Measuring Shocks and Stressors as Part of Resilience Measurement

Part of the FSIN Technical Series, this fifth paper elaborates on the concepts presented in Technical Series Nos. 1 and 2 regarding the definition, principles and proposed common analytical model for resilience measurement. It argues that, from, an analytical perspective, resilience focuses on attention on the relationship between well-being (e.g. food security, basic health and livelihood status), shocks and stressors, and the capacity to preserve and improve well-being in the face of shocks and stressors. Likewise, the paper proposes that reliable measures of shocks and stressors are needed to determine the effectiveness of a given resilience approach. It also notes that resilience measurement demands robust ways to relate shocks and stressors to development outcomes, livelihoods, ecosystems and other systems.

The paper reviews a number of principles for measuring shocks, how people perceive shocks and how they respond to them.

Technical Series

• Nos. 1: Resilience Measuremnet Principles Toward an Agenda for Measurement Design
• Nos. 2: A Common Analytical Model for Resilience Measurement: Causal Framework and Methodological Options
• Nos. 3: Household Data Sources for Measuring and Understanding Resilience
• Nos. 4: Qualitative Data and Subjective Indicators for Resilience Measurement
• Nos. 6: Systems Analysis in the Context of Resilience