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Books > Social sciences > Sociology, social studies > Social issues > Poverty
In this book Edward and Sumner argue that to better understand the impact of global growth on poverty it is necessary to consider what happens across a wide range of poverty lines. Starting with the same datasets used to produce official estimates of global poverty, they create a model of global consumption that spans the entire world's population. They go on to demonstrate how their model can be utilised to understand how different poverty lines imply very different visions of how the global economy needs to work in order for poverty to be eradicated.
This collection of documents contextualizes the ways in which Americans have addressed the evolving challenges of poverty throughout U.S. history. Each document is accompanied by an analysis that both summarizes its content and considers its impact. Poverty has always been a part of the fabric of American life, and this installment in the Documentary and Reference Guides series fills the gaps left by most educational treatments of the subject, beginning with an examination of poverty at the state and local levels as it was during the early 19th century. A federal plan for addressing poverty was not devised until Franklin Delano Roosevelt launched the New Deal in the 1930s. As these 70 chronologically arranged documents illustrate, the unfinished business of the New Deal, interrupted by World War II, culminated in new legislation during John F. Kennedy's New Frontier and Lyndon B. Johnson's War on Poverty; progress, however, fell victim to the Vietnam War, ushering in decades of rollbacks under presidents of both parties. Noted scholar and librarian John R. Burch Jr. provides thorough coverage of these and contemporary events throughout which poverty has endured, including the Great Recession of 2008-2009, the minimum wage debate, and the Affordable Care Act and attempts to repeal it. Analyzes primary documents to provide useful context in such areas as labor law, health care, housing, and family assistance Emphasizes state and local responses to poverty from the Founding Fathers through the early 20th century Devotes a chapter to Native Americans and the Indian removal policies and reservation system Features legislation, reports, court cases, and speeches Includes sidebars that highlight individuals or events related to the relevant time period, a guide to related documents, a chronology, and a bibliography
One of the main ideas behind this book was to trace continuities from the Soviet time to post-Soviet Russia. There are many similarities between Russia and Ukraine, indicating such a continuation. Russia and Ukraine had a lot in common in terms of culture, language and history, partly also because of their common origin. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, however, the two independent countries chose different routes of development. This makes it possible to distinguish between the effects of politics/reforms on the one hand, and the impacts from the Soviet system on the other. After some more or less chaotic development paths in the 1990s, showing clear differences between the two countries, and before the contemporary conflict broke out in Eastern Ukraine (2013), they had once again more similarities in terms of political leadership and policies in general. The chapters in this book focus on Ukraine and on two regions in Russia: Nizhny Novgorod and Archangelsk. Contributors look at attitudes towards poverty and poor people; strategies of the poor; and policies against poverty. This book was published as a special issue of the Journal of Contemporary Central and Eastern Europe.
Unlike other regions around the world, several Latin American countries have managed to reduce income inequality over the last decade. Higher growth rates and growing employment, but also innovative wage policies and social programs, have contributed to reducing poverty and narrow income disparities. Yet, despite this progress, nation-states in the region demonstrate little capacity to substantially change their patterns of deeply rooted inequalities. Focusing on the limits and challenges of redistributive policies in Latin America, this volume synthesizes and updates the discussion of inequality in the region, introducing the perspective of global and transnational interdependencies. The book explores the extent to which redistributive policies have been interlinked with the provision and quality of public goods as well as with structural changes of the productive sector. Inspired by structuralist and neostructuralist thinking of Latin American economists, such as RaAl Prebisch and Celso Furtado, authors question the redistributive impact of the interplay of recent macroeconomic, fiscal and social policies, particularly under left and center-left administrations committed to greater equality. Bringing together experts in social, fiscal and macroeconomic policies to investigate the interdependent and global character of inequalities, this book will appeal to scholars of sociology, economics, development and politics with interests in Latin America, inequality and public policy.
