal of gratitude to Sarah Wardwell, the Mercy Corps West Africa Resilience
Coordinator, for her guidance and supervision. Also to Thierno Diallo and Sebastien Fesneau, Mercy
Corps Country Directors for Niger and Mali, respectively. The Niger and Mali country teams provided
invaluable support without which the execution of this project would not have been possible. Finally, to
the many contributors who provided feedback during the research and execution of the project, and the
development of this report, including Mercy Corps staff from both the Washington D.C. and Portland
offices.
We would also like to thank Dr. Sean Roberts, Director of the International Development Studies
Program at the George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs, who contributed
generously to the team with his guidance, support, and wisdom.
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Executive Summary
In order to support the implementation of Mercy Corps’ Regional Value Proposition for Resilience in the
Sahel, the research team looked at agro-pastoral communities’ resilience to food insecurity in the face of
drought and conflict shocks. This was accomplished through a literature review and the development and
field-testing of a systems-based community assessment tool to gauge agro-pastoral communities’ existing
social capital and its role in promoting resilience in the face of shocks and stresses. The systems-based
approach to social capital is founded in an understanding that “problems” like a food crises are the
result of a number of smaller system failures resulting from a shock or long-term, lower level stresses
on the system and its environment. The ebb and flow of power and vulnerability, as reflected in the use
and distribution of social capitals, through time can help identify leverage points for intervention.
Furthermore, the exercise allows development and humanitarian actors to understand the system-wide
effects of interventions, which may result in more resilience for one group at the expense of another. Focus
group discussions in five sample communities in these countries are the basis for the conclusions and
recommendations set forth in this document. The Feed the Future “Community Resilience: Conceptual
Framework and Measurement” was accepted as the base conceptual framework1, while a systems approach
was used as the analytical framework for this research. Using these frameworks, the research team sought
to understand the strengths, weaknesses, relationships, and leverage points within Sahelian agro-pastoralist
communities that enable individuals, households and communities to learn, cope, adapt, and possibly
transform in the face of recurrent drought and conflict.
Mercy Corps defines
The research revealed severely reduced levels of critical adaptive and
resilience as the capacity of
transformative capacities to food insecurity in the sampled
communities in complex
communities. Although data reflected a number of communal coping
socio-ecological systems to
mechanisms reflecting absorptive capacities, these are primarily used
learn, cope, adapt, and
to maintain basic subsistence levels. Informal bonding linkages, such
transform in the face of
as credit, lending, and borrowing, represented the most robust set of
shocks and stresses.
coping mechanisms in the face of recurring shocks and stresses
present in participating communities. However, there were noticeable
differences in groups’ abilities to employ these and absorb the effects of drought and conflict. Women’s
limited access to land (and subsequent inability to secure land tenure) limited the range of viable coping
mechanisms they could employ. Many times, these absorptive capacities do not contribute to resilience, but
rather erode or degrade their long-term and short-term resilience, both at the household and community
level. Communities tend to experience a persistence of shocks and stressors, which systematically degrades
the communities’ capacity to absorb, respond to, and recover from shocks.
One of the most evident trends is the limited transformative capacities across all communities. The
research revealed minimal effort on the part of governments as well as NGOs to facilitate the creation
of greater transformative capacities. Rather, current efforts are primarily address end-result needs of
system failures (such as the provision of food aid), creating a bias towards the promotion of absorptive and
adaptive capacities. This may be a contributing factor to the ineffectiveness of programming that fails to
address the systemic failures and continues to target these end-result needs year after year.
Women and youth groups were distinct in their views of their communities and thus provided valuable
insight to inequalities within the systems. In Mali and Niger, social cohesion has been a source of survival
in the face of near continuous shocks and stresses such as drought and conflict. Through this research, it
has become clear that these informal relationships within and between communities and larger systems
cannot be ignored and must be capitalized upon to enhance resilience to food insecurity. The research
1
While many conceptual frameworks for modeling resilience exist, the research team chose this one for its relative acceptance by
USAID and most closely matched the research objectives of the team.
2
provides a snapshot that can deepen communities’ understandings of their own barriers and opportunities.
However, a full system analysis was outside the scope of this research and the capabilities of the tool.
Therefore, this tool should be one part of a much broader toolkit that includes economic, environmental,
political, and other areas of analysis.
Introduction
Mercy Corps is currently working in North, West, Central and East Africa to enhance communities’
resilience by reducing the effects of social, economic, and natural resource constraints. The organization
plans to drive forward regional and country strategies as part of the Regional Value Proposition on
Resilience in the Sahel. The research team aimed to support this implementation through the development
and field-testing of a systems-based community assessment tool. The tool is meant to gauge agro-pastoral
communities’ existing social capital, which is recognized as an essential aspect of communal resilience,
and the effects of drought and conflict on systems’ resilience to food insecurity in relation to social capital.
This project has been driven by field leadership from inception and is therefore based in Niger and Mali
field teams’ perspectives, needs, and experiences. A literature review provided a knowledge base reflecting
both academic and development literature on the effects of food insecurity, conflict, and drought on agropastoralist communities in the Sahel. Taking this forward, the Capstone team was able to compare and
contrast knowledge gained from field staff’s vital participation in the creation of the methodology while
providing a critical lens through which to analyze data gathered. Critical to these points was the introduction
of a systems approach to assessing community resilience. Field staff’s understanding of resilience in the
context of the Sahel was found to be very advanced, but a systems approach was introduced to deepen this
understanding and subsequent application to current and future programming. This was achieved through
the pilot testing of the Systems-based Community Assessment Tool in 16 focus group discussions in five
communities in Mali and Niger. This data forms the basis of the findings that contribute to a deeper
understanding of communal resilience in the region.
This report begins with a background explaining the concepts that are the foundation of this document. The
definition and use of the term resilience is drawn from both Mercy Corps’ definition and the Feed the Future
(FtF) Framework for Communal Resilience, which promotes three types of social capital as the basis for
communal action capacities leading to resilience. This is followed by a brief explanation of a systems
approach. The research methodology, including the literature review and the building and implementation
of the Systems-based Community Assessment Tool, includes concrete examples of the added value,
limitations, and opportunities presented by this research. The findings are focused on the
characterization of the agro-pastoralist system in relation to forms of bonding, bridging and linking
social capital that have been affected by community-identified shocks and stresses. These findings are
drawn from raw data that was analyzed through a matrix that categorizes capitals in relation to communal
action capacities for resilience, thus leading to conclusions of trends in the region and recommendations
for further use of the tool and further study.
This research is by no means an exhaustive study of resilience to food insecurity in agro-pastoralist
communities in the Sahel. Rather, this study offers an introduction to the structure and function of these
systems in the face of drought and conflict, lending a preliminary snapshot of communities’ communal
action capacities that contribute to resilience. The findings originate from only five communities lying
within a large geographic area that is characterized by social, economic, and climate variability; thus, the
contextual nature of the conclusions and recommendations should be recognized. However, the literature
review, collaboration with field staff, tool development, and piloting of the methodology have allowed for
a regional focus that is meant to inform the subject while providing an easy-to-use tool that can be
contextualized for different geographic, livelihood, and resilience purposes.
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Background
Resilience
Mercy Corps defines resilience as the “capacity of communities in socio-ecological systems to learn,
cope, adapt, and transform in the face of shocks and stresses,”2. Simply put, communities consisting of
men, women, boys, and girls living in households within these communities are able to withstand recurring
and unexpected challenges such as drought and conflict. Communities and individuals must not only
endure, but also overcome the challenges that shocks present and learn how to better prepare for future
events in order to achieve resilience. It is understood that there is no single route, strategy or mechanism to
achieve resilience. A resilience approach recognizes that the primary drivers of positive coping must come
from within the community itself, leading to effective self-organization and gradual increase in communal
capacities to cope with varied shocks and stressors.
Mercy Corps and a wide range of development and humanitarian partners have used the FtF Framework to
understand resilience in East Africa. This framework is based on the assumption that social capital is the
basis for communal action capacities, including absorptive, adaptive, and transformative capacities
demonstrated by communities to enhance different levels of resilience. Social capital can be described as
the quantity and quality of social resources such as networks, membership in groups, social relations,
and access to wider institutions in society, upon which people draw in pursuit of livelihoods3. Social
cohesion brings a community together and can promote greater self-organization. This is achieved through
bonding, bridging and linking social capital. Annex 3 contains an explanatory diagram. These capitals
contribute to Communal Capacities for resilience.
● Bonding Social Capital is the links or bonds that exist amongst community groups, which
promote communal cohesion. This excludes political or other formal organization and is
normally based on principles such as trust, cooperation and reciprocity.
● Bridging Social Capital is the links or bonds connecting members of one community to other
communities or external groups. This allows for access to external social, economic and
political assets that may be called upon during times of need.
● Linking Social Capital is the links, bonds and interactions between community groups that
occur through formal, institutionalized entities or mechanisms. These are particularly
important in explicit or formal communal organization surrounding resource management,
governance, economic development, etc.



2
3
Absorptive capacities reflect the ability to incorporate coping mechanisms and preventive
measures in order to minimize exposure to shocks and stresses and reduce permanent negative
impacts, such as being part of a cooperative that maintains a cereal bank for the lean season.
