Incorporating experiences of violence into livelihood decision-making: a micro level study in the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh

This paper has sought to analyse the influence of violence on livelihood deci-sion-making of indigenous households in formal post-conflict Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh. Study results suggest that households’ livelihood deci-sion-making is influenced by threat perceptions of violence. Households per-ceiving high level of violence spend less on consumption expenditure and are sending children to school more. Cultivating more land and producing mixed crops are also found more among the households perceiving higher level of violence. Using cross sectional data this study finds that decreasing emphasis on present consumption, long term investment in human capital, using land more intensively to earn more cash and move towards creating surplus instead of producing for subsistence suggests perceived violence is producing decisions which are similar to those advocated in a classical ‘modernization process’. Findings of this paper are similar to the argument of ‘post traumatic growth theory’ and suggest existence of ‘Phoenix Factor’.