Globally, the governments dedicate a significant portion of their national budgets to social protection, though a good number of vulnerable people remain excluded from the benefits of these programmes. Such types of exclusion errors are not infrequent in Bangladesh as well. However, these victims of exclusion errors somehow manage to get support from the social capital of community organizations. Drawing on the examples of the Japanese neighbourhood organizations (NHA), the paper endeavours to explore the possibility of tapping the potential of the age-old traditional community organizations of Bangladesh for more systematic protection of the poor and vulnerable people of the society. The study reveals that the community organizations could have better served the vulnerable groups of the society when these organizations would be given formal status by associating them with local government offices following the model of Neighbourhood Associations (NHA) of Japan. These organizations may also be given some lump grants during disasters to support their members, complementing the social protection of the poor at the grassroots level. Thus, the social capital of community organizations may be better employed for strengthening the overall social protection system of Bangladesh.

DOI : #

Authors : Mohammad Khaled Hasan

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