Adaptive capacities are proactive measures taken around livelihood practices that are
determined in accordance with perceived changes in the communal environment as it is
impacted by a shock or stress, such as reduced food intake during a food shortage.
Transformative capacities are characterized by “the governance mechanisms,
policies/regulations, infrastructure, community networks, and formal and informal social
protection mechanisms that constitute the enabling environment for systemic change,” 1 This
could include infrastructure investment or a redistributive land tenure policy being informed by
gender analysis.
Mercy Corps Africa Resilience Statement, 2013
Frankenberger and Garrett, 1998
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A Systems Approach
A systems approach recognizes that the interacting parts of
a family, community, market, country or region must be
analyzed in function of how they relate to each other and
with other elements of the wider encompassing
environment. A common way of thinking about a system is
that “the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.” It is
driven by the understanding that complex systems, such as
social systems, are made up of smaller, interrelated
components, or subsystems, while also forming part of wider
encompassing systems. For instance, a small agropastoralist village is itself a social system, but it is also made
up of smaller, overlapping communal groups (subsystems)
such as extended family networks, women’s groups,
households, and formalized political structures. Conversely,
it is also part of a larger social system that may include
intervening and interacting elements such as governance and
market structures. Within systems thinking, one agent’s
actions impact another agent’s actions and environment
within the system. This represents a novel way for Mercy
Corps to approach programming, by analyzing the actors
within the system, the impacts of one actor’s actions on
another’s, and subsequently designing programming in a
way that accounts for these predictions.
Characteristics of a Social System
I.
Subcomponents are interrelated
II.
Boundaries and scale are defined
by the observer
III.
Constantly changing, meaning
observations are bound in time
and space
IV.
Composed of smaller subsystems,
while forming part of a larger
encompassing system
V.
Processes inputs, while creating
outputs
VI.
Subject to feedback loops that
introduce information from the
external environment
VII.
Neither linear, nor static
VIII. Different and ever-changing
equilibriums at each system level
IX.
Systems self-organize
Figure 1
5
Description of Community System Diagram
1) This represents the community system made up of groups and households that create an intricate
network based on relationships.
2) This is the environment within which the system exists. It is itself a wider encompassing system
and includes external elements which influence the system: governance, natural environment,
conflict, economy, and gender dynamics, among others.
3) Inputs are processed by the system and include influences or interactions with the external
environment.
4) Outputs are generated through and from system processes. These are the results of whatever
input or stimulus is received from the external environment through feedback loops.
5) Feedback loops occur as system outputs interact with the external environment, creating a new
set of inputs that has been influenced by stimuli within and outside of the system.
6) Emergent behaviors are the resulting synthesis of the countless simple interactions taking place
within the system which characterize the community.
The value of such an approach is derived from its ability to break down highly complex systems, allowing
for greater understanding of its subcomponents, while recognizing that the network of interactions
between these sub-elements is just as important as the individual elements. This allows for a wider
encompassing understanding of how communal systems operate as a whole, which is a determining factor
of how a community self-organizes to learn, cope with and respond to shock and stressors. Complex social
systems self-organize to respond to shocks or stresses by proactively minimizing exposure (vulnerability),
absorbing and coping with the shock, or by reorganizing -transforming structures or linkages within the
communal system. This differentiates it from current assessment methods by understanding the chain
reaction of a number of smaller system failures that contribute to prolonged stress and make shocks acutely
more damaging.
Research Methodology
Literature review
A literature review was undertaken to provide a generalized knowledge base on the specific obstacles and
opportunities for household and community resilience to food insecurity in the face of drought and conflict
in the Sahel. The research targeted formal and grey literature, which were captured and processed through
retrieval, screening, evidence assessment, and analysis. These methods were key in providing an academic
basis for analysis and subsequent tool development while remaining flexible between established fields of
thought and a new and expanding group of literature of findings from fieldwork and development research.
Systems Based Community Assessment Methodology
The community assessment tool was developed to better understand social capital’s relationship to
resilience as conceptualized in the FtF Framework. Specifically, the tool was used to identify kinds and
uses of social capital, which is recognized as a vital aspect of communal resilience by both Mercy Corps
and the FtF Framework. The relationships within a system and those connecting it to outside systems are
represented by bonding, bridging, and linking social capital and were prioritized for the purposes of the
exercise. This is not an exhaustive measure of these elements of social capital, but offers a general overview
of communal organization as it pertains to promotion of resilience to identified shocks and stressors.
Focus Group Discussions (FDGs) served as the primary data collection and community interaction
mechanism for the Systems-Based Community Assessment Tool. However, this tool was not used in
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isolation: triangulation through a literature review and key informant interviews were done to enhance
validity of findings. Key informant interviews with field staff and partner organizations were useful for
rapid “ground-truthing” of findings from the literature review including important contextual complexities
faced by target communities, facilitating access to study sites, and a general outline of the community
structure and greater socio-ecological systems. This allowed the research team to focus more discussion
and analysis on the systems’ reactions to shock and stress.
Figure 2:
Focus Group Discussions
Adult Male
Niger
2
Mali
3
Adult Female
2
3
Male Youth
1
2
Female Youth
1
2
In three of five targeted communities in Niger and Mali, four focus groups were conducted, resulting in a
total of five adult male groups, five adult women groups, three male youth groups, and three female youth
groups, resulting in six FGDs in Niger and ten FGDs in Mali. Participants were gathered by field program
staff and/or community mobilizers, which can itself present a biased sample that may not be representative
of the entire community. For instance, herders were consistently underrepresented and mobilization was in
a short timeframe, limiting those available to participate, often to powerful community members or contact
points.
To set the stage for a fluid conversation surrounding the mapping of social capital and how it may have
changed due to shocks or stresses, participants were first asked to identify and prioritize primary events or
factors that have impacted the community in the last five years. These events are assumed to be the primary
shocks or stresses impacting the community. A 3-step participatory process (see Annex 6) was used to
generate a model of the perceived community structure, market linkages, and resource management
practices. Participants were asked to define the events and characterize the importance and nature of the
bonding, bridging, and linking relationships throughout the exercise both in time of reference (“normal”)
and times of identified shock or stress to better understand absorptive, adaptive, and transformative
capacities of the target communities.
Field work in Niger was spent in the Niamey country office and Filingue and Maradi field offices, focusing
considerable effort on defining a systems approach and tool development in close coordination with staff.
The first pilot tests of the tool were completed in Tarkassa, a small remote village outside of Filingue, and
a village near the commercial center of Maradi. In Mali, three communities were chosen and prioritized
for their accessibility and recent history of food insecurity due to the effects of drought and conflict. Djombo
Djeneke, situated in the middle of the country outside of Mopti, was severely food insecure and noticeably
more resource poor than the other study sites. The two southern communities of Sinsina and Koyan lie
within 35 kilometers of Bamako: Koyan is located close to a military base and demonstrated a higher
awareness and more acute effects of the 2012 coup, while Sinsina is closer to the main highway and had
the most access to markets and resources of the three sites.
The development of the systems-based tool was founded in an understanding that “problems” like a
food crises are the result of a number of smaller system failures, in response to a shock and the result
of long-term, lower level stresses on the system and its environment. By mapping the different groups
within a system and their social capital, the ebb and flow of power and vulnerability during time of reference
and time of crisis can help identify leverage points for intervention. Furthermore, the exercise allows
development and humanitarian actors to understand the system-wide effects of interventions, which may
result in more resilience for one group at the expense of another. For instance, does empowering a womenonly group that provides credit and work sharing within the community disempower chiefs’ assistants who
7
are an important conflict mitigation and management structure? The tool aids the conceptualization of these
systemic effects of interventions that seek to bolster the entire system’s resilience.
Limitations of methodology
While our definition of agro-pastoralist communities is not all-encompassing, this tool allows allow for
analysis of both agriculture and pastoralism in communities and these groups’ social capital. This led the
research team to a deeper understanding of the intricacies and situational complexities that are many times
brought under the umbrella of “agro-pastoralist,” but this definition should be closely examined for each
context in which the tool is used. The findings were heavily influenced by a number of factors present
during focus group discussions and during analysis. Limitations on women and girls’ participation were
tangible: the presence of male authority figures from the community, the time of day, and the gender of the
facilitator were factors that influenced data gathered. In almost all groups, older participants either
dominated or heavily influenced discussions
Findings
The findings are derived from evidence collected from select communities in Niger and Mali. However,
the validity of these findings is also rooted in the wider scope of a previously conducted literature review
which investigated the state of resilience to food insecurity of agro-pastoralists in the West African Sahel.
Shocks and Stressors
The main negative event named by each community was drought leading to food crisis (henceforth to be
referred to as drought), which created a struggle for both animals and people. This was characterized by a
lack of and irregular rain over consecutive years, leading to reduced yields which fail to meet subsistence
level-consumption needs and have historically led to price hikes of staple cereals. It also reduces water for
animals, household use, and dry-season farming. Communities also mentioned intermittent disease
outbreaks including malaria, dysentery, and diarrheal episodes, which disproportionately affect more
vulnerable groups such as children (primary effect), and weaken the entire system (secondary effect)
because people are less mobile and productive if their kids are sick. Women in both southern communities
in Mali also mentioned the negative impact of the lack of trees due to deforestation. One community in
Mali and both communities in Niger also identified flooding as a major shock in their villages. Crop pests
such as locust infestations and irregular rain patters were also shocks identified by the communities in
Niger.
