Like other West African countries, Mali has a low HIV prevalence rate (estimated at 1.5 percent in 2007). The epidemic seems to be feminized and urbanized. In Bamako district, 4.5 percent of pregnant women were found to be HIV positive in 2006. Since 2004, a national program enables people living with HIV (PLWHIV) to have free access to antiretroviral therapies. Due to this intervention, the health status of many patients has stabilized. But even if less patients suffer from the physical symptoms typical for AIDS, new forms of social vulnerability appear: PLWHIV experience or fear discrimination and stigmatization.

In an urban setting shaped by poverty and by constantly changing living conditions, capabilities for improvisation, social navigation and self-organization are essential. Therefore, this study of resilience focuses on pathways seropositive persons may embark on, in order to live with the conditions of their sickness without drastic economic and social losses. Additionally it aims to identify measures which might foster their resilience.

The central research questions of this study are:

How do PLWHIV master stigma related risks without loosing their social reputation? What kind of new forms of sociability are negotiated? Where are the limits of trust?

The research uses an actor-centered approach. Over a period of three years, several field visits of two to four months were carried out in Bamako and Mopti. This longitudinal approach favors qualitative methods and considers both the temporal as well as spatial dimension, related to the mobility of PLWHIV.