The study by Adato (2000) has striking findings on the effects of Mexico’s PROGRESA on community social relations – an important form of social capital. Adato used qualitative research methods to assess the effects of PROGRESA’s beneficiary targeting method and system on community social dynamics and social relationships (ibid., 7). The study found that PROGRESA had mixed social effects: the household targeting system had adverse effects on community collective action, created social cleavages between beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries, created few conflicts, and social tensions.
However, the study reports some positive social effects on sharing benefits and information, and strengthening social relationships among women benefiting from the programme.
176 Non-beneficiaries living in areas receiving cash transfers from PROGRESA reported their resentment, envy and frustration created by being “wrongly excluded” from the programme and lack of adequate information and understanding of the selection criteria (ibid., 18). Non-beneficiaries perceived that they shared a common identity (all poor) with beneficiaries of the programme. There were also indications of beneficiaries’ discomfort with the social differentiation created by the programme. Some beneficiaries felt their poverty circumstances were no different from non-beneficiaries.
Consequently, the community perception of the targeting system was negative as it was felt it had not been done accurately and had left out some deserving households. Social divisions took the form of non-beneficiaries refusing to cooperate and participate in rural community activities particularly communal activities “where people come together to perform volunteer labour for the benefit of the community” because they were not part of PROGRESA (ibid., 22).
Adato (2000:16) found that although it was not clear how common this phenomenon was, some beneficiaries shared programme benefits and information with non-beneficiaries. The information shared was mainly from beneficiaries’ participation in health groups. A similar finding on sharing of programme benefits is reported by AIR (2014a:33). The study reports that Zimbabwe’s HSCT programme has stimulated the purchase of agricultural assets in the form of livestock such as goats, donkeys, mules; and small farming implements such as yokes, sickles and axes. The qualitative data from the study “indicated that beneficiaries share agricultural assets with non-beneficiaries” (ibid.).
The study by Adato (2000:16) shows evidence of new social relationships among women beneficiaries in the PROGRESA CCT programme. Monthly meetings, health groups, cash collection points, and communal activities where people volunteered labour for community programmes created useful opportunities for new social networks where women gathered together and spoke about other issues, shared problems and solutions. The study suggests
177 that the new social networks for beneficiary women appear to be “new forms of social capital among them” (ibid., 30).
3.4.8 Effects on civic participation and membership of associations Attanasio, Pellerano and Reyes (2009) combine survey and experimental methods to examine the effects of Familias en Acción, Colombia’s flagship conditional cash transfer programme, on social capital. Using a public goods experimental game played by individuals from poor households in two neighbourhoods in Cartagena, Colombia, the authors investigate CCT effects on “individual and group behaviour and their ability to obtain better social and economic outcomes” (Attanasio et al. 2009:143). Households in one of the neighbourhoods received conditional cash transfers for over two years (treatment group), while in the other neighbourhood the programme had not yet started (control group). The game is a version of the Voluntary Contribution Mechanism often used to examine dimensions of social capital:
trust and cooperative behaviour. The game is designed in such a way that individuals face a social dilemma: “whether to invest a token in a private account with private benefits or to invest the token in a group account (public good) where the benefits for all members increase with the number of contributors” (ibid.). The total return on investment in the group is higher than the return on private investment. However there is no incentive to invest in the group scheme due to the higher individual payoff that can be obtained from investing in a private account. Consequently, individuals face a strong private motivation to avoid investing in the public good which undermines the social optimum. The outcome of the experimental game depends on the ability of individuals to trust each other and act as a group (ibid.). The study’s measure of social capital is behaviour in a public goods game defined as percentage of individuals who resist the temptation to invest in a private account for personal gain, and who opt to trust others and act as a group to maximise group social outcomes (ibid.). The dominant strategy is often not to contribute or cooperate at all (ibid., 144).
Results from the study indicate effects of the CCT programme on social capital. The measure of social capital, that is, percentage of participants
178 contributing towards the public project, is higher at 33 percent in El Pozón, the neighbourhood that received CCTs for over two years, and low at 6.6 percent in Ciénaga, the neighbourhood with potential beneficiaries (ibid., 153). The post-game survey examined the programme’s effects on other dimensions of social capital namely civic participation and membership of social groups and organisations. The descriptive evidence shows that “[w]hile the differences between membership of associations in El Pozón and Ciénaga are not always significant, participation in religious, voluntary, environmental management and, to a lesser degree, state-sponsored associations is higher in the former than in the latter” (ibid., 167). Representatives from Ciénaga neighbourhood who played the public goods game were more involved in the most institutionalised spaces for civic participation in Colombia, that is, neighbourhood committees, and school parents’ associations compared to players in El Pozón who showed intense civic participation in new non-traditional associations. The results suggest that the CCT programme may have influenced the formation of new associations and networks (ibid.).
Results further reveal that the quality of player’s membership is more intense in the treatment neighbourhood than in the control group. Players in El Pozón are likely to spend more time in their membership organisations in terms of attendance at meetings and time spent in the meetings. The same players were more likely to take up roles of responsibility within the associations and organisations and to contribute money or voluntary work (ibid.).