PhD thesis Title Page Final _Richard Juma - Victoria University ...

local patterns of adjustment to drought which have grown up in the
different ecological zones of the country; fostering those which seem to be
effective. According to Korten (1995: 5) a sustainable livelihood is not like a
substance which can be borrowed from outside - real livelihood
sustainability cannot be purchased with foreign aid or assistance, and
rather it depends on people’s ability and interest for using the local
resources efficiently. Cernea emphasizes people’s importance in livelihood
sustainability as “people are ... and should be ... the starting point, the
centre and the end goal of each livelihood intervention” (Cernea 1985: ix,
emphasis added). Chambers (1983) maintains that there is a need for local
participation for solving poverty 13 issues because the people in the
community can define criteria for well-being and the key elements of
deprivation as they appear in the local context 14 . It is argued here that
Turkana people should not be treated as passive recipients of livelihood
intervention programs but play an active role in what is done for them.
Famine relief efforts are a more intrusive external influence that creates
dependency, exacerbate inequality, and undermine and erode the intrinsic
capacity of the Turkana people to buffer environmental disturbances, such
as drought (Gore 1994; Hendrickson, et al. 1998; Hogg 1987; McCabe
1990; Oba 1992). Any intervention that focuses on saving lives which
neglects the possibility that the basis of livelihoods may be undermined
risks tackling the symptoms rather than addressing the causes of
destitution.
There is a gap between external ideologies and local practice which
impacts disadvantageously on sustainable livelihoods in the Turkana
district. As Zoomers (1999) has recently suggested for the Andes, one
important reason external interventions fail is probably that they simply
misperceive the way local people get by and get things done. According to
my respondents, livelihood intervention programs in the Turkana District
13 Cited in Ellis (2000).
14 For detailed analysis of people-centred development (Acharya 1997; Oakley 1991;
Schumacher 1997).
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