WIDER Studies in Development Economics – serie

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.Developing countries seek economic development which is broad-based or inclusive in the sense that it raises the income of all, especially the poor. Yet this is at odds with Simon Kuznets' hypothesis that economic development tends to put upward pressure on income inequality, at least initially and in the absence of countervailing policies. The Developer's Dilemma explores this 'Kuznetsian tension' between structural transformation and income inequality. The book asks: what are the varieties of structural transformation that have been experienced in developing countries? What inequality dynamics are associated with each variety of structural transformation? And what policies have been utilized to manage trade-offs between structural transformation, income inequality, and inclusive growth? Across nine country cases written by academics across the Global South, this book answers these questions using a comparative case study approach with a common analytical framework and a set of common datasets. The intended intellectual contribution of the book is to provide a comparative analysis of the relationship between structural transformation, income inequality, and inclusive growth; to do so empirically at a regional and national level, and to draw conclusions about the varieties of structural transformation, their inequality dynamics, and the policies that have been employed to mediate the developer's dilemma.

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.Based on studies of a range of countries in the Global South, this book examines heterogeneity within informal work by applying a common conceptual framework and empirical methodology. The country studies use panel data to study the dynamics of worker transitions between formal and heterogeneous informal work and present a comparative perspective across developing countries in Asia, Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa, and North Africa and the Middle East. Each study provides a nuanced view of informality, dividing workers into six work statuses: formal wage-employees, upper-tier informal wage-employees, lower-tier informal wage employees, formal self-employed, and upper-tier informal self-employed. Based on this common conceptual framework, the country studies examine the distribution of workers across each of these work statuses, and document transition patterns across different formality and work statuses. The panel data analysed in each country study provide a basis for making statements about labour market transitions that are not warranted when using comparable cross-sections. The studies also examine the individual- and household-level characteristics associated with workers in each work status. Using these characteristics, each study constructs a 'job ladder' that ranks each work status, and then examines the characteristics of workers that are associated with transitions up (and down) the job ladder.

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO licence. It is free to read at Oxford Academic and is offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.The extraction and use of natural resources underpins a global economy that provides high living standards for many as well as the prospect of ending poverty in the developing world. Mining as well as the oil and gas industry - which constitute the 'extractive industries' - are vitally important sectors in many developing countries. They provide substantial public revenues as well as much-needed foreign exchange, and livelihoods for many. Yet, the extractives industries are highly controversial. The continued extraction and burning of fossil fuels in energy generation and transport, together with the emissions associated with mining and metals refining, has taken the world to levels of emissions that increasingly imperil humanity. In addition, the extractive industries have a poor record of damaging nature both through pollution as well as via the destruction of biodiversity (thereby endangering the livelihoods that depend on such renewable natural capital). This book explores a central issue of our time: our materials world is simultaneously both part of the problem (especially fossil fuels) as well as part of its solution (the materials necessary for the technologies required for 'net zero'). Resources Matter discusses how the extractive industries can be leveraged to generate larger and more beneficial impacts in poorer economies and improve livelihoods at local and national levels. A central argument is that the so-called 'resource curse' - the potentially negative effect of resource booms on economies and societies - is not inevitable, as it is often said to be. Rather, much can be done through policy, coordinated government action in partnership with the private sector, and judicious investments to improve the prospects for resource wealth to make a positive contribution to escaping underdevelopment and poverty. Companies in the extractives industry have a key role in working with governments to achieve these goals.

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.The book investigates the trends in earnings inequalities in developing countries to determine the main drivers. Particular attention is paid to extending the most conventional explanations of changes in earnings inequality, based on the relative abundance of skilled and unskilled labour, with recent theories that put the nature of tasks performed by workers in their jobs, rather than their skills, at the centre of the analysis. The latter approach has helped to explain relevant patterns recently observed in the trends in earnings inequality in the US and other industrialized countries. Developed countries have experienced a polarization in earnings and in employment, namely stronger growth in the earnings and jobs for the most and least skilled workers at the expense of those in the middle. This pattern has been attributed to differences in tasks-whether a given job is routine and can be automated or offshored-rather than skills, and has reduced employment and incomes in typical middle-class jobs in manufacturing and services. However, this narrative has been developed in the context of mature industrialized economies on the frontier of technological change that have also seen a large set of activities offshored to emergent economies. Evidence for developing countries, however, is still scarce and faces bigger challenges, both conceptual, and in terms of gathering the necessary data on earnings and task content of jobs. This book presents the main results of the UNU-WIDER project, The Changing Nature of Work and Inequality, aiming to fill this knowledge gap.

