The Blackwell Companion to Sociology (42 page)

from poverty in the USA to poverty in less-developed societies exponentially

ratchets up the complexity factor. Not only is the magnitude of poverty incom-

parably greater, but the contours and causes of poverty throughout developing

regions are far more varied. Measurement issues are more complicated too,

because of the lack of comparable data across nation-states and over time. In

this section, we discuss poverty measures and broadly sketch poverty trends in

developing regions and countries, revealing some of the stern challenges to

poverty reduction in the twenty-first century.

In contrast to absolute poverty thresholds developed for single societies

(national poverty lines), several measures have been devised for comparisons

across regions and nations. The World Bank's one dollar a day `èxtreme pov-

erty'' measure and the United Nations Development Programme's (UNDP)

``human development'' indices are both useful constructs that inform the magni-

tude and contours of poverty in comparative settings. We use the first measure of extreme poverty as a crude, though effective, yardstick of economic deprivation.

Table 12.1 contains the most recent data on the incidence of extreme poverty,

reporting the staggering number of persons and percentage of the population

living on less than one dollar per day in developing and transitional economies

over the decade 1987±98 (World Bank, 1999a). In 1998, an estimated 1.2 billion

people subsisted on less than one dollar per day. The incidence of extreme

poverty increased since 1987, fluctuating considerably over the decade. The

regions of South Asia, particularly India, and sub-Saharan Africa accounted

for two of every three persons living in extreme poverty in 1998. The most

rapid increase in the incidence of extreme poverty has been in Eastern Europe

and Central Asia, although it appears to have stabilized. Rapid social, political, and economic change in the former Soviet bloc countries has clearly led to a

dramatic rise in material deprivation.

The major exception to worsening regional poverty trends took place in the

East Asia and Pacific region until 1996. The reduced incidence of extreme

1998 (est.)

15.3 (9.6) 5.1 15.6 7.3 40.0 46.3 24.3 (27.3)

1996

14.9 (8.1) 5.1 15.6 7.8 40.1 48.5 24.3 (27.3)

4.0

8.4

Percent

1993

25.5 (12.4)

15.3

42.4 49.6 28.5 (28.5)

1990

27.6

1.6 16.8 9.3 44.0 47.7 29.3

1987±1998

(15.0)

(29.3)

1987

26.6

0.2

(22.9)

15.3 11.5 44.9 46.6 28.7 (29.6)

economies,

24.0 78.2 20.9

1998 (est.)

278.3 (55.6)

522.0 290.9 1,214.2 (991.5)

transitional

and

1996

265.0 (45.2) 23.8 76.0 21.3 504.7 289.0 1,179.9 (960.1)

(millions)

1993

18.3 70.8 21.5

developing

431.9 (66.0)

505.1 273.3 1,320.9 (955.0)

in

)

Number

7.1

region

1990

452.4 (76.0

73.8 22.0 495.1 242.3

by

1,292.7 (916.3)

1.1

1987

63.7 25.0

poverty

415.1 (109.2)

474.4 217.2 1,196.5 (890.6)

extreme

Asia

of

Caribbean Africa

Pacific

Central the North

Region

the

and and

Distribution

and

Africa

and China)

China)

Europe

East

12.1

Asia

Asian

America

Table

East (excluding Eastern Latin Middle South Sub-Saharan Total (excluding

The Persistence of Poverty in a Changing World

169

poverty in this region was impressive between 1987 and 1996, although China

lagged behind the rest of the region until 1993. The recent economic recession in Asia reversed the post-1993 decline in extreme poverty, yet the number and

proportion of persons living on less than one dollar per day in this region today are one-third to half their level in 1987. In sum, the one dollar per day extreme poverty measure indicates that there is wide regional variation in the extent of extreme poverty in developing and transitional economies. The numerical incidence of extreme poverty has increased, while the proportion of persons in such

regions living in extreme poverty declined, from nearly one in three in 1987 to

one in four in 1998. Most regions have experienced either stagnant or rising

numbers of persons subsisting on one dollar per day, with the exception of the

East Asia and Pacific region.

The growing number of persons in the world living on less than a dollar a day

is a worrisome trend given the expansion of global linkages, economic growth,

and a full decade of post-Cold War international relations. The dust of political, economic, and social upheaval has yet to settle, and hundreds of millions of

people continue to suffer the consequences of impoverishment. In addition to

global macroeconomic forces, ethnic conflict has wreaked havoc in numerous

countries in Africa and Central Europe, while climatic dynamics in Southern

Asia, Africa, and South America have undermined food security. In many

countries, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, the HIV/AIDS crisis is causing

widespread devastation with generational repercussions. Clearly, poverty indic-

ators based on income alone, such as the one dollar per day extreme poverty

measure, are wholly inadequate to reflect the multidimensional features of

poverty.

In terms of the quality and adequacy of material conditions, income among

the poor in developing nations is often less important than access to resources.

Recognizing the limits of income measures and that economic development by

itself did not necessarily improve people's material living conditions, the UNDP

has recently created several new indices based on the concept of ``human devel-

opment.'' These indices, which include the human development index, the

gender empowerment measure, and the human poverty index, are not simply

summary consumption measures, such as gross national product per capita.

Instead, these measures attempt to more broadly capture dimensions of the

human experience and are based on three concepts: longevity, knowledge, and

a standard of living measure (UNDP, 1999). While certainly limited, this more

comprehensive conceptualization of poverty by the UNDP is a shift toward a

deeper and better understanding of poverty and its underlying causes. Unfortu-

nately, the UNDP human development indices are not directly interpretable and,

therefore, we do not report them here. Instead, we briefly consider some of the

non-monetary resources used to create the UNDP indices that are associated

with poverty and their differential impact on men, women, and children.

