Social Funds in Stabilization and Adjustment Programmes: A Critique

This article evaluates the impact of the large number of Social Funds (SFs) which were introduced over the last fifteen years to offset the increase in poverty induced by adjustment. SFs have enjoyed greater visibility and financial support by the donor community than traditional social security programmes, and raised expectations about improvements in living conditions in developing countries. Notwithstanding the visibility and administrative flexibility they enjoyed, and their fairly rapid implementation, SFs played only a minor role in reducing the number of adjustment poor and chronic poor and reversing adverse shifts in income distribution. This was due to problems in funding, targeting and sequencing, and cost‐effectiveness. The article concludes that, all in all, SFs have proven to be no panacea. Many of them were formulated with the political objective of reducing domestic opposition to the adjustment process. Greater impact on poverty would have required increased resources, more permanent relief structures, improved planning and targeting and, especially, better timing in relation to the fiscal cuts entailed by macroeconomic adjustment.     

On the targeting and cost-effectiveness of anti-poverty programmes in rural India

This article is motivated by a concern for the cost‐effectiveness of anti‐poverty outlays; much of its focus is on the targeting of Rural Public Works (RPW) and the Integrated Rural Development Programme (IRDP) over the period 1987–93. It is argued that benefits to the rural poor of larger outlays on these two major anti‐poverty programmes are likely to be limited, given their mistargeting. Large sections of the rural poor were not covered in 1987. Worse, the non‐poor were in a majority among the participants. Although the evidence is mixed, there was a worsening of the targeting of both RPW and IRDP, with RPW maintaining a slight superiority, over the period 1987–93. Yet IRDP was more cost‐effective in both years, using a somewhat limited measure of cost‐effectiveness. Large unspent balances due largely to slow disbursal of allocations and bunching of expenditure in a few months are linked to changes in cost‐effectiveness. Wastage and diversion of funds are unavoidable, in a context of corrupt bureaucracy and capture of locally elected bodies such as Panchayats by a few influential persons. Short of drastic changes in the design and implementation of RPW and IRDP, substantially larger outlays may thus accomplish little in terms of poverty alleviation.     

Cash Transfers and the Well‐being of Older People in Brazil

This article provides a comprehensive assessment of the effects of social protection interventions on material and subjective elements of well‐being. Drawing on a longitudinal survey located in two relatively deprived parts of Brazil, it assesses the effects of pensions and other cash transfers on the well‐being of older people and their households. This analysis is located within a dynamic economic and public policy context. The article finds that pension benefits significantly increase per capita income and that this is strongly associated with overall levels of satisfaction with household well‐being. Levels of reported subjective well‐being do not fall as respondents age, and the survey finds high levels of optimism about future well‐being. The positive effects of pension benefits were supported by upgraded health services and by more specific policies such as access to credit on favourable terms. Overall, the authors conclude that a combination of economic growth and effective public policies significantly boosted the well‐being of most households in their survey, and that Brazil can be taken as a model of good practice for other middle‐income countries.     

Social capital and poverty of the wage-labour class: problems with the social capital theory

Social capital, understood as norms of reciprocity and associational life, is supposed to provide a bottom-up approach to poverty alleviation world-wide. The World Bank says that social capital is a necessary condition for long-term development and that social capital is the capital of the poor. This paper will argue that much of the literature is too sanguine of the benefits of social capital for the poor. It is, of course, important to look at the extent to which social capital can help the poor. But how the conditions of the poor people can also affect their social capital is equally important to examine, and this has often been neglected by many scholars who have been busy to prove that social capital is a new paradigm of development. Based on qualitative interviews in two rural areas in Orissa, eastern India, this paper seeks to examine whether and to what extent poor people of the daily wage labour class benefit from their social capital. It then goes on to unpack the mechanisms in which the economic-political conditions under which poor people live and the spatiality of these conditions affect the production of social capital. By seeking to unpack the dialectical relation between social capital and poverty, the paper aims at problematizing the overly optimistic claims about social capital. It shows that it is untenable to posit social capital as an independent variable and poverty as a dependent variable because the economic-political conditions of poor people have an enormous constraining effect on social capital itself and its supposed material benefits for the poor.     

Crisis of Ageing in Less Developed Countries: Too Much Consumption or Too Little Production?

