A Abordagem dos Modos de Vida Como Ferramenta de Análise das Estratégias de Sobrevivência no Meio Rural Africano

Diversification is a social and economic process that interprets creation of many and different sources of income in a given period of time. The constancy and eventually the increase of diversification of activities and income sources in rural spaces led to a revision of theories and approaches for better understanding this phenomenon. The Sustainable Livelihood Approach (SLA) was adopted in the 1990s as a new paradigm to address the issue of diversification and poverty in developing countries, with emphasis on rural Africa. Currently, this approach has been used by various organizations and individuals as an analytical tool for studying the livelihood strategies; however, little attention has been made to the its limitations. Based on literature revision the article presents and discusses the SLA. A conclusion is that although it has some limitation in general it can provide a better understanding of realities evolving rural spaces, mainly in low developed societies. The main limitation is regarding the difficulty for capturing the dynamics and complexity that involves the process of assets transformation into livelihood strategies.