A Duplicitous Revolution? Maoistss Armed Conflict and Public Goods Provisioning in Rural India

We examine the influence of three historically important sources of social divisions on the availability of public goods in rural India: colonial power, landowner-peasant relations as determined by the land tenure system and social fragmentation based on the Hindu caste system and the presence of sizable religious minorities. Using data on public goods from 1991, we find that regions that were under British colonial power in the pre-independence period and those where agrarian power was concentrated in the hands of landlords have lower access to these goods as do areas with high levels of social fragmentation.

PurposeThis article investigates the relationship between entrepreneurship and ethics under extreme poverty conditions to unearth context-specific nuances faced by entrepreneurs in these conditions.Design/methodology/approachA qualitative case study, research method approach was used to collect data from established firms engaged in some form of entrepreneurship and new entrepreneurs.FindingsFindings from the study indicate that a different mindset is required for entrepreneurs to conduct business in conditions of extreme poverty, and therefore a different approach is needed to evaluate business ethics instead of a wholesale adaptation of Western-based ethical values and practices. The study identifies and provides evidence of imitative entrepreneurship undertaken by both new entrepreneurs and established firms to address basic human needs such as for food and personal hygiene.Research limitations/implicationsThe emic focus on Zimbabwe, which has its own inherent circumstances, has the potential to minimise the generalisability of findings from the study. However, this does not detract from the findings of the study but actually provides a basis for further research in other markets that have extreme poverty conditions.Practical implicationsCoping strategies are outlined for managing constraints faced by entrepreneurs and opportunities for interacting with consumers. A conceptual framework is developed for use in understanding and managing the relationship between entrepreneurship and ethics in markets where there are conditions of extreme poverty.Originality/valuePrevious studies have largely focused on Western developed markets. This article extends the debate to markets under conditions of extreme poverty.

The paper deals with the process of building social capital as constrained by the availability of public and private The purpose is to show that social capital shapes, both in positive and negative terms, the capacity of local institutions to support development projects and strategies. The analysis assumes that a higher level of social capital gives to communities a stronger planning capacity; a lower level of social capital implies that new initiatives are implemented only if they give private individual benefits; a higher level of social capital generates actions that increase and improve social capital itself.The first section outlines the logical links between the concept of social capital and the availability of services. Social capital is here seen as a public good. Section 2 focuses on the relationship between the supply of public services and the level of social capital. Evidence from the welfare system in Southern Tuscany shows that public transfers fail in reducing territorial and social marginality, while people ask for more support in terms of Section 3 compares the Italian case with other cases in Northern Europe.The concluding section shows the relationship between marginality and the availability of public goods. It contributes to the analysis of the relationship between social capital and development, showing that there is both a theoretical framework and evidence that justify the principle that public action supporting social capital has a major role in determining the performance of development strategies and actions.

This dissertation consists of three independent articles. The first chapter “Giants and Midgets: the Effect of Public Goods’ Provision on Urban Population Concentration” analyses population distribution within a system of cities with availability of public goods in the country and provides an explanation for the existence of urban giants in developing economies. The article argues that (1) differences in public goods’ provision cause excessive growth of the primate cities; (2) better provision of public goods at the national level decreases the difference between growth rates of the primate agglomeration and the hinterland; (3) consequently, low provision of public goods at the national level leads to the emergence of urban giants. Regression analysis suggests that lower provision of public goods at the national level causes excessive population growth of the largest city of the country, and a subsequent further growth of urban giants can potentially attract even more migrants to the primate cities and halt urbanisation process in the rest of the country. These findings are especially relevant for developing countries, where rapid urbanisation is currently taking place. The second chapter “The Puzzle of Urban Sprawl. Now in 3d” documents a striking paradox: cities occupy larger areas in developed countries, where land is relatively more expensive than capital, while urban agglomerations in Africa and Asia do not sprawl wide despite low land prices. This paper presents a model analysing the markets for formal housing and its production factors. The main innovation of the model is distinguishing between agricultural and housing land. The abundance of public amenities in the city determines the intensiveness of the land improvements that have to be done privately before erecting houses. Inclusion of land improvements into the analysis affects the price ratio of inputs used for housing construction and explains the capital-land paradox. The final chapter “Burnt by the sun. Explaining suicide in developing countries” takes advantage of the macro data
\nand analyses fundamental factors determining cross-country variations in suicide rates. The main novelty of the study is introduction of ultra-violet radiation as a key factor affecting incidence of suicide. As a result, this paper documents a striking contrast between the major determinants of suicide in developed and developing countries. While biology explains a substantial part of cross-country variation in high-income countries, suicide rates in the developing world are primarily driven by a range of social factors (e.g., adult mortality). These findings are crucial for designing an efficient suicide-preventing policy.

