Description
'To take birth as a poor man itself is a big punishment. We are facing many difficulties and there is none to support us. We cannot die also. ... Our condition is like applying perfumed oil to mustache when there is no food to eat.' - Male focus group discussion, Appipuram, Andhra PradeshIndia has experienced accelerating growth in the last 10 years, yet millions of Indians remain mired in poverty. Why? Most books on growth and poverty reduction are dominated by the perspectives of policy makers and academic experts. 'Moving Out of Poverty: The Promise of Empowerment and Democracy in India' brings together the voices of poor men and women from 300 villages across Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal, as it seeks to understand how these people have managed to escape poverty, while others remain stuck, and still others fall into poverty. The study explores the role of institutions such as family, markets and local panchayats, and factors such as aspiration, empowerment, social exclusion and conflict, health and asset accumulation, in explaining escape from poverty and falling into poverty.
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This World Bank study of poverty in India is different from others, according to project director Narayan, in that the focus is on realities from the bottom up; the dynamics of social, political, and economic institutions at the local level; and the complex economic, psychological, social, political, institutional, and community-level processes that are hidden beneath net poverty rates. It also includes the voices of people experiencing poverty, who have moved out of poverty, and others and relies on life stories, discussion groups, and community questionnaires for its data. Some of the study's key findings include: official poverty lines systematically underestimate poverty, net poverty figures hide the dynamics of moving out of poverty and falling into poverty, the chronic poor undertake as many initiatives as the better off, falling into poverty is primarily the result of health and social shocks, aspirations are a powerful force for moving out of poverty, poor people's self-confidence and empowerment matters, family is the most important institution, poor people value democracy as an ideal even if it doesn't help them, the private sector and civil society are underutilized resources, and caste barriers are unevenly falling. Co-published with Palgrave Macmillan. Annotation ©2009 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
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