Social Protection:

Some definitions
Social protection is associated with a number of key concepts that are used in different ways by different people. Some of the terms used in this Journal are here defined. Social protection focuses on the threats to well-being arising from hazards, risks and stresses.

Hazards are events which, if they materialize, can adversely affect the consumption and investment plans of households. Unemployment, sickness and drought are typical hazards threatening the well-being of the poor.

Risk is the probability that hazards will materialize. For example, research shows that the poor face a higher risk of sickness.

Stresses are typically continuous and cumulative pressures that adversely affect well-being, such as low wage rates or having to work excessive numbers of hours. Households and communities deploy a range of buffers to protect their well-being against hazards, risks and stresses, including assets, insurance, social networks and public entitlements. The poor are especially vulnerable because they face higher risk of hazards and stresses, and have fewer buffers. Social protection involves interventions from public, private, voluntary organizations, and social networks, to support individuals, households and communities prevent, manage, and overcome the hazards, risks, and stresses threatening their present and future well-being.

Social Contract 1:
It usually refers to an agreement between the members of a society –or between the governed and the government – defining and limiting the rights and duties of each. In the Modern European context, the term “social contract” generally refers to a collective agreement that regulates employment and wages and that is secured by bargaining among representatives of the State, labor and capital 2 thus providing wage stability to the employers, addressing the interests of organized labour, while the State would be providing the institutionalized channels for negotiations and conflict resolution 3.

Social Funds:
In the mid-1980s and 1990s, a wide range of “safety net programmes” have been introduced in a large number of developed and developing countries under varying terminology: “Social Action Programmes”, “Social Development Funds”, “Social Investment Funds”, “Social Recovery Funds etc.. Ensuing from the realization that structural reforms took longer than estimated in bringing out expected growth, Social Funds were developed as a response to increasing criticism of the negative impact of the adjustment measures on employment and on poverty.
For the World Bank, “Social funds have been used to mitigate shocks and their effects on the most vulnerable groups and also as compensatory mechanisms to increase access to, and the quality of, basic services used by the poor” 4. They cover programmes such as: public works, community development projects and microfinance.
The main social funds (hereafter SF) in the Middle East region are: the Egyptian Social Fund for Development, the Yemen Social Fund for Development, the West Bank and Gaza Community Development and NGO projects 5.
A Social Fund is defined as i) any central (or State) government financing facility that has discretion to programme and transfer small grants to local actors, ii) for multisectoral investments in local public goods and services that benefit the poor, iii) in a way that builds the capacity of community groups and/or local governments to engage in community driven development.
While many SF are semi-autonomous agencies, the specific organizational structure of a fund is not a defining feature of the instrument. SF can consist of ministerial units/programmes using government systems. From a public sector perspective, the key characteristic of a SF is the existence of a separate, flexible, grant-making facility for local projects.

Conditional Cash Transfers (CCTs)
CCTs are grants provided to targeted poor households on the condition they engage in human capital investment. They address demand-side constraints for poverty reduction, combining short term objectives of safety nets with long term goals of breaking intergenerational poverty traps. With substantial support from the international community, CCTs have become popular in many countries. They are both short-term social safety nets and long-term tools for breaking intergenerational poverty traps. Initial evaluations have shown positive effects on schooling and nutrition, but their impact on poverty is still not clear. CCTs can only work where the poor have access to social services with acceptable quality.

Direct Transfers Programmes, in Cash and in-Kind:
Many governments provide cash and in-kind transfers programmes in their direct effort to reduce poverty and vulnerability. Such programmes include: Food aid to elderly and persons with a disability ( Morocco ), financial aid to the hard-core poor who can't support themselves such as the elderly and the persons with a disability ( Algeria , Egypt and Tunisia ) and means-tested cash transfers to poor families (Jordan, Tunisia and Yemen ).

