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The purpose of this paper is to explore the critical interrelationships between poverty, culture and knowledge-based community development.

The traditional approaches to the management of poverty such as infrastructure, literacy and economic aid have failed to deliver and ameliorate the lot of common people. The current paper engages in critical constructivist discourse on poverty as unfolding in the era of knowledge economy and seeks to propose a community focussed knowledge-based development model of human economic and social uplift. This model has three dimensions: community knowledge focus, interactions of local, regional and global knowledge shaping and influencing poverty management and finally collective responsibility (collective commitment) of groups to rid them of poverty trap.

First, this paper looks at the social interconnections of poverty, culture and knowledge-based development in a critical discourse context. Second, it discusses the alternative worldviews of economic development. Third, it questions current epistemological and sociological assumptions of development paradigm.

The paper looks at the issues of poverty, culture and economic development from a critical pluralistic epistemological standpoint. It also questions some of the prescriptive methods of development by poverty experts. It also proposes to effectively explore and integrate different cognitive styles in development discourse and their usefulness and relevance to global development discourse.

The paper aims to look into the implications of urban informality in Chris Abani's Graceland as represented in slum life and urban poverty as products of over urbanization and globalization, seeking to unravel multi-layers of the human side of the slum.

The paper examines slum life from a descriptive approach to highlight how people survive under poverty. The study of the culture of slums entails an analysis of the survival techniques and everyday practices of slum dwellers, the relations and patterns of behavior and the outcomes of the interplay between place, culture and power relations in such communities.

The urban slum dwellers utilize everyday forms of resistance which comprise a number of “low-profile techniques” to subvert state-imposed power structures and break the cycle of poverty.

Despite the relevance of a post-colonial approach to the texts, this paper is limited to the study of the impact of urban poverty on individuals.

The margin, represented in the urban poor, is brought into focus and perceived in a new light of empowerment which challenges alienating discourses.

The multidimensional vision of Nigeria in Abani's text highlights the cultural and economic impacts of multiculturalism, neocolonialism and globalization on the urban poor.

The paper formulates a framework for understanding the culture of the slum as a space of a peculiar nature, seeking to deconstruct a fixed view of slum life and poverty culture.

Urban sociological research posits a strong correlation between social isolation and the growth in illicit activities of street culture, namely the drug trade and violent gang activities. However, in this article we offer an explanation for why, even in the absence of extreme poverty and social isolation from mainstream institutions, youths in Cambridge, Massachusetts feel vulnerable to illicit street cultural activities. We also offer an explanation for why these youths perceive the effects of social dislocation to be similar to that experienced by youths from larger central cities. As we will elaborate below, some students in Cambridge are affected by illicit street cultural activities because: (1) social dislocation is a relative phenomenon and not merely an absolute phenomenon as described by William J. Wilson; (2) there is a social dislocation spill‐over effect from larger central cities that intensifies or amplifies the experiences of youths in the relatively poorer neighborhoods of Cambridge; (3) and some youths, from stable working‐class or wealthier neighborhoods in Cambridge, view involvement in the illicit activities of street culture as a reputable means of gaining peer respect through status group affiliation.

The base of the pyramid (BOP) is characterized by deep and wide poverty, which dampens market exchanges, or making/selling and buying/consuming activities. The purpose of this paper is to address the specific issue of how national culture distinguishes BOP markets in terms of exchange activities, and the broad issue of how market exchanges can grow and flourish by accounting for comparative differences across BOP markets.

The study design is a conceptual framework drawn from the extant BOP literature and several theories such as Amartya Sen’s theory on poverty, and Anthony Bebbington’s concepts of human capital. The framework specifies research propositions for future empirical examination.

The conceptual framework proposes that BOP poverty lowers or inhibits market exchanges but is countered by several factors: national culture (performance orientation), non-traditional assets (creative and social capitals), and transformative technologies (mobile telephony). Assuming these factors vary by BOP setting, greater performance orientation alongside higher social capital, creative capital, and mobile telephony directly and/or interactively increase market exchange activities.

