AN71022C-33213062-2011-12 Critically analyse the different Theories of Poverty.

This essay seeks to analyse the different theories of poverty by focusing primarily on the individualistic, cultural and structural or situational perspectives. It starts by giving an overview of the concept of poverty and thereafter subjecting the various theories that have shaped the discourse on poverty to an extensive analysis. The concluding part of the essay deals with how an analysis of the theories may inform policy makers in the field of development since effective poverty reduction strategies are based on the theories of poverty.

Poverty continues to receive global attention especially in all programmes that concerns development because it is an age-long phenomenon that besets mankind in our efforts towards development. The definition of poverty is very complex in nature because it is a social phenomenon that is multidimensional in nature. Poverty goes beyond the economic spheres and includes ones inability to participate in political and social life. The World Bank (2000) defines poverty as the economic condition in which people lack sufficient income to obtain certain minimal levels of health services, food, housing, clothing and education generally recognized as necessary to ensure an adequate standard of living. Another stream of idea in the definition of poverty is allowing the poor to describe their own poverty. That is allowing those who are experiencing poverty themselves to define what constitutes their basic necessities in life.

Several streams of ideas have emerged to inform and shape the discourse on poverty theories across the globe. While these streams have many ideas in common, they do not add to a single coherent theory of explaining poverty. Because of the complex nature of the individual, cultural and structural theories, the text below seeks to offer a critical analysis to the theories of poverty.

The individualistic as well as the pathological theory explains poverty as a result of the attributes that are inherent in the individual which includes the character of the person as well as his or her personal abilities in life such as intelligence. That is to say people are poor in life because of their inabilities to compete with others for resources. As a result of this, they end up being caught up in poverty and its associated effects. An example can be made of people who are born with disabilities and this restricts them in competing for resources.

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This theory sees the cause of poverty as something that the individual is born with and for that matter cannot do anything about the situation and as a result, his or her life is being determined by his present condition. Arguably, the theory fails to recognise the abilities of people who are born with disabilities to doing something that can push them out of their poverty situations. Disabilities will only result in poverty when the individual concerned is not willing to do something to improve upon his or her condition and for that matter becomes comfortable with his conditions.

Another view of this theory that is related to pathology also sees poverty to be as a result of acquired or developed personality traits such as the character and actions of people. Some people are born with the character of being lazy and as a result of that, they are not willing to participate meaningful in life and for that matter depends on others for assistance in life. The decisions people make in life as well as their characters such as indolence always results in causing poverty. An example is the case of an unmarried teenage mother without the support of any member of the family. Such an individual is likely to be ensnared by poverty and its associated effects.

The individualistic and the pathological theories of poverty explains and blames the individual for their poverty but it fails to recognise the fact that, these factors in themselves cannot lead to poverty but it serves to establish casual links that may in effect trigger and promote factors that can push the individual into poverty. The idea of blaming the person for his or her own poverty based on morality is often considered as an ideology and is not applicable in helping to shaping the discourse on poverty in relation to development because it lacks evidence. Also the theory can also be criticised on the basis that, people who might appear to have inherited the characteristics associated with poverty do not themselves become poor.

The cultural theory of poverty explains the persistence of poverty as a product of the culture of poverty. The culture of poverty became a strong idea in the War on Poverty with the writings of Oscar Lewis and Oliver La Farge in 1959 on their study of poor Latin American families in an effort to explain the similarities between lower class families in Mexico and Puerto Rico. The culture of poverty presupposes that the poor has unique patterns of behaviour and priorities of values that distinguish them and these unique characteristics always cause them to be trapped by poverty. That is a set of values are transmitted intergenerationally through the process of socialization and have become the subcultural determinants of the lower socio-economic status of the poor and this leads to a vicious cycle of poverty and is only
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a few who are able to get out of the poverty cycle. An analysis of this theory to the explanation of poverty is very important in development because, it helps us to know how culture influences development because culture is a constitute part of development.

What is interesting about this theory is that, it gives an understanding of how poverty can be tackled by changing the values system and motivations in a given society. Accordingly, people are poor because their values are embedded in personality traits which were acquired through the process of socialization. In order to tackle poverty in such an environment, there is the need to change the entire values of the people and incorporate into them, new set of values and motivations. In spite of the usefulness of the culture of poverty model, it also has some flaws in the sense that the application of the model was only limited to developing countries. Oscar Lewis asserts that the culture of poverty is mostly likely to be found in developing economies. This assumption does not hold since poverty is also prevalent in developed countries as well. Poverty is a global phenomenon and therefore it is not limited to Third World or developing countries alone but also some developed countries are still battling with the issue of poverty. Also it can be seen that the theory lacks evidence. For instance, Charles and Betty Lou Valentine in their study of low income earners in America did not find any evidence of the existence of culture of poverty among the people.