Among the basic central resources affecting the lives of the poor are access to

safe drinking water, access to health care, and adequate sanitation systems that reduce the threat of disease. Nearly one-third of the population in developing

countries is without access to safe water and nearly six in ten are without

170

Melvin L. Oliver and David M. Grant

adequate sanitation (UNDP, 1999). Access to health care is critical, particularly for infants and children, to ensure long, productive, and fulfilling lives; in many poor nations, only small proportions of the population have such access, including Cameroon (15 percent), Nepal (10 percent), Yemen (15 percent), and the

Central African Republic (12 percent). While poverty is intimately connected

with access to health care resources, there is wide variation among poor nations, with important consequences. Currently, some two million children die each

year, for example, from diseases that could be prevented with low-cost vaccina-

tions (World Health Organization, 1999).

The incidence of HIV/AIDS in many poor countries has completely over-

whelmed already inadequate health care facilities, particularly in sub-Saharan

Africa. The impact of HIV/AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa is horrific and projected

to worsen. Eighty percent of AIDS deaths worldwide took place in sub-Saharan

African (1.8 million deaths in 1998), possessing one-tenth of the world's population, and resulted in the orphaning of one-fifth to one-third of the children in nine sub-Saharan African countries by the end of 1999 (UNAIDS, 1998). The

impact of AIDS and related infectious diseases reduced life expectancy at birth in sub-Saharan African to less than fifty years in 1997. While the past century has witnessed à`health revolution'' due to the eradication of communicable diseases

and a near doubling in life expectancy worldwide since 1900, a number of

countries in sub-Saharan Africa experienced substantial declines in life expect-

ancy over the past decade (World Health Organization, 1999).

While the HIV/AIDS crisis will worsen in the future, it is, unfortunately, not

the only, or even the worst, of health threats to the poor. Sexual behavior (2.2

percent) ranked a distant fourth among risks that contributed to global mortal-

ity, behind tobacco use (6 percent), hypertension (5.8 percent), and inadequate

water and sanitation (5.3 percent) according to a recent World Health Organ-

ization study. The biggest health threat, tobacco use, has been rapidly increasing in developing nations, while decreasing in industrialized nations. ``[B]y the third decade of the next century, smoking is expected to kill 10 million people

annually worldwide ± more than the total of deaths from malaria, maternal

and major childhood conditions, and tuberculosis combined. Over 70% of these

deaths will be in the developing world'' (World Health Organization, 1999,

p. 67).

Education is a key resource in the fight against tobacco, HIV/AIDS, and other

health-related risks, as well as poverty more generally. Unfortunately, women in the developing world are less likely to receive access to adequate health care and education and are disproportionately poor. Like their sisters in the industrialized world, women in poor regions are more and more frequently finding themselves

heading households in the absence of men; these women and their children are

more likely to be poor (Buvinic, 1997). Adult literacy rates and child mortality rates demonstrate the additional burden associated with being a female in many

poor countries. Child mortality rates over the past decade show a disturbing

trend toward gender imbalance at birth. In a handful of the world's largest

developing countries, the ratio of girls' to boys' mortality rates were particularly high: Nigeria (1.7), India (1.4), and Bangladesh (1.3). Adult literacy rates in

The Persistence of Poverty in a Changing World

171

1997 universally favored men (80 percent) over women (63 percent) throughout

the developing world (UNDP, 1991).

An Asset Building Strategy

Strategy for Poverty Reduction

Reduction

Poverty trends in the USA and in developing regions do not generate much

optimism. Many people believe that poverty is intractable and that the poor

will always be with us. They cite the multidimensional character of poverty, the impersonal nature of global economic forces, and the belief, sanctioned by

religion, tradition, or personal worldviews, that the poor are the cause of their social conditions. These beliefs, among both the powerful and the powerless, are among the major impediments to the development and application of comprehensive strategies for poverty reduction around the world. While macroeco-

nomic trends, which lead to cyclical changes in local, regional, and world

economies surely play a significant role in material development, institutional

arrangements and social policies also mediate income redistribution, other

resources, and opportunities to affect the level and extent of poverty in a given society.

An `àsset building'' strategy for poverty reduction starts with the assumption

that poor people need to be empowered to become a part of their own solution

to poverty. As we have stated, most discussions of poverty are concerned with

income poverty ± the lack of sufficient cash income to meet basic household

needs. Policy responses that involve temporary subsidies to income (or consump-

tion) generate little change in the fundamental ability of families to escape

poverty and may, in fact, lessen the likelihood of reducing poverty in the long

run. For example, many welfare systems around the world are premised on

providing poor people with the income to consume and spend at poverty levels.

The present focus on putting ``welfare'' mothers to work in the USA does not

address the fact that they work in poverty wage jobs. Thus, the resources that

will enable people to invest in their capacities, to seize opportunities, and to move from economic insecurity and poverty to economic security and self-sufficiency are unavailable when the goal is to always keep people consuming

at poverty and below poverty income levels.

Asset building as a poverty alleviation strategy refers to a mixture of activities by which the poor are assisted to acquire individual or collective control or

ownership of assets, to effectively manage the assets in hand, and to sustain or improve the quality of their assets. Public and private groups often aid in the

asset building process and pressure the state to pursue policies that facilitate the acquisition, control, and protection of these assets among the poor.