Unit: Poverty & Development

What we are going to cover

• Global poverty: the situation. What does poverty mean? – Look at various definitions.

• North-South divide: What is it? Trends in global inequality since 70s- show how the gap has grown in some

cases (in particular look at sub-Saharan Africa). Decline in between country inequality and increase in within country inequality.

• Globalisation and poverty: arguments for and against TNCs.

• Development : what is development? A look at different concepts of development.

• Two major competing theories of development: neo-liberalism and neo-Marxism. Is there another way?

• SAPs and the IMF & World Bank. Is this a new form of colonialism? (conditionality) A look at alternatives (human development).

• Aid and development. Global poverty campaign (NGOs, MDG, G8). What’s happened since (governments falling short of their promises). Cases for and against aid. Particular focus on aid conditionality- can tie this back to IMF and World Bank (neo-colonial).

Section One

What is Poverty?

Poverty is:

What is poverty?

Think about some of the signs that might alert you to the presence of poverty, whether in the UK or overseas…

…and try to define poverty in a sentence.

Insufficient food

Inadequate nourishment

Poor housing

Inadequate clothing

No access to clean drinking water

Poor sanitation

Poor education

Poor health

Unemployment

Vulnerability

Lack of power

Low status

Conceptions of Poverty

• Income poverty: Poverty seen as shortage of income- governments can do something about income e.g. support growth.

 • Multi-dimensional: Not just material consumption but also health,

education, social life, environmental quality, spiritual and political freedom matter.

Poverty & Development

“Persons, families and groups of persons whose resources (material, cultural and social) are so limited as to exclude them from the minimum acceptable way of life in the Member State to which they belong”.

The European Union’s working definition of poverty is:

Which conception of poverty does this fall within?

Absolute poverty refers to a set standard which is the same in all countries and which does not change over time.  An income-related example would be living on less than $X per day.

Relative poverty refers to a standard which is defined in terms of the society in which an individual lives and which therefore differs between countries and over time.  An income-related example would be living on less than X% of average UK income.

The World Bank defines absolute (or extreme) poverty as living on below US$1 a day, and moderate poverty as living on US$1 - US$2 a day. Based on these figures, half the world’s population – about three billion people - are considered poor, with one in six living in extreme poverty.

How is poverty measured?

There are three major ways of measuring a country’s wealth:

• Gross National Product (GNP) is the annual total value of all goods produced and services provided in a country.

• Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is the same, excluding deals with other countries

• Human Development Index (HDI) does not use money as the only factor. It includes education, length of life and GDP per capita.

• Advantages/disadvantages of measuring with GDP/ HDI

National measurements of wealth

Poverty & Development

Poverty & Development

HDI

•Advantages: wider measurement so gives a broader picture.

•Disadvantages: what factors should you include? Difficult to calculate.

What do you think are the advantages/disadvantages of measuring wealth using GDP & HDI?

GDP

•Advantages: easy to calculate.

•Disadvantages: narrow measurement, doesn’t take into consideration inequalities.

Poverty & Development

The politics of poverty

•Why are the different definitions and measurements important?

•Which are orthodox and which are alternative?

Poverty & Development

Read the two articles and complete the following:

a)What are some of the causes of poverty?

b)What are some of the social consequences of poverty?

c) Why is the way we measure and define poverty important?