REFLECTIONS ON HOUSEHOLD AND COMMUNITY SYSTEM RESILIENCE IN THARAKA

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Reflections on household and community system resilience in Tharaka South and Tharaka North Sub-counties in Tharaka Nithi County, Kenya

By
 
Dr Sebastian Njagi Runguma
(Lead Researcher)[1]

24/8/2018


INTRODUCTION

The Lead researcher of the ongoing IAS commissioned resilience research in Kenya (Tharaka South and Tharaka North sub-counties) and Ethiopia (Borena Zone) has developed a series of 12 blog posts on the Kenyan component of the research. Similar blog posts will be developed for the Ethiopian component. The blog posts are organized under themes and subthemes that speak directly to the objectives of the research. They are also aligned with the structure of a research paper that will be developed at the conclusion of the study. As such, the blog posts have two purposes. The first purpose is to provide the RWG with early findings (impressions) on the Kenyan case study. It is hoped the RWG will reflect on these reflections and provide input that will boost the quality of the research findings, conclusions and recommendations that will appear in the final research paper. Secondly, the blog posts will serve as an inventory of preliminary findings, which the lead researcher will draw on when writing the research paper at the conclusion of the research. There are 12 blog posts in this series. Each of these addresses a specific theme of the study. The lead researcher will update and revise each blog post as more data and fresh insights emerge from the ongoing field research in Tharaka, further literature review, and analysis of all the data that will be obtained in the study. As such, the reflections contained in the blog posts should be viewed as preliminary and not conclusive findings. The blog posts draw from the following two sources: direct observations during a 3 day tour report made by the research team  and which covered the whole of Tharaka South and Tharaka North sub-counties (24th to 27th July 2018);  and rapid analysis of 157  household interviews undertaken in eight administration locations in Tharaka, 34 key informant interviews, and 12 focus group completed in the 2 sub-counties. The reflections covers the first 1 month of research field activities in Tharaka (24th July to 23rd August 2018).Field research activities are ongoing and are expected to end around 23rd September 2018. In additional to the blog posts, there are four separate sets of field observation notes developed members of the Tharaka field team. The notes contain select photos that are relevant to the themes pursued in the research. More photos will  be shared with the RWG in due course.

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