Everyday mobility and changing livelihood trajectories: implications for vulnerability and adaptation in dryland regions
Dryland regions are highly dynamic environments in which multiple pressures intersect, threatening livelihood security. Mobility is an integral feature in these environments and represents a key risk management strategy for people to respond to frequent livelihood shocks and stresses. Global environ...
| Main Authors: | , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Resilience Alliance
2023-03-01
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| Series: | Ecology and Society |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol28/iss1/art36/ |
| _version_ | 1827973936579608576 |
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| author | Mark G. L. Tebboth Chandni Singh Dian Spear Adelina M. Mensah Prince Ansah |
| author_facet | Mark G. L. Tebboth Chandni Singh Dian Spear Adelina M. Mensah Prince Ansah |
| author_sort | Mark G. L. Tebboth |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Dryland regions are highly dynamic environments in which multiple pressures intersect, threatening livelihood security. Mobility is an integral feature in these environments and represents a key risk management strategy for people to respond to frequent livelihood shocks and stresses. Global environmental change scholarship has tended to articulate spatial and temporal change inadequately, portraying populations in a way that belies their socially differentiated and inherently mobile livelihoods. We explored the role of mobility as an ongoing, “everyday” adaptive response to changing environmental, economic, and social conditions. We draw on 21 Life History (LH) interviews to explore the drivers and outcomes of people’s mobility behavior in drylands of Ghana, Kenya, Namibia, and India. We present the adaptation option space (AOS) as a novel theoretical development to explore livelihood trajectories. Within our cases, we found that mobility was ubiquitous and facilitated changes to and exchanges within people’s risk profiles in three main ways: novelty (risks gained or lost), modification (risks attenuated or accentuated), and no change. Temporal analysis showed three broad trajectories in people’s lives set within broader structural constraints: upward, downward, and stable, depending on people’s abilities to manage their AOS. The analysis confirmed that the AOS was a useful heuristic to understand how people exert agency to respond to an array of converging risks while negotiating broader drivers of change. Moreover, the data demonstrated how compounding shocks had negative impacts on people, highlighting the value of temporally-sensitive approaches. |
| first_indexed | 2024-04-09T19:45:48Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-bf09d52ae6234baaa44041bde44450c6 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1708-3087 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-04-09T19:45:48Z |
| publishDate | 2023-03-01 |
| publisher | Resilience Alliance |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Ecology and Society |
| spelling | doaj.art-bf09d52ae6234baaa44041bde44450c62023-04-03T16:05:42ZengResilience AllianceEcology and Society1708-30872023-03-012813610.5751/ES-13626-28013613626Everyday mobility and changing livelihood trajectories: implications for vulnerability and adaptation in dryland regionsMark G. L. Tebboth0Chandni Singh1Dian Spear2Adelina M. Mensah3Prince Ansah4School of International Development, University of East AngliaSchool of Environment and Sustainability, Indian Institute for Human SettlementsAfrican Climate Development Initiative, University of Cape TownInstitute for Environment and Sanitation Studies, University of GhanaAfrican Climate Development Initiative, University of Cape TownDryland regions are highly dynamic environments in which multiple pressures intersect, threatening livelihood security. Mobility is an integral feature in these environments and represents a key risk management strategy for people to respond to frequent livelihood shocks and stresses. Global environmental change scholarship has tended to articulate spatial and temporal change inadequately, portraying populations in a way that belies their socially differentiated and inherently mobile livelihoods. We explored the role of mobility as an ongoing, “everyday” adaptive response to changing environmental, economic, and social conditions. We draw on 21 Life History (LH) interviews to explore the drivers and outcomes of people’s mobility behavior in drylands of Ghana, Kenya, Namibia, and India. We present the adaptation option space (AOS) as a novel theoretical development to explore livelihood trajectories. Within our cases, we found that mobility was ubiquitous and facilitated changes to and exchanges within people’s risk profiles in three main ways: novelty (risks gained or lost), modification (risks attenuated or accentuated), and no change. Temporal analysis showed three broad trajectories in people’s lives set within broader structural constraints: upward, downward, and stable, depending on people’s abilities to manage their AOS. The analysis confirmed that the AOS was a useful heuristic to understand how people exert agency to respond to an array of converging risks while negotiating broader drivers of change. Moreover, the data demonstrated how compounding shocks had negative impacts on people, highlighting the value of temporally-sensitive approaches.https://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol28/iss1/art36/adaptationclimate changedrylandsmobilityrisktemporality |
| spellingShingle | Mark G. L. Tebboth Chandni Singh Dian Spear Adelina M. Mensah Prince Ansah Everyday mobility and changing livelihood trajectories: implications for vulnerability and adaptation in dryland regions Ecology and Society adaptation climate change drylands mobility risk temporality |
| title | Everyday mobility and changing livelihood trajectories: implications for vulnerability and adaptation in dryland regions |
| title_full | Everyday mobility and changing livelihood trajectories: implications for vulnerability and adaptation in dryland regions |
| title_fullStr | Everyday mobility and changing livelihood trajectories: implications for vulnerability and adaptation in dryland regions |
| title_full_unstemmed | Everyday mobility and changing livelihood trajectories: implications for vulnerability and adaptation in dryland regions |
| title_short | Everyday mobility and changing livelihood trajectories: implications for vulnerability and adaptation in dryland regions |
| title_sort | everyday mobility and changing livelihood trajectories implications for vulnerability and adaptation in dryland regions |
| topic | adaptation climate change drylands mobility risk temporality |
| url | https://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol28/iss1/art36/ |
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