Among research implications are the application of other culture theories to the BOP market exchange issue, and the need to examine the role of government and other non-traditional capitals in exchanges.

Managerial implications include the targeting and selection of BOP markets and development of marketing tactics that leverage cultural, nontraditional, and technological assets.

This paper explores how to counter the negative effects of BOP poverty on market exchanges by leveraging the distinctives and variations among BOP markets.

The purpose of this paper is to identify the factors which are instrumental to poverty reduction opposed to many factors that are considered as impediments to poverty reduction in a poor country like Bangladesh.

This paper is an outcome of review of literature covered wide range of issues including sectoral contribution to economic growth but none has exclusively dealt with the instrumental role of the poverty reduction factors, insider’s view, long-term observations (1960-2014), and reviews of secondary data.

In order to reduce poverty, rather than attempting to change the “culture of poverty,” remove the “structural trap,” or “kin system as poverty trap” it can be achieved through harnessing the enabling factors of poverty reduction. Study argues that rather than focusing on “barriers” to poverty reduction, a country needs to identify and focus on its “potential” factors of poverty reduction. The dominant enabling factors for Bangladesh were agricultural development and remittance. The utilization of land and labor could bring a transformation in the rural economy of Bangladesh which was essential to poverty reduction.

The study shows that the individuals can escape poverty largely through their own effort where a proper policy support from the government is needed. The state needs to play the facilitating role rather than the instrumental in the case of poverty reduction.

The paper reveals instruments to poverty reduction where usual practice was to identify the barrier to development and to suggest the means of overcoming those barriers. It suggests how to look into the matter from other way round where instead of identifying the barrier attempt should be made to identify the enabling factors and to harness those enabling factors. The findings are based on the country-specific literatures but not generalized in the form as attempted here. The study shows a means of poverty reduction where country-specific strategy or home-grown model can be drawn out based on the identification of potential factors.

The purpose of this paper is to address the ideological narratives which came to comprise a new welfare consensus in the USA and subsequently a welfare state which was more fiscally austere, demeaning, and coercive. It also explores the role of the political and financial restructuring which facilitated the implementation of retrogressive reforms.

Macro-level historical forces are investigated through various texts such as policy statements, journal articles, press releases, political addresses, congressional transcripts and testimony, archived papers, newspaper articles, and occasional sound bites and popular culture references pertaining to welfare and which have come to construct the common understanding of it.

The formation of this consensus was due in part to three factors: first, the growth of and increased influence of an elite policy planning network; second, welfare program administration and financing had been decentralized which allowed greater autonomy of state and local governments to implement their own retrogressive reforms; and third, there emerged an overarching discourse and paradigm for structuring policy and explaining the causes of poverty which emphasized individual behavior.

This paper focusses on the materialization of the contemporary welfare consensus during the 1980s and 1990s in terms of its ideological and political history and on its persistence which has affected the ensuing policy culture and which continues to constrain anti-poverty policy discourse as well as what can be accomplished legislatively. The paper is of value for for readers, fields, courses with work that encompasses an examination of political and social theory, ideology, social policy, power/hegemony, poverty, inequality, families, gender, race, and meaning making institutions.

The cardinal point to note here is that the development (and unfortunately the likely potential) of area policy is intimately related to the actual character of British social policy. Whilst area policy has been strongly influenced by Pigou's welfare economics, by the rise of scientific management in the delivery of social services (cf Jaques 1976; Whittington and Bellamy 1979), by the accompanying development of operational analyses and by the creation of social economics (see Pigou 1938; Sandford 1977), social policy continues to be enmeshed with the flavours of Benthamite utilitatianism and Social Darwinism (see, above all, the Beveridge Report 1942; Booth 1889; Rowntree 1922, 1946; Webb 1926). Consequently, for their entire history area policies have been coloured by the principles of a national minimum for the many and giving poorer areas a hand up, rather than a hand out. The preceived need to save money (C.S.E. State Apparatus and Expenditure Group 1979; Klein 1974) and the (supposed) ennobling effects of self help have been the twin marching orders for area policy for decades. Private industry is inadvertently called upon to plug the resulting gaps in public provision. The conjunction of a reluctant state and a meandering private sector has fashioned the decaying urban areas of today. Whilst a large degree of party politics and commitment has characterised the general debate over the removal of poverty (Holman 1973; MacGregor 1981), this has for the most part bypassed the ‘marginal’ poorer areas (cf Green forthcoming). Their inhabitants are not usually numerically significant enough to sway general, party policies (cf Boulding 1967) and the problems of most notably the inner cities has been underplayed.