Over the past two decades it has become widely recognized that housing issues have to be placed in a broader framework acknowledging that civil society in the form of Community Based Organizations (CBOs) and their allies are increasingly networking and emerging as strong players that cannot easily be overlooked. Some of these networks have crossed local and national boundaries and have jumped political scales. This implies that housing issues have to be looked at from new angles: they can no longer simply be addressed through localized projects, but rather at multiple scales. The current debate is largely limited to statements about the relevance of individual organizations for local housing processes and tends to overlook the innovativeness in terms of re-scaling those processes and of influencing institutional change at various levels by transcending national boundaries. There is a significant lack of a systemic understanding of such globally operating grassroots networks and how they function in the housing process. This book brings together different perspectives on multi-scalar approaches within the housing field and on grassroots' engagement with formal agencies including local government, higher levels of government and international agencies. By moving away from romanticizing local self-initiatives, it focuses on understanding the emerging potential once local initiatives are interlinked and scaled-up to transnational networks.
First Published in 1983. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.
This book presents the findings of a five-year action research programme into how far poverty-oriented microfinance institutions (MFIs) in Africa, Asia, and Latin America are contributing to global poverty reduction, and how they can do so more effectively. Martin Greeley reviews evidence on their success in reaching poorer clients and improving the average income and wealth of their clients (chs 2&3). Naila Kabeer reviews evidence on performance against a wider array of indicators, including women's empowerment, citizenship rights, and social inclusion (chs.4&5). Both authors highlight methodological difficulties associated with assessing impact, but are cautiously positive. Susan Johnson is more cautious, suggesting that the contribution of MFIs to the overall growth of financial services in selected parts of Africa and India remains small (ch.6). James Copestake reviews evidence on the organizational factors that influence achievement of MFIs' social as well as financial goals, as well as progress in routinely monitoring and managing social performance (ch.7&8). He and Anton Simanowitz then make clear and simple suggestions for how this can be done better (ch.9). This covers how MFIs can manage their 'double bottom lines' more effectively, as well as what public and private investors in microfinance can do to help them. The bigger challenge, linking up with the wider movement for corporate social responsibility, is to find ways to do so across the entire financial sector.
Framing Class explores how the media, including television, film, and news, depict wealth and poverty in the United States. Fully updated and revised throughout, the second edition of this groundbreaking book now includes discussions of new media, updated media sources, and provocative new examples from movies and television, such as The Real Housewives series and media portrayals of the new poor and corporate executives in the recent recession. The book introduces the concepts of class and media framing to students and analyzes how the media portray various social classes, from the elite to the very poor. Its accessible writing and powerful examples make it an ideal text or supplement for courses in sociology, American studies, and communications.
A unique historical review that traces health spending from ancient times to the present and forecasts 21st century trends. There are many histories of medicine, yet none that assess the dynamics of expenditures over decades and centuries. Economists have not yet addressed the magnitude of the transformation that occurred during the twentieth century as payments shifted from solo physician practices to health systems, nor the legacy effects of social practices accumulated over millennia that will shape health spending in the twenty-first. In Money and Medicine, Thomas E. Getzen provides a unified narrative of medical spending from ancient Egypt and Babylonia to the present day. Drawing on a wealth of historical reports, data, and documents, Getzen concentrates on a single ratio-the share of income devoted to medical care-to frame the evolutionary path of medicine, revealing an S-shaped growth curve that rose rapidly after 1900 as science made therapies more effective and more expensive, inflected as national health systems coalesced and rates of expansion peaked in the 1960s, then decelerated after 1975. International trends in forty-three countries are graphically illustrated with analysis supporting a parsimonious financial model. Significant lags are seen between medical innovation or macroeconomic shocks and the corresponding changes in national health expenditures. Getzen explains inertial responses to the 2008 financial crisis and Covid-19 recession, provides a method for projecting trends over the next fifty years, and suggests why spending is so much higher in the United States than other countries. As rising costs and unequal distribution of medical care have created a sense of crisis in many countries, Money and Medicine shows that we must look beyond the last few years to craft sensible solutions.
