000			01563pab a2200145 454500
008			180718b2004 xxu||||| |||| 00| 0 eng d
100			_aKiely, Ray
245			_aThe World Bank and "Global Poverty Reduction": good policies or bad data?
260			_c2004
300			_ap.3-20.
520			_aThis article investigates recent claims - made principally by the World Bank - that world poverty is declining, and that this decline is due to countries adopting "pro-globalisation" policies. It is argued that such claims are based on selective and very questionable evidence, as well as a technocratic approach to poverty reduction that ignores the issue of inequality. Through an assessment of the problems of measuring income-related poverty, it is argued that (i) there is insufficient reliable data for us to know what is happening in terms of poverty trends; (ii) the measurements used tend to have a bias towards recording a long-term reduction in global poverty; (iii) there is a linkage between poverty and inequality, both within and between countries, is a far more important issue than current poverty reduction discourses suggest; (v) insofar as there may be a decline in poverty, this is despite, rather than because of "pro-globalisation" policies. The article concludes by briefly suggesting that the world economy is not as benign a force as the World Bank suggests, and that capital concentration takes place through a process of "cumulative causation". - Reproduced.
650			_aPoverty
773			_aJournal of Contemporary Asia
909			_a61969
999			_c61969 _d61969