The article analyzes the issue of family resources in a family with a single father with mental retardation raising two adolescents in conditions of extreme poverty. The research methodology is based on the model of case study qualitative research within the phenomenological “life world” approaches. The study has an entire description of the father’s “life world” and the structural, constituent, and essential elements of his day-to-day parenting experience. It is shown that the family experience is struggling with extreme poverty within the conditions of severe social exclusion and is governed by the father's family history with a class nature. Current family resources (health, education, social, and economic) are characterized as being affected by different types of deficiency and dependence on external “donors”. The discussion is raising awareness of the role of special education in the process of structuring essential elements of the “life world” experience in such families, in general, and conditions of extreme poverty, in particular.

This paper presents the problems of poverty in the U.S. from the perspective of the notion of “extreme poverty,” regarded as a violation of human rights. By choosing the United States as the case study, this paper seeks to illustrate that extreme poverty is a pervasive societal problem, irrespective of the level of income of a country. The case of the United States is particularly interesting as it presented an apparent paradox: the wealthiest country on earth has also the highest incidence of poverty amongst the rich industrialised nations and even higher than many developing countries. The conditions of extreme poverty in a country such as the US, with both the resources and the institutions to solve the problem but unwilling to do so due to the lack of political motivation, can be, much more plausibly than in any other country, considered as violation of human rights. The paper provides a broad overview of various dimensions of extreme poverty in the United States through the lens of the human rights framework and offers some policy suggestions.

BackgroundMalnutrition in children can be a consequence of unfavourable socioeconomic conditions. However, some families maintain adequate nutritional status in their children despite living in poverty. The aim of this study was to ascertain whether family-related factors are determinants of stunting in young Mexican children living in extreme poverty, and whether these factors differ between rural or urban contexts.MethodsA case-control study was conducted in one rural and one urban extreme poverty level areas in Mexico. Cases comprised stunted children aged between 6 and 23 months. Controls were well-nourished children. Independent variables were defined in five dimensions: family characteristics; family income; household allocation of resources and family organisation; social networks; and child health care. Information was collected from 108 cases and 139 controls in the rural area and from 198 cases and 211 controls in the urban area. Statistical analysis was carried out separately for each area; unconditional multiple logistic regression analyses were performed to obtain the best explanatory model for stunting.ResultsIn the rural area, a greater risk of stunting was associated with father's occupation as farmer and the presence of family networks for child care. The greatest protective effect was found in children cared for exclusively by their mothers. In the urban area, risk factors for stunting were father with unstable job, presence of small social networks, low rate of attendance to the Well Child Program activities, breast-feeding longer than six months, and two variables within the family characteristics dimension (longer duration of parents' union and migration from rural to urban area).ConclusionsThis study suggests the influence of the family on the nutritional status of children under two years of age living in extreme poverty areas. Factors associated with stunting were different in rural and urban communities.Therefore, developing and implementing health programs to tackle malnutrition should take into account such differences that are consequence of the social, economic, and cultural contexts in which the family lives.

This article examines the paradox that very poor households spend large sums of money on celebrations. Using qualitative and quantitative data from South India, it demonstrates that expenditures on weddings and festivals can be explained by integrating an understanding of how identity is shaped in the Indian context with an economic analysis of decision making under conditions of extreme poverty and risk. It argues that publicly observable celebrations have two functions: they provide a space for maintaining social reputations and webs of obligation, and they serve as arenas for status-enhancing competitions. The first role is central to maintaining the networks essential for social relationships and coping with poverty, while the second is a correlate of mobility that may become more prevalent as incomes rise. Development policies that privilege individual over collective action reduce the incentives for the former while increasing them for the latter, thus reducing social cohesion while increasing conspicuous consumption.