This comparative study of urban poverty is the first to chart the irregular pulse of poverty's encounters with officialdom. It exploits an unusual methodology to secure new perspectives from familiar sources. The highly localised characteristics of the welfare economy generated a peculiarly urban environment for the poor. Separate chapters examine the parameters of workhouse life when the preconceptions of contemporaries have been stripped away; the reach of institutional charities such as almshouses, schools and infirmaries; and the surprisingly broad clientele of urban pawnbrokers. Detailed analysis of the poor is achieved via meticulous matching of individuals who fell within the purview of two or more authorities. The result is a unique insight into the survival economics of urban poverty, arising not from a tidy network of welfare but from a loose assembly of options, where the impoverished positioned themselves repeatedly to fit official, philanthropic, or casual templates of the 'deserving'. This book will be essential reading for historians of English poverty and welfare, and eighteenth-century social and economic life. -- .
In the United States, the causes and even the meanings of poverty are disconnected from the causes and meanings of global poverty. The "Routledge Handbook of Poverty in the United States" provides an authoritative overview of the relationship of poverty with the rise of neoliberal capitalism in the context of globalization. Reorienting its national economy towards a global logic, US domestic policies have promoted a market-based strategy of economic development and growth as the obvious solution to alleviating poverty, affecting approaches to the problem discursively, politically, economically, culturally and experientially. However, the "Handbook" explores how rather than alleviating poverty, it has instead exacerbated poverty and pre-existing inequalities privatizing the services of social welfare and educational institutions, transforming the state from a benevolent to a punitive state, and criminalizing poor women, racial, ethnic minorities, and immigrants. Key issues examined by the international selection of leading scholars in this volume include: income distribution, employment, health, hunger, housing and urbanization. With parts focusing on the lived experience of the poor, social justice and human rights frameworks as opposed to welfare rights models, and the role of helping professions such as social work, health and education, this comprehensive "Handbook" is a vital reference for anyone working with those in poverty, whether directly or at a macro level. "
Poverty is generally defined as a lack of material resources. However, the relationships that poor people have with their possessions are not just about deprivation. Material things play a positive role in the lives of poor people: they help people to build social relationships, address inequalities, and fulfill emotional needs. In Materializing Poverty, anthropologist Erin Taylor explores how residents of a squatter settlement in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, use their material resources creatively to solve everyday problems and, over a few decades, radically transform the community. Their struggles show how these everyday engagements with materiality, rather than more dramatic efforts, generate social change and build futures.
Hurricane Katrina inflicted damage on a scale unprecedented in American history, nearly destroying a major city and killing thousands of its citizens. With far too little help from indifferent, incompetent government agencies, the poor bore the brunt of the disaster. The residents of traditionally impoverished and minority communities suffered incalculable losses and endured unimaginable conditions. And the few facilities that did exist to help victims quickly became miserable, dangerous places. Now, the victims of Hurricane Katrina find themselves spread across the United States, far from the homes they left and faced with the prospect of starting anew. Families are struggling to secure jobs, homes, schools, and a sense of place in unfamiliar surroundings. Meanwhile, the rebuilding of their former home remains frustrating out of their hands. This bracing read brings readers to the heart of the disaster and its aftermath as those who survived it speak with candor and eloquence of their lives then and now.
Twenty-first-century US policymakers face a great challenge: How can federal government help more people achieve the American dream? Specifically, how can we provide greater opportunities for less-prosperous individuals, enabling them to succeed through hard work, on their merits, and take increased responsibility for their lives? Lewis D. Solomon sees this as the challenge of our time. He seeks to thread the fine public policy needle between social democratic efforts to perfect the world and those who negatively view public sector programs. Based on the premise that capitalism is not inherently unjust and defective, and American capitalism's structural features do not inexorability thwart opportunity, Building an Opportunity Society offers the possibility of more limited, carefully structured, cost-effective, empirically verified federal policies and programs. Solomon first provides the background and context of many existing domestic challenges and problems that the current and proposed federal policies and programs seek to address. He then analyzes the federal safety net that keeps Americans from poverty and helps reduce income inequality. Finally, he presents a lifecycle analysis of current federal policies and programs, preventive and remedial, designed as part of the Entitlement State, but if restructured could facilitate the building of an Opportunity Society. Solomon challenges policymakers to take a fresh look at how best to achieve society's goals for all citizens.
