Social Protection
Context
The State of the World’s Cash 2020 report found:
- Working with, through and alongside social protection systems is now considered key to strengthening the humanitarian-development nexus and humanitarians are increasingly active in this space
- Practitioners find that the three biggest challenges to effective linkages are: (i) lack of coordination between the actors involved, (ii) social protection systems are not designed to respond to crises, (iii) humanitarian practitioners lack expertise in social protection
- Critically, there is no ‘one size fits all’ solution to linking CVA and social protection. Trade-offs between efficiency, effectiveness, accountability, and sustainability must be considered to ensure the best outcomes for people living in crisis and depends on context, existing systems, and timeframe. Linking will not always be appropriate and social protection systems may not meet all needs. In many contexts, in the short to medium term at least, humanitarian programming will be required to fill gaps.
Current Priorities
The CALP Network has invested intensely in this thematic area over the last few years. We will continue to work closely with the SPIAC-B Working group on linking humanitarian (cash) assistance and social protection (formerly the Grand Bargain Sub-Workstream on Social Protection) and with the SocialProtection.org platform and the Online Community Social Protection in Crisis Contexts to develop evidence, produce capacity building materials and provide technical support to coordination actors.
Community of Practice
SocialProtection.org hosts a dynamic and collaborative online community of practice (CoP) bringing together individuals from diverse backgrounds interested in expanding social protection in crisis-prone areas. The CoP offers a space to exchange documents, insights, and news in order to progress and learn together. Its inclusive and member-led approach offers organisations and individual members a forum to increase learning and outreach, facilitating the exchange of experiences and expanding knowledge. A discussion group hosted by dgroups.org complements these activities by connecting users rapidly via email.
SPACE
There are a wealth of relevant resources from ‘Social Protection Approaches To Covid-19: Expert Advice’ (SPACE) published in the CALP library.
Featured content
Linking Social Protection and Humanitarian Cash and Voucher Assistance
Report
There is a growing momentum and body of work around the idea of developing stronger links between humanitarian cash and voucher assistance (CVA) and social protection (SP). This Briefing Paper for the CALP Network, based on a literature review, a survey, and interviews, is intended to inform the CALP Network’s overall approach in this area, and subsequently its capacity building and...
Linking Social Protection and Humanitarian Cash
Blog Post
The case for social protection to help people cope with shocks has always been clear and never more obvious than during the current Covid-19 crisis. These issues are currently playing out in real time as governments, donors and aid agencies scramble to find ways to get more help to more people to cope with the economic consequences of illness and lockdown. As the virus starts to take hold in...
Linking Social Protection and humanitarian cash and voucher assistance (CVA) – what do we really know and where to start? Findings from the CALP Network commissioned high level briefing paper at the time of COVID-19
Webinar
State of the World’s Cash 2020 Chapter 8 summary: Linking CVA and social protection
Report
Longstanding efforts to strengthen links between humanitarian CVA and social protection have been accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, with significant progress since the last report. CVA should aim to complement robust social protection systems where they exist and contribute to their strengthening where they are weak or early-stage. This chapter asks: ‘What opportunities and challenges...
Supporting the Linkages Between Humanitarian Cash and Voucher Assistance and National Social Protection Systems
Report
This tipsheet aims to support country-level coordination efforts to strengthen the engagement between humanitarian coordination groups that implement cash and voucher assistance (CVA) and existing social
protection or disaster risk reduction coordination actors and groups. In particular, it seeks to offers inter-cluster and cash working group coordinators simple practical tips for engaging...
Case Studies
Linking CVA and Social Protection in the MENA Region – Crib sheet
Report
Building linkages between humanitarian cash and voucher assistance (CVA) and social protection (SP) has become an increasingly prominent topic over the past five years and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region has been at the centre of this evolution. The objective of this resource set (the crib sheet and 3, soon to be 6, regional case studies) is to ensure that the CALP Network...
Linking CVA and Social Protection in the MENA Region – Iraq Case Study
Report
Building linkages between humanitarian cash and voucher assistance (CVA) and social protection (SP) has become an increasingly prominent topic over the past five years and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region has been at the centre of this evolution. The objective of this resource set (the crib sheet and 3, soon to be 6, regional case studies) is to ensure that the CALP Network...