Very poor households spend large sums on celebrations. To the extent that these expenditures are central to maintaining the networks essential for social relationships and coping with poverty, these are reasonable expenses. To the extent that they are status competitions, they may merely increase conspicuous consumption. Rao examines the paradox of very poor households spending large sums on celebrations. Using qualitative and quantitative data from South India, Rao demonstrates that spending on weddings and festivals can be explained by integrating an anthropological understanding of how identity is shaped in Indian society with an economic analysis of decisionmaking under conditions of extreme poverty and risk. Rao argues that publicly observable celebrations have two functions: they provide a space for maintaining social reputations and webs of obligation, and they serve as arenas for status-making competitions. The first role is central to maintaining the networks essential for social relationships and coping with poverty. The second is a correlate of mobility that may become more prevalent as incomes rise. Development policies that favor individual over collective action reduce the incentives for the networking function and increase the incentives for status- enhancing functions - thus reducing social cohesion and increasing conspicuous consumption. Market-driven improvements in urban employment, for example, could reduce a family's dependence on its traditional networks, could reduce incentives to maintain these networks, and could reduce social cohesion within a village and thus its capacity for collective action. In contrast, microfinance programs and social funds try to retain and even build a community's capacity for collective action. This paper - a product of Poverty and Human Resources, Development Research Group - is part of a larger effort in the group to study the relationship between poverty and collective action. The author may be contacted at vrao@worldbank.org.

No AccessPolicy Research Working Papers21 Jun 2013Poverty and Public Celebrations in Rural IndiaAuthors/Editors: Vijayendra RaoVijayendra Raohttps://doi.org/10.1596/1813-9450-2528SectionsAboutPDF (0.1 MB) ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload CitationsTrack Citations ShareFacebookTwitterLinked In Abstract:January 2001 Very poor households spend large sums on celebrations. To the extent that these expenditures are central to maintaining the networks essential for social relationships and coping with poverty, these are reasonable expenses. To the extent that they are status competitions, they may merely increase conspicuous consumption. Rao examines the paradox of very poor households spending large sums on celebrations. Using qualitative and quantitative data from South India, Rao demonstrates that spending on weddings and festivals can be explained by integrating an anthropological understanding of how identity is shaped in Indian society with an economic analysis of decisionmaking under conditions of extreme poverty and risk. Rao argues that publicly observable celebrations have two functions: they provide a space for maintaining social reputations and webs of obligation, and they serve as arenas for status-making competitions. The first role is central to maintaining the networks essential for social relationships and coping with poverty. The second is a correlate of mobility that may become more prevalent as incomes rise. Development policies that favor individual over collective action reduce the incentives for the networking function and increase the incentives for status-enhancing functions—thus reducing social cohesion and increasing conspicuous consumption. Market-driven improvements in urban employment, for example, could reduce a family's dependence on its traditional networks, could reduce incentives to maintain these networks, and could reduce social cohesion within a village and thus its capacity for collective action. In contrast, microfinance programs and social funds try to retain and even build a community's capacity for collective action. This paper—a product of Poverty and Human Resources, Development Research Group—is part of a larger effort in the group to study the relationship between poverty and collective action. The author may be contacted at [email protected] Previous bookNext book FiguresReferencesRecommendedDetailsCited ByMissing Girls, Income Shocks, and Consumption SmoothingSSRN Electronic JournalExtreme Weather: Mental Health Challenges and Community Response Strategies21 April 2016 View Published: November 1999 Copyright & Permissions Related RegionsSouth AsiaRelated CountriesIndiaRelated TopicsCulture & DevelopmentEducationFinance and Financial Sector DevelopmentGenderHealth Nutrition and PopulationLaw and DevelopmentMacroeconomics and Economic GrowthPublic Sector DevelopmentSocial Development KeywordsANTHROPOLOGYBASICCELEBRATIONSCEREMONIESCITIESCULTURAL CONTEXTCULTURESCUSTOMSFESTIVALFESTIVALSLANGUAGELITERATUREPERCEPTIONPERCEPTIONSRELIGIOUS EVENTRITUALSSILVERSOCIAL COHESIONTHOUGHTTIME PDF DownloadLoading ...

Both policymakers and scholars have expressed concern that trade has increased inequality in advanced industrialized countries (AICs). We argue that the impact of trade on inequality depends on the availability of public goods, such as educational opportunities, that allow displaced workers to upgrade their skills and adjust to trade. The provision of public goods, in turn, depends on political institutions: institutions that unify budgetary powers promote public-good spending while institutions that separate budgetary powers discourage it. Trade should thus increase inequality more (reduce inequality less) in countries with a high separation of budgetary powers. We test and find support for these hypotheses with a cross-sectional time-series analysis of fourteen AICs. Our results imply that trade can improve aggregate welfare without worsening economic inequities, but only if governments adopt complementary policies that facilitate human capital formation and labor-market adjustment.