Are poverty, misery, famine, disease and war inevitably part of the human condition? Will the creations of science become uncontrollable and socially dangerous, like Frankenstein's monster? Or can science and education create a world of material plenty - a war-free world, where the benevolent, creative and intellectual sides of human nature will have a chance to flourish?
This book examines the effects of high and volatile food prices during 2007-08 on low-income farmers and consumers in developing, transition, and industrialized countries. Previous studies of this crisis have mostly used models to estimate the likely impacts. This volume includes actual evidence from the field as to how higher prices affected access to food and farm income among poor people. In addition to country and regional case studies, the book presents discussions of cross-cutting themes, including gender, risk management, violence, the importance of subsistence farming as a coping strategy, and the role of governments and markets in addressing higher prices. With 2011 witnessing an unprecedentedly high level of food prices, the findings and policy recommendations presented here should prove useful to both scholars and policy makers in understanding the causes and consequences, as well as the policies needed to ensure food security in light of the skyrocketing cost of food. This book was published as a special double issue of Development in Practice.
A third of poor people are disabled in the developing world. How much do we know about their livelihood with hard data? Are they entirely powerless and dependent on family members? How do they earn income? These questions have become more important than ever, now that persons with disabilities (PWDs) in developing countries have awakened to rights and entitlements and that the international community started considering the incorporation of disability into the context of poverty reduction. This book highlights opportunities and challenges faced by PWDs in the developing countries. This book also illustrates the analyses with a case study which was conducted in the Philippines and this case study has made a good progress in legislation for PWDs. A field survey was jointly conducted by the Institute of Developing Economies, Japan, and the Philippine Institute for Development Studies in Metro Manila, the capital city of the Philippines, in 2008. Around 400 PWDs were interviewed, and the data was investigated with econometrics. The book highlights a remarkable disparity in earnings and education among PWDs. The book also examines the positive role of organizations such as Disabled People s Organizations and how empowerment of PWDs is made through dissemination of useful information such as programs given by the central and local governments. The book concludes that all measures, i.e. education, training, DPOs and institutional preferences, must be mobilized harmoniously to boost the livelihood of PWDs sinking in the bottom stratum in income."
"Did you ever go to bed and wonder if your child was getting enough to eat?" For food insecure mothers, the worry is constant, and babies are at risk of going hungry. Through compelling interviews, Lesley Frank answers the breastfeeding paradox: why women who can least afford to buy infant formula are less likely to breastfeed. She exposes the shocking reality of food insecurity for formula-fed babies and the constraints limiting mothers' ability to breastfeed. Out of Milk calls out the pressing need to establish the economic and social conditions necessary for successful breastfeeding and for accessible and safe formula feeding for families everywhere.
M. Riad El-Ghonemy argues that if current trends in government-led and market based land reforms persist the rural poor population in developing countries will continue to rise. Based on nearly half a century of academic and field research this valuable work presents compelling evidence on persistent rural poverty, hunger and increased inequality in developing countries over the last thirty years. The book furthers the debate with sixteen detailed case studies and looks beyond the typical views of the roles of the state and the market on land reform. The Crisis of Rural Poverty and Hunger contains comprehensive case studies including countries such as China, Korea and Honduras provides bases for discussions of government-mandated land reform, pro-active participation of NGOs and facilitated functions of the market mechanism. This book is essential reading for undergraduate and postgraduate students interested in the fields of rural and agricultural development, development economics and geography.