The age structure in many developing countries is changing—the population is ageing. There is increasing concern over the social and economic costs of caring for this ageing population, and the capacity of the state to finance the expected rising social expenditure has come to dominate the debate on the economics of population ageing. In this context the elderly are considered primarily as consumers and ‘dependent’ on the working population. Following the Keynesian and post-Keynesian literature, this article argues that such a view of the elderly is incorrect, for several reasons. Firstly, empirical evidence shows that the aged do not consume (relative to their income) more than the rest of the population. Secondly, the issue of ‘dependency’ of the aged should be put in the broader context of the dependency of the unemployed and under-employed in a market economy. Thirdly, the focus of the debate should move away from consumption and towards production; and finally, since the old make claims on the national output on the basis of their accumulated assets, savings and pensions, the distributional issues (with regard to assets as well as incomes) have to be an integral part of any pension system in order to alleviate poverty among the elderly.     

怒江大峡谷旅游扶贫研究

旅游扶贫是解决旅游资源丰富型地区贫困问题的有效途径。怒江峡谷区是个区域性的特困少数民族地区,山高坡陡、生态环境脆弱的地理环境决定传统的农业难以改变其贫困面貌。而其丰富的民族文化资源、生物多样性资源和独特的峡谷自然景观等旅游资源,使怒江旅游扶贫成为可能。文章分析了怒江峡谷旅游扶贫的优势、劣势资源和机遇,提出怒江旅游发展应以乡村生态旅游为目标,开发特色旅游扶贫产品,发挥政府引导和扶持作用。     

‘Social Exclusion’ Discourse and Chronic Poverty: A South African Case Study

This article questions the export of ‘social exclusion’ discourse to the field of development and poverty studies. It considers the findings of ongoing research into chronic poverty in the Western Cape district of Ceres, one of the centres of the South African deciduous fruit export industry. It explores the links between the livelihood options of poor people and processes of global integration, agro‐food restructuring and the modernization of paternalist farming styles. In this context the concept of ‘social exclusion’ is of only limited utility, and has significant disadvantages. Although it has the potential to focus attention on the disabling effects of poverty, its most common usage often fails to capture how poverty can flow not only from exclusion but also from processes of integration into broader economic and social networks. The author argues that these are better captured by the notion of ‘adverse incorporation’, and calls for a more cautious approach to the modernizing myths and moralizing narratives that shape policy debates.     

The Paradox of the Earned Income Tax Credit: Appreciating Benefits but not Their Source

The Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) is widely recognized as the United States’ most effective contemporary policy for reducing poverty, and scholars have found that it elevates recipients’ sense of social inclusion. This raises the question of how it influences recipients’ civic engagement, namely their attitudes about government and political participation. We draw on policy feedback scholarship to consider expectations. Then we use a unique dataset to compare recipients of the EITC, Aid to Families With Dependent Children/Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, and nonrecipients of either policy in order to identify how policy features are related to political attitudes and behaviors. We find that despite the benefits they receive, EITC recipients experience low external political efficacy, but are more likely to be politically active than their peers.     

Simple Transfers,Complex Outcomes: The Impacts of Pensions on Poor Households in Brazil

Drawing on quantitative survey data and in‐depth interviews, this article seeks to map out the potential direct and indirect effects of simple cash transfers on households in impoverished rural and urban settings. Brazil is shown to have an extensive system of old age pensions, which affords almost universal coverage to households containing older people. These benefits have a significant impact on levels of poverty and vulnerability in recipient households. They also facilitate access to essential healthcare items, such as drugs, which are seldom freely available through the state health system. The in‐depth interviews reveal that pensions can have important effects on intra‐household relations, but these effects were not generalizable nor easily captured by quantitative survey tools. There was clear evidence that pensions reduced the propensity of older people to remain economically active, but this must be understood in a context of limited employment opportunities for all age groups and a high prevalence of disability. Overall, the article demonstrates the complex effects of a relatively simple cash transfer, which policy makers need to take into account.     

MARRIAGE MIGRANTS AS EMIGRANTS

This article examines the emigration dimension of marriage migration in Asia by focusing on remittances received by parents from daughters who married and migrated abroad. Based on a study of 250 migrant-sending households in Vietnam with a daughter living in an Asian country as a ‘foreign wife’, the analysis provides empirical evidence that emigrant spouses make substantial financial contributions to their natal families through remittances. A multivariate analysis of the determinants of remittance-sending shows that a woman's characteristics and living conditions abroad largely determine whether or not she remits, while the relative poverty level of her natal family has limited influence. Findings call for a broader conceptualization of ‘women who marry foreigners’ or ‘foreign brides’ as emigrants who contribute to the social development of their sending countries.     

Old‐age Poverty in Indonesia: Measurement Issues and Living Arrangements

Drawing on several rounds of nationally representative household survey data for Indonesia, this article shows that poverty rates among the elderly are substantially higher than those of the rest of the population. Using sensitivity checks on adult equivalence scales and economies of scale, the author demonstrates that the gap in poverty rates between the elderly and non‐elderly population would increase even further if moderate changes to the per‐consumption expenditure assumption were made. Additional panel data evidence reveals that about one‐third of the elderly population is currently vulnerable to poverty. While the findings do not show gender differences in old‐age poverty rates, they do highlight important differences in living arrangements across gender, with the majority of elderly women being widows while the majority of men are still married at all ages.     

