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Armed Violence and Poverty Initiative

In 2004, the UK Government's Department for International Development commissioned CICS to carry out research to promote understanding of how and when poverty and vulnerability is exacerbated by armed violence. There appears to be a close correlation between levels of armed violence and poverty, but to date this has not been fully documented or analysed. The Armed Violence and Poverty Initiative (AVPI) aims to fill that gap.

This Initiative, which expanded beyond DFID to involve a number of donor agencies and NGOs, grew out of a concern to understand the problems created by arms availability and their violent use, and of the ways in which measures to reduce armed violence can be integrated into poverty reduction work at both policy and programme level. The papers from this project, therefore, have a heavy policy focus.

The AVPI is made up of four projects:

  1. A "Briefing Papers Series" on armed violence and poverty reduction measures in the areas of:
    • Disarmament, Demobilisation and Reintegration (DDR). This briefing paper seeks to increase awareness of and review the linkages between DDR and small arms and light weapons (SALW) reduction in the context of post-conflict reconstruction (PCR). Its objective is to outline the types of activities that have been undertaken under these rubrics, the difficulties and constraints encountered at the level of implementation, and identify opportunities in linking SALW programmes and DDR. It also seeks to highlight the problems created by widespread arms availability and usage in PCR. This briefing paper offers an introduction to some core issues.
    • Security Sector Reform (SSR). This briefing aims to highlight and clarify the importance of the availability and misuse of SALW, and associated armed violence, for development programming in the areas of governance, SSR, and safety, security and access to justice (SSAJ). Its objective is to outline how the effectiveness of governance, SSR and SSAJ programmes can be enhanced, and how they can help contribute to the reduction of armed violence.
    • Conflict Assessment. This briefing aims to clarify and highlight ways in which the spread, possession and misuse of SALW can be relevant in each aspect of a conflict assessment. It focuses on DFID's conflict assessment guidelines, and aims to assist people using these guidelines. Most of the issues raised are generic, and thus the briefing will be of wider use and interest to all concerned with conflict, armed violence and SALW.
    • Rural Livelihoods. This briefing paper examines relationships between armed violence affecting rural communities and efforts to maintain, restore and promote already fragile livelihoods. It considers how, and in what way, DFID's current sustainable rural livelihoods framework could be applied to contexts of armed violence, and seeks to highlight the implications of this for planning and programming rural development.
  2. Impact of Arms Transfers on Poverty and Development, an assessment. The 50-page report from this study will be used to encourage and enable DFID country programmes to assess whether a proposed arms transfer is likely to impact negatively on poor people, poverty and poverty reduction programmes.
  3. Assess and Review the Impact of Small Arms Projects on Arms Availability and Poverty. Although donors have been supporting a wide range of small arms reduction projects for several years, very few projects have been assessed for their impact on poverty reduction and development. This study aims to fill that gap. The 50-page synthesis report presents the evidence from 6 desk studies and five fieldtrips. In addition it has a practical policy-oriented purpose and concludes with programming and policy recommendations to donor government agencies.
  4. The Impact of Armed Violence on Poverty and Development, a research project to document and analyses. The core task has been to assemble evidence about the impact of armed violence, including small arms and light weapons (SALW) and their violent use, on the macro-economy, the state, the social fabric, and on the poverty of households, communities, regions and countries. The 100-page report brings together key findings from 13 country case studies with differing patterns of armed violence, supplemented by deskwork on other cases. It also aims to analyse the processes through which such impacts occur and the circumstances which exacerbate or moderate them. In addition it has a practical policy-oriented purpose and concludes with programming and policy recommendations to donor government agencies.