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO licence. It is free to read at Oxford Academic and is offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.This book investigates the performance of firms and households in Tanzania and the strategies they adopt to navigate shocks, achieve sustainability, and build resilience in order to sustain their growth and development. The contributions take into account competitiveness and productivity for firms, and income or welfare for households. Has the ability to navigate successfully through shocks and a changing economic environment improved over the past two decades? What are the lessons for managing and recovering from shocks, such as the COVID-19 pandemic? Chapters cover a range of issues including competitiveness and value chains as determinants of (export) trade performance and the importance of technology, innovation, linkages, and value chains for the resilience and sustainability of firms. Trends in household income diversification and rural livelihoods, and improvements in financial inclusion, particularly through digital financial innovations such as mobile money services, promote the resilience and sustainability of households. Gender and regional, especially urban-rural, differences are incorporated.Cross-cutting themes emerge: the need for modern technology and infrastructure to increase the productivity and employment of firms; the role of investment in human capital in reducing gender inequalities and equipping workers and entrepreneurs with relevant skills; and the importance of access to resources for innovation. The performance of Tanzanian firms has gradually improved since 2000 - although many challenges remain - and this has benefitted households through employment opportunities; the COVID-19 pandemic was however a significant shock to the economy and progress stalled or reversed as a result. Tanzania, like many countries, faces a challenging future but is better positioned to do so than it has been.

Social mobility is the hope of economic development and the mantra of a good society. There are disagreements about what constitutes social mobility, but there is broad agreement that people should have roughly equal chances of success regardless of their economic status at birth. Concerns about rising inequality have engendered a renewed interest in social mobility--especially in the developing world. However, efforts to construct the databases and meet the standards required for conventional analyses of social mobility are at a preliminary stage and need to be complemented by innovative, conceptual, and methodological advances. If forms of mobility have slowed in the West, then we might be entering an age of rigid stratification with defined boundaries between the always-haves and the never-haves-which does not augur well for social stability. Social mobility research is ongoing, with substantive findings in different disciplines--typically with researchers in isolation from each other. A key contribution of this book is the pulling together of the emerging streams of knowledge. Generating policy-relevant knowledge is a principal concern.Three basic questions frame the study of diverse aspects of social mobility in the book. How to assess the extent of social mobility in a given development context when the datasets by conventional measurement techniques are unavailable? How to identify drivers and inhibitors of social mobility in particular developing country contexts? How to acquire the knowledge required to design interventions to raise social mobility, either by increasing upward mobility or by lowering downward mobility?

An open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO licence. It is free to read at Oxford Academic and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.This book explores the emergence of wartime governance and its enduring effects on post-conflict state-building, development, and institutional change. Drawing on rich empirical research and original case studies from conflict-affected countries across Africa, Latin America, and Asia, it brings together leading scholars in political science, development studies, and economics to examine how non-state and hybrid actors govern during war, and how these forms of governance interact with, challenge, or complement state authority in the long term. Rather than portraying war solely as a period of state collapse and institutional erosion, this volume reveals the emergence of complex systems of rule that provide public goods, administer justice, and collect revenues. These wartime institutions often reshape postwar political settlements, influencing patterns of state legitimacy, social cohesion, and local development trajectories. By bridging disciplinary boundaries and combining theoretical innovation with grounded fieldwork, the book sheds light on key policy debates about peacebuilding, humanitarian interventions, and institutional reform in fragile contexts. It argues for a nuanced understanding of wartime governance - not merely as a symptom of conflict but as a central force in the political and institutional evolution of societies affected by war. This volume is essential reading for scholars, policy-makers, and practitioners seeking to understand the dynamics of authority, legitimacy, and governance in the world's most challenging settings.

