Abstract
Cash transfers are a common component of social security and poverty reduction policies. To date, positive effects have been registered on expenditures, investments and children's education and health outcomes while the evidence base as regards savings and production effects is somewhat smaller and less consistent. Drawing on intrahousehold allocation literature and the assumption that women tend to spend more on children's human capital and public goods, cash transfers are generally allocated to women in the household. However, while the expectation is that his might lower gender-based inequalities and increase women's empowerment, findings are mixed so far.
While research on the topic is booming, there are gaps in the evidence base which we seek to address:
(1) The scope of existing research has centred on individual and household effects. We broaden the scope to the community level by investigating the effects on social cohesion and networks, trust and collective action. Focusing on changes at the collective level is critical because social cohesion, in itself, is a desirable outcome and also a means to generate the public goods (e.g. schools, water, roads) needed to sustainably lift citizens out of poverty. Moving beyond the individual and intra-household level might also help us to understand the mixed effects of cash transfer interventions on gender equality, as gendered effects are often mediated through changes (or lack thereof) at the collective level.
(2) There has been little attention paid to long term effects, something our study wants to correct by explicitly investigating to what extent cash transfer effects, both at household and individual level (first order & second & third order effects) and at collective level are sustainable after program closure.
Drawing upon insights of social sciences and development studies, we hypothesize likely effects that will materialize and test hypotheses in rural western Uganda using a cross-sectional & longitudinal design and mixed methods approach. Our quasi-experimental impact study is linked to a recently finalized two-year experiment of universal unconditional mobile cash transfer (UCT) implemented by the Eight project in western Uganda (http://www.eight.world). Two rounds of data collection using a multitude of data collection tools (including conventional survey, network survey and focus groups) have been done so far and will be (partial) input for the currently proposed study.
In addition to a substantive contribution, our study is also methodologically innovative as it applies social network analysis (SNA) to analyze cash transfer effects on social interaction patterns and structures, something which has, to the best of our knowledge, not been done before.
Given the widespread use of cash transfers and the existing gaps in the evidence base, our study is obviously not only interesting for an academic audience but also for policy makers and practitioners. As to trigger the policy impact of our research, findings will be synthesized through infographics, policy briefs and will be presented during (policy) seminars and the European Development Days. Eight's substantial media-coverage (see http://www.eight.world for an overview), which is likely to get a new boost in the future as a documentary is in the making, also opens opportunities to reach a broader audience with vulgarized research findings, something which is increasingly high on the academic agenda. Also tailor-made feedback to local communities and duty bearers is part and parcel of the outreach plan.
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