Locating the roots of our poverty.
The symptoms and causes of our poverty are mixed; they both reinforce and feed back one upon the other, making it harder at times to identify the causes by which they were generated. Poverty in countries like Pakistan has a very strong structured base, where roots are outside the country, or at least the most important, that is to say in the developed countries, and these causes combine with those of the country itself. Many people now think it is no longer possible to eradicate it or to prevent it. Along the internal causes, understanding the external roots of the phenomenon is necessary for a proper response to the question of our persistent poverty.
From Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto's Roti, Kapra Aur Makan to Nawaz Sharif and General Musharraf's focus on poverty alleviation, and from donor A to Z's funding for the same objectives is meaningless until we reach to the roots of the problem by finding out how 15% of the world population own 79% of the world's wealth and 85% population the remaining 21%. While 20% of the developed world's population consumes 10 times as much commercial energy as developing countries, 35000 children in developing world die everyday for reasons directly related to poverty. 130 million children do not receive basic education (of these 70% are girls) and 1,300 million people do not have access to drinking water. The important thing is to think of ways to break these links to our poverty.
From a global perspective, in the past 30 years important economic growth has occurred and funds have been reserved for poverty alleviation by donors and lending institutions, but the number of people who live in poverty has increased and the difference from those who live in abundance has markedly increased. In 1960 the income of 20% of the richest countries was 30 times more than that of 20% of the poorest countries. In 1990s it was 60 times greater. Today the 20% of the world population that lives in the five poorest countries of the world receive only 20% of the worlds' earnings. In this way the differences between rich and poor have doubled in the last 30 years.
Furthermore, developed countries give approximately 12% of their gross national product to satisfy the needs of their population, including the 100 million people who live in poverty in these countries. On the other hand, the developing countries allocate 36 times less: below 0.35% of GNP to help to satisfy the needs of the 1000 million of the absolute poor in these countries. At present 40% of the developing countries receive twice as much aid per person as 70% of the poorest countries.
The first point is that the developing countries transfer more to the developed ones than they receive. So the net transfer of resources from the poor to the rich is positive. Not only at the level of capital funds, but also of qualified human resources (a brain drain of those trained with poor resources). Some causes of this financing of the rich from the poor countries are:
1. Unequal Commercial Relations
The economies of all countries depend more and more on international trade. The rules of the market work more and more in favour of the richest countries. The developed countries and the transnational businesses impose their interests on the developing nations (protectionism, the low prices of raw materials, the increase in the price of manufactured good, financial dependence...). It is estimated that a sum, ten times more than the developing countries receive in official aid for development and poverty alleviation, is denied to the developing world.
The so-called free market is freer for some than for others. The European Agricultural Policy, for example, subsidises the production of European farmers and when there is excess production its export is subsidised. There is an organisation responsible for protecting the textile industry in the developed world. The rich European countries impose quotas on the import of textiles from the Third World, but not on that of the other countries of the North. The restrictions on textile products and clothes represent a loss of millions of dollars for the developing world. The share of sub Sahara Africa in international trade has been reduced by a quarter from the level registered in 1960. The poor tend to be left at the margin of the market, whether at the national or international level.
The globalization of the economy has made it much more dependent on foreign investment and outside decision. Entry to the world market is ruled by the IMF the World Bank: the developing countries depend on these by virtue of their external debts. Dominated by neo-liberal ideas, these institutions encourage transformations in political economy of states, such as: the increase of state solvency for the payment of the external debt, the reduction of social costs and the reduction of state protectionism. The effects of these adjustment policies fall on the poorest of people: prices of the essential commodities, the level of unemployment, and the acquisitive capacity of salaries and social investment. Those least able to adapt themselves to charges are paying the heaviest cost of the social and economic transformation proposed by the agents of IMF and World Bank.
2 An immoral external debt.
For the last 15 years many of the poorest countries have been trapped in an external debt which they are unable to pay. Interest rates have risen while the prices of the goods on which they depend to pay the debt have fallen. Although in some countries the change in the debt has diminished (as in Brazil and Mexico) the total for developing countries has increased sevenfold since 1970. In Sub Saharan Africa 2.5% of earning from exports are allocated to funds for the redemption of its external debt.
3 Unjust Distribution of Wealth within States
The pattern of unjust international relations is very frequently reproduced on the national scale: the few monopolise wealth at the expense of the majority. The access of people who live in poverty to credit facilities, to technology and to other inputs of production in their countries is limited. The national governments of the developing countries generally respond to the interests of their privileged minorities. This is shown directly in the lack of interest shown towards redistributive policies (agrarian and fiscal reforms for example) and in the bias in budget policies (lack of basic excessive expenditure on defence services).
When the prices of raw materials are in the hands of the western, rich multi-nationals, the producers of the poor countries remain conditioned by their own possibilities of development and the eradication of their own poverty: these external causes are reinforced in many cases by a network of consequent causes which are developed in our own county, such as foreign sponsored dictatorial government, oligarchies, corruption, the exploitation of talent and labour in sub-human conditions etc.