An open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO licence. It is free to read at Oxford Academic and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.The primary goal of economics is, or should be, to improve the living conditions and overall well-being of individuals, but most analyses of inequality, poverty, and the redistributive effects of public policies are conducted instead at the household level. Similarly, the bulk of our data - whether drawn from surveys or administrative records - pertains to households rather than individuals. This approach might be acceptable if households were inherently equitable spaces. However, extensive research across the human and social sciences has revealed significant inequalities within families. Against this backdrop, The Economics of Power and Poverty in the Home begins by exploring what can be measured about the sharing of resources and the distribution of well-being within households, with particular attention to gender disparities and child poverty. Taking stock of a wide range of economic and social science research, it offers a critical assessment of available microeconomic models and measurement tools, examining what they can illuminate about intra-household dynamics. Olivier Bargain then investigates the key demographic, economic, and social factors that shape inequalities within households, including women's participation in the labour market and their control over income and assets, as well as broader contextual influences such as economic crises, social movements, media and role models, and the enduring impact of formal and informal norms. Some of these factors are also relevant as potential markers for policy intervention and the targeting of social programs, especially when they help to identify instances of acute inequities within families. Turning explicitly to redistributive policies, the volume analyses how cash transfers, in-kind benefits, and taxation can shift power dynamics within households and affect the poverty status of women and children. Throughout, the book critically engages with recent developments in academic and policy debates, and outlines directions for future research. It concludes by addressing the normative challenges households present for the design of equitable public policies, such as the complexities of redistributing resources both between and within households.

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 IGO licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.The term `social security' has a very different meaning in underdeveloped countries and is best understood as poverty alleviation. This book attempts to define social security in the Third World and to examine what sort of programmes are most suitable for developing countries. The authors review current literature on the subject. Some chapters explore broad themes, others describe social security provisions in various regions in India, China, Latin America, and Southern Africa. Western systems are compared and broad assessments made of the traditional social security systems in Third World village societies. The editors aim to put the subject of social security firmly on the agenda of development economic research with a view to stimulate much further research in this area. The book is written in a way that will be accessible to a much wider audience.

The collapse in commodity prices since 1980 has been a major cause of the economic crisis in a large number of developing countries. This book investigates whether the commodity-producing countries, by joint action, could have prevented the price collapse by appropriate supply management. The analysis is focused on the markets for the tropical beverage crops: coffee, cocoa, and tea. Using new econometric models for each market, the impact of alternative supply management schemes on supply, consumption, prices, and export earnings is simulated for the later 1980s. The results indicate that supply management by producing countries would, indeed, have been a viable alternative to the `free market' approach favoured by the developed countries. This has important implications for current international commodity policy, and, in particular, for future joint action by producing countries to overcome persistent commodity surpluses as a complement to needed diversification.

This book investigates the ways in which the characteristics of a developing country's domestic industrial sector – for example, oligopolistic markets, the position of foreign enterprises, and the acquisition of modern technologies – affect its chances of industrializing far enough to engage in substantial export trade.Particular attention is devoted to the real-world imperfections frequently overlooked by orthodox economists. Case studies are included of, for example, Brazilian civil aircraft, Korean semi-conductors, and the automobile industry in a number of developing countries.The volume contributes to a better appreciation of the actual problems and constraints of industrialization and growth in developing countries and points the way to useful further lines of research.

WIDERThe World Institute for Development Economics Research, established in 1984, started work in Helsinki in 1985, with the financial support of the Government of Finland. Its principal purpose is to help identify and meet the need for policy-oriented socio-economic research on pressing global and developmental problems and their inter-relationships. WIDER's research projects are grouped into three main themes: hunger and poverty; money, finance, and trade; and development and technological transformation.The 1980s ushered in a `globalization' of finance, and governments began rejecting the task of engaging in international financial management. A new doctrine - global neoclassicism - arose, based on the idea that government regulation of financial markets was futile and foolish.The authors of this book tackle the question of whether national policy autonomy is still possible, in the process challenging the new orthodoxy, and the dangers attendant upon deregulation. They explore the `political economy' of financial openness, and the political nature of recent developments such as the ascendency of private financial interests and a reduced role for government regulation. The book includes both general historical and theoretical approaches, as well as case studies of various countries, such as Australia, Mexico, and Pakistan. It represents a major contribution in the political economy of international finance.

