* Authored by an international team of researchers* Marshals a wealth of evidence to expose the little-examined links between urban governance and poverty * Provides policy guidance for cities, governments, practitioners, and the poor for alleviating the growing problem of urban poverty In this book an international team of researchers examines the hitherto little-examined relationship between urban governance and growing poverty. The core of the book is the result of three years of research in ten cities in Africa, Asia, and Latin America including interviews with key actors both within and outside city governments, discussions with poverty groups, community organizations, and NGOs, as well as analyses of data on poverty, services, and finance. Ultimately the evidence demonstrates that in many countries the global trend towards decentralization and democratization offers exciting new opportunities for the poor to have an influence on the decisions that affect them. It proves that the extent of that influence depends on the nature of those democratic arrangements and decisionmaking processes at the local level. The book presents insights, conclusions, and practical examples that are of relevance for all cities, and it outlines policy implications for national and local governments, NGOs, and donor agencies.

Most changes in education-including the rise of standardized testing, holding teachers accountable for their students' academic performance, and rewriting math and reading standards-don't address poverty. Understanding the relationship between poverty, class, and education for decades has been framed through studies on the behavior and culture of poor students and their families. Educators are caught up in the history of classism and are often guilty of buying into the mindset-including the implementation of activities and strategies for working with 'parents' in poverty or 'students' in poverty-that leads them to believe in the need to 'fix' the poor instead of eliminating the inequities that oppress them. So it is not just one or the other; nature or nurture, poor or not poor. Poverty is a potential outcome for all of us. Culture, Poverty, and Education: What's Happening in Today's Schools? is intended to not only discuss 5 myths about the culture of poverty and its effects on education, but provide some resources on alternatives for educator's to better address this growing barrier to student achievement in today's schools.

Collected in this volume are the best articles and symposia from Poverty & Race, the bimonthly newsletter journal of The Poverty & Race Research Action Council (PRRAC), a Washington, DC-based national public interest organization founded in 1990. Poverty & Race in America includes over six-dozen works originally published between mid-2001 and 2005, many of which have been updated and revised. The contributors represent the best of progressive thought and activism on America's two most salient, and seemingly intractable, domestic problems-race and poverty. Divided into topical sections, this volume considers the issues of race, poverty, housing, education, health, and democracy. Poverty & Race in America is especially concerned with the links between and among these areas, both for purposes of analysis and policy prescriptions. Featuring a foreword by Congressman Jesse L. Jackson, Jr., this edited collection will be of great interest to policy makers and human rights activists and hopefully stimulate creative thought and action to bring an end to racism and poverty.

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.

Bangladesh has low levels of urbanization but a high urban population in absolute terms, being one of the most densely populated countries in the world. Rapid urbanization in developing countries brings numerous problems and challenges; urban poverty is one important issue. This important volume presents the findings of a complex and revealing multidisciplinary cohort study conducted in the slums of Dhaka, Bangladesh. Detailed information was assembled on material, social and economic conditions, livelihoods, health and nutritional status. Together with associated qualitative work, the data forms the basis for understanding groups who are vulnerable to economic and environmental shocks and stresses, and for differentiating strategies which might be adaptive in situations of hardship and scarcity. The author examines many aspects of poverty and vulnerability including livelihoods, work disabling illness and coping strategies, the female workforce, women's negotiation and well being, marital instability, child labour, and investments in health and nutrition, and utilizes the assembled material to debate on policy options.

Globalization is characterised by persistent poverty and growing inequality. Conventional wisdom has it that this global poverty is residual - as globalization deepens, the poor will be lifted out of destitution. The policies of the World Bank, the IMF and the WTO echo this belief and push developing countries ever deeper into the global economy.
Globalization, Poverty and Inequality provides an alternative viewpoint. It argues that for many - particularly for those living in Latin America, Asia and Central Europe - poverty and globalization are relational. It is the very workings of the global system which condemn many to poverty. In particular the mobility of investment, and the large pool of increasingly skilled workers in China and other parts of Asia, are driving down global wages.
This poses challenges for policy makers in firms and countries throughout the world. It also challenges the very sustainability of globalisation itself. Are we about to witness the implosion of globalisation, as occurred between 1913 and 1950?
Using a variety of theoretical frameworks and drawing on a vast amount of original research, this book will be an invaluable resource for all students of globalization and its effects.