Conflict-related stresses were largely not found in the communities studied. The research team proactively
included questions about the 2012 coup in Mali and farmer-herder conflict so to facilitate this analysis, but
these shocks and stresses were not prioritized by communities during FGDs. Women in both Southern
communities in Mali talked relatively openly about the political crisis in 2012. Men said this had no effect
on a number of occasions once overtly asked about the event, while women described its negative impact
on the entire community, including reduced access to markets and restricted movement which were a
hindrance to sustaining livelihoods,.
Community Groups and Linkages
The literature review conducted and subsequent field visits evidenced agro-pastoral communities in the
Western Sahel as mostly sedentary groups organized into communities made up of multiple households and
comprised of extended family groups. They maintain intricate resource management practices that aim to
balance farming and herding livelihoods to ensure adequate means for subsistence. Farming represents their
main livelihood practice, accounting for anywhere between 70-80%4 of their income generating activities.
4
As reported by focus group discussion participants.
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Animal herding represents an important secondary livelihood mechanism. Agriculture tends to be divided
into large cash crop cereals (millet, sorghum, etc.), high value vegetable fields, and an increasing number
of off-season community subsistence gardens. Understanding how different community groups are affected
differently by the same shock or stress is important in understanding agro-pastoralist systems’ abilities to
adapt and transform in the face of shocks.
All of the villages identified farmers, merchants, and herders as the most important groups in the
community. Farmers represented virtually the entirety of the community and had the largest number of
general links with all other groups, ensuring their position in the center of the community. Merchants, on
the other hand, had the strongest trade links within the communities, which include buying and selling of
goods, as well as the provision of credit to community members. Despite all community groups reporting
ownership of animals, herders were identified as those who possess larger herds requiring localized grazing
routes, with larger transhumance movements being less common. Other community groups included
artisans and functional community groups such as cooperatives and women’s groups, which also act as
sources of credit.
In Niger, herders reported having dynamic relationships with farmers, which includes buying and selling
of agricultural goods, and cooperative relations for grazing land use. This last linkage can often result in
tensions during the rainy season as animal herds can encroach on farmland and destroy crops.
Market access is critical in rural communities. Across the communities, merchants go to the market most
often and thus constitute the largest amount bridging capital, i.e. the links that communities have with
surrounding communities. Vegetable farmers also go to the market and interact with other villages
frequently. Women in Mali are said to go to markets and other nearby villages more than men, whether for
buying and selling or social reasons. Farmers and herders in Mali go to market the least, consuming the
vast majority of their harvest and thus having little to sell. In Niger, these groups tended to go to more
specialized market spaces, such as livestock markets. The markets in Niger were also identified as key
forums for social interaction as well as dissemination of information such as market prices or community
initiatives. Other forms of bridging capital that herders have include exchange relationships with outside
farmers, such as selling manure for fertilizer.
Resource Management
Communities mainly identified institutional resources and infrastructure such as schools, mosques, clinics,
and banks. Hand pumps, land, and schools were identified as the most important resources by the
communities studied. While land for farming tends to be private, village chiefs and their advisors facilitate
the arbitration of any disputes regarding land use or encroachment instead of the owners themselves.
Water was a highly valued resource, whether through public (wells or hand pumps) or private access. The
management committees for these water resources included women, however their level of participation
was difficult to gauge outside of a 50% representation. When asked about management of institutional
structures, school, clinic, and Islamic school committees were identified in both countries. Overall,
community satisfaction with committees was high and very little, if any, critique of these structures was
mentioned. The clinic committees had a gender-balanced structure, but there were obvious imbalances in
committee members’ participation and influence. Women cleaned and maintained the clinic daily, but the
men met separately each week, only including women in monthly meetings where women were unable to
exercise influence over decisions about staff salary and stocking medicines.
Social Capital and Resilience Capacities
As discussed earlier, the Feed the Future (FtF) conceptual framework was adopted as a foundation for
creating a tool to help determine the social capital and resilience capacities of systems through focus group
discussions.
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The bonding social capital that contributes to absorptive
“The bonding social capital that
capacities -- that is, reactive coping mechanisms based on
contributes to absorptive capacities -relationships within the community -- in the Sahel consists
that is, reactive coping mechanisms
of informal community-based risk sharing mechanisms
based on relationships within the
based on trust, community cohesion, solidarity, and other
community -- in the Sahel consists of
intangible elements of community organization. Credit
informal community-based risk sharing
mechanisms emerge as an essential coping strategy
mechanisms based on trust, community
throughout each of the sampled communities. Although
cohesion, solidarity, and other
more formal credit mechanisms exist, the primary source of
credit tends to be merchants. Credit can take the form of
intangible elements of community
production loans used to purchase supplies necessary for
organization.”
income generating activities or in-kind consumable
products, like food. Secondly, individuals and groups may
participate in resource sharing, management, and solidarity mechanisms, such as food stock management,
labor sharing in women’s gardens and other farming activities, and sharing resources with vulnerable
community members. Finally, a critical component to this resilience capacity is the dissemination of critical
information. In the participating communities, this has included awareness raising for health and sanitation
efforts, the promotion of disease mitigation strategies, and the organization of community response
mechanisms.
The bridging social capital that promotes absorptive capacities, which are coping mechanisms that manifest
though relationships between distinct communities, in the region tend to be very limited because villages
interact with other villages in close proximity with very similar if not identical environmental and political
conditions. This is particularly true for drought, which affects large geographic areas rather than a specific
location or lone community. However, resources from community to community can differ, which provides
an opening for communities to share resources and take advantage of the resources of their neighbors. For
example, in Mali, outside individuals and groups were reported to visit the clinic in Sinsina village and
people came from nearby villages to take advantage of Djombo Djeneke’s larger farming cooperative’s
services. Regionally, in times of drought, groups may travel to more distant markets to gain access to
external credit options, to sell their animals or products, or to sell their services to a broader market. In
times of extreme need, young men migrate for employment purposes, either to national hubs such as capital
cities or regional hubs, which entail crossing national borders.
Proactive coping mechanisms that manifested through formalized networks in the community -- linking
social capital that promotes absorptive capacities -- were primarily through formal community based risksharing mechanisms including women’s groups, cooperatives, village savings and loan associations
(VSLAs), and post-production management options such as cereal banks. These mechanisms reduce
vulnerability by pooling response capacities across different groups within the community, creating formal
structures to cope with the effects of recurrent shocks and stressors. Other community based organizations
activate during times of crisis, such as a women’s land committee in Mali that reported spreading manure
and compost on fields to increase moisture retention in the soil during periods of drought, and a school
committee that negotiates school fees and teacher salaries when families’ resources are more strained.
Finally, at a local government level in Niger, people pay taxes to the district which in turn offers specialized
services to assist communities in times of need.
The bonding social capital that supports adaptive capacities was reflected in the adoption of proven
practices for communal well-being that were facilitated by close relationships between community
members. In Mali, for example, the adoption of bed nets to prevent malaria was a result of the trusting
relationship between community members and the local health staff. Farmers in the region also entrust their
animals to herders - such as the Fulani in Niger who have historically participated in long-range grazing
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circuits - for transhumance. This resilience capacity is contingent on the level of trust present between
community groups.
The linking social capital for adaptive capacities were very limited, as few to no formal response
mechanisms were in place. Village resource management structures and political leadership such as the
chiefs and their staff did not actively promote well-coordinated community response strategies. Community
members readily admitted their limited functionality in this capacity and pointed to their lack of resources
as a root cause of this inadequacy. The few examples of proactive strategies in advance of a shock that
manifested through formalized institutions included infrastructure investment and maintenance in a
community clinic and water hand pumps. Additionally, there was an example of a school committee
reaching out to the district mayor’s office to advocate necessary resources.
The bridging social capital contributing to transformative capacities was also very limited as described by
FGD participants in the communities. Marriages between members of different communities came up
multiple times as a practice that strengthens social bonds. This also increased the level of economic
exchange activities and other resource exchange links between communities.
The bridging social capital that contributed to adaptive capacities and linked social capital for
transformative capacities were not evident in the sampled communities. The selected communities have
social and economic ties with other systems, but they share many of the same environmental and livelihood
structures, problems and obstacles as the wide geographic impact of prevalent shocks and stressors such as
drought plays a formative role in this reality. Therefore the sharing of good practices or livelihood
diversification is not prevalent. Exposure to new models and experiences is mainly driven by national and
international NGOs. The only example that was provided was the “Nigeriens for Niger” program, which
promotes the creation of community dry-season gardens on public land. These are growing in popularity,
and for some communities have become the primary coping mechanism for subsistence food production
during the lean season. Although characterized as a positive step and popular program, this program stood
alone as an example of transformative capacity along institutional lines in the communities surveyed. In
fact, women in a Malian village expressed frustration in this regard as they described their desire to create
and enforce a policy against cutting down the trees in their immediate vicinity. The deforestation
occurring has adverse affects on their lives, yet they feel powerless and disconnected from the formal
structures which could enact their desired changes.
