The R-ARCSS was designed as an all-encompassing package of measures that would help end the civil war in South Sudan. Yet, in reality it does not efficiently address some of the root causes of the conflict. More than addressing those in a manner that connects both bottom-up and top-down drivers of tension, it focuses on elements of a power-sharing agreement and paves the way for resource sharing arrangements. This brief examines how and why grievances…
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CSRF Research Repository
The CSRF Research Repository aims to support greater contextual knowledge for policy makers, programme managers, and implementers by providing a searchable repository of research, analysis, and resources, and providing periodic updates on new research and analysis.
The core argument of this paper is that it is possible to engage in meaningful peacebuilding and reconciliation activities in South Sudan, despite the many complexities and tensions. However, serious re-thinking is required to develop and design more strategic and context-sensitive approaches. Consideration of the tensions raised here, and devising methodologies to manage them that accurately reflect the complexities of the context and of action within it, will help. All actors, whatever their role, position…
This report describes the main findings and recommendations of research carried out for the Partners for Resilience (PfR) alliance on how the PfR programme is affected by – or may affect – conflict. Although PfR works in different conflict-affected countries and contexts, it does not address conflict or insecurity explicitly. This is potentially problematic for PfR’s effectiveness. It is therefore important to consider whether PfR could or should address conflict more explicitly. For this research,…
Breaking Out of the Borderlands is the second report by Dr Nicki Kindersley and Joseph Diing Majok on South Sudan’s changing borderland economy. The first report in the series—Monetized Livelihoods and militarized Labour in South Sudan’s Borderlands—described the protracted state of social and economic crisis that has gripped the borderland region of Northern Bahr el-Ghazal. Breaking Out of the Borderlands takes the phenomena described in the authors’ earlier work—the monetization of land, life and work…
This study assesses jobs in businesses and NGOs in the towns of South Sudan. It is based on a 2019 business survey that includes informal and micro enterprises, as well as a dedicated survey of foreign-owned businesses. The business community is typical of a low-income post-conflict country, but with a particularly weak productive sector and an outsize importance of NGOs and foreign-owned businesses. Two in five commercial businesses are foreign-owned; they employ far more South…
This study assesses the state of markets and of jobs in market-linked agriculture in the towns of South Sudan. It is based on a 2019 market trader survey end extensive qualitative work. Agriculture provides most urban livelihoods, and there is high potential for raising production. However, insecurity has disrupted all elements of agricultural markets, from production to the transformation of produce, trade networks, and demand. Market activity is recovering, but food system value chains are…
This study assesses jobs outcomes in the towns of South Sudan, based on a 2017 household survey and a dedicated 2019 youth jobs survey. It discusses how years of conflict have touched nearly all livelihoods, leaving few productive jobs, and causing high poverty. Most urban households diversify their job activities little, and rely on household work in agriculture, commerce or personal services, or they depend on a household member’s work for NGOs or as a…
This study assesses the macro-fiscal framework for jobs in South Sudan, working with the limited macro-fiscal data available on the fiscal years 2019 and 2020. The macroeconomic environment can hardly be more difficult for South Sudanese looking to make a living. For workers, the dramatic contraction of non-oil output since the beginning of the conflict reflected a loss of job activities and a breakdown in market demand. A 60-fold increase in prices since before the…
This research project was commissioned in response to a growing concern among civil society, faith-based organisations, affected communities, and refugees about the negative impact of logging on local communities in South Sudan, particularly in the Equatorian Region and Greater Bahr El Ghazal. It was envisaged that through the initial research and deeper understanding of the issues involved, opportunities for engagement would be identified to inform strategic programming in a subsequent phase. This document therefore is…
Abstract South Sudan is a poignant case study for understanding the opportunities as well as the more controversial ideas within the Humanitarian-Development-Peace Nexus. The characteristics of the protracted crisis in the country, its root causes and the long-standing experience with a pragmatic, integrated approach on community level make the Triple Nexus for local actors an inter-esting way forward. While an integrated Triple Nexus approach poses risks of instrumentalising humanitarian action, humanitarian actors do not perceive…
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