Linking CVA and Social Protection in the MENA Region – Lebanon Case Study
Report
Building linkages between humanitarian cash and voucher assistance (CVA) and social protection (SP) has become an increasingly prominent topic over the past five years and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region has been at the centre of this evolution. The objective of this resource set (the crib sheet and 3, soon to be 6, regional case studies) is to ensure that the CALP Network...
Linking CVA and Social Protection in the MENA Region – Yemen Case Study
Case Study
Building linkages between humanitarian cash and voucher assistance (CVA) and social protection (SP) has become an increasingly prominent topic over the past five years and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region has been at the centre of this evolution. The objective of this resource set (the crib sheet and 3, soon to be 6, regional case studies) is to ensure that the CALP Network...
Linking Cash and Voucher Assistance (CVA) and Social Protection – Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT): Country Summary
Report
This country summary is part of a larger resource set, providing practitioners with examples of different approaches to linking CVA
and social protection.
Linking Cash and Voucher Assistance (CVA) and Social Protection – Turkey: Country Summary
Report
This country summary is part of a larger resource set, providing practitioners with examples of different approaches to linking CVA
and social protection.
Linking Cash and Voucher Assistance (CVA) and Social Protection – Lebanon: Country Summary
Report
This country summary is part of a larger resource set, providing practitioners with examples of different approaches to linking CVA
and social protection.
Thematic lead
Latest
SPACE Summary Brief: What are future financing options for shock responsive social protection?
Guidelines and Tools
This paper, and the longer Technical Primer that accompanies it, are designed to inform discussions around financing shock-responsive social protection (SRSP). It starts by clarifying terms and providing a framing to guide approaches to SRSP financing. It then provides a high-level overview of current and...
SPACE Social protection and climate change: scaling up ambition (Summary Brief)
Policy paper
Climate change, once perceived as a long-term environmental issue, is now an immediate threat to safety and prosperity, especially for the most vulnerable people that are hit hardest by increasing weather extremes. The impacts cannot be managed just by reducing greenhouse gas emissions or by small tweaks...
SPACE Drivers of Timely and Large-Scale Cash Responses to COVID-19: what does the data say?
Guidelines and Tools
This note compares the experiences of 53 low- and middle-income countries to identify drivers of timely and large-scale government social assistance responses to COVID-19. The analysis covers cash responses only and focuses on the capacity of the social protection sector and beyond. It compares response...
SPACE Better responding to shocks through social protection: COVID-19 insights on identifying and responding to dynamic poverty
Policy paper
The Coronavirus pandemic has affected substantial proportions of the population raising questions about how social protection systems could be used to respond. One of the key policy questions emerging is how to deal with a sudden, large-scale increase in poverty levels. This paper relies on pre-existing...
Forecast based financing – lessons learned on early actions with cash transfers
Report
The objective of the document is to present the lessons learned related to the implementation of early actions with cash transfers as part of the forecast-based financing mechanism implemented by the World Food Programme in the Yaque del Norte watershed in the Dominican Republic.
Minding the (financial and digital) gap! – How informal social safety nets leverage digital & cash enablers in COVID-19 pandemic
Presentation
Minding the (financial and digital) gap! – How informal social safety nets leverage digital & cash enablers in COVID-19 pandemic: In every context, strengthening the links between cash transfers, savings groups and digitisation contributes to resilient recovery from COVID-19. Representatives of...
Linking Cash and Voucher Assistance (CVA) and Social Protection – Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT): Country Summary
Report
This country summary is part of a larger resource set, providing practitioners with examples of different approaches to linking CVA
and social protection.
Linking Cash and Voucher Assistance (CVA) and Social Protection – Turkey: Country Summary
Report
This country summary is part of a larger resource set, providing practitioners with examples of different approaches to linking CVA
and social protection.
Transfer Values: How Much Is Enough? Balancing social protection and humanitarian considerations
Policy paper
This Operational Guidance paper follows on from two blogs published by SPACE on the subject of transfer values across the social protection and humanitarian nexus (here and here). This note dives even deeper into the topic, highlighting some key elements that could be considered when setting transfer...