Conclusions
●
●
●
Informal bonding linkages that lend to absorptive capacities represented the most robust set of coping
mechanisms in the face of recurring shocks and stresses present in the participating communities. Credit
relationships emerge as one of, if not the most important coping mechanism as identified. Access to
credit is vital to facilitating a series of other coping strategies such as the purchase of productive
materials, access to food items or medicine, and even to finance the cost of migration.
The research revealed minimal evidence of adaptive and transformative capacities, leading to minimal
resilience to food insecurity. Communities employ many absorptive coping mechanisms, but those are
used for survival. Many times, these same coping mechanisms do not augment or contribute to
resilience, but rather erode or degrade their long-term and short-term resilience, both at the household
and community level. Communities lack the resources and assets to build these capacities without
outside assistance: these systems are already so weak that in the face of recurrent drought they are
unable to demonstrate resilience capacities.
One of the most evident trends is the lack of transformative capacities across all communities. The
research revealed minimal effort on the part of national and local governments as well as NGOs
to facilitate the creation of greater transformative capacities. Rather, current efforts are primarily
focused addressing end-result needs of system failures (such as the provision of food aid), creating a
11
●
●
bias towards the promotion of absorptive and adaptive capacities. This may be a contributing factor to
the ineffectiveness of NGO or government programming that failed to address the systemic failures,
and continue year after year to target these end-result needs.
Women and youth groups were distinct in their views of their communities and thus provided valuable
insight to inequalities within the systems. Women had a much more complex perception of the social
organization of their communities, whereas men had a much more economic and productionbased perspective. Women’s limited access to land (and subsequent inability to secure land tenure)
limited the range of viable coping mechanisms they could employ. Finally, women were generally more
willing to talk about conflict and tensions between inter-communal groups, whereas men consciously
avoided the topic. The male youth in communities in which migration was prevalent expressed feelings
of disenfranchisement and exclusion, while female youth reflected these conditions without naming
them.
Communities tend to experience a persistence of shocks and stressors, which systematically
degrades the communities’ capacity to absorb, respond to, and recover from shocks.
Implementation of the Methodology:
While this tool was useful for to understand the effects of stresses such as drought, which has no clear
human “perpetrator,” this tool is not believed to be very effective for drawing out the complexities and
sensitivities related to conflict. There is need for considerable revision for use in conflict scenarios. This
tool will likely prove more useful in communities in which Mercy Corps does not have ongoing projects,
as it offers a rapid assessment mechanism to identify viable points for program intervention by providing a
snapshot of the social capital and resilience capacities in time of reference and during shock. The tool
provides a summary of social composition of the community as well as for identifying strengths and gaps
of the capacities these communities use to cope with the shocks and stressors that degrade their resilience.
A systems approach can serve to effectively identify trigger points and systemic failures which provides a
more useful starting point for better targeted programming by revealing root causes of recurrent systemic
problems. For a true systems approach to be implemented, this tool should be one part of a much broader
toolkit that includes economic, environmental, political, and other areas of analysis. Existing Mercy Corps
tools such as HEAs, VCAs, and the gender and conflict assessments can be synthesized to provide a wider
encompassing systemic analysis in lieu of a formal systems toolkit.
A system’s approach to assess resilience to food insecurity can aid in identifying the strengths, weaknesses,
challenges and opportunities already existent within communities to create more secure, productive, just,
and resilient societies. As Mercy Corps pushes to be at the forefront of promoting resilience within the
Sahel, it is hoped that this methodology and tool can aid in identifying ever more effective leverage points
for intervention.
12
Annexes
Annex 1: What is a Systems Approach?
As the first of its four Resilience Principles, Mercy Corps recognizes that a systems approach is necessary
to understand complex, dynamic social groups. Such groups are often characterized by intricate networks
of social, environmental, economic, political and other factors that determine communal organization.
Understanding the inner workings of these complex social systems requires identifying and evaluating how
interrelated components interact. Hence, the value of a systems approach is its’ ability to break down
highly complex systems, allowing for greater understanding of its subcomponents, while recognizing
that the network of interactions between these sub elements is just as important as the individual
elements. The approach also offers a novel perspective for addressing communal needs be recognizing that
these needs result from breakdowns in the community system network as a whole. By addressing the system
failures, programing can promote communal organization to proactively prevent the failures rather than
targeting repetitive end result needs year after year.
A system is composed of interrelated parts or components. These parts can be people, institutions,
infrastructure and environment, as well as the formal and informal structures that govern and manage them.
In the case of social systems, these have boundaries that are defined by the observer for purposes of analysis
(i.e. a country, a town, a community or only part of a community), which can be thought of as “zooming”
in or out in perspective. A system is also bound in time in the sense that observed characteristics may only
be constant for the chosen time of observation. This is particularly important in highly dynamic social
systems, which can change drastically at different points in time (i.e. communal organization of agro
pastoralist during the rainy season versus during a period of drought).
Another vital aspect is that all systems are made up of smaller, interacting subsystems, while also
forming part of a larger encompassing system. Social systems tend not to be mutually exclusive and
system boundaries will certainly overlap. For instance, a small agro-pastoralist community is itself a social
system, but it is also made up of smaller, overlapping communal groups (subsystems) such as merchants,
herders, farmers, village savings and loans groups, and so on. Simultaneously, the agro-pastoralist
community is also part of a larger social system that may include intervening and interacting elements such
as governance and market structures. As we “zoom out”, we see larger encompassing systems, like regional
markets influencing our small village system.
A system consists of processes that transform inputs into outputs. A system receives input from, and sends
output into, the wider environment. It should be noted that systems are neither linear nor static: within a
system, each sub-system has its own level of resilience or equilibrium. Therefore, the promotion of
resilience for a system at large (i.e. at state-level) may marginalize resilience at the local level, with the
obvious corollary that promoting resilience at a smaller, local level or for specific subsystems may
undermine resilience at a state level (Anderies and Martin-Breen, 2011). Conversely, promoting resilience
at a local level does not always lead to increased resilience at the national level and vice versa.
To sum up, a systems approach is recognized as an effective mechanism to structure assessment of
communal resilience by promoting comprehensive analysis of both communal composition as well as
social, environmental and other linkages and interactions.
13
Annex 2: Social Capital vs. Capacities Matrix
Systems-Based Community Assessment Tool
Communal Capacities – Social Capital Analysis Matrix5
Scope: Regional – West African Sahel
Bonding Social Capital
Absorptive
Capacity
Community-based risk
sharing mechanisms
(informal):
a. Provision of credit by
community merchants
b. Credits in kind (food
products to be paid off
later) are extremely
important
c. Credits for production
(cash for supplies
necessary for production
for farmers and artisans)
are also of great importance
d. Credit links between
migrants and farmers or
merchants - first line of
credit for young men to
migrate (Niger)
Bridging Social Capital
Linking Social Capital
- Sharing resources between
communities:
a. Other communities use clinic
in Sinsina (Mali)
- Community-based risk
sharing (formal):
a. Community based
organizations (i.e. women’s
groups, coops, VSLAs)
b. Post production
management (cereal banks
Niger)
- Market Interaction
a. Access to external credit
markets/sources (Ex. Other
communities use cooperative in
Djombo Djeneke for credit
(Mali)) (Farmers sometimes
borrow money from migrants
when they run out of food, so
the credit link goes both ways
(since the farmers finance the
migrant’s traveling) (Niger)).
b. Travel to further markets for
animal and other product sales
(Ex. herders have a place to sell
of animals, merchants still have
access to outside markets, and
- Community-based
service workers can find more
dissemination of critical
business outside of their own
information:
a. Awareness-raising for
system)
malaria mitigation:
c. Sale of animals (there is an
covering latrines, bed net
important pushback to doing
usage
this because animals represent
b. School committees going social status, and during times
to families in time of
of crisis the prices of animals
sickness to take their kids
tend to plummet. So people will
to clinic
sometimes prefer to take the
c. Community health clinic chance of not selling their
(where present)
animals)
d. Sometimes herders are
unable to sell, so they leave
- Livelihood
animals with a third party at the
diversification
a. Opportunistic livelihood market who sells them (and
expansion (ex. during the
profits) which avoids having to
- Community-based
organizations that activate in
response to disasters:
a. Women’s land committee
spreads compost on fields to
keep moisture in during
drought (Mali)
b. School committee provides
community members with
voice and leverage in time of
food crisis by negotiating
school fees and teacher
salaries so the school can stay
open (preserving human
capital, business continuity)
- District level local
government services
a. People pay taxes to the
department/district at the
market  tax base influences
how much services are
provided (Niger)
Analysis matrix taken from the Feed the Future Learning Agenda “Community Resilience: Conceptual Framework and
Measurement”
5
14
wet season when the ponds
are high, nearly all young
people supplement by
fishing → fish are sold
within the community, not
through markets in Niger)
b. Women engaging in
small scale income
generating activities
c. Merchants become the
primary generators of
employment. Most people
in the community will go to
work with merchants to
transport food to market
and other activities in
exchange for cash.
take animals back to the village
at a loss (plus the animals can
be held and fattened up)
e. Labor for cash
- Migration
a. Migration of young men to
send back money
Resource Sharing and
Solidarity Mechanisms
a. Extended families help
each other and depend on
solidarity.
b. Some farmers will sell a
little product directly
within the community and
bypass the market
c. Well-diggers digging out
wells for free in
drought/food crisis (Mali)
d. There is an expected
charity/alms (“zakat”),
from higher income groups
to poor and vagabonds
(Niger)
e. Work sharing (women’s
gardens, farmers helping
other farmers with
weeding/plowing, lending
animals for farm work)
f. Transportation by coop
(Mali)
g. Household food stock
management, and sharing
with extended family
groups (Niger)
15
Adaptive Capacity
Transformative
Capacity
- Close relationships
between community
members facilitates
adoption of proven
practices for communal
wellbeing:
a. Adoption of using bed
nets for malaria prevention
(trust of nurses/clinic)
b. Farmers give their
animals to herders to take
them out to pasture, and
pay for this service in kind
(through food).
c. Islamic association and
village chief facilitating
community response
(Niger)
NOTE: these communities have
social and economic ties with
other systems, but they share
many of the same
environmental and livelihood
structures, problems and
obstacles. Therefore the
sharing of good practices or
livelihood diversification are
not prevalent. Exposure to new
models and experiences is
mainly driven by national and
international NGOs.
