In Search of the Resilient Sahelian : Reflections on a Fashionable Notion
be major natural disasters as the “ small shocks ” that make up the daily lives of the Sahelian poor , they are both local events and global or distant trends .
Finally , resilience can be integrated fairly easily into standard humanitarian frameworks . Household Economy Analysis ( HEA ) tools and the sustainable livelihoods framework can easily integrate the notion into their toolboxes . Since resilience is a multiscale , systemic , and historical notion ; however , it requires aid workers to develop an in-depth knowledge of the social environments in which they implement response , which could improve the effectiveness of this response .
How to Measure Resilience
Since resilience applies to everyone within the aid sector , the challenge is to identify the conditions in which the notion can be usefully implemented . The first such condition is the ability to measure it correctly .
Resilience of What ?
First , we need to establish the indicators to measure resilience . A factor common to all resilience approaches is the focus on the ability to cope with risks and shocks . To measure resilience , therefore , we need to assess a capacity , which is not straightforward . Many authors distinguish between different types of capacities , which combine to produce resilience . Researchers at the IDS , 5 for example , associate
5 Institute for Development Studies . absorptive capacity ( when the shock is neutralized and the system persists ), adaptive capacity ( structural adaptation to shocks through incremental adjustment ), and transformative capacity ( shift to a fundamentally new system in response to shocks ) ( Béné et al . 2012 ). However , such distinctions , although they allow resilience to go beyond the metaphorical stage , do not make it easier to measure .
Previous attempts , particularly by the FAO ( 2016a ), share two factors in common : they aim to develop synthetic indicators aggregating different kinds of variables ( psychosocial , material , etc .); they are ad hoc attempts , since the variables selected are adapted to the local context , and are not presented as extendable without adaptation ( Constas et al . 2016 ). All of these attempts have the potential for circularity due to the confusion and interdependence between causes and consequences , between determinants of resilience and resilience itself ( Béné 2013 ). As such , they struggle to take into account the interactions between what are seen as the various components of resilience : institutions are necessary to make assets useful , the value of education depends on work opportunities , etc . Finally , asset indicators , such as the possession of productive capital , can be “ positive ” in certain situations and disadvantageous in others , particularly during protracted conflict ( Jaspars and O ' Callaghan 2010 ).
It is probably pointless to doggedly attempt to extract a single measure of Sahelian resilience from more
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