Giving birth during adolescence is linked to a variety of negative health, social, and economic outcomes for both mothers and their children. Conflict, displacement, and humanitarian crises — which disproportionately…
Elizabeth Stites
Contact
Elizabeth Stites directs Feinstein’s Research Program on Conflict and Livelihoods, focused on the effects of conflict and violence on civilian livelihoods. She is particularly interested in how different members within a household make changes to their livelihoods in times of conflict or crisis, and also how violence and livelihood strategies can reinforce each other. On the policy level she examines the effects of humanitarian, development, and military policies on livelihoods, security, and gender roles. Her field work aims to improve the effectiveness of international and national policies through evidence-based research reflecting the lived experiences of local communities. She aims to understand the challenges and hopes that inform people’s daily decision making, and strives to ensure that local people’s voices and experiences are heard in contexts in which they are often invisible. She has worked in multiple countries in sub-Saharan Africa, in Afghanistan, Bosnia, and Nepal and on the Syria crisis.
Prior to joining Feinstein, Elizabeth worked as a consultant to UN organizations, academic centers, and international non-profits. She lived in South Africa for four years in the 1990s, where she researched post-apartheid land restitution and worked closely with families, community groups, government agencies, and non-profit organizations.
Elizabeth holds a B.A. from Wesleyan University, an M.A. from the University of Cape Town (South Africa), and an M.A.L.D. and a Ph.D. from The Fletcher School at Tufts University.
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This desk study explores how state-owned policies and programs in pastoral areas of the Sudano-Sahel and the Greater Horn of Africa meet pastoralists’ needs and priorities.
This report presents the final findings from the USAID Nawiri longitudinal study, which investigated the drivers of the persistently high rates of acute malnutrition from September 2021 to September 2023.
This learning brief examines the drivers of malnutrition in Isiolo and Marsabit Counties and their implications for policy and programs.
This synthesis report reflects upon Phase 1 findings on humanitarian action in pastoral drylands of the Greater Horn and Sudano-Sahel.
This desk study explores how pastoralists manage climate, conflict, and other stresses through indigenous early warning systems, preventive actions, local emergency responses, and customary safety nets.
This briefing paper summarizes some of the nuances that exist and the shifts that are occurring within gender dynamics in pastoralist livelihood systems in Africa.
Cette note d’information résume certaines des nuances qui existent et les changements qui se produisent actuellement dans la dynamique du genre dans les systèmes de subsistance pastoraux en Afrique.
This learning brief explores the continuity and changes to livelihoods in select sites in Isiolo and Marsabit Counties, Kenya, and reviews the implications of the continuity and the changes on the drivers of child acute malnutrition.
This learning brief presents preliminary findings on strategic mobility and its nutritional benefits to pastoral and agropastoral communities in select sites in Isiolo and Marsabit Counties, Kenya.
This learning brief presents preliminary findings about the cause (drivers) of persistently high rates of child acute malnutrition in select sites in Isiolo and Marsabit Counties.
This report provides insights and perspectives from participatory workshops with displaced female youth in the Kurdistan region of the Republic of Iraq (KRI).
This paper examines the role of marital status and motherhood on schooling experience and educational interruption, attainment, and aspirations in South Sudan and the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.
This brief investigates the perceptions and experiences of young women related to wealth, livelihoods, and aspirations in Uganda’s Karamoja sub-region.
This brief investigates how wealth, wealth equality, and food security have changed in specific villages in four districts in the Karamoja sub-region of Uganda from 2018 to 2021/22.
This study aimed to better understand changes in and perceptions of wealth and equality in four counties in the Karamoja sub-region of Uganda.
Very little is known about the experiences of female youth who marry under 18 and later become separated, divorced, or widowed. This briefing paper underscores the unique vulnerabilities and challenges that these youth face in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI) and South Sudan.
This briefing paper examines the experiences of life after marriage for female youth who married under the age of 18 in South Sudan and the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. It describes how early marriage affects education, mental health, protection issue, and family dynamics.