NOTE: Bonding social
capital is by nature solely
existent within a system
and does not link or bridge
vertically to a higher
community structure.
Therefore, it cannot have
transformative capacities.
- Relationships forged to
realize one community
function can be applied to
other functions:
a. Marriages between
communities during normal
times strengthens safety net in
times of need and further down
the line expand exchange
relationships (more bridging
capital)
NOTE: the village resource
management structures and
political leadership such as the
village chiefs and their staff
are not actively promoting
well-coordinated community
response strategies in the
villages surveyed. FGD
participants, many of who
were members of these formal
community structures readily
admitted their limited
functionality in this capacity.
- Infrastructure investment:
a. Clinic: built, maintained,
staff, and equipped by the
community.
b. Hand pump: built by outside
NGOs, but maintained by
communal, locally-elected
committee
- Government accountability
mechanisms
a. School committee advocated
with mayor’s office on behalf
of community re: school’s
needs
- Policies informed by
representative participation
of different community
sectors:
a. Women expressed desire to
have law against cutting down
trees to mitigate deforestation
– lack of political will to create
and enforce this policy has led
to continued deforestation.
- Government sponsored
coping strategies
a. Implementation of
community off season gardens
for subsistence consumption
(promoted by Gov. in
“Nigerians for Niger
Program”)
16
Annex 3: Feed the Future Resilience Framework6
6
Extracted from the Feed the Future Community Resilience Conceptual Framework and Measurement (2013).
17
Annex 4: Mali Country Report
Introduction
The Capstone research was conducted in Mali from March 9-22, 2014. The group conducted ten focus
group discussions (FGDs) in three villages. This report provides information about the villages visited and
summarizes the major findings of the FGDs. The FGDs focused on the effects of stresses and shocks such
as drought and conflict on the social capital and resilience of communities.
Three sites were chosen for their location and accessibility: one village outside of Mopti and two villages
within two hours of Bamako represented diverse levels of food security and experiences with drought and
conflict. Stakeholders in Mopti relayed that Djombo Djeneke, a Dogon Village approximately one hour
from Mopti and situated in the middle of the country in a noticeably drier climate, was not only a place of
severe food deficit, but also a historic recipient of food aid. Although not markedly further from markets
than the other two villages, the levels of food insecurity were more acute in Djombo Djeneke. Koyan lies
outside of Kati, approximately 2 hours Northwest of Bamako. Sinsina, outside of Sanankoroba (Southeast
of Bamako) was closest to the capital, and had more resources than the other two communities, including
agricultural assistance programs and food aid.
Mercy Corps Mali leadership, including the Regional Resilience Advisor and Country Director, were
instrumental in the completion of this field study. Future field staff will utilize the tool created to better
understand resilience and community systems in villages where they work. The ten FGDs completed using
the tool are a continuation of a field test done in Niger earlier this year. A number of situational and
methodological biases limit the findings of the Mali research. While the FGDs were participatory, in some
instances the location and/or presence of village leaders influenced the conversation. This was most
noticeable for both male and female youth FGDs: older participants dominated conversations or spoke
authoritatively on matters, limiting full participation of younger members. Gender lessons learned have
been compiled and include emphasis on time, location, and method of gathering participants as key success
factors for women’s and female youth FGDs in Mali. In addition, members of resource management
committees tended to be present during all FGDs, possibly limiting critiques of them.
Key Findings
The following findings are illustrative of how shocks and stresses affect the bonding, bridging, and linking
of social capital of communities, affecting resilience as measured by absorptive, adaptive, and
transformative capacities. Participant groups identified both acute shocks and recurrent, seemingly lowerlevel stresses as having major impacts on their villages. While a village may be more visibly affected by a
shock such as a coup d’état, the cumulative effects of stresses such as drought or malaria - which weaken
the village system’s ability to withstand a shock - may be far greater.
Shocks and Stressors
The main event named by each community was drought leading to food crisis (henceforth to be referred to
as drought), which created a struggle for both animals and people. This was characterized by a lack of and
irregular rain over consecutive years, leading to reduced yields, fodder, and water for animals, less water
for household use and dry-season farming, and price spikes. All of the communities also mentioned malaria
and disease, which disproportionately affect children (primary effect), and weaken the entire system
(secondary effect) because people are less mobile and productive if their kids are sick. Women in both
southern communities talked relatively openly about the 2012 coup d’etat and its effect, while men said this
has no effect whatsoever on a number of occasions once overtly asked about the event. Women directly
questioned about the coup described its negative impact on the entire community and the system’s well
being (access to markets, movement, etc). However, young women were not even aware the coup occurred
in Koyan. Women in both southern communities also mentioned the lack of trees due to deforestation and
its negative impact on their lives.
18
Bonding Capital
Each of the villages identified farmers, merchants, and herders as the most important groups in the
community. Farmers, which include dry season vegetable producers, represented virtually the entirety of
the community and had the largest number of relationships, or links, with all other groups. Merchants, on
the other hand, have the strongest exchange links, defined as relationships based on the exchange of goods
and/or services, in the community, which include buying and selling, as well as the provision of credit.
Despite all community groups reporting ownership of animals, herders are identified as those who possess
larger herds requiring localized grazing routes, with larger transhumance movements being less common.
Other community groups included artisans such as blacksmiths and functional community groups such as
cooperatives and women’s groups known as tontines.
Economic exchange, including buying, selling, trading, and bartering, is often the basis for links, or
relationships, between community groups. Farming represents the primary economic activity for the
community. Farmers and vegetable farmers are also many times the same group, but both were prioritized
groups during FGDs. Herders have a dynamic relationship with both groups of farmers, which includes
buying and selling of agricultural goods and cooperative relations for grazing land use. This relationship
can become tense during the rainy season when animal herds encroach on farmland and destroy crops and
again in the dry season when encroaching occurs on vegetable fields. This is of particular importance as
dry-season vegetable farming was the most prominent form of food security in times of drought. The
collective commercial action of the cooperative and the tontine, or women’s informal cooperative groups,
provided communities access to credit in times of need. While community members prefer not to buy things
on credit, it is the most prevalent coping mechanism. It is recognized by community members that price
fluctuations are a result of larger country-level trends and not exploitative or predatory on the part of
merchants, thus it does not damage bonds that rely on exchange relationships. These relationships could be
seen as getting stronger, but it should be recognized that these are tense relationships, especially in the case
of recurrent drought when repayment can be delayed indefinitely.
Bridging Social Capital
Across the communities, merchants go to the market most often and thus have the largest amount bridging
capital. Vegetable farmers also go to the market and interact with other villages frequently. Women are said
to go to markets and other nearby villages more than men, whether for buying and selling or social reasons.
Farmers and herders go to market the least, consuming the vast majority of their harvest and thus having
little to sell. The bridging relationships farmers and herders have are often weakened by drought. Herders
only go to the market to sell animals which tend to be sold primarily during times of stress as a coping
mechanism. Other forms of bridging social capital that herders have include exchange relationships with
outside farmers, such as selling manure for fertilizer.
Cooperatives tend to be a major bridging force for local communities by providing transportation to and
from local markets, credit, and other services that draw outside groups from nearby communities. However,
the tontine, a village-level women’s group, acts as a work-share, credit, and lending mechanism, and is a
more internal structure and does not have bridging capacities like the cooperative. For instance, the soap
made by the tontine is sold within the system and not to outside groups. Masons, mechanics, and others
whose bridging exchange relationships are based on the selling of services often rely on these links during
times of drought. Their search for business beyond their villages increases their bridging capital.
While drought affects these bridging relationships by increasing groups’ interactions or by weakening the
relationship through decreased contact or exchange, merchants continue to bring goods to their
communities from outside markets in times of drought. Women still maintained social relationships in other
villages during times of drought or conflict, but they also reported a significant decrease in the level
interaction. During the coup, for example, women reported not going to Kati or Sanankoroba for almost a
19
year, temporarily severing many links. Herders’ bridging social capital is also weakened during rainy
season as encroachment, or allowing large animals to pass over and/or eat farmers’ crops, on other
communities’ lands becomes more prevalent. None of the communities reported that this had ever escalated
to inter-communal violence, explaining that communal dispute resolution has been effective to dispel
tensions.