Social Safety Nets:
Safety nets programmes protect persons or households against two adverse outcomes: “chronic incapacity to work and earn (chronic poverty) and a decline in this situation that provides minimal means for survival with few reserves
Social safety nets are meant to prevent people from falling into hardship. Safety nets usually include subsidies on basic consumer good (food, water, energy), direct assistance in the form of family allowances and cash transfers. “State retrenchment in the last decade has strained safety nets initiatives” 6.

International Poverty Line:
An income level established by the World Bank 7 to determine which people in the world are poor- set at $1 a day per person in 1985 international purchasing power parity (PPP) prices(equivalent to $1.08 in 1993 PPP prices). A person is considered poor if he or she lives in a household whose daily income or consumption is less than $1 per person. Although this poverty line is useful for international comparisons, it is impossible to create an indicator of poverty that is strictly comparable across countries. The level of $1 a day per person is close to national poverty lines in low-income countries but considerably lower than those in high-income countries. For comparing poverty levels across middle-income countries, international poverty lines of $2, $4, and $11 a day per person are considered to be more appropriate.

National Poverty Line:
The income level below which people are defined as poor. The definition is based on the income level people require to buy life's basic necessities -food, clothing, housing- and satisfy their most important sociocultural needs. The poverty line changes over time and varies by region. Also called subsistence minimum. Official national poverty line is determined by a country's government.

Services:
Intangible goods that are often produced and consumed at the same time. An example is education: students consume a lesson- an educational service- at the same time a teacher produces it. The service sector of the economy includes hotels, restaurants, and wholesale and retail trade; transport, storage, and communications; financing, insurance, real estate, and business services; community and social services (such as education and health care); and personal services.

Disability:
Disability is an evolving concept; it is the result from the interaction between persons with impairments and attitudinal and environmental barriers that hinders full and effective participation in society on an equal basis with others. In other words, disability results from an interaction between a non-inclusive society and individuals. The United Nations Conventions on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities did not include a definition of “disability” or “persons with disabilities” as such. However, elements of the preamble and article 1 provide guidance to clarify the application of the Convention.

According to the aforementioned article “Persons with disabilities include those who have long-term physical, mental, intellectual or sensory impairments which in interaction with various barriers may hinder their full and effective participation in society on an equal basis with others” 8.

Education

Accommodations: Practices and procedures that allow students with disabilities to learn, have access to, and be tested on the same curriculum as students without disabilities. Accommodations do not change what the student is expected to learn but rather how he or she learns the curriculum.  Providing accommodations during instruction and assessment may also promote equal access to the general curriculum.

Education for All: is based on the fundamental principle that all should have the opportunity to learn. Inclusive education is the education framework for including children with disabilities and was originally based on a principle stating that all should have the opportunity to learn together. This is not a principle universally acknowledged. On the contrary it is the subject of lively debate as it generates questions of a moral and educational nature. In addition, there are practical issues, especially in developing countries with scarce resources and teacher expertise. Disability and education involves a strong involvement from community as well as parents in early childhood intervention, the relation between school and health, teacher education, school accessibility and not least the ability to look at disability in a broad context so not only visible disabilities are addressed, but also those of low incidence and visibility, like mental health issues and learning disabilities, that still prevents a person from getting a proper education and, in turn, employment 9.

Inclusive education:
As defined by UNESCO, is a system of education in which all the pupils with special educational needs are enrolled in ordinary classes in their district schools, and are provided with support services and an education based on their forces and needs .

Integrated Education:
It's the situation where special classes for children with disabilities are attached and functioning parallel to the ordinary classes within a school .

Cognitive Development: The mental process of acquiring information, building a knowledge base, and learning increasingly advanced reasoning and problem-solving skills from infancy through adulthood.

Cognitive Dissonance: Mental confusion and emotional tension caused by incompatible values. Created through classroom stimuli such as hypothetical stories or pagan ritual that conflict with home-taught values, it forces most children to rethink and modify their values to resolve the conflict.