Legal notice EU (project) Inequality has emerged as the social challenge of the decade. Empirically, a series of influential studies of the available international evidence suggest that global inequality has been falling in the last quarter century. However, this encouraging trend appears to have been driven entirely by convergence in GDP per capita across nations and the consequent decline in inequality between countries, with the average inequality within countries remaining constant until the about 2000 but increasing thereafter.
Context
The picture within Africa is more complex, and often obscured by problems with unreliable and non-comparable data, both over time and across countries. The most careful African data analysis suggests that, measured in monetary terms, African inequality is very high, Africa being the most unequal continent. There is, however, huge variation in the magnitude, changes and texture of this inequality across the continent.
This implies a double danger. Africa first needs to ensure that it is included in the international measurements. At least as importantly, the continent must also ensure that the particular contexts of its societies are considered in the analysis both of the factors causing inequality and the consequences of inequality. This analysis is absolutely crucial because it is the basis for policy interventions and civil society action, which are necessary to reverse the trend.
Given this context, a research project focusing on the development of diagnostic tools and capacity building was launched in partnership with the African Center of Excellence on Inequality Research (ACEIR) in the framework of the first phase of the Research Facility on Inequalities. The initial study (2018-2020) led to an in-depth analysis of inequalities in four countries: South Africa, Ghana, Kenya and Cote d’Ivoire. A Handbook on Inequality Measurement, which serves as a foundational guide for multidimensional inequality analysis, was also developed by ACEIR. The Handbook outlines key dimensions and indicators of inequality and provides guildelines for measuring income and beyond income inequalities.
This project was part of the first phase of the Research Facility on Inequalities, coordinated by AFD and funded by the European Commission's Directorate-General for International Partnerships over the 2017-2020 period. The first phase of the Facility has led to the conduct of 22 research projects and the publication of around 100 research papers and policy briefs.
Following the success of this research project:
- A fifth analysis was launched in Mozambique over the 2022-2024 period;
- A research project aming to expand and update the Handbook by incorporating methodologies for assessing vulnerabilities related to climate change and ecological transitions has also been launched over the 2024-2025 period.
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Goals
The main objective of this research project was to advance the analysis of African inequality and the policy discussion on strategies to overcome inequality in Africa through a series of country-level engagements. The project was given structure and impetus through the development of a diagnostic tool that was implemented in a limited number of pilot countries. This diagnostic tool consists of a thorough analysis of the various inequalities in a given country which enables the government to identify the priorities and policy options in order to reduce them.
In order to build the diagnostic tool, a Handbook was also developed to set up a common base which enabled country comparisons. To extend its use and improve accountability, it was backed with a central data hub and strong data centres in each partner country that allowed and facilitated further inequality analysis.
Existing multidimensional inequality analyses primarily concentrate on examining inequalities within the social and economic domains. While many low-income countries are severely impacted by climate change, there is a notable research gap in the analysis of inequalities related to climate vulnerabilities and their interactions with other socio-economic and environmental factors. The extension and updating of the Handbook, carried out over the period 2024-2025, aims to address this gap and provide the guidelines for integrating the analysis of climate-related inequalities in future diagnostics.
Method
The diagnostic tool is based on three pillars :
- a conceptual and empirical review of the studies on inequality in Africa, allowing us to have a baseline for the development of future projects, as well as a better comprehension of the specificities of inequalities in Africa and of their measurement;
- a Handbook which contains the framework proposed for the country inequality diagnostics, the methodological issues around the measurement of inequalities and their analysis and the important issues linked to policies;
- the support to the implementation of the country diagnostic, in collaboration with the pilot countries’ local research teams and the creation of the data hub.
In order to expand and update the Handbook, researchers will thoroughly examine and synthesise existing literature that addresses the measurement and analysis of climate-related vulnerabilities. This approach will help identify gaps in current research and propose a minimal set of indicators for measuring vulnerabilities linked to climate change and the imperatives of the ecological transition and detail appropriate data and measurement methods to enable their inclusion as part of an inequality diagnostic report.
Results
In practical terms, the country diagnostic takes the form of a report which overviews the inequality within a country, across all relevant dimensions, for a given time and over time. Alongside this, it summarises the main policies passed, or in place, expected to have an impact on inequalities. Each country will use their diagnostic as a platform:
- for policy engagements on strategies to overcome inequality,
- for the stimulation of national dialogue and a national research focus on inequality,
- to lead the national discussion through further, high impact research papers from the country node on inequality.
- The Handbook on Inequality Measurements for Country Studies: in order to insure a certain degree of comparability among all the country studies and to support researchers and statisticians in conducting inequality diagnostics, a Handbook was developed by the African Centre of Excellence for Inequality Research (ACEIR).
- A review on inequality in Sub-Saharan Africa: this research paper takes stock of what we know about African inequality both to promote better analysis and better policymaking in addressing inequality in Africa.
- The diagnostic of inequality in South Africa, carried out by Statistics South Africa in partnership with the Southern Africa Labour and Development Research Unit (SALDRU), ACEIR in the EU-AFD Facility framework: Inequality trends in South Africa: a multidimensional diagnosis of inequality
This report was presented at a workshop involving all actors working to reduce inequality (11 February 2020 in Philippi, Cape Town), on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the release of Nelson Mandela. You will find here the synthesis of the workshop here: Stakeholder engagement on inequality trends in South Africa.
- The diagnostic of inequality in Ghana, conducted by ISSER and the University of Ghana in partnership with the ACEIR in the EU-AFD Facility framework: Inequality Diagnostics for Ghana
- The diagnostic of inequality in Kenya, conducted by University of Nairobi in partnership with ACEIR in the EU-AFD Facility framework: Inequality Diagnostics for Kenya
- An in-depth analysis of inequality in Côte d'Ivoire (in French)
- An analysis on the dynamics of social inequalities in Mozambique, conducted by Instituto de estudos sociais e economicos (IESE) and the University of Cape Town in partnership with ACEIR in the EU-AFD Facility framework
- The research project aming to expand and update the Handbook will result in:
- A research paper that conceptualizes the links between inequalities, climate change and the ecological transition in low and middle income countries (in progress);
- An updated edition of the Inequality Handbook that integrates key metrics of climate change's impact on inequality (in progress).
Contacts
- Anda David, Research Officer, AFD
- Rawane Yasser, Junior Research Officer, AFD