A systematic integrated approach for crafting poverty reduction and sustainable development projects

Abstract

Poverty reduction and sustainable development programmes lack a systematic, integrated approach that serves to frame issues, simplify complexity and guide action. Responding to five common challenges yields such an approach: 1) How diverse groups can work together effectively, mitigating power inequities and corruption; 2) How to prioritize problems more objectively; 3) How to build sufficient contextual understanding of problems; 4) How to compare alternative solutions for relative sustainability; and 5) How to build sufficient societal capacity to sustain solutions. The approach weaves together five strands: Social learning theory and participatory methods to build collaboration; Vulnerability theory to prioritize problems; Systems thinking to understand context; Sustainability assessment to compare alternative solutions; and integrated capacity building to sustain the preferred solution: SVSSC for short. Existing projects often fail to recognize several of these strands and synergy is not exploited, undermining progress. Globally, the approach seeks to strengthen Agenda 21 and Millennium Project plans that are prescriptive. The literature foundation is complemented by case study applications: urban industrial poverty and health risks in Massachusetts, USA (design and implementation using SVSSC); malaria in the Lake Victoria Region, East Africa (framing and design); and watershed stress in Central Mexico (framing and design). The SVSSC model can strengthen governance, can be scaled up or down, applied across different sectors, tailored to existing contexts yet remain adaptive to change.

Vulnerability, Risk Perception, and Health Profile of Marginalized People Exposed to Multiple Built‐Environment Stressors in Worcester, Massachusetts: A Pilot Project

“…In this way, “vulnerability” and “sustainability” may be seen as two halves of the same coin: building societal capacity reduces vulnerability and increases relative sustainability. ( 13 ) Perceptions of risk are a key aspect of risk‐induced stress so we also investigate perceptions in our questionnaire.…”

“…(9,10,11) Biosocial and ecosystem approaches to health are appropriate because the "health" of natural and built environments directly and indirectly impinges on human health. (12,13) We used "vulnerability theory" as our theoretical framework. An extension of risk theory, it lends itself to holistic, systems-based models.…”

Delving into the “Institutional Black Box”: Revealing the Attributes of Sustainable Urban Water Management Regimes1

“…The management and implementation group of SUWM attributes requires a range of mechanisms to be used, such as top‐down and bottom‐up approaches, and utilization of solutions that have multiple benefits (Tippett et al. , 2005; Downs, 2007). Leadership by politicians, organizations, community members, and other stakeholders can positively influence implementation (de Loë and Lukovich, 2004; Nunes Silva and Syrett, 2006; Timmer et al.…”

Complexities of holistic community-based participatory research for a low income, multi-ethnic population exposed to multiple built-environment stressors in Worcester, Massachusetts

“…We faced considerable methodological challenges in trying to understand and address complex vulnerability and in integrating five dissimilar components. We combined four methodologies, after Downs (2007): 1) CBPR to build our partnership and carry out community based activities; 2) risk/vulnerability theory to frame and describe complex vulnerability to multiple stressors; 3) a capacity building approach to build the response capacities of partners and the adaptive capacities of residents; and 4) the development of a logic model to manage and elucidate the complex relationships among multiple priority problems, strategies for responding and emerging outcomes.…”

“…Responding involves either reducing the probability of an adverse outcome and/or the severity of the outcome should it occur. Since vulnerability is a function of exposure to stressors and adaptive/coping capacity it links directly to the need for capacity building (Downs 2007). Using a coupled CBPR-capacity building approach allowed us to identify and tackle agreed-upon issues.…”