PROTECTION AND CASH AND VOUCHERS An update to the literature review in 2014

Protection and Cash and Vouchers “ Cash transfers can shift decision-making power from the aid agency to the recipient. This raises questions around how much humanitarian actors typically trust recipients, defer to local knowledge, and are willing to respect the agency of conflict and disaster- affected people, and who can best determine where these boundaries lie.” Erik Johnson, DanChurch Aid

Protection and Cash and Vouchers LITERATURE REVIEW OF 2014  Update 2011 literature review and 2013 UNHCR/WFP study.  Over 150 studies, manuals, information sheets, other literature reviews etc. reviewed.  Not meant to be a comparison of cash versus vouchers versus in-kind assistance.

Protection and Cash and Vouchers ISSUES FROM THE WFP AND UNHCR STUDY AND 2011 LITERATURE REVIEW  Identification/Documentation  Preferences  New Technology/Financial Inclusion  Targeting  Security/Diversion  Cash for Work  Additional Burdens on Women  Antisocial Spending

Protection and Cash and Vouchers Particular focus on 5 key themes 1. Protection Outcomes 2. Cash and Voucher with other programming- leading to protection results/outcomes. 3. Persons with Specific Needs (PSN) 4. Protection impacts on households and communities 5. “Resilience”

Protection and Cash and Vouchers 1.Protection Outcomes  Few programmes using cash and voucher transfers designed with protection outcomes.  Few even have protection baselines or age, gender, diversity analysis/baseline.  Most studies considered protection outcomes that arose incidentally.

Protection and Cash and Vouchers 2. Cash and Voucher with other programming: leading to protection results/outcomes?  Under-researched.  Unclear what combinations will yield what results since largely untested.  Some results when combined with livelihoods, monitoring, training, advocacy.

Protection and Cash and Vouchers 3. Persons with Specific Needs  Very little on older people and persons with disabilities.  Focus on vulnerable women and children.

Protection and Cash and Vouchers Vulnerable Children/Child Protection Generally Positive Results  Education (if available but may not be a quality education).  Nutrition Mixed Results/Needs More Study  Child Labour  Separated and Unaccompanied Children  Sexual Activity  Early Marriage  Association with Armed Forces and Armed Groups

Protection and Cash and Vouchers Vulnerable Women  Improvements in economics do not necessarily have secondary effects on women’s health or empowerment or social connectedness.  Cash alone does not “empower.”  Questions about duration of effects.

Protection and Cash and Vouchers 4.Impacts on households and communities Households Findings are Mixed/Needs More Study  Gender relations in the household/empowerment.  Gender based violence/Intimate partner violence.  Inter-generational violence/relations.  Polygamy and household dynamics.  Dignity and social status.

Protection and Cash and Vouchers Communities “In practice, negative consequences on social relations are often cast as problems to be solved within the framework of the intervention, rather than reasons to reconsider the intervention itself.” Richer but resented: What do cash transfers do to social relations and does it matter?’ Ian MacAuslan and Nils Riemenschneider .

Protection and Cash and Vouchers  Communities sometimes see themselves as collectives not individuals-targeting may run counter to this.  In one study, beneficiaries ranked social relations as one of the highest matters of importance to them.  Social Jealousy- more than food as often not shared in some cases, but not all

Protection and Cash and Vouchers “The suggestion that cash transfers have unambiguously positive impacts is not borne out by the evidence. This is absolutely not an argument for revisiting the case for making net transfer from rich to poor; rather, it is case for considering the nature of those transfers and the decision- making and institutional structures that support them. It is an argument for reconsidering the costs and benefits of those transfers to reflect a more comprehensive understanding of wellbeing and a broader understanding of the ways in which interventions can affect people’s lives.”

Protection and Cash and Vouchers 5. Resilience DEFINITION? “The ability of people, households, communities, countries, and systems to mitigate, adapt to and recover from shocks and stresses in a manner that reduces chronic vulnerability and facilitates inclusive growth.”

Protection and Cash and Vouchers Resilience  Short-term unlikely to yield longer term resilience but some protection against shocks.  Most studies reviewed did not in their programme design specifically appear to tackle resilience, or either at an individual level, much less a community, or structural level.  Some looking at linkages to social protection progammes.

Protection and Cash and Vouchers  Some encouraging signs but root causes of social and economic marginalization not likely to be addressed in the shorter term.  Longer, development programmes have shown possibilities.

Protection and Cash and Vouchers Gaps in Knowledge/Areas for Further Study  Achieving protection outcomes/setting protection objectives and measurements. Protection or gender as the focus not cash.  Moving beyond avoiding harm and looking at outcomes  Cash and vouchers+ ?  Social and Household relations as more of a focus.  More on PSN-especially child protection, and protection of older persons and persons with disabilities.