This paper evaluates the impact of socio and demographic factors on the multidimensional poverty of smallholder arable crop farming households in Nigeria.

Data were drawn from the second wave of the LSMS-Integrated Surveys on Agriculture General Household Survey Panel 2012/2013. The methods adopted in analysing the data were descriptive statistics, Alkire and Foster Method (AFM) and logit regression model.

The result shows that 84.34% of the households were headed by a male while 80.26% of the respondents were married with a mean household size of seven persons. The multidimensional poverty of arable crop farm households in Nigeria is 0.60, while the adjusted headcount ratio (MPI) is 0.27, with an average intensity of 0.45. We found that deprivation in the dimension of living standard accounted for 45.5% of the overall multidimensional poverty index (MPI). The result of the logistic regression indicates that household location, gender, household size and non-farm income are negatively correlated to poverty. The factors that increase poverty among households are the age of the household head and access to extension services.

The study presents an alternative means of assessing poverty among smallholder arable crop farming households in Nigeria. This study recommends that policymakers should focus more on improving the living standard of arable crop farming households to reduce poverty in rural areas. Similarly, concerted efforts should be made towards providing adequate health care and improved sanitation, supply of electricity and educational training that goes beyond primary education for farming household members.

Globally, poverty has been a persistent problem despite decades of unprecedented growth. The purpose of this paper is to deliberate on a sustainable livelihoods and poverty eradication approach in an African context.

The paper aims to bridge the gaps in poverty eradication strategies in East Africa by examining recent literature on livelihoods approaches and poverty eradication approaches.

Safari tourism is one way of connecting poor communities in Kenya to the tourism industry. The development of community conservancies in Kenya presents yet more opportunities for communities to be integrated with the sector. The Africanization of the tourism sector in Kenya is a priority, as communities embrace tourism and poverty eradication measures.

There is a need for the Safari tourism sector to integrate the local community’s indigenous knowledge systems, community social capital and the community’s natural capital with tourism product development and diversification.

The paper draws on applied research and technical analysis of the unique opportunities for enhancing sustainable poverty eradication through the tourism sector in East Africa and, more particularly, a Kenyan context.

The primary aim of this paper is to analyse the contribution made by business organisations in the fight against poverty in Mauritius. Whereas on one side businesses are flourishing and ultra‐capitalism is the order of the day, we are witnessing, in parallel, a growing level of poverty worldwide. This situation of paradoxes is not being dealt with effectively by governments, being more interested in attracting foreign direct investment. Civil society organisations, on the other hand, lack the resources to do so. The role played by the business sector is analysed in this work.

For data collection purpose, a questionnaire‐based semi‐structured interview schedule, worked out through the application of the mixed‐methods approach, was devised and applied to a stratified sample of 33.3 per cent of the top 100 companies and the 19 locally‐incorporated banks, based on the stratified random sampling method. Secondary sources, mainly in the form of company publications were also used.

Most businesses surveyed already have established procedures with regards to the allocation of corporate social responsibility (CSR) funds. They are willing to help in creating a better society whether through financial or non‐monetary means, and do have the resources to do so. However, presently, only 11 per cent of CSR funds are devoted to the fight against poverty. There is a need to set the priorities and to coordinate these efforts. What is lacking is the active involvement of business leaders and public figures. This is needed to create the momentum for setting poverty alleviation as a top‐priority of our social agenda.

This work contributes to the scarce literature on CSR in Africa by analysing the way business organisations in the Mauritian economy contribute to the fight against poverty through CSR. It provides an evaluation of what is presently being done, and proposes ways through which the business contribution could be enhanced in order to help more people in need.