Collected in this volume are the best articles and symposia from Poverty & Race, the bimonthly newsletter journal of The Poverty & Race Research Action Council (PRRAC), a Washington, DC-based national public interest organization founded in 1990. Poverty & Race in America includes over six-dozen works originally published between mid-2001 and 2005, many of which have been updated and revised. The contributors represent the best of progressive thought and activism on America's two most salient, and seemingly intractable, domestic problems-race and poverty. Divided into topical sections, this volume considers the issues of race, poverty, housing, education, health, and democracy. Poverty & Race in America is especially concerned with the links between and among these areas, both for purposes of analysis and policy prescriptions. Featuring a foreword by Congressman Jesse L. Jackson, Jr., this edited collection will be of great interest to policy makers and human rights activists and hopefully stimulate creative thought and action to bring an end to racism and poverty.

Most changes in education-including the rise of standardized testing, holding teachers accountable for their students' academic performance, and rewriting math and reading standards-don't address poverty. Understanding the relationship between poverty, class, and education for decades has been framed through studies on the behavior and culture of poor students and their families. Educators are caught up in the history of classism and are often guilty of buying into the mindset-including the implementation of activities and strategies for working with 'parents' in poverty or 'students' in poverty-that leads them to believe in the need to 'fix' the poor instead of eliminating the inequities that oppress them. So it is not just one or the other; nature or nurture, poor or not poor. Poverty is a potential outcome for all of us. Culture, Poverty, and Education: What's Happening in Today's Schools? is intended to not only discuss 5 myths about the culture of poverty and its effects on education, but provide some resources on alternatives for educator's to better address this growing barrier to student achievement in today's schools.

This book provides key insights into the nature of officer-recipient relationships and shows how they have non-negligible impacts on the way recipients feel and think about themselves and their lives using mixed methods and subjective and psychosocial well-being approaches. The importance of placing well-being at the heart of policy is widely accepted. Yet, it is far less clear how this can be translated into practice. Discussion has tended to focus on the outcomes of policy and particularly on the metrics to assess well-being. While these are important debates, they can obscure an equally vital dimension: the processes of policies and the effect that implementation can have on the experiences - and ultimately well-being outcomes - of the recipients. This is the subject matter of this book. By taking the world-renowned case of the Oportunidades-Prospera conditional cash transfer programme in Mexico, it provides an in-depth account of interactions between officers and recipients and how these influenced programme delivery and well-being outcomes. It particularly scrutinizes the implementation of the health conditionalities of Oportunidades-Prospera by physicians working in the health clinics of rural and indigenous localities.

Despite the recent success of welfare reform in moving people off public assistance and into jobs, most of America's working poor are still unable to accumulate even the most minimal of assets. Even when they are getting by, they lack many of the resources --tangible and intangible --that provide middle-class Americans with a sense of security, stability, and a stake in the future. In "Owning Up," Michelle Miller-Adams demonstrates how asset-building programs, used in combination with traditional income-based support, can be an effective means for helping millions of American out of poverty. Miller-Adams expands the traditional concept of assets to encompass a range of tools, experiences, resources, and support systems that are necessary if asset building is to serve as an effective anti-poverty strategy. She identifies four types of assets that can represent sources of wealth for low-income individuals and communities: economic human social, and natural assets. Economic assets include equity, retirement savings, and other financial holdings. Human assets include education, knowledge, skills, and talents. Included among social assets are the networks of trust and reciprocity that bind communities together. Natural assets include the land, water, air and other natural resources we depend on for survival. Owning Up also examines five organizations at the forefront of building assets for the poor. Their stories are told through the eyes of individuals whose lives they have helped transform. These organizations have all developed effective strategies for building assets, and Miller-Adams identifies them as models to be emulated elsewhere. The profiled organizations include: Neighborhoods Incorporated of Battle Creek, Michigan. Its innovative strategies seek to increase home ownership and promote neighborhood revitalization in poor communities. The Watershed Research and Training Center. This local organization strengthens the natural resource-based economy by retraining workers and strengthening social ties. The Private Industry Partnership of Wildcat Service Corporation. Based in New York City, PIP trains former welfare recipients in New York City for entry-level white collar jobs. Iowa's Institute for Social and Economic Development. This microenterprise development organization is one of the largest U.S. based organizations training low-income entrepreneurs. The Corporation for Enterprise Development. CFED, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank that has been instrumental in showing that poor people can and will save if given the opportunities and incentives for doing so. They have helped put Individual Development Accounts on the national agenda.

