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Social Cohesion through Community-based Development in Kyrgyzstan

Damir Esenaliev / Aida Bolotbekova / Gulzhan Asylbek kyzy / Kanat Tilekeyev / Anastasia Aladysheva / Roman Mogilevskii / Tilman Brück (2018)

Key facts

Journal/Publisher
IPPA Working Paper Series
Type of publication
Technical/Evaluation report
Elements of social cohesion
Trust
Identity/feeling of belonging
Participation
Orientation towards the common good
Cooperation
Connectedness
Geographical focus
Kyrgyzstan
Main thematic areas
Conflict & peacebuilding
Economic development
Youth
Political institutions & governance
Concept & measurement

Summary

Community-driven development (CDD) – a widely practiced tool by development donors and practitioners worldwide - strives to empower and develop communities by giving them joint control over aid allocations. This is expected to improve local development, local governance, and strengthen social cohesion. However, the empirical evidence for the third outcome is quite weak. This paper presents the findings of an impact evaluation research examining the extent the community driven development intervention implemented during 2014-2017 strengthened social cohesion in two regions in Kyrgyzstan. Our findings are that, on the one hand, the CDD project led to a sense of unity and cooperation and to a perception of improvements in local governance and educational services. On the other hand, the program had at best a weak effect on deep-trenched perceptions, attitudes and trust for closely related social groups and local institutions. We posit that these results obtained in part because the duration of the CDD interventions was rather short and the micro-projects were only realized in less than a half of villages in treatment sub-districts. It stands to reason that larger and longer CDD projects would have had larger impacts on social cohesion as well.

Cover-page_2018_Damir Esenaliev / Aida Bolotbekova / Gulzhan Asylbek kyzy / Kanat Tilekeyev / Anastasia Aladysheva / Roman Mogilevskii / Tilman Brück

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