This is an open access publication, available online and distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-Share Alike 3.0 IGO licence (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 IGO). It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.This study was well-received and widely discussed when it appeared in hardback in 1990. It is devoted to analysis of the enduring problem of hunger in the modern world, and of the role that public action can play in countering it.The book is divided into four parts. The first attempts to provide a coherent perspective on the complex nutritional, economic, social and political issues involved in the causation of hunger and deprivation. The second deals with famine prevention, paying special attention to Africa and India. The third focuses on chronic undernourishment and related deprivations. Parts two and three include a number of case studies of successful public action for the prevention of hunger and famines in various parts of the world. The fourth part of the book draws together the main themes and concerns of the earlier chapters, and provides an integrated view of the role of public action in eliminating hunger.

This volume addresses issues arising from the definition and measurement of poverty in terms of nutritional status. A high degree of nutritional deprivation is considered to be an indicator of poverty. Hence the definition of an appropriate nutritional yardstick and its measurement are of crucial significance for determining the level and magnitude of poverty.The book also debates energy related deprivation and evaluates the respective merits of making comparisons of calorie intake against an average reference standard and making comparisons of anthropometric measurements of the body with some reference standard. Gender bias in the incidence of nutritional deprivation is also considered.Contributors: Sudhir Anand, J. R. Behrman, Roderick Floud, Robert W. Fogel, C. Gopalan, Christopher Harris, Nank C. Kakwani, S. R. Osmani, P. R. Payne, and T. N. Srinavasan.

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 IGO licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.WIDER Studies in Development Economics The World Institute for Development Economics Research, established in 1984, started work in Helsinki in 1985, with the financial support of the Government of Finland. The principal purpose of the Institute is to help identify and meet the need for policy-oriented socio-economic research on pressing global and development problems and their inter-relationships. WIDER's research projects are grouped into three main themes: hunger and poverty; money, finance, and trade; and development and technological transformation.BL Sen is an internationally renowned, prizewinning economistThis volume is the first of three addressing a wide range of policy issues relating to the role of public action in combating hunger and deprivation in the modern world. It deals with the background nutritional, economic, social, and political aspects of the problem of world hunger.Topics covered include the characteristics and causal antecedents of famines and endemic deprivation, the interconnections between economic and political factors, the role of social relations and the family, the special problems of women's deprivation, the connection between food consumption and other indicators of living standards, and the medical aspects of undernourishment and its consequences.Several contributions also address the political background of public policy, in particular the connection between the government and the public, including the role of newspapers and the media, and the part played by political commitment and by adversarial politics and pressures. Taken together, these essays provide a comprehensive and authoritative analysis of the problem of hunger and deprivation, and an important guide for action.

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 IGO licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.WIDERThe World Institute for Development Economics Research, established in 1984, started work in Helsinki in 1985, with the financial support of the Government of Finland. The principal purpose of the Institute is to help identify and meet the need for policy-oriented socio-economic research on pressing global and development problems and their inter-relationships. WIDER's research projects are grouped into three main themes: hunger and poverty; money, finance, and trade; and development and technological transformation.Volume II deals with famine prevention, paying particular attention to sub-Saharan Africa. The topics covered include: the problems of early warning and early action; the politics of famine prevention; the influence of market responses; the role of cash support and employment provision in protecting threatened food entitlements; and long-term issues of reduction of famine vulnerability.In addition to general analyses, the book contains a number of case studies of failures and successes in famine prevention, both in South Asia and in sub-Saharan Africa.

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 IGO licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.WIDERThe World Institute for Development Economics Research, established in 1984, started work in Helsinki in 1985, with the financial support of the Government of Finland. The principal purpose of the Institute is to help identify and meet the need for policy-oriented socio-economic research on pressing global and development problems and their inter-relationships. WIDER's research projects are grouped into three main themes: hunger and poverty; money, finance, and trade; and development and technological transformation.Volume III deals with the strategic options for the elimination of endemic hunger. The topics covered include: the comparative extent of hunger and deprivation in different parts of the world; the influence of food production; the interconnections between economic growth and public support; the role of economic diversification in reducing vulnerability; the potential impact of direct public provisioning on living standards; and the politics of public action. In addition to general analyses, the book examines the international relevance of a number of specific country experiences in Asia, Africa, and Latin America (including those of China, India, Sri Lanka, Brazil, Kenya, Bangladesh, and Nigeria).

