世界银行-探讨社会保护对萨赫勒地区社会凝聚力的影响（英）

EXPLORING THE IMPACTS OF SOCIAL PROTECTION ON SOCIAL COHESION IN THE SAHEL September 2025 SUMMARY Vulnerability, poverty, competition over natural resources and lack of economic opportunities have distended social bonds and fueled conflict in the Sahel. Climate change exacerbates existing social, political, and economic tensions and conflicts. Policies and programs seeking to address poverty and other drivers of vulnerability, such as social protection, have the potential to support social cohesion. Untangling the relationship between social protection and social cohesion is essential to maximize this positive impact and prevent unintended detrimental dynamics. Social protection can have several effects on social cohesion, but few studies have evaluated such effects systematically in the Sahel. In addition, little evidence exists on the impacts of different components or design features on multiple dimensions of social cohesion, and the importance of institutional and social contexts in contributing to these impacts. Globally, evidence points to the potentially significant role social protection can play in improving social cohesion.1 For instance, safety nets can help build institutional trust and strengthen the citizen-state contract. They can also strengthen trust within and across groups; as well as promote greater cooperation within groups. Finally, they can contribute to greater unity and peace. However, to be able to inform program design and enhance its positive impacts, more knowledge is needed on the pathways through which program design and implementation features, as well as contextual characteristics, operate on the different dimensions of social cohesion (potentially in circular fashion). In addition, the evidence base in the Sahel is marked by significant gaps, with most evidence focusing on social cohesion within-community or bonding relations. Further analysis should help fill gaps in evidence around cohesion or bridging relations (such as between host populations and displaced populations) and vertical cohesion or linking relations (between citizens and the state). Better understanding the relationship between social protection and social cohesion is essential for policy and program design and implementation, as well as to support advocacy. UNICEF, the World Bank (WB) and the World Food Program (WFP), building on a strong partnership forged to support social protection systems in the Sahel, are jointly implementing a research project focusing on identifying the multiple linkages between social protection and social cohesion. The research project combines qualitative and quantitative methods to quantify the causal effects of social protection interventions on different dimensions of social cohesion while shedding light on the channels through which these impacts manifest. The quantitative study will analyze social cohesion-related indicators from impact evaluations of selected safety nets in the Sahel, whi