The social nature of poverty implies that those who live in it are not the only people affected. The whole of society is affected. The community is deprived of the creative energies and potentialities of those who are impoverished: Besides poverty and inequalities frequently generate social instability, migration and environmental degradation. In their turn, these factors reinforce the privation of those who are trapped in the spiral of violence.
Because it is multi-dimensional, poverty has imposed intellectual and psychological limitations on us, which often hinder the search for more wide reaching solutions. We are simply setting short-term goals, and allow them to become even more firmly rooted and consolidated within the system itself. That is to say, poverty generates spaces within the system of injustice, which enable it to perpetuate itself. Once poverty has found its place the struggle to break out of the vicious circle ceases and it is transmitted from generation to generation.
We can speak of a poverty line which if not crossed, it becomes impossible to escape because of the gravitational force which poverty exerts on those who live in it. The line must be crossed in a combined choice, no only of all those who live in poverty, but also by those who live in plenty and think their small handouts would alleviate our poverty. We need multi-dimensional action.
The Strategy of Eradication
The eradication of poverty in the developing countries cannot be achieved by adopted policies that attempt to return to earlier situations. It must be achieved by looking forward, taking for granted historic processes which have been consolidated, and seeking new ways for the future of our communities.
To eradicate poverty is not a synonym for alleviating it; it is to force the passing of a limit threshold, which will permit a new system of relationships.
If it is technically possible to eradicate poverty and there are ways and sufficient resources, then if we do not do so we are deliberately choosing the maintenance of poverty. It is to take up the fight against the causes which provoke it and not simply against its consequences. It presupposes in fact, confrontations with the groups in power who generate it.
- Our society is in many instances an accomplice of these power groups and therefore it is an ethical duty to commit oneself to a form of active opposition and efforts to achieve radical changes. On international level it becomes a commitment to a system that is not only economic but also political and social at the level of international justice.
- It implies the restructuring of the United Nations that carries some of its poverty alleviation and development programmes through UNDP, and of the way in which the UN itself intervenes; as well as a greater political commitment at the international level of action including boycotts, in the face of situations in which rights of the poor are being violated.
- The working of UNO must become more democratic with a complete revision of the system of representation and voting, eliminating every form of veto, in use at present. There is no efficient system for the redistribution of income at the international level, it is therefore necessary for the economists to come up with solutions about taxing the flows of funds originating in speculative finances.
- It is not only a question of dividing the surplus value more equitably, but also the mechanisms of production. It is necessary to struggle in order to obtain a world wide pact for the eradication of poverty. Industrialised countries could find themselves benefiting from such a pact, with a diminution of damage to the environment, the pressure for immigration, political instability in the poor countries and the nuclear threat.
- World Markets must be opened to the poor countries and their inhabitants. Developing countries could obtain at least 35 billion a year of the rich countries lowered the restriction on immigration of foreign workers.
- Social clauses must be included and guaranteed in commercial relations that favour just commercial dealings. The debts of the poorest countries must be cancelled and renegotiated. In these the objective of eradicating poverty must be given priority over the economic and political interests of the donor countries.
- Only 7% of the total allocation of bilateral aid and 16% of multi lateral aid goes towards covering priority areas for the eradication of poverty (primary education, health, drinking water, environmental health, family planning and food safety) The proposed 20/20 agreed in the Copenhagen Summit in 1995, attempted to correct this situation by obliging the donor countries to give 20% of bilateral aid the priority sectors for the eradication of poverty and in the recipient countries to allocate 20% of their national budget to the same sectors. But so far this has not been put into actual practice.
At National level
- Poor countries like Pakistan must reduce the structure of the state means of redistribution of wealth (agrarian and fiscal returns) and the access of all person to basic social services must be defended. They must organise their own forces to eradicate poverty.
- Besides reducing the non-development expenditure, the decentralisation of control and the creation of true local power, will encourage the approach of administrations to the situation of the poverty and the participation of people in the decisions affecting their lives.
Co-operation and participation for development is only a useless element if the other factors present are not taken into account, it may even become a tranquilliser for consciences, or a weapon in the service of the governing power.
Only 3 or 4% of the economic volume of Co-operation for Development passes through NGO's, nevertheless an exaggerated responsibility is attributed to them. In the poor countries, participation should be a tool for social transformation and a support for the marginalised sectors in the incidence of the distribution of wealth and power in their countries: Creditable symbols that the eradication of poverty is possible must be created, and it must be shown that human rights, democracy and participation also apply to the poor and excluded. The NGO's have a special responsibility in the social task.
To combat the mentality of an offensive against all the mechanism of the redistribution of wealth, and the accumulation of wealth of a speculative origin. We must take up active and demanding social activity in the face of public administration, political parties, and civil organisations, in particular NGO's that ought to feel the support but also the pressure of civil society, to carry forward this all embracing commitment to the eradication of poverty.
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