The Risks and Reconstruction Model for Resettling Displaced Populations

Abstract Involuntary population displacements and resettlement entailed by development programs have reached a magnitude and frequency that give these phenomena worldwide relevance and require policy-guided solutions. The author extracts the general trends and common characteristics revealed by a vast body of empirical data, to construct a theoretical model of displacement and reconstruction. The model captures the socioeconomic content of both segments of the process: forced displacement and reestablishment. It identifies the key risks and impoverishment processes in displacement as: (a) landlessness; (b) joblessness; (c) homelessness; (d) marginalization: (e) food insecurity; (f) loss of access to common property resources; (g) increased morbidity; (h) community disarticulation. Conversely, the model suggests that reconstructing and improving the livelihood of those displaced require risk-reversals through explicit strategies backed up by adequate financing. Flawed approaches to reconstruction and the intrinsic limitations of cost-benefit analysis are discussed. The paper shows how the proposed model can be used by practitioners and researchers as a diagnostic tool, a predictive tool, a problem-resolution tool and a research-guidance tool.

[1]  N. Luhmann.  Risk: A Sociological Theory , 1993 .

[2]  Thayer Scudder,et al.  From Welfare to Development: A Conceptual Framework for the Analysis of Dislocated People , 2019, Involuntary Migration and Resettlement.

[3]  S. Kaplan,et al.  On The Quantitative Definition of Risk , 1981 .

[4]  E. Quarantelli.  Evacuation Behavior and Problems: Findings and Implications from the Research Literature. , 1980 .

[5]  Thayer Scudder.  What it Means to be Dammed: The Anthropology of Large-Scale Development Projects in the Tropics and Subtropics , 1981 .

[6]  Michael M. Cernea.  Involuntary resettlement in Bank-assisted projects - a review of the application of Bank policies and procedures in FY79-85 projects , 1986 .

[7]  Ulrich Beck.  On the Way toward an Industrial Society of Risk , 1990 .

[8]  H. M. Mathur,et al.  Resettlement and rehabilitation in India: some lessons from recent experience. , 1998 .

[9]  Donald Cox,et al.  Achieving Social Objectives through Private Transfers: A Review , 1990 .

[10]  H. M. Mathur.  Development, displacement and resettlement: focus on Asian experiences. , 1995 .

[11]  Steven R. Brechin,et al.  Resident peoples and national parks: social dilemmas and strategies in international conservation. , 1991 .

[12]  Ismail Serageldin.  Nurturing Development: Aid and Cooperation in Today's Changing World , 1995 .

[13]  Blair Wheaton,et al.  The epidemiology of social stress , 1995 .

[14]  Env.  Resettlement and development : the Bankwide review of projects involving involuntary resettlement 1986-1993 , 1994 .

[15]  Robert A. Stallings,et al.  Promoting Risk: Constructing the Earthquake Threat , 1995 .

[16]  L. K. Mahapatra.  Tribal development in India : myth and reality , 1994 .

[17]  Chris de Wet,et al.  Stress and Environmental Change in the Analysis of Community Relocation , 1988 .

[18]  R. Merton,et al.  The Sociology of Science: Theoretical and Empirical Investigations , 1975, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion.

[19]  Michael Nelson,et al.  Development of Tropical Lands: Policy Issues in Latin America , 1973 .

[20]  M. Cernea,et al.  Involuntary Resettlement in Development Projects: Policy Guidelines in World Bank-Financed Projects , 1988 .

[21]  L. K. Mahapatra.  Development for whom? Depriving the dispossessed tribals , 1991 .

[22]  M. Cernea,et al.  Understanding and Preventing Impoverishment from Displacement: Reflections on the State of Knowledge , 1995 .

[23]  Tim Allen,et al.  In Search of Cool Ground: War, Flight and Homecoming in Northeast Africa , 1996 .

[24]  P. Atteslander,et al.  Global Developments and the Meaning of Local Cultures: Reflections on Structural Anomie , 1995 .

[25]  Michael M. Cernea,et al.  Bridging the research divide : studying refugees and development oustees , 1996 .

[26]  Thomas Sowell,et al.  Migrations and Cultures: A World View. , 1996 .

[27]  R. Merton,et al.  The Sociology of Science: Theoretical and Empirical Investigations. , 1976 .

[28]  Norman Kaplan,et al.  The Sociology of Science: Theoretical and Empirical Investigations , 1974 .

[29]  William L. Partridge,et al.  Involuntary Resettlement in Development Projects , 1989 .

[30]  M. Cernea,et al.  Poverty risks from population displacement in water resources development. , 1990 .

[31]  S. Thangaraj,et al.  Impoverishment risks' analysis: a methodological tool for participatory resettlement planning. , 1996 .

[32]  Raymond F. Mikesell,et al.  The World Bank in a Changing World , 1963 .

[33]  Thayer Scudder,et al.  Development-induced Relocation and Refugee Studies: 37 Years of Change and Continuity among Zambia's Gwembe Tonga , 1993 .

[34]  Victor Salvadore D'Souza,et al.  Development planning and structural inequalities: the response of the underprivileged. , 1990 .

[35]  Peter Atteslander.  Social Destabilization and the Development of Early Warning Systems , 1995 .

[36]  Robert Chambers,et al.  Settlement schemes in tropical Africa , 1969 .

[37]  Scott E. Guggenheim,et al.  Involuntary resettlement : an annotated reference bibliography for development research , 1994 .

[38]  A. Giddens.  The consequences of modernity , 1990 .

[39]  Robert Chambers,et al.  Mwea: An Irrigated Rice Settlement in Kenya , 1973 .

[40]  A. Oliver‐Smith,et al.  Involuntary migration and resettlement: causes and contexts. , 1982 .

[41]  M. Cernea.  Social integration and population displacement : the contribution of social science , 1995 .

[42]  C. McDowell,et al.  Understanding impoverishment : the consequences of development-induced displacement , 1998 .

[43]  Edward K Mburugu.  Dislocation of settled communities in the development process: The case of Kiambere hydroelectric project , 1994 .