Poverty and Social Protection Revision

When did asset-based approaches develop and how were they useful?

In the 1980s to make it possible to identify the people experiencing poverty and distinguish between persistent, structural poverty and that which may pass with time; this also considered the mobility of assets in relations to shocks

When did relational approaches develop and how were they useful?

In the 1990s to expand on the initial rejection of poverty as an individual condition and to become more attentive to systems of power, exclusion and social stigma at work over multiple scales

How does a historically relational approach challenge scale?

This shifts from the national to the global to move beyond bordered states to colonial and imperial relations between states

How have historical relations impacted contemporary poverty?

Relationships between the coloniser and colonised drive poverty through extraction of resources, market expansion, the slave trade and the continuation of racial capitalism which upholds racial banishment and White supremacy

What was the relationship between Britain and India that informs contemporary poverty?

The ‘colonial drain’ saw Britain drain a huge amount of capital from the Indian economy over less than 150 years thorough taxes and remittances to dismantle the Indian economy

How much was Britain able to collect through the Indian ‘colonial drain’?

$45 trillion

What was the relationship between Africa and Europe that informs contemporary poverty?

The growth of the slave trade where slaves were captured by force and exchanged for European fire arms led to the expansion of this in countries such as Angola and Benin; this weakened legal institutions, prevented state development and encouraged ethnic fracturing to reduce socioeconomic development

What was the relationship between Western Europe and the global East that informs contemporary poverty?

Wester Europe benefited from the transfer of seeds and agriculture technology from the East where they were planted in the Fertile Crescent to grow large varieties of wheat and barley that fuel lifestyles, incomes and prevent disease

How does climate change interact with poverty?

Poverty is a key factor increasing the risk for individuals through heightened exposure and reduced social connectivity; climate change can also increase poverty through stress on agricultural productivity and food prices

How does urbanisation interact with climate change and poverty?

Rapid urbanisation forces the poor to reside in poorly constructed, vulnerable areas such as floodplains or hillsides at greater risk to natural events

Which 2 American natural disasters illustrate the impact of poverty on vulnerability to natural disasters? (names and dates)

Superstorm Sandy 2012 and Hurricane Katrina 2005

How many fatalities were caused by Superstorm Sandy compared to Hurricane Katrina?

100 in Superstorm Sandy but nearly 2000 in Hurricane Katrine due to differences in infrastructure, poverty and resources

Which hurricane illustrated the potential impact of natural events to push vulnerable households into poverty traps?

Hurricane Mitch 1998, Honduras

How did Hurricane Mitch push vulnerable households into poverty traps in 1998?

There was a 40% reduction in crop incomes and a 6% increase in poverty as low-income households lost their capacity to generate earnings and uphold their livelihoods due to loss of productive assets and housing; wealthier households were able to rebuild much faster where the lowest earning households fell into long term poverty

How is poverty governed through representations of the poor?

Socially constructed representations seek to humiliate those experiencing poverty and break down their rights to representation; elites and government officials produce and embed narratives that legitimise banishment of the poorest in society

How were the destitute in Southern Asia represented?

Those experiencing the most extreme poverty are considered ‘nonpeople’ in relation to the market, state and civil society; this stems from observed deviance from social norms as people are perceived to lack cleanliness, suffer from disease and become framed as ‘lunatics’; this is then used to justify laws criminalising their lifestyles, inadequate benefits systems and political initiatives that exclude those to whom they are most relevant

How was poverty reduction in Uganda influenced by representations of the poor?

Poverty reduction policies were biased towards the ‘economically active’ poor to exclude those most in need

How can harmful representations and exclusion of the poor be overcome?

Through breaking down categories of ‘deserving’ and ‘undeserving’ to redirect attention to the motives of actors who construct binaries; rights should be restored to the poor to offer them a voice in shaping poverty alleviation and restore their agency in spaces of political possibility

Where were understandings of poverty reframed in South Africa?