This briefing paper focuses on the decision-making processes that led displaced female youth to marry early, based on their experiences in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq and South Sudan.
This briefing paper follows displaced female youth in South Sudan who had unintended pregnancies. It describes the circumstances leading to early pregnancy, their after becoming aware of their pregnancies, and the impact of their pregnancies on marriage, education, mental health, family relationships, and household economics.
This report examines how informal social safety nets operate, the functions they serve, who benefits, and the obligations on community members in North and South Darfur.
New shocks (such as Covid-19) and persistent shocks (such as livestock and crop disease) caused rapid changes for young men and women in the Karamoja sub-region of Uganda between 2019…
This briefing paper examines how various shocks affected youth in the Karamoja sub-region of Uganda in 2020 and early 2021.
This assessment examines three ways in which national and international actors have sought to implement long-term, “durable,” solutions to internal displacement in Ethiopia’s Somali Region: resettlement, relocation, and local integration.
The gender gap analysis analyzes available information and identifies evidence and knowledge gaps around livelihood systems from a gender perspective in Isiolo and Marsabit Counties in northern Kenya.
This desk study examines the existing knowledge on how livelihood systems influenced nutritional outcomes in the Marsabit and Isiolo counties in northern Kenya.
This briefing paper is based on a midline quantitative survey for the Apolou project in the Karamoja sub-region of Uganda.
This briefing paper examines the ways in which young people take advantage of emerging livelihood opportunities and respond to shocks.
This briefing paper explores some of the major life events and social markers for young people in the Karamoja sub-region of Uganda.
This paper analyzes and investigates young people’s interactions with savings and credit associations and how this contributed to livelihood strategies.
This briefing paper examines how South Sudanese refugees in settlements in West Nile, Uganda establish and leverage their social connectedness throughout the process of displacement and settlement.
This report describes household recovery in northern Uganda from the 20 years of conflict between the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) and the Government of Uganda (GoU) by following the same…
This paper examines the parallel but separate trajectories of peace-building, transformation, and livelihood recovery in northern (Acholi and Lango sub-regions) and northeastern (Karamoja sub-region) Uganda over the past 15 years….
This briefing paper examines changes to wedding rituals and the nature of marriages in the Bentiu Protection of Civilians site and adjacent areas of Rubkona and Bentiu towns.
This briefing paper explores the establishment and reconfiguration of informal livelihood groups and associations as a form of socioeconomic connectedness in Bentiu, South Sudan.
This briefing paper examines changes in social connectedness in the Bentiu Protection of Civilians site and surrounding town.
This paper synthesizes findings from four studies on youth migration and resilience in different urban contexts. This work emerges from a collaboration between Save the Children US (Save US) and…
This report presents findings on the experiences and aspirations of male and female youth as they interact with the economic and aid systems in the Karamoja sub-region of Uganda. This…
This report reflects findings from the baseline quantitative study of a four-year research project in the Karamoja sub-region of Uganda. We describe different aspects of wealth, such as animal-related wealth…
This working paper presents findings on the migration of youth from Acholi, Uganda to the urban areas of Gulu and Pabbo in northern Uganda, and to the Acholi Quarter neighborhood in Kampala.
This briefing paper examines alcohol brewing and consumption in Karamoja, Uganda from the health and economic perspectives.
This report investigates food security resilience in Far-Western Nepal.
Resilience is defined as the ability of people to mitigate, weather, and “bounce back” from shocks or adversity. This definition is framed in terms of understanding capacities and risk—often particularly…
This is a briefing paper of the full report. Resilience is defined as the ability of people to mitigate, weather, and “bounce back” from shocks or adversity. This definition is…
This fifth year report examines key areas of change in Karamoja over the past five years to inform development programming decisions.
This publication explores the evolution of the “livelihoods approach” to development and humanitarian assistance.
This report reviews the state of animal-based livelihoods in the Karamoja region of northeastern Uganda and examines how animal ownership affects a household’s ability to weather shocks.
This study provides a nuanced understanding of the transformation of violence for women, men, girls and boys in northern Karamoja at the household, community, district and the regional levels. Drivers…