Drawing on the emerging field of narrative theory in sociology and psychology, this book argues that an individual's response to job loss is a product of the shape of the story a person tells about their experience. This, in turn, is a product of both individual creativity and the structuring effects of their social location. Based on a qualitative study of the experience of unemployment in Australia, three main types of job loss narratives are identified. First, romantic narratives describe job loss as a positive experience of liberation from an oppressive job, leading to a gradually improving future. Second, tragic narratives describe job loss as undermining a person's life plan, leading to a phase of depression, anxiety and self-deprecation. Finally, job loss narratives may be complicated by marital breakdown or serious illness. The book breaks new ground in its use of narrative theory to account for the variations in responses to unemployment.

Every society has had to cope with poverty and the poor. Traditionally, most scholars have located the origins of modern philanthropies in the free-grain-distribution schemes common in ancient Greece and Rome, while most social workers see the history of philanthropic or welfare institutions as beginning with the Elizabethan Poor Laws. A few students know that the early Christian church made provisions for the poor, but few are aware of what occurred prior to the beginning of Christianity. This volume provides evidence that contemporary philanthropic and welfare institutions owe a greater debt to Judaism than to the Greco-Roman culture.

By skillful use of source documents, the author explores Jewish influence on early Christian charities, seeing it as more important than previously believed.He traces the evolution of charitable institutions in ancient Judaism from the days of the monarchy until the conclusion of the Talmud, a period of about fifteen hundred years. He demonstrates how responsibility for support of the poor was initially placed on the individual, with every farmer obligated to provide for the poor from his field. Dramatic increases in the number and proportion of poor people made major structural changes imperative. A theme throughout the book is how communal institutions evolved in place of individual responsibility. The change was gradual and not without opposition. How these changes came about and in what functional areas they occurred are discussed, as well as an analysis of Jewish support for the non-Jewish poor and non-Jewish support for the Jewish poor. In an appendix, the author discusses the philanthropies of the early Christians.

From Charity to SocialJustice adds to current debates on the role of religious institutions in welfare programs. It will be of particular interest to those who are interested in the history of philanthropy and in the development of welfare institutions. For the first time relevant sections of the Talmud and other post-biblical Jewish writings are made available to those who cannot read these in the original.

The book is a compilation of the best and still-most-relevant articles published in Poverty & Race, the bimonthly of The Poverty & Race Research Action Council from 2006 to the present. Authors are some of the leading figures in a range of activities around these themes. It is the fourth such book PRRAC has published over the years, each with a high-visibility foreword writer: Rep. John Lewis, Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr. Bill Bradley, Julian Bond in previous books, Rep. Luis Gutierrez of Chicago for this book. The chapters are organized into four sections: Race & Poverty: The Structural Underpinnings; Deconstructing Poverty and Racial Inequities; Re(emerging) Issues; Civil Rights History.