THE POLITICS OF MEASURING POVERTY AMONG THE ELDERLY

We discuss the special problems associated with efforts to measure poverty among the elderly. Income measures must be adjusted for a variety of non-income sources of well-being such as net worth, human capital, and in-kind, transfers. While such adjustments are needed, efforts to date are problematic to the extent that new sources of error are introduced. A close analysis of official government measures of poverty reveals that they reflect a variety of political assumptions and compromises. Examination of the eligibility criteria associated with various government social programs for the elderly reveal implicit poverty lines that differ from the official poverty lines. The importance of these operational poverty lines cannot be overestimated.     

Saints, Stalwarts, and Slackers: State Financial Contributions to Welfare Reform

Considerable literature finds that spending levels are important predictors of poverty rates, both in the American states and in western European nations. Those jurisdictions with the most generous support programs generally have lower poverty rates. This article examines state Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) spending levels in relation to national norms, the spending ability of the state as predicted by their total taxable revenue base, and the state's poverty rate. The analysis shows enormous variation in state per capita TANF spending, with many states spending far less than the national mean and their fiscal capacity. Most of the low-spending states have the fiscal ability to fund more vigorous programs but at optimal levels; some would still fall below the national mean. In return for improved funding, these states would be candidates for increased federal assistance. A few states with a high poverty rate and usually with large numbers of poor citizens are generous spenders, indicating that funding is one component of effective programs.     

The Historical Impact of Welfare Programs on Poverty: Evidence from the American States

Over the years, there has been a spirited debate over the impact of the welfare expansion associated with the War on Poverty. Many analysts have maintained that public assistance expansion during this period decreased poverty by raising the incomes of the poor (an income enhancement effect), while others have contended that welfare expansion increased poverty by discouraging the poor from working (a work disincentive effect). There has been considerable empirical research about the historical effect of welfare on poverty, nearly all of which relies on the poverty rate (i.e., the percentage of persons with income less than the “poverty threshold”) as an indicator of the extent of poverty. However, this work has not employed designs that allow researchers to sort out distinct income enhancement and work disincentive effects. We develop a model of poverty rates in the American states that permits estimation of these distinct effects—based on state‐level time‐series data observed annually for the years 1960–90—and we find that welfare had both effects during our period of analysis. We also calculate the net impact of increases in welfare benefits on the poverty rate—taking into account both work disincentive and income enhancement effects. Our results indicate that this net impact is dependent on three variables: the initial level of cash benefits, wage levels for unskilled workers, and the share of the benefit increase provided through cash rather than in‐kind assistance. Because of historical trends in these variables, since the 1970s welfare spending has become increasingly less effective in reducing the poverty rate. However, the significance of this result for policymakers must be tempered by evidence that flaws in the poverty rate as an indicator of poverty make it so that any finding about the net effect of an increase in welfare benefits on the poverty rate underestimates welfare's ability to lessen the true extent of poverty.     

Vietnam's Coastal Communities: An Assessment of Poverty

A Vietnamese geographer examines factors leading to the persistence of poverty in the coastal regions of Vietnam, against the backdrop of the country's overall recent success in poverty amelioration. After reviewing the spatial pattern of poverty for Vietnam as a whole, based on current government statistics, the author contrasts the situation in the country's interior relative to coastal locations, based on a detailed survey of over 200 households in Khanhhoa Province, located in south-central Vietnam. The changing labor market conditions in East Asia are discussed briefly in light of continued poverty reduction in the country. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: D31, I31, O15, P20. 4 figures, 5 tables, 33 references.     

Poverty Reduction with Growth and Redistribution

In the late 1990s the bilateral and multilateral development agencies placed increasing emphasis on poverty reduction in developing countries. This led to the establishment by the United Nations of the ‘International Development Targets’ for poverty reduction. The target of poverty reduction might be achieved through faster economic growth alone, through redistribution, or through a combination of the two. This article presents an analytical framework to assess the effectiveness of growth and redistribution for poverty reduction. It concludes that redistribution, either of current income or the growth increment of income, is more effective in reducing poverty for a majority of countries than growth alone.     

