The origins of Relational Wellbeing

RWB developed through in-depth qualitative research listening to how people tell the stories of their lives

Why stories?

We began working on wellbeing because we wanted to understand people’s own perspectives. Or to put it another way, we wanted an approach that was person-centred. Stories are the way that most people make sense of their lives, so stories seemed like the right place to start.

The story we tell here comes from our research on wellbeing in a marginalised community in Zambia, 2010-2014. We conducted parallel research in India at the same time, about which you can find out more in our publications.

In Zambia our research was in a rural area called Chiawa, only two and a half hours by road from the capital city, but with the characteristics of somewhere much more remote, because all access depended on a ferry crossing, which was open only from dawn to dusk. This is the setting for Thomas’ story.

Personal drivers

Thomas is someone for whom things have a habit of going wrong. His wife sometimes wonders if he was just born unlucky, or if someone might have put a bad spell on him. At other times she brushes such thoughts aside, telling herself that the bad times are now past and done.

When we met him Thomas was in his early thirties, with three children under seven. Thomas had a difficult childhood, spending ten years far from home in an uncle’s household so he could go to school there, but undergoing cruel and exploitative treatment by his aunt.

Rather than go on to professional training he settled back in his home district and got a salaried job. By his mid 20s he was happily married, supporting his younger siblings at school and all seemed well.

Then, however, disaster struck. There was a robbery at Thomas’ work and he was accused and arrested. Although there was no evidence against him Thomas was kept in prison waiting for the case to come to court.

Conditions inside were dire, with severe over-crowding, filth, lice, shortage of food and lack of toilet and washing facilities. The family spent all their savings trying to look after him without any idea of when the case would be heard or what the outcome would be.

In the event Thomas was released after a year, without the case ever coming to court. Both he and his wife describe the time of his release as a dream- time, hardly daring to believe that he was, as she puts it, ‘a real person’ again.

But Thomas’ experience of relationships is deeply troubled. He is scarred by the way his aunt treated him in childhood, and angry with his father, whose alcoholism meant that Thomas’ younger brothers and sisters depend on Thomas for support.

Asked about wellbeing, Thomas is clear that for him relationships are central:

“Well, if one is to live a good life in our community… I think first of all one must have enough food for his family… for himself and his family.

And must also have something to share with the community, because like you don’t just say, ‘No, this is for my family alone,’ but you’ve also got some other relatives, some friends who can come and ask for things.”

The people who did the robbery were friends and kin, and while Thomas says that they still meet and share a beer together, he also talks of trusting no-one but his wife.

Listening to Thomas we got a sense of deep internal struggle, between the ‘good self’ that he wanted to be, providing for his family and being generous towards his friends and wider kin, and the ‘bad self’ that he feared, he was suspecting the worst of others and drinking away his children’s chances in life.

It is easy to see how Thomas’ personal history affects his capacity to experience wellbeing. But to understand this more fully, we need also to consider the societal and environmental context.

Societal drivers

Wellbeing is affected by gender and age. It was because he was a boy that Thomas was sent away for schooling – at that time girls’ education was not valued. The job where the robbery took place was one that only men do. The responsibility Thomas feels to provide for the family also reflects the particular gendered expectations of men.

Thomas’ anxiety about his ability to support his family reflects the broader precarity of livelihoods in his community. Most people survive through a mix of different activities, with a constant struggle to make ends meet. A few people are doing much better.

These include a small local elite and the (mainly White) outsiders who have come to the area to run businesses: large agricultural plantations or safari lodges.

The marked differences between the many who are struggling and the few who have a good living has not happened by chance: it reflects amongst other things the laws around land use. These give preference to those who plan ‘development’ – which means new plantations or prospecting for minerals, not improvements to the small-scale subsistence agriculture of local people.

Virtually all the best land along the river is now in the hands of outsiders or the local elite. And land is still being sold off, sometimes without even informing the people who are living on and farming it.

Thomas’ lack of trust in his kin and neighbours is clearly related to his own painful story. But it also reflects a broader cultural ambivalence. Social ties are strongly present in Chiawa, with many people linked through kinship.

This means that people try to avoid conflicts and to seek reconciliation. But close ties also mean multiple claims and expectations that can be difficult to meet, especially when everyone is struggling to get by. While people stress their mutual support, they also caution: ‘you never know what is in people’s hearts.’

Environmental drivers

The marked social, political and economic inequalities in Chiawa also take their toll on the extra-human world.

The construction of a major dam upstream disrupted the natural flow of the river, which used to replenish the fertility of the soil beyond its banks. It has also brought significant risk of flooding, when the sluice gates are suddenly opened to release pressure on the dam.

Meanwhile, drought is an increasing issue as rainfall declines. This is exacerbated by the cultivation of water hungry crops and the absence of conservation practices, such as mulching after harvest.

In addition, Chiawa is on the edge of a national park, and the number of wild animals has been increasing. People are afraid for their own security and that of their children, with the constant threat of damage to crops, personal injury, or even death, from the crocodiles, elephants, hippos and buffalo who roam freely through the territory.

For the animals, meanwhile, land fenced off by lodges or plantations removes areas for foraging and disturbs their traditional routes to sources of water, shrinking their habitats and bringing them ever closer to the villages.

These characteristics of the environment are not natural, of course, but again rooted in society and politics. Increasing privatisation means villagers and wildlife are crowded into ever smaller patches of land.

Conservation projects that could have provided a common interest between local people and the animals have failed, having been captured by the elite.

While some profiteer, ordinary people, animals, climate, and soil… all pay the consequences.

What does Thomas’ story tell us about wellbeing?

Thomas’ story tells us that relationships are central to wellbeing. However, the role of relationships is not always positive. His present experience of wellbeing is affected by his past history, combined with his own personality and circumstances, what we call personal drivers.

These are in turn shaped by societal factors, including his gender and age, national laws and the local organisation of society and politics. We call these societal drivers.

But we cannot understand Thomas’ story without taking account also of the way the human world is shaped by and in turn affects other living creatures, climate and soil. We call these environmental drivers.

Relational Wellbeing
Essentials

Learn more about the RWB approach that we developed from stories like Thomas’.

RWB Essentials