Ceres, Western Cape

How were the conditions that create poverty challenged at Ceres?

The poor quality of life here was put down to the ‘deviance’ of the poor and their lifestyles at odds with urban norms; upon a closer analysis this is instead due to paternalist legacies of colonialism, modern legal reforms and pressures placed on fruit produce by globalisation; here it is not social exclusion that forms poverty but instead ‘adverse incorporation’ where the poor become integrated into networks that marginalise them

What is social protection and when did it begin to emerge?

Since 2000 social protection has emerged as a key policy framework to address poverty and vulnerability in developing countries through public institutions and programmes aimed at protecting workers and households from threats to basic living standards through cash transfers, income transfers and poverty reduction programmes

What is the Brazilian social protection programme called and how many households did it reach in 2010?

Bolsa Familia reaching over 12 million households

What is the South African children’s social protection programme and how many households did it reach in 2009?

Child Support Grant reaching over 8 million households

What is Indian unemployed persons social protection programme and how many households did it reach in 2008?

Employment Guarantee Scheme reading over 48 million households

What are the successes of social protection programmes?

They have reduced incomes inequality, poverty and improved household consumption, school attendance and nutrition though liberal paternalism

How can social protection be viewed as a biopolitical endeavour?

Cash transfers and conditionality can encourage responsibility in the poor through conditions forcing recipients to ‘earn’ their grants through keeping children in school, having them vaccinated, improving education, health and civic responsibility in a shaping of the behaviour of the poor

How can grant conditions have a gendered effect?

Grants can undermine traditional divisions of labour as motherhood is responsibilised and traditional gendered caring roles often implicated; this impacts women’s position in the home and community through programme conditions

How can social protection be criticised for being apolitical?

Social protection is often technocratic and universalises ways of engaging with the poor to obscure the political character of uneven development problems; there is a need to move away from simply protecting the poor to empowering them as citizens with rights

What is the Philippines conditional cash transfer programme and how many households did this reach in 2018?

The 4Ps Programme reaching 4.5 million households

How did the 4Ps programme form a disproportionate burden on women?

The conditions of the cash transfers forced women to send their children to school whilst also taking on extra responsibilities such as attending mandatory training every month on subjects such as governing household finances, responsible parenting, health and hygiene etc. with women policing the actions of their family; they were expected to support their children’s education and health through extra domestic work with little help from their husbands or risk being cut off from the programme

How has Bolsa Familia been seen as a form of governmentally in North East Brazil (Ponta Fina)?

Individuals must come in person to local bank branches with their cards to regulate bodies at certain times and certain locations; they are forced to present themselves to the state and take on behaviours seen as compliant and productive such as health checkups and children attending schools

How is Bolsa Familia undermined by state actors and recipients?

The border dispute leads to recipients being bounced back and forth between municipal services and spending not directed to intended purposes due to political corruption leading to poorly delivered public works projects and feelings of neglect; the money is also only digital on PBF cards but recipients find new and novel ways of trading these and exerting more control over the process

How can social protection policies become spaces of political possibility?

They may not always produce what they aimed to accomplish as populations fail to reproduce neoliberal ideologies in predictable ways

How have recipients of Bolsa Familia interpreted this in unpredictable ways?

In Porta Fina employment in low paying jobs have fallen due to the poor being less willing to work certain jobs that they might have been when they were desperate and experiencing extreme poverty; others reduce their time in waged labour to spend more time in informal work such as farming, care giving, construction and teaching as they perceive these to have more importance to their community to bolster social prospects further than neoliberal discourses of profit maximisation; residents have more control over their labour due to no longer being In extreme poverty; there is also a rise in alternative economies with non-capitalist exchange

How has social protection in Pakistan led to a new development in state-society relations?

The response to widespread flooding became linked to ID cards which people understood as defining features of their citizenship; this saw people demanding more of the newly democratic state as it reached out in unprecedented ways to form a new rights based disaster citizenship allowing Pakistani people to asset and form new relations with the state