The Poverty of the State: Reconsidering the Role of the State in the Struggle against Global Poverty

ALBERTO D. CIMADAMORE, HARTLEY DEAN AND JORGE SIQUEIRA (EDS.)

CLACSO

Lugar: Buenos Aires; Año: 2005 p. 314

987-1183-22-4

A quarter of the world's population, that is 1,300 million people, lives in severe poverty. Nearly 800 million people do not get enough food, and about 500 million people are chronically malnourished. More than a third of the children of this world are malnourished. More than 840 million adults are illiterate -of whom 538 million are women- and 1,200 million people live without access to safe drinking water. These are some of the basic facts and figures on poverty, according to the United Nations Development Program (UNDP). The data are well known by most students, informed people and policy makers. What seems to be less well known, accepted or acted upon is the fact that, according to the same source, today the world "has the resources to eradicate poverty ... and that extreme poverty can be banished from the globe". In the words of UNDP "(p)overty is no longer inevitable and should thus no longer be tolerated". Despite these striking facts and laudable aims, poverty is present everywhere, even in developed countries where more than 100 million people live below the poverty line, more than five million people are homeless and 37 million are jobless. Why is it then that one of the most urgent social, economic and ethical problems of humankind cannot be solved despite the fact that there are enough resources to do so? In order to answer this question, we contend, we have to start asking questions about the state and its role in the struggle against poverty. That is the main concern of this book, as it was of the work-shop that led to its production. The attainment of such a desirable objective -that is, the eradica-tion of poverty- requires decisive action that most governments are apparently not prepared to take despite the fact that the state still has the responsibility and the main instruments to define strategies against poverty in the contemporary world. The social and political task is huge -sometimes overwhelming- because in many cases, such as in Latin American countries, the state has to deal not only with an enormous accumulated deficit in this matter (the 'old poverty'), but also with the 'new poverty' created by the neo-liberal experiment, the adjustment and restructuring of national economies. Nonetheless, the task is imperative and feasible because the resources to deal with poverty and its social, economic, ethical and political consequences are available. There is a considerable consensus in poverty studies that the state is central to poverty reduction and the creation of better conditions for social inclusion and equity. But the mere existence of unacceptable levels of poverty, inequity and exclusion in most of the less developed countries (LDCs) shows that the state has not only been inefficient in reducing those levels, it has actually allowed them to increase. Therefore, a substantial reform of the state would appear to be the logical step ahead to deal with these social maladies. From a normative standpoint, such reform should aim for the sustainable creation of wealth as well as its equitable redistribution. Fiscal, economic and social policies are the potential instruments to redefine social relations within different historical forms of state. However, some forms of state are better suited than others to be part of the solution to poverty. It may be argued that some specific forms of state are prone to poverty creation -particularly in countries in the South where vested interests support voluntarily or involuntarily the policies that produce poverty while others are better suited to poverty reduction. In theoretical or abstract terms, therefore, the state can be part of the problem as much as the solution. In any event, the performance of the state in such matters is susceptible to empirical evaluation.