The Dangers of ‘Poverty’ as a Topic

Studying ‘poverty’ has become a popular activity within the field of international development.  There are poverty specialists, pro-poor programs (which always make me wonder if the programs are designed to encourage poverty rather than overcome it), and more.  CIFOR (the Center for International Forestry Research) has for a number of years run a “Poverty and Environment Network”, with field studies and comparative analyses that span the globe.   I myself am now involved in one of Cornell’s IGERTs (Integrative Graduate Education, Research and Training programs) focused on “Food Systems and Poverty Reduction.”

But I have found myself uneasy with the use of the term, poverty, and its role as a ‘frame’ within which research should be undertaken.  My dis-ease began when, sometime in the mid-2000s, I read Arturo Escobar’s Encountering Development:  The Making and Unmaking of the Third World.  Although his writing is more radical, more anti-establishment, than my own thinking, I came away from reading that book with an altered outlook, particularly on poverty.  Indeed, I have avoided talking about poverty, and have encouraged others to similarly refrain from doing so, ever since I read that book.

Here I emphasize my own conclusions, sparked by his analysis.  The crux of the problem is that an emphasis on poverty is an emphasis on a lack, a shortcoming; it defines the people whose conditions are addressed in negative terms; it reinforces unwarranted feelings of superiority among those whose financial situations are good and, conversely, it encourages feelings of inferiority among those defined by their lack of cash.  It also defines the world, and what is important in it, in purely economic terms, a problem I see as more general. 

In the early 2000s, when I was reading Escobar’s book, CIFOR began a process of defining what it meant by poverty.  I argued—if we had to have an emphasis on poverty—for using the ideas propounded by Amartya Sen.  Sen identified three kinds of deprivation, which he saw as together resulting in ‘poverty’:

  • Social capability deprivation: shortages of information, knowledge, skills, participation in organizations, and sources of finance;
  • Political capability deprivation: lack of access to political decisionmaking, inability to voice aspirations or take collective action (not only the capability to vote);
  • Psychological capability deprivation: inadequacy of people’s sense of their own potential, rendering critical thought difficult; lack of self-confidence.

Those developing CIFOR’s definition of poverty were not impressed, choosing instead the more conventional, financial definition as the only feasible one. I have also seen cases where Sen’s broader definition (or a similarly broad one) was accepted as the ideal by a project; but when ‘push came to shove’, decisions were made to address only the financial issue.  The argument: ‘measurable’ indicators were needed—by a government, a donor, or narrow, disciplinary conventions relating to evidence and validity. [Incidentally, if you’ve ever tried to document the incomes of rural people in developing countries, you’ll know just how reliable such ‘measurable indicators’ really are—-not very.]

I do not argue that ‘poor’ people are uniformly involved in well-functioning social systems, that they all possess useful and insightful indigenous knowledge, that they all equitably distribute the goods they produce, or that they all provide well for the old and the infirm.  But I do know that many cultural systems provide their adherents, their members with non-monetary benefits of great value.  The Kenyah Dayaks with whom I’ve interacted for over three decades, for instance, tend to more openly recognize and value the differing strengths of individuals than do Americans, leading to a sense of security and self-confidence worthy of envy.  Their norms of sharing make Americans appear utterly niggardly.  Gender equity is higher among them than among any other group I have encountered.  In comparison with life on Java, they pride themselves on the fact that ‘no Kenyah has to sleep under a bridge’—they take care of their own. 

Differing strengths appear among different cultural groups, but the importance, even the utility for humanity, of locally valued traits disappears completely with the emphasis on poverty, on the people’s simple lack of money.  Better we should build on people’s strengths and the opportunities these provide; we might consider, for instance, ‘food systems and empowerment’ or ‘food systems and local knowledge’—such foci recognize the potential and capabilities of local people and provide conceptual frames that implicitly recognize the creativity, energy, knowledge, and potential for improvement that exist among all human beings.

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