Giants and midgets: The effect of public goods provision on urban population concentration

The paper deals with the process of building social capital as constrained by the availability of public and private services. The purpose is to show that social capital shapes, both in positive and negative terms, the capacity of local institutions to support development projects and strategies. The analysis shows that a higher level of social capital gives to communities a stronger planning capacity; a lower level of social capital implies that new initiatives are implemented only if they give private individual benefits; a higher level of social capital generates actions that increase and improve social capital itself. 
\n
\nThe first section outlines the logical links between the concept of social capital and the availability of "services". Social capital is seen here as a public good. Section 3 focuses on the relationship between the supply of public services and the level of social capital. Section 4 compares the Italian case with other cases in Northern Europe. 
\n
\nThe concluding section shows the relationship between marginality and the availability of public goods. It contributes to the analysis of the relationship between social capital and development, showing that there is both a theoretical framework and evidence to justify the "principle" that public action supporting social capital has a major role in determining the performance of development strategies and actions.

The delineation of the global poverty measurement debate, the scrutinization of the dollar-a-day methodology, and the empirical implementation of the cost of basic needs approach over the long and the short run are the core substances of this thesis. Without a doubt, this thesis is not about addressing all problems related to global poverty measurement. Rather, this thesis aims at answering three main research questions: (a) identify the level and the evolution of global poverty (across all countries) over the long run since 1820 using the cost of basic needs approach; (b) estimate the uncertainty of the standard method and compare it with the uncertainty of the proposed cost of basic needs alternative; and (c) identify possible differences between the standard method and cost of basic needs implementations for the recent, more data abundant, period among developing countries. First, this research strongly indicates that the Purchasing Power Parity used by the standard approach in global poverty measurement does not hold at the level of consumption habits relevant to those living in conditions of extreme absolute poverty. This has long been suspected by the critics of that method, and this thesis provides the evidence that support this intuition. Second, the cost of basic needs approach is a feasible method for a global scale appreciation of poverty. It has the advantage of addressing some of the key points raised against the dollar-a-day standard. Third, the long run results of this thesis offer no easy material from an analytical perspective. Mostly due to the nature of its methodological contributions the general framework selected in this thesis is a descriptive one. Perhaps the most striking result of this exercise comes from the total number of people living in conditions of extreme absolute poverty globally. According to my findings the total number is 757 million people in 1820 and 764 million people in 2018 despite all the progress in lowering the global poverty rate in the years in between. In terms of long run poverty rates, in 1820 the global poverty rate stood at 76\%, by the turn of the 19th century this rate drops at 60\%, and by the turn of the millennium it drops at 25.5\%. By 2018 the CBN global poverty rate stands at 10\%. Finaly, this research has identified the substantial uncertainty in the global poverty estimates largely as the result of most likely unrealistic price data in the pre-1995 China. In short run estimates, my research suggests that accounting for various sources of uncertainty MDG1 obtains at a 77% using the dollar-a-day approach, and MDG1's poverty reduction target does not obtain with the cost of basic needs method.

Literature on informal economy largely debated on the positive role of informal entrepreneurs toward poverty alleviation in developing countries. However, such contexts are characterized by extreme poverty conditions with institutional voids and resource constraints that affect the entrepreneurial operations. While scholars documented why informality persists in developing countries, and what lead informal entrepreneurs to avoid the transition to formal economy, we currently miss the mechanisms by which informal entrepreneurs can effectively operate in contexts of extreme poverty. Our paper addresses this gap through a qualitative research based on 58 informal entrepreneurs in Uganda and Ghana. We discovered that informal entrepreneurs operate through practices of embeddedness in community to get necessary resources and creating informal institutions to fill institutional voids. However, such entrepreneurial practices generate also dark side effects, which also reinforce each other in a cross-bracing mechanism. We then theorized such dynamic of a cross-braced interplay between community embeddedness and informal institutions revealing how informal entrepreneurs are trapped in operating in a ‘quicksand’, which is the main cause of persistence in poverty condition. With our paper, we contribute to the literature on informal entrepreneurship in extreme-poor contexts, and especially we extend literature on the entrepreneurial processes which lead entrepreneurs to persist in informality. Future research and limitations are offered as well.