Annotated Bibliography
An End to Poverty: New Hope for the Last Billion Poor
This site contains a five part series that shatters six myths about poverty, analyzes how aid can hurt the poor, and discusses what it will take to “open a door for the poor.” Although some of the ideas put forward are idealistic, such as the steps to end poverty, the article drew our attention to two issues in particular: how aid can actually hurt the poor, and the risk of fighting poverty too well. This website covered issues not normally seen on most websites, instead of focusing solely on how its organization could defeat poverty. Overall, it was a good summary of the issues facing the world.
Can Anyone Here Us?
As part of their Voices of the Poor series, the World Bank collected testimonies from over 60,000 impoverished people. Many of their findings have been compiled into this book, published by the World Bank in 2000. In particular, the second chapter, “The Definitions of Poverty,” builds on the stories of these people and inductively defines poverty as the complex web of deprivations the world’s poor face. Additionally, the source featured many stories relayed by the poor that added to the pathos of our report.
From Many Lands
The final book from the World Bank’s Voices of the Poor series, this book describes and analyzes regional patterns of poverty. The chapter on Jamaica emphasized the link between violence and poverty in Jamaica much more so than other sources and really helped refine our focus. This source also very clearly described how other factors caused poverty in Jamaica, such as high government debt, the drug trade, and a strong tradition of racial discrimination. This source contained a balance of logos and pathos, which were both appropriate at different points in our brochure.
Global Issues: Causes of Poverty
This site discusses many compelling causes of global poverty, including structural adjustment—that is as developing nations borrow funds, debt covenants and repayment clauses can lead these nations to lasting dependency. The site also lists and cites related facts and statistics (under Facts and Stats on the left sidebar). Also on the sidebar are links to more information and further reading. Particularly helpful is Poverty Around the World and its opening links to “What does it mean to be poor?” and “How is poverty measured?”
Jamaica PATH Program Evaluation Report
This report summarizes the findings of an evaluation of a social safety net initiative, the Programme of Advancement Through Health and Education (PATH), which was undertaken by the Government of Jamaica, beginning in 2001. PATH is one of the programs under the National Poverty Eradication Programme to combat poverty. The main objectives of the initiative are to achieve better targeting of welfare benefits to the poor and to increase human capital by conditioning receipt of the benefits on participants meeting certain requirements for school attendance and health care visits. The report concludes that PATH has met its basic objectives but has room for improvement in certain areas such as accuracy of information and delays in implementation.
Jamaica: Poverty and Wealth
This short discussion of wealth in Jamaica is heavy on comparative data (like GDP per capita across countries and the distribution of income or consumption in Jamaica) and examines the causes of wealth disparity. For example, wealth is distributed by location. The northern coast—home to tourism—and the suburbs of Kingston are generally home to wealth; nearby, however, many slum districts lack clean water and violent youth gangs run rampant. Also, wealth is distributed largely along racial lines. White and mixed-race descendants of plantation owners and traders tend to be far better off than the descendants of black slaves.
Micro Enterprise Financing Limited (MEFL) 2006 Annual Report
In its 2006 Annual Report, MEFL reports highlights, current news, and financials. The organization also discusses its background, organizational structure, sponsors, goals, and vision. This wealth of information guided our decision to focus on this organization and its success in combating poverty in Jamaica. From here, one can access annual reports from 2003-2005, too.
The National Poverty Eradication Programme (NPEP) Annual Report 2005-2006
This report summarizes the progress the NPEP has made in combating poverty in Jamaica since its inception in 1995 and lists various programs and projects that the NPEP has done. They’ve had programs for micro-finance, infrastructure investment, health care, education, as well as many other projects. The report has extremely detailed statistics on funding for the programs and people directly impacted by the programs.
Poverty and Its Alleviation in the Caribbean
This lecture by the President of the Caribbean Development Bank discusses poverty and its effects throughout the Caribbean. The focus, though, is on how poverty can be defeated. Particularly helpful were the six causes of poverty defined in Section V. These causes include (1) low income jobs and high unemployment, (2) inequality of income and wealth within countries, (3) global inequality of income, access to resources, and consumption, (4) economic volatility, (5) the absence of government-financed safety nets, and (6) disparity in education and training and health and nutrition.
The World’s Silver Lining: Somewhere Over the Rainbow
A great article that is unbiased and speaks from an economic and factual standpoint. It takes at look at three measures in particular to conclude that the world is indeed better than it used to be: “the underlying social conditions in poor countries; poverty alleviation over the past decade; and the incidence of wars and political violence.” The article starts out by talking about the progress the world has made and what has been successful. It covers everything from how effective basic services can be (canal digging, education) and then dicusses other efforts like birth control, government aid, and increases in technology. An interesting fact: A 1% increase in national income per head translates into a 1.3% fall in extreme poverty, hence the importance of the state of the world economy.
Comments (0)
You don't have permission to comment on this page.