Organization / Publisher / Reference:
American Economic Review, 99(2): 287–91
Authors:
James Fearon, Macartan Humphreys, Jeremy M. Weinstein
Method:
Treatment and control study.Not a nationwide survey, rather, an impact assessment of aid on social cohesion.
Main findings:
Social cohesion already quite high in measured communities (northern Liberia); CDR project (DFiD financed, IRC executed) has lead to significantly higher community cohesion, as measured by a game to raise funds for a selected collective community project. High level of displacement (85% ever, 25% still in 2008.
Further research recommendations:
Uses both a) surveying households to assess levels of trust, patterns of community activity, and the extent of associational life, drawing on a subset of the battery of social capital questions developed by the World Bank. But we were conscious that, particularly in the context of a program designed. and B) used an experiential game to assess it too.
Link:
http://fsi.stanford.edu/publications/can_development_aid_contribute_to_social_cohesion_after_civil_war_evidence_from_a_field_experiment_in_postconflict_liberia/