Leaving Vietnam: Nixon,Kissinger and Ford, 1969–1975, Part two: January 1972–January 1973

Although anticipated, the North Vietnamese ‘Easter offensive’ against South Vietnam in 1972 created problems for the United States. Having reached a rapprochement with Communist China, President Nixon and his foreign policy adviser, Henry Kissinger, believed that the attack could have serious repercussions for their attempt to balance it with détente with the Soviet Union, not to mention the US's credibility as a Great Power. They also feared it would damage Nixon's prospects for re‐election in November 1972. Despite opposition from his Defense Secretary, Nixon renewed the bombing of North Vietnam which had been stopped by President Johnson in 1968. This helped to bring the North Vietnamese back to the conference table and after complex negotiations, a draft peace agreement was ready for initialling in October 1972. However, President Thieu of South Vietnam saw significant drawbacks in the agreement and refused to go along with it. The North Vietnamese chose to have one more attempt to win on the battlefield and President Nixon, who had scaled down the bombing when peace seemed closer and won a landslide victory in the presidential election, launched another eleven days of concentrated bombing raids on North Vietnam at the turn of the year. This led to the final agreement initialled on 23 January 1973, which President Thieu reluctantly acceded to. Thieu's reservations were justified, but Nixon realized that, despite his electoral victory, he could not count on the continued support of Congress and the American people for the war. Far from bringing ‘peace with honor in Vietnam and Southeast Asia’, the January agreement was a fig leaf to cover American withdrawal.     

Public Intervention and Poverty Alleviation: A Study of the Declining Incidence of Rural Poverty in Kerala,India

In the context of the continuing and lively debate on the estimates, trends and determinants of rural poverty in India, this article examines the sharp decline, since the late 1970s, in the incidence of rural poverty in the state of Kerala, well known for its record of social development. It is argued that, given the slow rate of growth of the Kerala economy in general and agriculture in particular since the mid-1970s, the ‘trickle down’ theory cannot explain the decline in poverty. Similarly, the fact that rural wages have increased faster than the consumer price index does not constitute a sufficient condition for crossing the poverty line. Expansion of state-directed programmes is seen to be the single most important determinant in reducing rural poverty. The effect of public intervention programmes is roughly estimated to be equal to one fifth of the consumption of rural labour households. The lesson of Kerala for poverty alleviation is that social protection expressed in terms of meeting the basic consumption requirements of the poor, especially the vulnerable among the poor, should be a necessary component of development policy. However, this is not a sufficient condition: there should also be a growth strategy which would provide adequate employment to all members of the labour force from the poorer sections of the population. The current line of official thinking in India, in the context of economic liberalization, is hardly conducive to such a strategy.     

Caring for the Elderly in Kuwait

This article is based on the author's research investigation titled “Toward visualizing a proposal from a general practice perspective in social work to reach the social adjustment in the elderly residing the social nursing home: applied study on the old-age home (asylum) in Sulaibikhat area in the city of Kuwait.” Caring for the elderly is a humane issue encountered by many developed and developing nations. This dilemma of caring for the elderly has increasingly spread throughout the world. United Nations statistics reveal that there are over 200 million people who were over 60 years of age in 1950. The number increased in 1975 to 350 million, and further increased to 950 million in 2000. It is expected that the number will exceed 1,100 million people by the year 2025. In Kuwait, the number of elderly people has increased rapidly. Table 1 shows the number of elderly people in the last three years, according to gender and nationality. It is clear from the data displayed in Table 1 that there is a continuous annual increase in the number of elderly people residing in Kuwait. In light of this continuous increase and the government's interest in providing full care for the citizens, there is a great need to reconsider the status of this helpless group once again to fulfill their basic needs in accordance with the latest scientific and social development that is carried out by the country. The needs of the elderly are considered an important necessity, resulting from psychological and biological factors, as well as the nature of social relations associated with aging. Satisfying these needs will ensure the social adjustment of the elderly, while at the same time, accomplish the societal goals. Satisfying these and other emotional needs has given impetus to establishing comprehensive nursing homes in Kuwait, and shed more light on the social adjustment of the elderly residing in these homes.     

Tackling the Down Side: Social Capital,Women’s Empowerment and Micro‐Finance in Cameroon

Micro‐finance programmes are currently dominated by the ‘financial self‐sustainability paradigm’ where women’s participation in groups is promoted as a key means of increasing financial sustainability while at the same time assumed to automatically empower them. This article examines the experience of seven micro‐finance programmes in Cameroon. The evidence indicates that micro‐finance programmes which build social capital can indeed make a significant contribution to women’s empowerment. However, serious questions need to be asked about what sorts of norms, networks and associations are to be promoted, in whose interests, and how they can best contribute to empowerment, particularly for the poorest women. Where the complexities of power relations and inequality are ignored, reliance on social capital as a mechanism for reducing programme costs may undermine programme aims not only of empowerment but also of financial sustainability and poverty targeting.