Havard Haarstad is a postdoctoral research fellow at the Department of Geography, University of Bergen. He has worked extensively on the political economy of natural resource extraction, and the role of social movements, civil society and labor unions in politicizing extraction. Mark Amen is graduate program director in the Department of Government and International Affairs at the University of South Florida/Tampa and Deputy Editor of Globalizations. His current research is on urban indebtedness and the global economy. Asuncion Lera St Clair, philosopher and sociologist is Research Director at the Centre for International Climate and Environmental Research in Oslo-CICERO and Associated Senior Researcher with Chr. Michelsens Institute (CMI). Her research focus is on the interface between climate change, poverty and development, with particular emphasis on justice, ethics, and knowledge productions processes.
The poor seem easy to identify: those who do not have enough money or enough of the things money can buy. This book explores a different approach to poverty, one suggested by the notion of capabilities emphasized by Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum. In the spirit of the capabilities approach, the book argues that poverty refers not to a lack of things but to the lack of the ability to live life in a particular way. The authors argue that the poor are those who cannot live a life that is discovered and created rather than already known. Avoiding poverty, then, means having the capacity and opportunity for creative living. The authors argue that the capacity to do skilled work plays a particularly important role in creative living, and suggest that the development of the ability to do skilled work is a vital part of solving the problem of poverty.
Education and poverty exist in a highly contested relationship even in the developed world. On the one hand, educational outcomes seem solidly attached to socio-economic status, and on the other, education is often cited as a way out of poverty. Success at de-coupling poverty from educational outcomes varies across the developed world. The issues connecting education and poverty are complex, but the question of the successful engagement of students from poor backgrounds involves a complex mix of public policy on poverty, public policy on education, and teacher action. This book focuses on a number of exemplary teachers who demonstrate a set of common pedagogical qualities, assisting them to work productively with persistent classroom challenges in low SES classrooms. Exemplary Teachers of Students in Poverty shares successful classroom practice from schools serving diverse and disadvantaged communities, and stresses that opportunities in school can influence educational engagement and encourage students to achieve. The text locates itself in international debates about education and poverty, and reports on the Teachers for a Fair Go project - an Australian research project into the work of a number of teachers who were successful at engaging students from poor backgrounds. Included in the book: teaching in low SES communities what exemplary teachers of students in low SES communities do specific pedagogical approaches in literacy, ICT, creativity and culturally responsive practices students' voices professional qualities of these teachers Exemplary Teachers of Students in Poverty will greatly benefit researchers, teacher educators and trainee teachers, allowing them to gain a much deeper understanding of the issues, constraints and perspectives in teaching contexts across low SES communities.
This book provides insights into the way social protection policy is being redefined as a result of the new commitment by governments around the world to use these programs to reduce poverty. The case studies presented show how innovations in social protection have emerged in different countries. They also discuss various aspects of social protection that will be of interest to readers. While some of the case studies are primarily descriptive and seek to document recent trends in different countries, they also address important social policy issues. Others are particularly topical because they provide useful updates on recent social protection innovations. Countries discussed include Brazil, Britain, Chile, China, Indonesia, South Africa, and the United States. This book was originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Policy Practice.
Rethinking M&E - Challenges and Prospects in the Changing Global Aid Environment' incorporates the good examples and innovative M&E solutions of 120 development professionals from a wide range of countries, circumstances and specialisms. This book is based on INTRAC's international conference and regional M&E workshops in Ghana, India, Sweden and Peru, and includes perspectives from NGOs and CSOs, donor ministries, activists, think-tanks and foundations. Emphasising Southern perspectives and covering a rich variety of experiences, it stresses the important role of M&E in challenging many of our assumptions about poverty alleviation. It analyses practitioner issues and situates them within wider aid trends. It takes as its premise the observation that official development aid is shifting towards an increasingly technocratic, managerial, state-centred approach. It follows that M&E within the aid chain worldwide is directed away from its focus on qualitative outcomes and long-term poverty alleviation impacts. Within this context, Rethinking M&E provides innovative insights into such areas as M&E of NGOs as donors, the M&E of advocacy and the M&E of humanitarian emergencies. |
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