From the structural perspective, the poor manifest certain patterns of behaviour which are not internally generated as a result of their unique values but their actions are influenced by external factors as a result of their occupying an unfavourable position in a restrictive social structure. That is to say that the poor behave differently not because they have internalized the dominant values but they do not have the opportunity to realize these values through the socially sanctional avenues. The life courses and chances of people are usually determined by the social forces and circumstances that surround them. Economic growth, labour market opportunities, educational facilities in a country provides a framework in which the standards of living as well as the social relations of people are always created and recreated. The structures that are inherent in the society including the organisation of social relations such as race, gender, class and power determines the fate of people. In other words, it is the failure of the structures in the society that causes poverty among people.

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To buttress the above argument, failures resulting from government policies and programmes can also result in poverty through cuts in government spending and welfare programmes as well as inefficiencies and corruption in administration. For instance, the introduction of the Structural Adjustment Programme as a condition for loans and repayment by the International Monetary Fund in most developing countries resulted in cutbacks in vital social services, education and health and thus pushing more people in poverty.

The structural theory sees poverty as resulting from capitalism. In a capitalist economy, profit is the main motivation for production. A capitalist wage labour market produces poverty in order for it to operate efficiently through exploitation. A large number of the poor are usually not employed on full time basis and also the use of capital intensive methods of production such as the use of machines and technology causes redundancy and as a result the poor end up experiencing sporadic periods of unemployment and therefore creating a poll of excess labour. This makes it possible for the capitalist to enjoy higher profits by way of reducing wages of the labourers at the expense of the poor.

In order to explain the dynamics of poverty, there is the need to go beyond the level of the individual and community agents and focus on political action. MacGregor (1981) in his book Politics of Poverty argued that, policies to combat poverty are the products of political decisions. Poverty is seen as a result of political failure. Poverty is also seen as resulting from the biases in the structure of the society in the form of social exclusion and disadvantage. These biases usually tend to work against people such as those with learning disabilities, the disabled as well as those older people making them to be vulnerable in the society. That is to say, vulnerability is as a result of discrimination. In explaining poverty by the use of the structural approach, it helps to address factors in the society that perpetuates poverty by not changing the poor themselves but rather changing the situation of the poor by way of correcting the restrictive social structures that perpetuates poverty. Thus helps in analysing deprivation by looking at the broader view of the mechanisms and institutions in the society that causes poverty rather than concentrating on the individual.

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An analysis of the individualistic, cultural and structural perspectives of poverty is very important to efforts aimed at reducing poverty in the sense that, these theories provides a framework for policy makers in the field of development. The individualistic theory helps to inform policy makers on poverty that giving the poor a better chance in competition with others does not help in eradicating poverty but rather it improves the individual prospects. These strategies will only reduce poverty in so far as it has a collective impact rather than focusing on the relative positions of individuals and therefore the need to focus on policies that aims at reducing poverty on a collective basis.

The structural aspect of poverty helps to address the issue of economic growth and development being taken as a poverty reduction strategy. Economic growth is often perceived to lead to improvement in the living standards of people but an analysis of the structural perspective has revealed that, it has rather pushed people into poverty through displacement of work of people in a changing economy making people to be unemployed. Economic growth is not a guarantee of human development. That is to say that, promotion of economic growth is sometimes done at the expense of inequality. For growth to promote equality, reduce poverty and create employment, it has to be an inclusive growth rather than just an economic growth.

The conclusion to be drawn from the analysis of the theories of poverty, in so far as development is concerned, is that the both the individualistic, cultural and structural theories seeks to address the causes of poverty rather than finding practical solutions to the reduction of poverty. An analysis of the casual processes with regards to poverty does not in itself help in its alleviation. However it provides a framework upon which poverty reduction strategies may be built in that it addresses poverty from different perspectives and ones perspective of poverty determines the kind of strategies used in alleviating it.

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Bibliography Alcock, Pete (2006) Understanding Poverty, 3rd ed. Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke and New York. Lister, Ruth (2004) Poverty. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Lewis, Oscar, and Oliver La Farge (1959) Five families; Mexican case studies in the culture of poverty. New York: Basic Books.

MacGregor, Susanne (1981) The Politics of Poverty. Longman.

Spicker, Paul (2007) The Idea of Poverty. Bristol: The Policy Press. Valentine, Charles A. (1968) Culture and Poverty: Critiques and Counter Proposals. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Waxman, Chaim I. (1983) The stigma of poverty: A critique of poverty theories, 2nd ed. Pergamon Press

World Bank (2000): Attacking Poverty. World Development Report, World Bank, Washington DC.