Linking Capital
Communities mainly identified institutional resources and infrastructure such as schools, mosques, clinics,
a bank, and mechanical grinders. Hand pumps, land and, schools were identified as the most important
resources by the communities studied. While land for farming tends to be private, village chiefs and their
assistants facilitate the management of this resource. In Djombo Djeneke, a land committee was mentioned
that is made up of women who spread compost over fields to maintain moisture in the soil, mitigating the
effects of drought. The management committees were also explained to be the arbiters of any small-scale
conflict arising, however infrequently, both within and between communities.
Water was a highly valued resource, whether through public or private access. Public access was mainly
through a public well in the North, while hand pumps were extremely important to the southern
communities. The management committees for these water resources included women, however their level
of participation was difficult to gauge outside of a 50% representation within the structure. These
committees were not affected by the identified and stresses, but their responsibility to maintain, clean, and
regulate access to the infrastructures was seen as effective.
Overall, community satisfaction with committees was high and very little, if any, critique of these structures
was mentioned. When asked about management of institutional structures, one school and one clinic
committee were identified. The clinic committee had a gender-balanced structure, but there were clear
imbalances in members’ participation and influence. Women cleaned and maintained the clinic daily, and
the men met separately each week, only including women in monthly meetings in which women were
unable to influence decisions about staff salary and stocking medicines. The youth performed educational
outreach in Sinsina on behalf of the clinic, advising people to cover latrines to mitigate against malaria.
This was the only identified community action capacity shown by youth in the selected communities. The
school committee liaised with local governance to advocate for the school’s needs, and negotiated school
fees and teacher salaries during drought so children were able to attend even in times of financial distress.
Conclusion
These communities lack substantial resilient capacities. They have many coping mechanisms, but mostly
for survival. Many times, these same coping mechanisms don’t contribute to resilience, but rather erode or
degrade their current long-term and short-term resilience, both at the household and community level. These
systems are already so weak that communities can’t do much in the face of drought to show resilience
capacities. They lack the resources and assets to build and utilize these capacities. The research revealed
minimal evidence of critical resilience capacities to food insecurity.
The food crisis was noticeably more intense in Djombo Djeneke compared to the southern communities,
seemingly due to more limited access to water and an inability to rely on vegetable farming during the dry
season. Vegetable farming is the most important coping mechanism across the communities and impacts
all other forms of social capital that are reduced/weakened during drought. Food crisis-induced migration,
or sending children to live and work with family or in Bamako, was also an issue mentioned exclusively in
Djombo Djeneke. This indicates the necessity of more extreme measures as coping mechanisms.
Distinctions between values and perspectives across genders were drawn from FGD analysis, as separate
discussions took place with adult males, adult females, young adult males, and young adult females. Women
had a more complex perception of the social organization of their communities, whereas men had a more
20
economic perspective. Each group tended to perceive community organization as it pertained to their
specific demographic’s needs. In addition, women’s inability to own land limited their range of viable
coping mechanisms. Finally, women were generally more willing to talk about conflict and tensions
between intercommunal groups, whereas men consciously avoided the conversation.
These villages experience a persistence of shocks and stresses within their systems, draining resources and
thereby degrading the communities’ ability to build transformative capacities. This increases the villages’
vulnerability, making it more difficult to absorb, respond to, and recover from shocks.
21
Annex 5: Niger Country Report
Introduction
The Capstone research was conducted in Niger from January 6-25, 2014. After consultation with Niger
Country Office staff and with the Sahel Regional Resilience Advisor, the research team developed a
Systems-Based Community Assessment tool to gauge agro-pastoral communities’ existing social capital
and the role of said social capital in promoting resilience in the face of shocks and stresses. The team spent
two weeks in conjunction with the M&E Officer from the Niger Country Office and Mercy Corps field staff
from the Filingue and Maradi offices field testing the tool in two communities in which Mercy Corps
currently has programming. The primary objectives of these focus group discussions were to characterize
the agro-pastoralist system and to assess existing social capital. Training sessions for use of the systems
based community assessment tool were organized with both Filingué and Maradi field staff. The FGDs
were complemented by key informant interviews with Mercy Corps field staff, who provided invaluable
feedback on the uses of the tool as well as contextualizing information. This report provides information
about the field based research undertaken two regions in Niger and summarizes the major findings of focus
group discussions.
Tarkassa, a community of 500 approximately 10km from the Filingue field office in Tillabury department,
was chosen for the first field test due to its proximity to the Filingue office, relative ease of access, and the
familiarity of the Filingue staff with the community. Mercy Corps’s Wadata project has been working in
the area for approximately 5 years. A small community of approximately 2,500 people located about 10km
outside of the commercial hub of Maradi near Niger’s southern border was chosen as the second FGD site
for its relative ease of access and proximity to the Maradi field office.
Biases and Limitations
This report provides an overview of general findings from two Nigerien communities and is in no way
exhaustive. While FDGs were participatory, in some instances freedom of discussion was limited by the
presence of community elders, who had a silencing effect on younger FDG participants. The methodology
developed by the research team was meant to gauge social capital as a contributing factor for resilience.
Hence, the assessment is not meant the analyze the large number of other factors the impact resilience.
Finally, due to the limited length of stay in the field, communities that were familiar to field staff and where
Mercy Corps programming is currently present, were chosen - possibly resulting in a case bias.
Key Findings
The following key findings are illustrative of how shocks and stresses affect the bonding, bridging, and
linking social capital within and between communities, thus affecting resilience as measured by the
absorptive, adaptive, and transformative capacities of a given community.
Participant groups identified both acute shocks and recurrent, seemingly lower-level stresses as having
major impacts in their villages. It is important to note that while a community may be more visibly affected
by a large, rapid onset shock, the cumulative effects of recurrent stresses may be far greater. Although
communities mentioned multiple events in the past 5 years, except for illness, all events identified resulted
in critical food shortages. These events included recurrent droughts, changing rain patterns, recurrent
flooding, and irregular rain patterns during the rainy season. All the climate-related effects primarily impact
agricultural production - communities are critically dependent on near-subsistence-level farming yields minimal variations in crop yields can severely impact communal food security.
Primary adaptive practices identified by the surveyed communities include reduced food consumption,
increased dependence on community subsistence gardens and selling of animals, amongst others.
Ineffective resource management and critical resource constraints are key determinants in resulting food
crisis (generally identified as the primary event affecting communities), there are few/no participatory
22
mechanisms to gauge or promote shared communal response strategies around resource management.
Bonding Social Capital
Livelihood practices emerged as the primary theme by which community groups identified. Farmers,
herders, artisans and merchants were consistently identified as the main community groups; men often
identified these as the only communal groups. Women and female youth on the other hand, revealed a much
more extensive and detailed communal structure, identifying upwards of 20 community groups. These
ranged from productive groups, to communal organizations, to socio-economic divisions, to village
chief/administration group, to ethnic/tribal groups. This revealed and an evident difference in the perception
of communal organization between men and women.
Agriculture was identified as the primary productive practice, with everyone in the community, including
women and children, participating in a mix of wet-season cereal agriculture, high value vegetable farming,
and dry-season (subsistence) agriculture. 100% of the community participates in wet-season agriculture,
with slightly less in other forms in the off season. Slightly less important was herding, which included a
substantial proportion of the population yet was indicated by both Maradi and Filingue focus groups as
being only somewhat important.
Trade relations were identified as the most prevalent interactions between community groups. Farmers
tended to have the most interactions with other groups. Credit-based interactions were cited as some of the
most important to all community groups, of which merchants were the primary providers. They divided
credit into two types (for consumption and for investment). As an example of investment credit, artisans
might go to market and purchase the source materials for their products on credit, then sell their products
and after profit they pay back the loan. Investment credit is the most common form of credit, and is vital to
most subsistence income generation activities since few people do not have the cash flow to purchase
necessary supplies. Consumption credit was explained as food sold on credit to be repaid in a given period.
During times of stress merchants become the most important group in the community. Because production
in the form of agriculture disappears, eliminating the primary source of income, community members are
forced to depend on merchants’ expanded networks and increased capital and they become the primary
employers in the community. Farmers who ordinarily work their own land sell their labor to merchants.
Additionally, in Maradi, young men identified migration as a primary method of coping, not only as a
response to shock but also as an annual pilgrimage either to the city or across the border to Nigeria. During
lean times in Filingue, communities observed that small-scale vegetable gardens tended primarily by
women were essential to fill the nutritional gap in the lean season. The cereal banks also become extremely
important as a post-production resource management mechanism.
Bridging capital
Community members primarily visit markets for either trade or social reasons. In both communities,
multiple markets existed and were visited by nearly all identified community groups, except herders, who
tended to only visit specific animal markets. Men primarily identified financial interactions with the market,
while women often also identified social links, such as communicating news or receiving medical
consultations. All productive groups use the market as their primary means of selling their products, buying
materials, and gathering information (for farmers about prices of agricultural products, for herders about
animal prices).
The market can also be where credit is obtained from outside the community in the form of in-kind credit
or credit for production (cash for supplies). Women may go to the market to sell small wares during the
harvest season when there is a large stock to sell, but the majority of sales in markets are made by men. A
total of eight markets were identified in Filingué and market days covered every day of the week except for
Friday, meaning community attend markets almost on a daily basis. In Filingué, women in particular noted
23
that they visited the market expressly for paying taxes. Taxes were important because amount paid to the
department would result in the corollary provision of services to the community.
