Multidimensional Character of Poverty

The state of a person or community who lacks the basic amenities such as food, shelter and clothing is called the state of poverty. The term ‘poverty’ may vary by its definition from place to place (Lewis, 2017). A person in third world country might not be considered poor and the same person can come under the label of poor in united state. People are faced with poverty in different countries and the situation is difficult to overcome. The present study determines to apply major theoretical perspective to the social issue of poverty in a global perspective. The present paper highlights the causes of poverty and the theories that could help in explaining the current situation. There are four main approaches of poverty that are discussed in the paper along with some sociological concepts. In a brief, the causes, types, approaches and sociological concepts related to poverty are the focus of the paper.

Poverty is hard to define due its multidimensional character. According to Brunsma, Smith and Gran (2016), the definition of poverty can range from one place to another and from one time period to another. However, the manifestations that can provide the meaning of poverty will include lack of basic amenities, hunger and malnutrition, lack of access or no access to basic services such as water, health, education, lack of housing or very poor condition of housing, social discrimination, abode in insecure environment.

The above mentioned points explain the aspects that are important for living healthy life. the same has been said by Ngoma and Mayimbo (2017), that lacking of any requirement absolutely can make the person fall under the category of poverty.

Addae-Korankye (2014) elaborates the causes of poverty. According to him, poverty is a complex concept and it consists of multiple components of facts, facts such as. It is the deficiency in the basic need of human, poverty leads the poop people towards the exploitation and many more. There are multiple causes that can be held responsible for the cause of poverty. Few of the major causes identified for poverty are corruption, political instability, lack of education, ineffective geographical characteristics, governmental policies and geographical characteristics.  Corruption is one of the major problems that contribute to poverty, as it ceases the opportunity for the people who are lacking amenities and trying to get over the difficulty. On another part, education is an absolute necessity for the poor. The poverty can be reduced through education by making people aware and quality education is the critical solution for the problem. Often, political instability harms the society in many ways including civil war, waste of resources and public money. The resources and monetary assets wasted in the process of election, war and other government oriented area can be used for reducing poverty in a state. There are many countries that are found inherently poor due to the geographical conditions. The economic growth is not possible for these countries as the country is in constant need of resources for its geographical situation. Inappropriate geographical positions include countries situated in areas prone to earthquakes, flood or any other natural disasters, counties located in national borders and more. This article has given the aspects that are considered as the causes of poverty.

Manifestations of Poverty

In the article written by Bergh and Nilsson (2014), there is no universal definition of poverty however; there are certain criteria on which poverty can be divided into two types, the absolute poverty and relative poverty. In his article the absolute poverty is the total lack of resources, it is a condition where the person lacks the minimum requirement for one or even more than one basic living needs for an extended period of time. According to the World Bank, extreme poverty was defined as living on less than US $1.90 per day. Among the basic needs, food, safe drinking water, sanitation facilities, health, shelter, education, information and access to services, absence of any two needs is absolute poverty. It is situation where one has literally nothing; it is dangerous and can easily cause death.

The article by Hagenaars, (2017) who agrees with Bergh and Nilsson (2014) in absolute poverty also explains relative poverty. Relative poverty refers to a state of a person or group compared to other members of the society. In other words, the relative poverty is the standard of living; it is the condition where people lack the minimum income that is required to maintain the decent standard of living in society. Where absolute poverty is globally unchangeable condition, relative poverty can differs across countries as well as over time. The poverty line is the minimum level of income decided by the state on which a country can decide how much of the population is poor.

The approaches to poverty is explain by Hickey and Du Toit (2013). There are four approaches to poverty. The four approaches of poverty are the monetary approach, capability approach, social exclusion and participatory approach.

Monetary approach: The traditional approach basically considers people lacking money as poor and relates money to poverty. It is the most widely used measurement of poverty. Under the monetary approach poverty line is drawn and based on this poverty line, the people who fail to generate the required amount are deemed to be living in poverty.

The capability approach: The capability approach is beyond the materialistic understanding of poverty and it is unlike the monetary approach where the money is considered the deciding factor of someone’s poverty level. As the title says, this approach defines poverty as the lack of opportunity. A person having enough materialistic assets would still be considered poor if he is not getting the opportunity of enjoying life and enjoy things that people value. The approach focuses on the human freedom and human well-being. Theoretically the capability approach is more satisfactory approach to poverty than the monetary approach.