This book addresses the question of how it is that so much growth and technical change can take place in agriculture and yet leave the position of agricultural labourers relatively unchanged. Much has been written on farmers and employers in LDC agriculture, but little that focuses on employees - this book will thus stimulate contribution to the study of labour markets and to development studies.In an area described as in the vanguard of agricultural development in Southern India, the author shows in some detail how limited the changes in the situation of labourers have been as agriculture has developed, and how serious the constraints still are. There is full discussion of central concerns such as the increase in numbers and proportions of agricultural labourers, the stagnation and marginal decline of wage rates and earnings, the property-less status of agricultural labourers, consumption and indebtedness, and labour relationships and processes.

This book addresses the role of knowledge in economic development and in resistance to development. It questions the conventional view that development is the application of superior knowledge to the problems of poor countries, and that resistance to development comes out of ignorance and superstition. It argues instead that the basis of resistance is the fear that the material benefits of Western technologies can be enjoyed only at the price of giving up indigenous ways of knowing and valuing the world, an idea fostered as much by present-day elites, who have internalized colonial elites who ruled before them. A prerequisite to decoupling Western technologies from these political entailments is to understand the conflict between different ways of knowing and valuing the world.This book differs from previous critiques of development because it addresses neither the strategy nor the tactics of development, but the very conception itself. Its focus is on knowledge and power in the development process. The book argues that `modern' knowledge wins out in the conflict with `traditional' knowledge not because of its superior cognitive power, but because of its prestige, associated both with the economic and political ascendancy of the West over the past 500 years and with the cultural history of the West itself.

For some twenty years after the Second World War, Keynesian economic policies in countries of the capitalist West were successful in generating rapid growth with high employment. This `golden age of capitalism' did not survive the economic traumas of the 1970s; nor has the more recent emphasis on monetarist policies and supply-side performance succeeded in regenerating comparable growth rates. Blending historical analysis with economic theory, this book seeks to understand the making and unmaking of this `golden age', questions the basis of much present policy-making, and suggests alternative directions for policy.

Two and a half billion people are affected directly on a day to day basis by the allocation and use of primary local resources. Yet `official' development economics has concentrated on headline international issues and only recently begun to take account of the dependence of poor countries on their natural resources, the link between acute poverty and environmental degradation, and the problems associated with the management of local common property such as soil and soil cover, water, forests and their products, animals and fisheries. In these volumes, which are part of the WIDER programme on the Economics for the Environment, expert contributors provide a set of authoritative studies of emerging development issues, ranging from foundational matters to case studies, original research (in areas where there has been a paucity of work) to survey papers. They address both analytic and empirical issues on the role of environmental resources in the development process, presenting explanations of existing situations and policies for the future. A wealth of interests and backgrounds is represented, and reflected in the cross-fertilization between papers.

Two and a half billion people are affected directly on a day to day basis by the allocation and use of purely local resources. Yet `official' development economics has concentrated on headline international issues and only recently begun to take account of the dependence of poor countries on their natural resources, the link between acute poverty and environmental degredation, and the problems associated with the management of local common property such as soil and soil cover, water, forests and their products, animals and fisheries. In these volumes, which are part of the WIDER programme on the Economics of the Environment, expert contributors provide a set of authoritative studies of emerging development issues, ranging from foundational matters to case studies, original research (in areas where there has been a paucity of work) to survey papers. They address both analytic and empirical issues on the role of environmental resources in the development process, presenting explanations of existing situations and policies for the future. A wealth of interests and backgrounds is represented and reflected in the cross-fertilization between papers.

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 IGO licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.This book addresses issues of defining and measuring the quality of life. Recent developments in the philosophical definition of well-being are discussed and linked to practical issues such as the delivery of health care, and the assessment of women's quality of life. Leading philosophers and economists have contributed to this volume to consider the problems the subject raises.This volume reflects the growing need for interdisciplinary work as economists become more sensitive to the importance of facing fundamental philosophical questions and of the importance of linking their theoretical enquiries to an understanding of complex practical problems.Contributors: E. Allardt, J. Annas, C. Bliss, S. Bok, D. Brock, G. A. Cohen, R. Erikson, W. Gaertner, J. Griffin, S. Hurley, C. M. Korsgaard, L. Kruger, M. C. Nussbaum, O. O'Neill, S. Osmani, D. Parfit, H. Putnam, R. A. Putnam, J. Roemer, T. Scanlon, P. Seabright, A. Sen, C. Taylor, M. Valdes, B. M. S. van Praag, M. Walzer, B.-C. Ysander

