Table 1.

Typology of resilience and coping in the Somali famine.

Category	Examples	Level	Application/severity
Diversification	•Diversify livelihoods and assets •Diversification of risk •Diversify against drought risk (riverine farming and/or camels) •Have a foot in the urban economy	Individual/household Some diversification within clan or larger group	Mostly applies in the longer term and a means of reducing risk, not as a means of coping with shocks
Flexibility	•Physical mobility with livestock •Labor mobility (employment) •Exploit different opportunities (including humanitarian aid) •Outmigration as a last resort	Household Community-level decisions about when to move?	Limited ability to move condemned some small-scale livestock holders, but others suffered large losses far from home
Social “connectedness”	•Forms of mutual support •Usual: remittances; unusual: diaspora or urban contacts, etc. •Having “someone to cry to”; three overlapping circles model	“Second circle” community level/clan level Partly business level	Diaspora remittances stepped up in famine: food, water trucking Third circle as “system failure”
Political power	•Access to/control over aid	Household Community	Gatekeepers from powerful clans in IDP settings
Crisis asset protection	•Sharing food or assets with livestock •Buying water for livestock •Moving livestock in search of grazing and water •Leaving someone behind to protect land if migrating •Decision making about when to sell animals, when to move, etc.	Household Community	Feeding cattle thatch from roofs during drought Timing of livestock sales Out-migration usually as a last resort
Asset sales or depletion	•Sale of livestock •Sale of other productive assets •Land pledging or mortgaging	Household Community
Rapid livelihood adaptation	•Renting farmland (esp. riverine) to protect animals (access water/fodder) •Sharing lactating animals—move with non-lactating animals •Natural resource extraction: firewood, charcoal, thatch grass •Search for casual wage employment	Household or inter-household Wage labor in community as form of social reciprocity albeit a form of exchange	Some of these are “normal” livelihoods for poor people, others are coping strategies in crisis
Credit	•Use of savings/borrowing/debt •Borrowing/purchase on credit as one form of social connectedness	Household Business	Social networks portrayed in positive light; can lead to long-term indebtedness
Consumption strategies	•Changing diets •Borrowing food or money •Rationing strategies •Going hungry
Household and inter-household demographic strategies	•Family splitting—both consumption- minimization strategy and resource-acquisition maximization strategy •Opportunistic access to aid resources/household splitting •Labor-sharing	Household Inter-household/community

Data: Field Interviews 2012–14.