Different Approaches to Poverty

Social exclusion: A person having monetary resource still might be considered poor on bases of their race, religion, ethnicity or any other criteria. It is to describe the processes where people do not participate in any kind of societal activities or shaping society although they are willing to do so however, they become marginalized. The social exclusion approach differs from both monetary and capability approach as they put the social perspective in the centre.

Participatory approach: Participatory approach is understanding poverty dimension within the limits of cultural, social, economic and political environment. It is an approach where the concept of poverty is not relevant where as the concept of poverty is seen from the poor people’s perspective.

Poverty, when seen with sociological lens has a relation with social class. It is not new to sociologist to relate the concept of social class to the poverty. Social class has an economic base and therefore, the poverty of a state lies on the social class to a great extend. Social class makes a division in the society that makes an unequal distribution of resources. Social class positioning is a continuous process through which important influences are made. People tend to make the lower section of the strata deprived of benefits (Biddle, 2014).

Poverty is not only causes a person deprived from basic needs, it has a negative impact on a person experiencing poverty. Material deprivation is an important driver of stigma. The people experiencing poverty is often undertaken through the use of particular language, image and labels and that makes them feel the means of experience poverty. This is a process often done by people that leads to stereotyping the poverty and therefore it carries negative impact. People who are experiencing poverty face such problem by the people who do not. This results as a pressure to the poor people and make them feel ashamed of being poor (Hansen, Bourgois & Drucker, 2014).

Capitalism has long been seen as a major cause of poverty. The developed countries have benefitted from the industrialization however, the third world countries have not benefitted from the same as the developed countries. The capitalist market has exploited the labor market to great extend where only minimum wage is paid. Unemployment and underemployments are increasing with an increase in low-paid and part-time work (Pasternak, 2015). At present, global poverty is hugely influenced by the capitalism and will continue to do so until the socialism is achieved or people start playing their individual role.

Conclusion:

Sociology provides powerful explanation to the social issue. It helps in thinking the problem from different areas. In the above discussion it can be understood that poverty is a serious problem that needs to be fixed. Poverty has not occurred in one decade and so it is to make amendments. The causes of poverty are deep-rooted and needs proper strategies to deal with it. Poverty at different places are explained differently as it is as per the country’s policy varies. Each causes need to be analyzed separately to eliminate the problem. Education, inequality, corruption, unemployment, social class and many more are the reason that has the causes of poverty in the root. Social researchers have found the causes apart from the mentioned ones that are non-tangible. Sociological theories are useful in alerting people about the individual responsibility that one needs to play personal role in eliminating the poverty.

References:

Addae-Korankye, A. (2014). Causes of poverty in Africa: a review of literature. Am. Int. J. Soc. Sci, 3, 147-153.

Biddle, B. (2014). Social class, poverty and education. Routledge.

Brunsma, D. L., Smith, K. E. I., & Gran, B. K. (2016). Introduction. In Institutions Unbound (pp. 7-14). Routledge.

Hagenaars, A. J. (2017). The definition and measurement of poverty. In Economic Inequality and Poverty: International Perspectives (pp. 148-170). Routledge.

Hansen, H., Bourgois, P., & Drucker, E. (2014). Pathologizing poverty: New forms of diagnosis, disability, and structural stigma under welfare reform. Social Science & Medicine, 103, 76-83.

Hickey, S., & Du Toit, A. (2013). Adverse incorporation, social exclusion, and chronic poverty. In Chronic Poverty (pp. 134-159). Palgrave Macmillan, London.

Jha, P. (2008). Causes of poverty in developing countries. EOLSS.

Lewis, O. (2017). The culture of poverty. In Poor Jews (pp. 9-25). Routledge.

Ngoma, C., & Mayimbo, S. (2017). The Negative Impact of Poverty on the Health of Women and Children. Annals of Medical and Health Sciences Research, 7(6).

Pasternak, S. (2015). How capitalism will save colonialism: The privatization of reserve lands in Canada. Antipode, 47(1), 179-196.