**Figure 7: The breakup of evidence across different interventions and mechanisms**

|**Bonding**|**# Studies**|**Bridging**|**# Studies**|**Linking**|**# Studies**|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|Community Driven<br>Development|1 systematic<br>review + 3<br>studies|School based<br>peacebuilding|1 systematic review|Community<br>Economic Support|6|
|Household Economic<br>Support|3|Collaborative contact|1 systematic review +<br>1 study|Individual Economic<br>Support|11|
|Alternative Dispute<br>Resolution & Mediation|4|Intergroup dialogue|1 systematic review +<br>3|Citizen engagement|7|
|Security Reforms|4|Media targeting peace|1 systematic review +<br>2|Community Policing|5|
|||Workshop + Economic<br>Support|1 systematic review|||
|||Only Economic Support|3|||
|||Exposure to Outgroups|3|||

The evidence reviewed here includes study tracking the social cohesion impacts of local economic development programs. This enriches the evidence considered in the 3ie systematic review (Doherty et al., 2021) which restricted inclusion to programs that had at least a component with an explicit social cohesion objective. The 3ie review includes four studies that evaluate the bundling of economic support programs with interventions that encourage contact and dialogue with out-groups. Broader local development programs have typically not been extensively studied to understand their impacts on social cohesion on account of measurement challenges. In this review, 17 out of the 52 studies included shed light on the effects such programs can independently have on bonding, bridging, and linking cohesion. This helps practitioners better understand the interrelated and even unintended impacts of economic development programming and social cohesion. It can help offer insights on improving existing program design to positively influence social cohesion, identify promising new entry points through economic support programs, and allow for a more integrated and cross-sectoral development approach in resource constrained settings.

Some of the studies set in FCV contexts benefit from measurement strategies that capture intangible information. For instance, using public goods games help capture intangible concepts such as cooperative capacity in South Sudan and Turkey (Avdeenko et al., 2015, Alan et al., 2021) and changing behaviors towards out-groups in Lebanon, Iraq, and Nigeria (Doherty et al., 2021). Similarly, survey experiments such as list and endorsement experiments (Lyall et al, 2019; Grossman et al., 2021) help capture attitudes towards governments or support for rebel groups in contexts such as Afghanistan and rural Colombia, where eliciting such information directly is difficult and can create security risks for respondents.

Some of the research reviewed also charts out unintended adverse effects, providing practitioners with more nuanced insights to inform program design. For instance, recent evidence explores the unintended impacts of social cohesion interventions on communities in Bosnia and Herzegovina (Cleven, 2020) and on individual well-being in Sierra Leone (Cillier et al., 2018). It also reveals heterogenous impacts of alternative dispute resolution based on levels political connectedness in Liberia (Blattman et al., 2021) and based on existing political knowledge in Colombia (Grossman et al., 2021). These insights can inform practitioners as they design programs and adopt strategies to mitigate adverse effects. The following subsections look at the evidence on effectiveness of interventions across the three key dimensions of social cohesion.

28 | P a g e