Harnessing Social Capital for Resilience to Livelihood Shocks: Ethnographic Evidence of Indigenous Mutual Support Practices among Rural Households in Eastern Ethiopia

Abstract

In the absence of adequate support from formal social safety nets, rural households in Ethiopia have developed collective risksharing strategies to buffer them against adverse livelihood shocks, thus building their resilience capacities. Social capital and network based indigenous mutual support arrangements are the most important strategies that are institutionalized and widely practiced among rural households for centuries in Ethiopia to support households to cope with shocks. Nonetheless, resilience research and rural poverty alleviation policies have yet to fully recognize and embrace social capital as a tool to tackle poverty and vulnerability. Robust policy and academic studies on the role of indigenous welfare system with implications for social development policy making in Ethiopia are lacking. Using ethnographic techniques and simple descriptive statistics, we studied indigenous mutual support systems and how they shape the resilience trajectories of rural households against livelihood shocks within two selected PAs of Babille district of Oromia region. We found that mutual support practices are very effective in building coping resilience of households by smoothing consumption shocks. However, the traditional coping mechanisms often fail when the shock is systemic or covariate, when shocks last longer, and when a household has low level of human or finical capital.

Leuit and prohibition forest: Indigenous knowledge of an Urug community resilience

“…Action to store paddy can be categorized as adaptive resilience. Adaptive resilience (gradual adjustment and flexibility) requires long-term preventive strategies or actions (before shocks) (Endris, Kibwika, Hassan, & Obaa, 2017). Nevertheless, people will be allowed to sell rice when the new rice yield is sufficient to meet the family's needs.…”

Households Livelihood Coping Strategies in the Urban Informal Settlements the Case of Mlalakuwa Dar-es-Salaam Tanzania

“…in cows, goats, pigs, chickens, etc, illness, injuries or death to/of household head, spouse, or another person, unemployment, price fluctuation, Wedding and funeral expenses, or theft) and covariate or systemic (i.e. those affecting the wider community at the same time or same place, such as climatic shocks, natural disasters and crop loss caused by famine or epidemics), Endris, et al, (2017); Alderman & Paxson, (1999) in Endris, et al, (2017).…”

“…social stratification and hierarchy (vertical e.g. patrons or clients); social contacts; formal and informal social networks (horizontally) built by individuals with shared interest; membership in community-based social groups; associations to which people belong; relationships and level of trust, reciprocity, kindred, inherited habits, rules, sanctions as well as shared ethical value, norms and traditions that facilitate cooperation and economic opportunities; ability to work together and expand the access to wider institutions such as political or civic bodies; access to and source of information and communication; social support and mutual or common accepted aid within communities; and assistance to or from extended family networks in rural areas, urban areas or overseas) upon which people draw in pursuit of livelihoods objectives, for example, loans, childcare, food, accommodation and information (Bourdieu, 1986;Fukuyama, 1995;Coleman, 1998;Putman, 2000;& Woolcock, 2000) in Endris, et al, (2017); and Kassa, (2019). It is also referred as the terms of exchange between different kinds of capital, UNDP, (2017).…”

“…These urban informal settlements are densely populated and accommodate high, middle and lowincome socio-economic groups, who as a strategy, cope with life stress and shocks by combining numerous livelihood activities, Kalugila, (2014); and . Dercon, (2002) in Endris, et al, (2017), asserts that; households always face stress and shocks, both natural and man-made, and often devise their own responses and collective institutional strategies to cope with and recover from them. The way a household copes with and withstands economic stress and shocks, depends on the options available in terms of capabilities, assets (including both material and social resources) and activities, i.e., on the household livelihood strategy they draw to make a living, Ellis, (1998).…”

Innovating social connectedness for agricultural innovations in eastern Ethiopia

“…Smallholder farmers' throughout the tropics exhibit a deep understanding of their environment and how to utilize local environment and other resources for improved livelihoods (Talawar & Rhoades, 1998). In Ethiopia, farmers have old dating experience and time-tested knowledge of agricultural practices, and mutual support practices that are applied to respond to adverse livelihood shocks and risks (Endris et al, 2017;Maru et al, 2019). However, while smallholder farmers are among the key sources of agricultural innovations, many studies conceived them as adopters of externally developed technologies and practices (Kiptot et al, 2007;Kolade et al, 2014;Letty et al, 2011;Novo et al, 2014;Reij & Waters-Bayer, 2014;Röling, 2009).…”