The focus of this study is the poor law system, and the people who used it. Introduced in 1838, the Irish poor law established a nationwide system of poor relief that was administered and financed locally. This book provides the first detailed, comprehensive assessment of the ideological basis and practical operation of the poor law system in the post-Famine period. Analysis of contemporary understandings of poverty is integrated with discussion of local relief practices to uncover the attitudes and responses of those both giving and receiving relief, and the active relationship between them. Local case studies are used to explore key issues such as entitlement and eligibility, as well as the treatment of 'problem' groups such as unmarried mothers and vagrants, thus allowing local and individual experience to enrich our understanding of poverty and welfare in historical context. Previous studies of poverty and welfare in Ireland have concentrated on the measures taken to relieve poverty, and their political context. Little attempt has been made to explore the experience of being poor, or to identify the strategies adopted by poor people to negotiate an inhospitable economic and social climate. This innovative interrogation of poor law records reveals the poor to have been active historical agents making calculated choices about how, when and where to apply for aid. Approaching welfare as a process, the book provides a deeper and more wide ranging assessment of the Irish poor law than any study previously undertaken and represents a major milestone in Irish economic and social history.

This volume collects papers with a historical theme. They represent a fundamental review of A Study of Town Life and its impact on the study of poverty and empirical research more generally.

""Poverty and Discrimination" provides a wide-ranging discussion of all the aspects of social policy that are related to economic disadvantage, from welfare programs to education to labor markets, with a particular emphasis on discrimination. The text provides an excellent overview of facts, of research results, and of policy debates. Interspersed in this discussion are many good lessons in data analysis and research methodology. This book is a great reference and review of many areas and will work as an excellent text for undergraduate and graduate-level courses on poverty, inequality, or discrimination."--Rebecca M. Blank, University of Michigan

"Kevin Lang's new textbook on poverty and discrimination is at once lucid, rigorous, and topical. He shows how the conceptual insights of modern economic theory can be combined with state-of-the-art statistical techniques in order to answer the questions, 'What do we know about poverty and how do we know it?' This elegant, learned, and highly accessible book will, I predict, exert a major and beneficial influence in the years ahead on the study of poverty and discrimination in the United States."--Glenn C. Loury, author of "The Anatomy of Racial Inequality"

"Kevin Lang is engaging and always thought-provoking, and he covers a lot of ground. I don't agree with him on all issues, but that is really the point of the book--to show that reasonable people can differ on some of the most important social issues of our day and then give students the tools to assess arguments critically and make their own decisions. This book is an excellent resource for any class on poverty issues."--Janet M. Currie, author of "The Invisible Safety Net: Protecting the Nation's Poor Children and Families"

"This volume will be an extraordinarily helpful tool for anyone teaching in the field of poverty and discrimination. It assembles the latest data, weaves it together with competing theories, and highlights the policy options and dilemmas that we struggle with in the United States. We have not had a textbook like this in decades and it will be a tremendous asset to students and faculty alike."--Katherine S. Newman, author of "Chutes and Ladders: Navigating the Low-Wage Labor Market"

"This book provides a theoretically grounded and empirically up-to-date review of both economic research and economic policies related to poverty and discrimination. It is a welcome contribution reflecting Kevin Lang's broad knowledge of both the massive academic literature and current policy debates."--Joshua D. Angrist, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

In 1964, President Lyndon Johnson declared an "unconditional war" on poverty in the form of sweeping federal programs to assist millions of Americans. Two decades later, President Reagan drastically cut such programs, claiming that welfare encouraged dependency and famously quipping, "Some years ago, the federal government declared war on poverty, and poverty won." These opposing policy positions and the ideologies informing them have been well studied. Here, the focus turns to the influence of popular art and entertainment on beliefs about poverty's causes and potential cures. These new essays interrogate the representation of poverty in film, television, music, photography, painting, illustration and other art forms from the late 19th century to the present. They map when, how, and why producers of popular culture represent-or ignore-poverty, and what assumptions their works make and encourage.

This is a major collection of primary materials on the metropolitan poor, covering the period from the emergence of London as the world centre of trade and commerce, to the beginning of the First World War. The metropolitan poor has attracted much academic interest in recent years as a consequence of which we now have a sophisticated understanding of poverty and its distribution. Contemporary representations of the poor, however, have all too often been neglected.