In times of stress, as mentioned above, market links all but vanished. Farmers were unable to produce,
leaving them with nothing to buy or sell and entirely reliant on merchants for credit. Men noted in Filingue
that in bad harvest years, the merchants would buy what little was produced at a low price and then sell it
back to the community at an inflated price.
Linking capital
Linking social capital, which according to the FtF Framework takes the form of relationships between
people and formalized institutions, was looked at through a lens of natural resource management in order
to maintain the narrow geographic focus of each focus group discussion. The management structures were
rated through “satisfaction” which was used as a proxy to identify their functionality and efficacy. However,
in general, communities found fault not with the management structure, but with the availability or capacity
of the resource. Communities often identified infrastructure such as wells, mosques, and schools and,
accordingly, discussion then was focused on the management structures in place for these resources. All
communities listed land and water resources first, before adding religious institutions, schools, and health
clinics. Communities already had management committees in place for all named resources, although in
some cases, such as the water well committee in Maradi, the committee was non-functional. When asked
about conflict over reduced resources, either directly or indirectly, committees said they could not recall an
intractable conflict; only one minor conflict that was resolved peaceably between neighbors in Filingue was
mentioned.
Conclusion
The communities studied overall tend to lack the full spectrum of communal capacities to make
communities resilient to recurrent drought and food insecurity. Coping capacities are largely reactive to
stressors, taking the form of community-based risk sharing through the provision of credit between people
at the village or community level either in the form of direct cash loans for purchase or in-kind, such as
food or labor. Minimal resources in daily life has meant that communities have been unable to organize
community-level responses in advance of even a known, recurrent stress such as drought. The current nature
of inadequate rainfall and the community’s subsequent coping mechanisms systematically degrades the
communities’ capacity to absorb, respond to, and recover from shocks, eroding the potential for increased
resilience.
Distinctions between the values and perspectives across genders were able to be drawn from the FGD
analysis, as separate discussions took place with adult males, adult females, young adult males, and young
adult females. Across the board, women had a much more complex perception of the social organization of
their communities, whereas men had a much more economic perspective. Men were also found to be less
willing to discuss tensions between groups in the villages, while both women and adolescent girls touched
on the subject briefly. Second, each group tended to perceive community organization as it pertained to that
specific demographic’s needs, such as youth in Maradi highlighting the pervasive annual migrant
population or adolescent girls highlighting communal structures that support their livelihood such as the
school, Koranic school, clinic, parent groups, etc.
Finally, it is important to note that the research methodology had initially been designed to also assess the
effects of conflict, including large scale, intercommunal and intra communal, on communal resilience. Yet,
the methodology failed to gather any significant information about the impacts of conflict or communal
tensions. FGD participants did not identify conflict as a pertinent shock or stressor in their communities
(both in Filingé and Maradi). It is possible that communities are not willing to cover such a topic in a three
hour FGD. Further research is required to identify whether the methodology can be adapted to better assess
communal tensions, or whether a different approach is necessary.
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Annex 6: Field Research Guide for Systems-Based Community Assessment Tool
Introduction
Mercy Corps has been working in West and Central Africa to enhance communities’ resilience by reducing
the effects of natural resource constraints, chronic food insecurity, low levels of education, conflict, high
unemployment, gender inequality and a disenfranchised youth population. The organization plans to
articulate and implement regional and country strategies around the theme of resilience. The systems-based
community assessment tool presented below seeks to advance understanding of communal resilience to
shocks and stressors identified by target communities in Niger and Mali. The tool allows for further
understanding of existing social capital – defined here as the functional structure of relationships between
community groups – and communal response strategies, both recognized as essential aspects of communal
resilience. It initially designed for use with agro-pastoral communities, but can be adapted for use in varying
contexts.
This guide is to be used for the implementing the Systems-Based Community Assessment Tool. It should
be used with the Systems-Based Community Assessment FGD Questionnaire.
Conceptual Framework
The Feed the Future Community Resilience Conceptual Framework and Measurement is accepted as a
guiding framework to assess community resilience. Mercy Corps’ Resilience Principle #1 states that
communities, or “complex dynamic systems, require a systems approach” to understanding communities’
absorptive, adaptive, and transformative resilience capacities. The following community assessment tool
was developed using a system’s approach to better understand social capital’s relationship with resilience
in target communities as conceptualized in the FTF Framework. Specifically, the tool can be used to identify
three kinds of social capital, which are recognized as a vital aspect of communal resilience by both Mercy
Corps and the Feed the Future Framework. The following types of social capital have been thus been
prioritized for the purposes of the exercise: bonding social capital is identified through the network of
interactions between community groups; bridging social capital, which connects members of one
community or group to other communities/groups, is identified through the market links and the External
Group mapping exercise; and finally, linking social capital which is constituted in trusted social networks
between individuals and groups interacting across explicit, institutionalized, formal boundaries in society,
is identified through the community resource management structure. This is not an exhaustive measure of
these three elements of social capital, but it offers a general overview of communal organization as it
pertains to promotion of resilience to identified shocks and stressors.
Research Objectives
1. Characterize the agro-pastoralist market system and its social networks, including sub groups, external
groups, and interacting systems.
2. Assess the impacts of shocks and stressors (such as lean seasons, drought and conflict) on the social
capital within agro-pastoralist system, most specifically regarding the relationship between the changes in
social capital due to a shock or stress and the system as a whole and sub-groups’ food security.
3. Assess community responses and interventions to promote increased community resilience through
different forms of social capital, including which parts of the system are engaged and/or relied upon during
times of drought and conflict, which subsystems are affected by those changes, and possible negative effects
of resilience capacities.
Methodology
Focus group discussions serve as the primary data collection and community interaction tool for the
Systems-Based Community Assessment Tool. However, this tool is not to be used in isolation: triangulation
through a literature review and/or key informant interviews should be completed alongside the tool to
enhance validity of findings. In each target community, four groups are to be conducted - one group with
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adult men, one with adult women, one with male youth, and one with female youth. Participants will be
randomly selected by field program staff and will aim to represent the diverse community subgroups. A
one-day training is to be undertaken with program field staff to promote shared understanding of the
proposed methodology and provide ample space for discussion on appropriate implementation. General
guiding questions for FGDs are presented here, but this is to be used with the Systems-Based Community
Assessment FGD Questionnaire.
To set the stage for a fluid conversation surrounding the mapping of social capital and how it may or may
not have changed due to shocks or stresses, participants will first be asked to identify and prioritize primary
events or factors that have impacted the community in the last five years. These events are assumed to be
the primary shocks or stresses impacting the community. To better understand absorptive, adaptive, and
transformative capacities of these target communities, participants will be asked to characterize the
importance and nature of the linkages throughout the exercise both in time of reference and times of
previously identified shock or stress.
Then, a 3-step process will be used to guide the participatory exercise and generate a model of the perceived
community structure, market linkages, and resource management practices. The exercise will also gauge
the strength, quantity, and quality of network links both at time of reference (or “normal” time) and when
a shock or stress occurs so to assess how perceived shocks and stressors affect the community network.
Step 1: Bonding Social Capital
The first mapping exercise will ask FDG participants to assess the structure of their community: the agropastoral system. This is based on how participating community members perceive their internal
organization, in other words, how does the community function, which groups interact, what is the nature
of groups’ relationships, and which groups are seen to hold more power? This first mapping exercise will
provide a system structure for which further discussions move forward by providing a visual of the system
network assessed through perceived linkages, or relationships between groups that participants identify.
Step 2: Bridging Social Capital
The second mapping exercise will ask focus group discussion participants to identify and characterize
market linkages their community engages as to assess their linkages to resources outside of the community.
While participants may identify a number of markets, facilitators will convey that a central “market” at the
center of the map will represent the market system in which the community participates. Noting these
events’ impact could be done in a number of ways, including: which groups’ relationship with markets
changes because of a shock, who has better or worse access to markets after a shock, and if market
relationships changed between groups previously identified in Step 1: Bonding Social Capital exercise.
Step 3: Linking Social Capital
Finally, participants will be asked to identify decision-making structures within and interacting with their
community. Those structures, bodies, or groups (representing linking social capital) that steer communal
response strategies to the above-mentioned shocks and stresses will be prioritized in the discussion. The
capacity for communal action, characterized here by communal institutions that make decisions regarding
communal response strategies, has been identified as a basis for resilience. This may also provide valuable
insight into existing communal adaptive practices used to deal with system shocks and stressors.
In addition to mapping existing social capital, it is expected that this will generate a basic picture of how
the community systems may react during times of stress and facilitate the identification of specific points
or linkages where system failures occur, leading to negative system outputs such as generalized food
insecurity. The goal of this tool is to better understand the smaller system failures that precede larger, more
complete system failures such as death, famine, or displacement. System failures could include: rupture or
breakdown of linkages between a system’s sub-groups (affecting bonding social capital), disconnect to
26
outside resources or markets (affecting bridging social capital), or inability of decision-making bodies to
address a threat (affecting linking social capital).
