Excerpt from a letter written as an article by an anonymous development economist entitled "Increasing effectiveness in the fight against poverty"
Now, once we agree that there has not been done that has satisfied the development community, we then need to concentrate on the missing link. When something fails, it is not quite uncommon that multiple causes can be cited for that failure. To see this from the point of view of development efforts undertaken so far, let's see the following:
a) Let s just ask a simple question to start with: How many people worked on, researched on, or claimed to have their hearts on development and poverty reduction/eradication and inequality issues? Out of these, how many of them are actually from the countries where problems are quite persistent? Or rather to put it differently, how many of them actually experienced poverty and life in a poor environment in the field? On the other hand, how many of those who actually lived in poverty were given the opportunity to contribute towards the stated objectives/or how many of them actually pursued development of where they came from as a field of specialization?
b) A related phenomena that just started to get half open eyes and which is related to
the last points raised above is participation of the local endogenous people in the effort
to find solutions for their day-to-day lives. This is similar to the analogy that no
matter how skilled the physician can be, he/she can't know the true feeling of the
pain as much as the patient does. Given his closeness to what and how he feels, if he is
equipped with the expertise of a physician, the patient himself would find the right
treatment with the shortest time possible. There is also the concern here: As rational
maximizer beings, the concern of individuals is the highest when the issue at stake
directly affects them. So, let's give a chance to those directly affected for the joint
effort of poverty alleviation; Let's have the heart and the concern for those directly
affected by what we do than just focusing on the professional ladder we aspire to climb
on. After all, whether we do the right thing to help those we claim to improve their
lives, or whether we try to capitalize on their names through some sort of professional
theft (in this ever increasing competition of monopolizing credit for what is being done),
we all live JUST ONCE! Let's therefore do what is ethical, logical, humanitarian, and
legal -- as citizens of one world.
Underdevelopment and poverty-related problems
are all cousins to each other: Health, education, gender disparity, children's rights and
child labor, drought, environmental degradation, etc., feed on each other. If we
are therefore concerned about the final output of poverty reduction, all these should
concern us -- Gender disparity and women's rights should not be a concern only for women
... .. and .... as being a child or acting like a child is not an effective criterion for
working on children's issues. In both cases, economic transformation is about resource allocation and women's empowerment and children's rights are part of a smart Economics.
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