This is a study of the organisation and practical operation of the system of poor relief in Emden from the late 15th century to the end of the 16th. The city went through dramatic economic, confessional and constitutional changes during this period and so offers an ideal setting for the study of the emergence and development of a highly organised, multi-jurisdictional system of social welfare in the early modern period. Utilising account books, church council minutes, wills, contracts, correspondence and guild records it focuses on the day-to-day operation of poor relief - how the many diverse institutions actually functioned. As elsewhere in Europe, the Reformation did not immediately result in swift changes in poor relief; the Roman Catholic components of the administration of social welfare were dissolved and replaced gradually. It was only when the vast changes in religious, social and economic life which occurred at the middle of the 16th century forced matters that the methods of relief for the needy were revolutionised. The city was flooded with refugees from the Dutch revolt, there were widespread and severe economic difficulties caused by bad harvests and skyrocketing prices, and the church underwent a period of intense Calvinisation; only then were Reformed institutions and methods introduced. At times, religious arguments dominated the poor relief debate, while at others the social welfare system was barely affected; the effectiveness of the new systems and institutions is illuminated by an analysis of the recipients of relief during the second half of the 16th century.

Urban authorities and organizations are responsible for providing the basic services that affect the lives of urban children. Cities for Children is intended to help them understand and respond to the rights and requirements of children and adolescents. It looks at the responsibilities that authorities face, and discusses practical measures for meeting their obligations in the context of limited resources and multiple demands. While the book emphasizes the challenges faced by local government, it also contains information that would be useful to any groups working to make urban areas better places for children. Cities for Children begins by introducing the concept, history and content of children's rights and the obligations they create for local authorities. The volume then goes on to look at a variety of contentious issues such as housing, community participation, working children, community health, education and juvenile justice. The final section of the book discusses the challenge of establishing systems of governance that can promote the economic security, social justice and environmental care essential for the realization of children's rights. It follows through the practical implications for the structure, policies and practices of local authorities. Written by the top experts in the field of children's issues, and including a resource section which lists publications and organizations that can provide further information and support, this volume is a must for all involved in planning for, and the protection of, children within the urban environment.

Series Information:
Garland Studies in Entrepreneurship

For many decades the international community has endeavoured to eliminate extreme poverty; however, it is estimated that around 800 million people still live below the international poverty line of $1.90 a day. This book looks this global problem and presents applicable solutions to show that we can eliminate poverty today and meet the challenge of the UN Sustainable Development Goal 1. The first part of the book discusses what poverty and development are and asks whether the right to development is an international commitment to eradicate poverty. The second part looks at the strategy of the Sustainable Development Goals, and the concept of happiness for all people in the world. It examines the proposition of SDG1, evaluates the first actions taken in this area, and presents the best practice of recent SDG implementation. The final part considers several proposals and presents suggestions on how to make global action more effective. Concise Guides to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals comprises 17 short books, each examining one of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. The series provides an integrated assessment of the SDGs from economic, legal, social, environmental and cultural perspectives.

On January 20, 1949 US President Harry S. Truman officially opened the era of development. On that day, over one half of the people of the world were defined as "underdeveloped" and they have stayed that way ever since. This book explains the origins of development and underdevelopment and shows how poorly we understand these two terms. It offers a new vision for development, demystifying the statistics that international organizations use to measure development and introducing the alternative concept of buen vivir: the state of living well. The authors argue that it is possible for everyone on the planet to live well, but only if we learn to live as communities rather than as individuals and to nurture our respective commons. Scholars and students of global development studies are well-aware that development is a difficult concept. This thought-provoking book offers them advice for the future of development studies and hope for the future of humankind.

An in-depth view of the world of low-wage female workers in the United States. Written by expert authors actively involved in the field, this work provides -- for the first time -- a focused picture of the critical issues, along with realistic solutions in the struggle of working poor women. The book covers a wide range of topics, including getting and keeping a job, struggling to balance the demands of work and family, health care, child care, and unemployment. It is set in the context of both welfare reform and the low-wage labor market and incorporates both self-employment and micro-business enterprise.