Livelihoods

The nature of assistance provided to forced migrants has evolved over the years. In the past, the humanitarian community tended to focus on emergency relief, or addressing the immediate needs of displaced persons such as food, water, shelter, and health care. In the 1980s, attention shifted to a development approach, and to transitioning from short-term relief to longer-term development in a seamless kind of continuum. This model assumed that the source of displacement would eventually end, and the recipients of assistance would eventually return home and rebuild their livelihoods. Today, many argue that the relief-to-development continuum is less relevant in situations of complex emergencies, protracted crises, and involuntary resettlement. Moreover, with fewer resources available for humanitarian assistance, greater emphasis is now being placed on adopting a livelihoods approach to enhance the productivity of forced migrants, promote greater self-reliance, and help people to either regain sources of living lost during displacement or to cultivate new ones.

This resource page complements Forced Migration Review, no. 20, the theme for which is “Sustainable Livelihoods: Seeds of Success?”. The references below have been selected from Forced Migration Online (FMO), and include full-text documents, journal articles, web resources, and organizations.

Introductions/Overviews

Lautze, Sue. 1997. "Saving lives and livelihoods: the fundamentals of a livelihoods strategy."
What are livelihoods? (DFID, IDS)
See Livelihoods Connect resources for further relevant organizations

Documents

Selected full-text documents (for more, search in the FMO Digital Library)

Anderson, Mary B. and Peter J. Woodrow. 1988. "An approach to integrating development and relief programming: an analytical framework."
Chambers, Robert. 1986. “Sustainable livelihoods: an opportunity for the World Commission on Environment and Development.”
Downing, Theodore and Chris McDowell. “1996 Oxford statement on reconstructing livelihoods of displaced people. Paper from Conference ‘Reconstructing Livelihoods: towards new approaches to resettlement,’ 9-13 September 1996, Oxford.”
Duffield, Mark. 1995. “Protracted political crisis and the demise of developmentalism: from convergence to coexistence.”
Khan, M. Fahim. 1994. “Effective strategies for mobilizing women to self-reliance. Collected papers from International Conference on Uprooted Muslim Women, 12-15 Nov 1994, Sharjah, U.A.E.”
Lautze, Sue. 1996. “Lives versus livelihoods: how to foster self-sufficiency and productivity of disaster victims.”
Lautze, Sue and John Hammock. 1996. “Coping with crisis; coping with aid: capacity building, coping mechanisms and dependency, linking relief and development.”
Macrae, Joanna and Anthony Zwi. 1994. “When the war is over: speculations on the relief/development transition and its implications for the health sector - the case of Uganda.”
Martin, Susan Forbes. 1988. “The economic activities of refugee women.”
Waldron, Sidney R. 1992. “Food for thought: refugee survival strategies & administrative control in organized settlements.”
Women's Refugee Commission. 2009. “Building livelihoods: a field manual for practitioners in humanitarian settings”

Journal articles

Selected articles (for more, search in FMO’s Journals section)

Anderson, Mary B. and Peter J. Woodrow. 1991. “Reducing vulnerability to drought and famine: developmental approaches to relief.” Disasters 15(1): 43-54.
Hamid, Gamal Mahmoud. 1992. “Livelihood patterns of displaced households in greater Khartoum.” Disasters 16(3): 230-239.
Hay, Roger W. 1986. “Food aid and relief development strategies.” Disasters 10(4): 273-287.
Jackson, Stephen and Peter Walker. 1999. “Depolarising the 'broadened' and 'back-to-basics' relief models.” Disasters 23(2): 93-114.
Jamal, Arafat. 2003. “Camps and freedoms: long-term refugee situations in Africa.” Forced Migration Review 16: 4-6.
Jaspars, Susanne and Jeremy Shoham. 1999. “Targeting the vulnerable: a review of the necessity and feasibility of targeting vulnerable households.” Disasters 23(4): 359-372.
Macrae, Joanna, et al. 1997. “Conflict, the continuum and chronic emergencies: a critical analysis of the scope for linking relief, rehabilitation and development planning in Sudan.” Disasters 21(3): 223-243.
Maxwell, Daniel. 1999. “Programmes in chronically vulnerable areas challenges and lessons learned.” Disasters 23(4): 373-384.
Seitz, Stefan. 1998. “Coping strategies in an ethnic minority group: the Aeta of Mount Pinatubo.” Disasters 22(1): 76-90.
Stepputat, Finn and Ninna Nyberg Sørensen. 2002. “IDPs and mobile livelihoods.” Forced Migration Review 14: 36-37.