Climate variability is variation of climate elements from the longterm mean state on all spatiotemporal scales. Climate variability affects microfinance institutions directly and indirectly through physical and transition risks. However, no studies have analyzed the effects of climate variability in relation to informal microfinance institutions. The study, therefore, aimed to analyze the effects of climate variability in relation to informal microfinance institutions. It used a descriptive study design and multi-stage sampling design. Data was analyzed using thematic analysis, descriptive analysis, and Kendall’s tau-b correlation analysis. The study found a positive trend in climate variability (τ_b = 0.174, α>0.05). Local people are highly vulnerable to climate variability as confirmed by 98.7% of the respondents who observed that climate variability affects their livelihoods. This vulnerability stems from the effect of climate variability on access to capital assets and livelihood strategies. Vulnerability to climate variability has a significant negative effect on loan repayment performance, loan access and sustainability, and hence on informal microfinance performance (τ_b = - 0.109**, P<0.01). Nevertheless, climate variability increases participation in informal microfinance institutions as shown by the positive relationship with the number of people who joined informal microfinance institutions (τ_b = 0.239**, P<0.01) and the number formed per year (τ_b = 0.137, P<0.01) from 1981 to 2018. This is because informal microfinance institutions help vulnerable households in building resilience to climate variability as observed by 80.8% of the respondents.. The characteristics of informal microfinance institutions have positive or negative relationships with vulnerability to climate variability. These relationships are and could be further leveraged upon to address effects of climate variability on informal microfinance institutions. Detailed contextual analysis of informal microfinance institutions in the nexus of climate variability is thus imperative to inform actions aimed at cushioning the groups and their members against the impacts.

This paper analyses the origin and evolution of the Aguu, a group of street youth/children labelled as a criminal gang operating in the streets of Gulu, Uganda. Based on a series of interviews, focus group discussions, participant observations, archival work and literature review, the paper traces the origin of the Aguu to the conflict in Northern Uganda, and describes the transformation of the Aguu from street youth/children linked to war and displacement to their present day labelling as ‘criminal gang’. Anchored in an analysis based on Assemblage Theory, this paper demonstrates the complexity, multiplicity and fluidity of the Aguu identity as a group whose inception and evolution, both internal and external, occurs through a process of relationship between social, political, economic and infrastructural changes linked to war, culture, aid and politics, affecting present day security discourses in Gulu, Uganda.

The article outlines the substantial frames of the anthropology of security as an independent anthropological (humanistic) sub-discipline and the anthropological approach to security. The multidisci- plinary character of sources of the anthropological knowledge makes the anthropology of security a field of integration of biological and socio-humanistic facets of the knowledge of security aspects. The focus of the discipline is the entirety of human dispositions and accomplishments in the creation of the conditions for safe and satisfying existence, development and survival of both individuals and communities. Security, as well as the norms and patterns of human actions (i.e. cultural patterns of security) serving security creation, become the supreme category. Hence, the anthropology of security concentrates on the individual and collective natural protective and defensive dispositions (properties). Thus its attention focuses on creating technologies of security and the wholeness of the human artefacts stemming from their applications. In the anthropological perspective, security appears a sphere of creation and—simultaneously—its ultimate result. Therefore, it is more than a condition/process (a mere prelude to analyses). It is an intentionally created construction of human thought and an entity of practical activities. The presented reflections are only a broad, overall outline in both diachronic and synchronic areas. The aim of the article is to specify and promote an integrative approach in understanding the essence and structuring of the anthropology of security.

This editorial presents a brief review of pandemics from antiquity to COVID-19. Although all large-scale epidemic diseases ("pandemics") can be considered ecological "checks" on human population size, and although COVID-19 is the biggest such pandemic since HIV/AIDS emerged it is not likely to approach the deathtoll of earlier pandemics, such as the plague. There are two major hypotheses to explain the origin of COVID-19. One is the "natural origin" hypothesis, the other is that it might have escaped from a laboratory, with its origin subsequently hidden. Although most scientists support the natural origin idea the other cannot yet be dismissed. Evidence for each hypothesis is presented. If the first theory is correct then it is a powerful warning, from nature, that our species is running a great risk. If the second theory is proven then it should be considered an equally powerful, indeed frightening, signal that we are in danger, from hubris as much as from ignorance. More pandemics are inevitable, but their severity can be reduced by greater transparency, international co-operation, and retreat from planetary boundaries.