An abridged selection of papers from the hardbackHailed in its initial publication as a work with urgent implications for countless lives, Drèze and Sen's The Political Economy of Hunger is the classic analysis of an extraordinary paradox: in a world of food surpluses and satiety, hunger kills millions more people each year than wars or political repression. Now this abridged version, edited by Athar Hussain, puts the most influential essays from the three-volume work within the reach of concerned citizens who want to understand the real causes of hunger and deprivation, and the remedies that are feasible and effective.Ranging from Africa to South Asia to China and written by an international array of authorities, the essays included in this abridgement give the best available analysis of the causes of worldwide hunger and deprivation, and the best hope for effective aid policies in the future.

Development failures, environmental degradation and social fragmentation can no longer be regarded as side effects of `externalities'. They are the toxic consequences of pretensions that the modern Western view of knowledge is a universal neutral view, applicable to all people at all times. The very word `development' and its cognates `underdevelopment' and `developing' confidently mark the `first' world's as the future of the `third'. This book argues that the linear evolutionary paradigm of development that comes out of modern Western view of knowledge is a contemporary form of colonialism.The authors - covering topics as diverse as the theory of knowledge underlying the work of John Maynard Keynes, what the renowned British geneticist J.B.S. Haldane was looking for when he migrated to India, the knowledge of Mexican and Indian peasants - propose a pluralistic vision and decolonization of knowledge: the replacement of one-way transfers of knowledge and technology by dialogue and mutual learning.

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 IGO licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.BL Distinguished editors and contributorsBL Addresses questions of some urgency for the question of women's quality of lifeBL Inter-disciplinary, ranging over philosophy, economics, political science, anthropology, law and sociologyBL Combines theory with case-studiesBL Accessible to non-specialist readerBL Sequel to The Quality of Life, edited by Martha Nussbaum and Amartya Sen, applying the 'capabilities' approach outlined in that volumeBL Topical - challenges 'politically correct' relativist approaches and discusses the validity of charges of 'cultural imperialism' levelled at Western aid and intervention policies.Women, a majority of the world's population, receive only a small proportion of its opportunities and benefits. According to the 1993 UN Human Development Report, there is no country in the world in which women's quality of life is equal to that of men. This examination of women's quality of life thus addresses questions which have a particular urgency. It aims to describe the basic situation of all women and so develops a universal account that can answer the charges of 'Western imperialism' frequently made against such accounts. The contributors confront the issue of cultural relativism, criticizing the relativist apprach which, in its desire to respect different cultural traditions, can result in indifference to injustice. An account of gender justice and women's equality is then proposed in various areas in which quality of life is measured. These issues are related throughout to the specific contexts of India, Bangladesh, China, Mexico, and Nigeria through a series of case studies. Disciplines represented include philosophy, economics, political science, anthropology, law, and sociology.Like its predecessor, The Quality of Life, this volume encourages the reader to think critically about the central fundamental concepts used in development economics and suggests major criticisms of current economic approaches from that fundamental viewpoint.Contributors: Martha Nussbaum, Marty Chen, Susan Wolf, Jonathan Glover, Onora O'Neill, David Crocker, Hilary Putnam, Linda Alcoff, Amartya Sen, Susan Moller Okin, Ruth Anna Putnam, Cass R.Sunstein, Christine M.Korsgaard, Catherine Lutz, Xiaorong Li, Margarita M.Valdes, Nkiru Nzegwu