Limitations and Bias
As with all field-based research, significant limitations and sources of bias may arise. Notably, the present
tool does not attempt to take a representative sample of the target the populations. This study will contribute
to a general understanding provided by case data collected in each participating community. Results may
vary if data were collected in other regions or at different times of the year. For the original research
exercise, communities were selected due to their participation in Mercy Corps programming so that field
staff that regularly work in these communities can help analyze results of how data may vary if collected at
different points in time. Participation in focus groups will be voluntary and will be suggested by program
staff in coordination with the village leadership, therefore presenting a biased sample. Groups excluded
from focus group discussions, whether by choice, chance, or dynamics within the focus group discussion
dynamics, should be noted in facilitators’ log as another source of bias. As previously stated, this tool should
not be used in isolation, but be part of a strategy to understand community systems’ social capital and its
relationship to resilience in the face of shocks and stresses.
Detailed Strategy for FGDs
Materials needed: Flip Chart (large white paper for drawing), markers in easily visible colors (preferably at
least 3 colors, no yellow).
Identification of Primary System Shocks and Stresses (15 minutes)
Question 1: What are the primary events or problems that have impacted your community in the past 5
years?
Participants will be asked to identify and characterize the major disturbances in the community over the
last five years to discuss the nature of the shocks/stresses and how these have most the community in the
last five years? (Lack of rainfall, floods, illness, conflict, etc.) Types of events, such as environmental
shocks (lack of rainfall or flood), impacting production (pests, plague, animal disease), conflict, or health
(disease), can be used as discussion cues. For each event, the following will be asked:
 Type of event and description.
 What percentage of the identified community group was impacted?
 Rate the level of impact from 1-5 (scale shows increasing impact)
Characterization of Community Structure – Bonding Social Capital (45 minutes)
Question 2: What social groups make up the community?
Participants will be asked to identify existing community groups and their subgroups. Facilitators will
record the list generated by the community, asking for further clarification when an identified subsystem is
not understood. Participants will then be asked to list the subgroups that make up the larger groups identified
above. These are meant to be large encompassing categorical groups. Facilitators may cue the discussion
by offering possible examples (agriculturalists, herders, artisans, merchants, men’s groups, women’s
groups, management groups, etc.):
 How do people generally group themselves in your community? Headers, farmers, merchants,
village chief´s family, teachers, artisans, etc.?
 What types of people are in each group (e.g. women’s groups may include VSLAs, community
garden groups)
Participants then will be are asked to provide an approximate percentage of the community that makes up
each group (communal groups will likely not be mutually exclusive). They will then give an approximate
value (increasingly value 1 – 5 scale) to gauge the importance of each group to the community (e.g.
merchants may only be 10% of the total population but could be rated a 5 and thus extremely important to
the community’s survival, whereas herders may be 70% of the population but only somewhat important to
27
the community’s survival, ranking as a 2).
Question 3: How do community groups interact with each other? What links exist between groups?
Participants will be asked to identify number and character/type (exchange links, social links, ethnic links)
of links that exist between the groups mapped in Question 2. Each link will be given a numerical importance
(increasing from 1 to 5) (e.g. Question: How do agriculturalists interact with herders? Answer:
Agriculturalists sell grain to herders, sell hay to feed animals, and rely on the fertilizer from herders to
restore fields. This is vitally important to the whole community, so it is given a value of 5). Facilitators will
list identified links, perceived link strengths, and begin to draw links on the paper, using the name sheet as
Question 2 where groups were identified. Facilitators may use different kinds of lines to denote different
kinds of relationships (e.g. dotted lines for exchange links, straight lines for familial links, etc.).
Question 4: How was the community structure impacted by the events identified in Question 1?
Participants will be asked to discuss ways in which certain groups were impacted by events previously
listed and then subsequently asked if the impacted group’s links were impacted.
Question 5: How did the community prepare for, respond to, and recover from events identified in Question
1?
Participants will be asked to discuss ways in which their community used strategies to prepare for, respond
to, and/or recover from shocks and stresses. Facilitators should note important actors that led these efforts,
were key for their implementation, were left out of the process, or may have been put at a disadvantage due
to the strategy.
Community Group Interaction with Markets – Bridging Social Capital (40 minutes)
Question 6: How does each community group interact with local markets?
Participants will be asked how each group identified in Question 2 interact with local markets. The market
is assumed to be a central point in the community structure, for purposes of discussion. While many markets
may be discussed, the facilitator will convey the idea of a central market that may represent a number of
different kinds or locations of markets (e.g. the livestock market that occurs once a month is the same
market as the vegetable market that is open every day). Facilitators should identify these links in the
following categories, which may be used as discussion cues: exchange links (goods-money, good-good,
credit); social links (community interaction, information, recreation); information (price, quality, quantities,
lost animals, employment search).
 How does each group participate in the market? (E.g. for buying/selling goods, giving or receiving
information).
 What causes people to prefer specific markets to others or specific merchants over others?
Question 7: How where community interactions with local markets impacted by events described in
question 1?
These same market linkages will facilitate the discussion for Question 7 by asking participants how these
interactions changed due to shocks and stresses previously identified. Facilitators should take special note
of linkages that strengthened, weakened, became tense, or where conflict arose between groups due to
changes in the linkages.
Community Resource Management Structure – Linking Social Capital (35 minutes)
Question 8: What are the primary resources available in your community?
Participants will be asked to identify the different kinds of resources in their community, such as land,
water, or social services and resources (cereal banks, schools, health facilities). These resources will then
be divided into resource subgroups. For instance, grazing routes, fields for farming maize, small community
or household gardens are all land resources but vary in their use and importance for community groups.
Once identified, these resources and their subgroups will be ranked by participants for their importance
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(increasing scale from 1 to 5) and their availability (increasing scale from 1 to 5).
Question 9: Are there formal community structures to manage these resources?
Participants will be asked to identify committees, groups, or individuals who manage and/or control the
resources listed in Question 8. For each structure identified, participants will then be asked to describe the
nature of the committee or controlling structure: What is the committee’s structure? Does it have a
president? Or are there many members who share power equally? Is this group currently functional?
Question 10: How were community resources impacted by the events listed in Question 1?
Participants will be asked to explain if and how community resources listed in Question 8 were impacted
by the shocks and stresses previously identified.
Question 11: How did resource management committees prepare for, respond to and recover after events?
Participants will be asked if the structures identified in Question 9 were able to prepare for, respond to,
and/or recover from the events identified in Question 1. If participants discuss strategies for preparedness,
response, and recovery, facilitators will take special note of the dynamics involved in these processes,
including but not limited to: groups involved in these strategies, if linkages between groups became stronger
because of the interaction with the resource management committees, if tension was created between groups
due to a lack of preparedness, response, or recovery. In addition to assessing the impact on links previously
stated, participants may identify new linkages that were created due to the shock or stress.
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Annex 7: Systems Based Community Resilience Assessment FGD Questionnaire
1) Identification of Primary System Shocks and Stressors
Question 1: What are the primary events or problems that have impacted your community in the past 5 years?
Discussion cue: Type of events – Environmental {drought, floods, fires, irregular rain patterns}; Impacting production (crop pest/disease, animal disease);
Conflict {within communal groups, amongst communities, large scale}; Health (disease)
Event
Description
% of
Level of impact
community
to community
affected
(1-5)
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2) Characterization of Community Structure – Bonding Social Capital
Question 2: What social groups make up the community?
Discussion cues: Livelihood (farmers, herders, artisans, merchants, laborers) Social (men’s groups, women’s groups, religious groups, ethnicities);
External (migrants, surrounding communities)
Group
Subgroups
Description
% of
Importance
community of
community
group (1-5)
Question 3: How do community groups interact with each other? What links exist between groups?
Discussion cues: Exchange links {access to resources, buy-sell, credit, labor}; Familial links {family links, cousinage, ethnic links; confidence}; Political
links.
Group
Links to other groups
Description
31
Question 4: How was the community structure impacted by the events identified in question 1?
Event
Groups impacted and how they were impacted
Links impacted and how they were impacted
Question 5: How did the community prepare for, respond to and recover from events in question 1?
Event
Community strategy
Description
Effectiveness
(1-5)
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3) Community Group Interaction with Markets – Bridging Social Capital
Question 6: How does each community group interact with local markets?
Discussion cues: Exchange links {goods-money, good-good, credit}; Social links {community interaction, information, recreation); Information {price,
quality, quantities, lost animals, employment search}.
Group
Interactions with market
Question 7: How where community interactions with local markets impacted by events described in question 1?
Event
Interactions impacted and how
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4) Community Resource Management Structure – Linking Social Capital
Question 8: What are the primary resources available in the community?
Discussion cues: (Fields, grazing lands, water resources, cereal banks, health facilities, educational facilities, religious facilities, etc.).
Resource
Resource Subgroups
Description
Importance Availability
to
(1-5)
community
(1-5)
Question 9: Are there formal community structures to manage community resource?
Management committee
Resources managed
Description (composition, currently functional)
Community
satisfaction
with
committee
(1-5)
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Question 10: How were community resources impacted by events from question 1?
Event
Resource impacted and how
Question 11: How did resource management committees prepare for, respond to and recover after events?
Event
Committee strategy
Description
Effectiveness
(1-5)
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