Home
Poverty Politics Research Group

Warning message

There has not been added a translated version of this content. You can either try searching or go to the "area" home page to see if you can find the information there

The Poverty Politics research project

"Poverty politics. Current approaches to its production and reduction" is a research programme initiated in 2004 that comprises multiple affiliated projects and people.

Main content

Concerns about poverty who is the poor, why they are poor, and what can be deemed a proper response to them have long been at the core of discourses about society and its others. This comparative and multi-disciplinary project is a direct response to current discussions in development politics and the difficulties experienced in the implementation of poverty-reducing strategies.

Far from being a straightforward condition of deprivation and destitution that is easily defined empirically or unambiguously detected through standardised indicators and measurement, poverty is a contentious and complex construct. Poverty is entangled in an archetypal thick discourse, encapsulating a vast range of social, political and historical struggles, constantly evolving new values, imagery, social identities and material outcomes. While a lack of key resources is at the core of most poverty registers worldwide - what defines that lack differs widely across societies and over time. The experience of being poor forged from a multiplicity of possible lacks and shortcomings