This is the seventh in a series of blog posts that bring together PASTRES work from 2018-2023 around a number of themes. In this post, we discuss the theme of resilience in pastoral systems.
Variability in environmental, climate, market, political, and other conditions affects all pastoralists. Living with and from variability is central to pastoral livelihoods, as was discussed in our Pastoralism Primer and open-access book. But sometimes, major shocks – such as droughts – or more often combinations of shocks and stresses – when droughts combine with conflict, disease outbreaks, or rapid changes in market conditions – disrupt the ability of pastoralists to respond effectively. There is much discussion in development circles about enhancing ‘resilience’ in pastoral areas. But what does this mean?
Too often, such resilience programmes take the negative narratives about pastoralism and argue that the best thing to do for pastoralists is to seek alternative livelihoods outside pastoralism, rather than investing in improving the capacities of pastoralists to respond to shocks and stresses. In our view, resilience should not be seen just as ‘bouncing back’ to a previous state, but always adapting and transforming in ways that new conditions are accommodated. Crucially, this requires building on networks and relationships and the social fabric on which pastoralism is built. This is why our focus is on what we call ‘relational resilience’.
This article is from PASTRES, a research programme that aims to learn from pastoralists about responding to uncertainty and resilience, with lessons for global challenges. PASTRES is co-hosted by IDS.