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 IGO licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.BL Distinguished editors and contributorsBL Addresses questions of some urgency for the question of women's quality of lifeBL Inter-disciplinary, ranging over philosophy, economics, political science, anthropology, law and sociologyBL Combines theory with case-studiesBL Accessible to non-specialist readerBL Sequel to The Quality of Life, edited by Martha Nussbaum and Amartya Sen, applying the 'capabilities' approach outlined in that volumeBL Topical - challenges 'politically correct' relativist approaches and discusses the validity of charges of 'cultural imperialism' levelled at Western aid and intervention policies. Women, a majority of the world's population, receive only a small proportion of its opportunities and benefits. According to the 1993 UN Human Development Report, there is no country in the world in which women's quality of life is equal to that of men. This examination of women's quality of life thus addresses questions which have a particular urgency. It aims to describe the basic situation of all women and so develops a universal account that can answer the charges of 'Western imperialism' frequently made against such accounts. The contributors confront the issue of cultural relativism, criticizing the relativist approach which, in its desire to respect different cultural traditions, can result in indifference to injustice. An account of gender justice and women's equality is then proposed in various areas in which quality of life is measured. These issues are related throughout to the specific contexts of India, Bangladesh, China, Mexico, and Nigeria through a series of case studies. Disciplines represented include philosophy, economics, political science, anthropology, law, and sociology. Like its predecessor, The Quality of Life, this volume encourages the reader to think critically about the central fundamental concepts used in development economics and suggests major criticisms of current economic approaches from that fundamental viewpoint.Contributors: Martha Nussbaum, Marty Chen, Susan Wolf, Jonathan Glover, Onora O'Neill, David Crocker, Hilary Putnam, Linda Alcoff, Amartya Sen, Susan Moller Okin, Ruth Anna Putnam, Cass R.Sunstein, Christine M.Korsgaard, Catherine Lutz, Xiaorong Li, Margarita M.Valdes, Nkiru Nzegwu

The role of the state has occupied centre stage in the development of economics as an independent discipline and is one of the most contentious issues addressed by contemporary economists and political economists. The immediate post-war years saw a swing in economic theory towards interventionism, motivated by the urgent need for reconstruction in advanced capitalist countries, the establishment of socialism in parts of Asia and Eastern Europe, and the liberation of many developing nations from colonialism.After a quarter of a century of interventionist policies, a vigourous backlash against state intervention began with the discrediting of welfare statism in advanced capitalist countries, grew through the spread of liberalisation programmes among developing nations during the 1980s, and culminated in the dismantling of socialist central planning since 1989.In this volume, ten distinguished contributors examine patterns of interventionism and anit-interventionism in a wide variety of historical, political and institutional contexts and within different theoretical traditions. Their primary focus is on the internal factors which shape the role of the state and determine its effectiveness in promoting economic change. They explain the growing disenchantment with the Neo-Liberal, anti-interventionist programme--even in Eastern Europe and the former USSR, where the initial optimism in the efficacy of the free market is fading fast.The overall conclusion of the empirical and theoretical analysis is that the simplistic notion of politics fundamental to Neo-Liberal arguments makes them at best misleading and at worst deceitful. Although one can talk of certain general principles, there is no hard and fast rule to determine the optimal degree and the desirable areas of state intervention, which can only be determined in the concrete historical, institutional, and geographical context. The challenge is to form a new synthesis in which the valid insights of Neo-Liberalism are stripped of their ideological baggage and intergrated into a wider and more objective intellectual framework.

At the end of the twentieth century, after four world conferences on women, debates on the impact of economic development on the lives and status of women - including their life-options and opportunities for betterment - continue unresolved. Is patriarchy on the decline, or is it merely its form that is changing? What effect does development have on gender relations, and how do patriarchal structures affect the development process?The chapters in this book were written for a UNU/WIDER research conference convened to explore two parallel phenomena: the changing position of women and gender relations and the relevance of the concept of patriarchy, and the impact of development--and especially industrialization and wage work--on women and gender. They address questions through theoretical, historical, and empirical approaches, and provide critical analysis and macro- and micro-level data for Asia, the Middle East and North Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, sub-Saharan Africa, the Indian sub-continent, the Nordic region, and Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. Following an introduction and overview (Part 1), the book is divided into two main parts. Part II offers historical and theoretical perspectives on the evolution of women's positions in the course of development, with contributions by Sylvia Walby, John Lie, Elizabeth Dore, Sheila Carapico, Leela Kasturi, and Jane Parpart. Part III focuses on industrialization, state policies, and women workers, with contributions by Ruth Pearson, Helen Safa, Rita Gallin, Valentine Moghadam, Guy Standing, and Tuovi Allén. The book ends with an appendix of statistical tables providing descriptive data on women in the countries under consideration and others.The contributors are well-known academics and researchers who utilize the methods of economics, sociology, history, and feminist analysis in their case studies of economic development and women's positions.