Cashing in: Turning Challenges into Opportunities when Evaluating Humanitarian Cash Assistance
Report
The use of cash transfers in humanitarian action has implications for evaluative activity. On the one hand, the utility of some evaluations has been strengthened by the increased attention that has been paid to evaluating cash transfers, the agreement of common outcome indicators and the creation of...
Toolkit for Monitoring and Evaluating Child Protection When Using Cash and Voucher Assistance
Guidelines and Tools
The Toolkit for Monitoring and Evaluating Child Protection when using Cash and Voucher Assistance (CP and CVA M&E Toolkit) is a resource for actors working in Monitoring and Evaluation, CVA (across sectors), and child protection. It aims to assess, address and monitor 1) Direct and indirect impact on...
Inclusive Information Systems for Social Protection: Intentionally Integrating Gender and Disability
Policy paper
Digital information systems serving the social protection sector, and especially social assistance, are increasingly prominent and will continue to be, as is the case within all other sectors. “Why? Because the ability of a country to care for its people and respond to their lifecycle needs depends on...
How Targeting Mechanisms Can Identify People With Disabilities for Inclusion in Social Protection Programmes
Guidelines and Tools
Persons with disabilities have worse education, health and employment outcomes and are more vulnerable to shocks than persons without disabilities. At the same time, they are less likely to be enrolled in social protection programmes, including those for which they are eligible. They can face significant...
COVID-19 and the Emergency Social Safety Net (ESSN) and Conditional Cash Transfers for Education (CCTE) programmes
Guidelines and Tools
FCDO Turkey commissioned SPACE to assess the impact of COVID-19 on the principal cash vehicles active in Turkey: Emergency Social Safety Net (ESSN) and Conditional Cash Transfers for Education (CCTE) programmes, both funded by the EU through the EUR 6 billion Facility for Refugees in Turkey (FRiT)...
Brief: Towards shock-responsive social protection: lessons from the COVID-19 response in Ethiopia
Policy paper
COVID-19 and national and international measures to curb its spread, may have pushed 15 million more people below the poverty line in Ethiopia. This policy brief draws on key learnings from the Ethiopia country case study, focused on the social protection response to COVID-19 and identifies...
Towards shock-responsive social protection: lessons from the COVID-19 response in Pakistan
Report
The stringent lockdown measures and global economic slowdown, due to COVID-19, are likely to increase the poverty rate in Pakistan by 35 percentage points in urban areas and 32 percentage points in rural areas. The report documents the Government of Pakistan’s social protection response to mitigate the...
Towards shock-responsive social protection: lessons from the COVID-19 response in Bangladesh – Policy brief
Policy paper
This policy brief presents the key findings of the Bangladesh country report, exploring the social protection response to COVID-19 from the Government of Bangladesh. Considering factors that have both helped and hindered the effectiveness of policy responses at various levels, the brief presents...
Group Cash Transfers Guidance and Tools
Guidelines and Tools
This guidance highlights key steps and considerations to take to be able to design, implement and monitor GCTs. The guidance is accompanied by a set of tools, as well as references to existing tools, to help facilitating agencies and GCT-supported groups with implementing the approach. Furthermore, this...
Leveraging the Potential for Group Cash Transfers: A complementary report to the Group Cash Transfer: Guidance and Tools (pilot version)
Report
This report is an accompanying document to the GCT Guidance and Toolkit. The report identifies internal and institutional barriers to using and scaling GCTs, along with mitigation measures. These were identified through an online survey, literature review and interviews with key informants that engaged...
Tip-sheet: Engaging beyond CVA and GCT communities of practice: Supporting the uptake and scaling of Group Cash Transfers (GCTs)
Guidelines and Tools
The objective of this tip-sheet is to support facilitating agencies’1 staff, volunteers and associates in engaging beyond the Cash and Voucher Assistance (CVA) and GCT Communities of Practice (CoPs) and to help address barriers in designing and implementing GCTs. The key actions are based on the “GCT...