scholarly journals Hardships of Scarcity: Microsociology on Poor People’s Survival Strategies in Everyday Life

Author(s):  
Antonio Rosales

Basic human rights are not met in many parts of the world. Hunger, ill-health, and poor education are often part of the lives of the poor. The purpose of this study is to understand poor people's sources of strength, social relations, sources of income, and perspectives as strategies to cope with poverty in everyday life. Data gathering was done through field observations and semi-structured interviews with poor and non-poor people in the Philippine town, Hagonoy. All data was codified according to recurrent and salient issues and analyzed using chiefly symbolic interactionism as the theoretical framework. The results of this study reveal that poor people suffer from stigmas. Poor people carry out various survival strategies: some strategies are creative, spiritual, and norm-breaking; social relations are important to cope with poverty. There are differences in the way poverty affects men and women due to culturally defined gender roles. The poor people in this study were marginalized into less desirable areas; because of their lack of resources they live in shanties where they have little protection. Calamities affect both the non-poor and the poor people but the latter are in a less fortunate position.

2002 ◽  
Vol 22 (5) ◽  
pp. 647-663 ◽  
Author(s):  
GAIL WILSON

This paper discusses the material aspects of globalisation and the effects of the movements of trade, capital and people around the world on older men and women. While some older people have benefited, most notably where pensions and health care are well developed, the majority of older men and women are among the poor who have not. Free trade, economic restructuring, the globalisation of finance, and the surge in migration, have in most parts of the world tended to produce harmful consequences for older people. These developments have been overseen, and sometimes dictated, by inter-governmental organisations (IGOs) such as the International Monetary Foundation (IMF), the World Bank and the World Trade Organisation (WTO), while other IGOs with less power have been limited to anti-ageist exhortation. Globalisation transfers resources from the poor to the rich within and between countries. It therefore increases social problems while simultaneously diminishing the freedom and capacity of countries to make social policy. Nonetheless, the effects of globalisation, and particularly its financial dimensions, on a nation's capacity for making social policy can be exaggerated. Political will can combat international economic orthodoxy, but the evident cases are the exception rather than the rule.


2017 ◽  
Vol 17 (5) ◽  
pp. 1278-1286 ◽  
Author(s):  
Larry W. Mays

There are many people on Earth today that live with severe water shortages and severe lack of sanitation, particularly among the poor. These people for the most part do not understand the knowledge base of methodologies of harvesting and conveying water and sanitation methods that have been around for thousands of years. A survey of ancient water technologies used in semi-arid and arid regions is presented in this paper. The survey will include methodologies used by Mesopotamians, the Persians, the Egyptians, and the Nabataeans. The attempt here is to explore how these traditional methods developed by the ancients in semi-arid and arid regions of the world could possibly be used to help solve the present-day water resources sustainability problems, especially in developing parts of the world. The advantages of the traditional knowledge of ancient water technologies are explored with the goal of determining ways to help poor people with water shortages and sanitation.


2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 318
Author(s):  
Mohammad Aslam ◽  
Senthil Kumar ◽  
Shahryar Sorooshian

Poverty is a threat to the world. In its extreme form at any part of the world, it will make endanger rest of the world. In fact, it is the source of crime and the worst form of violence. The poor people do not commit any crime but they get punishment out of being born as a poor that is not controllable in their hand. Microfinance has been designed to eliminate poverty and help marginal and poor people through small income generating activities. The borrowers need capital to materialize their dream, may be in a small amount and microfinance can play important role in this scenario. Through microfinance, small entrepreneurs may acquire necessary inputs to start their business. Both local governments and international agencies are trying to eliminate poverty through microfinance programs, services and guidelines. With this concept, Microfinance has been hosted primarily in Bangladesh. Grameen Bank (GB) has been serving large number of people below poverty level in Bangladesh. However, impact of microfinance is still questionable in several studies. Microfinance used properly and returned back to the lender with stipulated amount and time shows its working effectively for poverty alleviation. Otherwise, there must be loan default and the whole system may be in question. We survey with questionnaire to find out factors contributing to loan default among GB borrowers using binomial logistic regression. The results showed that some factors were crucial for loan default and should be treated properly at the start of lending.


2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 69-79
Author(s):  
Rajiv Ranjan

From a public policy perspective, how publicly funded medical research gets privatized by the award of patents is a critical issue. It leads to a loss of welfare for the poor people throughout the world and more so in the developing world. This raises issues related to health care provisioning and financing—namely public versus private intervention debate—accessibility and affordability issues, lack of medical researcher’s attention to the diseases pertaining to the poor only, geopolitical issues between the developed world and the developing world with regards to TRIPS among a host of other issues. In this article, it is shown how power and politics operate along dimensions of poor–rich, developed–developing world, public–private–NGOs and international agencies to keep the idea of IPRs as a critical instrument for health innovation alive.


2000 ◽  
Vol 45 (S8) ◽  
pp. 47-69 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeremy Boulton

Although research on survival strategies is still at a relatively early stage, there are clearly some areas where there is considerable difference in emphasis placed by historians on the relative importance of particular “expedients” deployed by the poorin extremisThere is, for example, uncertainty regarding the amount of support given by neighbours as opposed to relatives. There is some historical contention, too, over the importance to the elderly of care by their children, as opposed to alternative sources of maintenance such as earnings, charity and especially the formal institutions of poor relief. After all, in the early modern period the principle source for a study of the survival strategies of poor people is always likely to be the records of poor relief or charitable agencies and institutions. The obvious danger here is that historians of poor relief consistently overestimate the importance of such relief to the poor. Both Richard Wall and Pat Thane, using evidence from nineteenth- and twentieth-century England, for example, have demonstrated that the elderly received far more support from relatives than has been realized. Professor Thane has argued that this situation is unlikely t o have been new. Other historians, however, are much more sceptical over the value of intergenerational flows of wealth from children to elderly parents.


2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 33
Author(s):  
Leoni Maria Padilha Henning

Estudo bibliográfico que visa compreender a experiência existencial no pensamento freiriano, atentando para três questões principais: 1. Em que consiste a experiência existencial em Freire? 2. Por que ela é fundamental ao trabalho que pretende ser realmente educativo? 3. Por que a experiência existencial, como princípio educativo, e educação bancária não se correspondem? Esses questionamentos conduziram ao aprofundamento do conceito, em torno do qual gravitam outras noções básicas da Pedagogia da Humanização. Pautada na educabilidade dos homens e das mulheres e no seu inacabamento, a teoria freiriana é esperançosa, amorosa em relação ao mundo. Trata-se de uma contínua busca da conscientização e libertação humana em relação ao império de ações afogadoras de suas experiências reais, desrespeitando homens e mulheres como intérpretes insofismáveis de sua própria existência. O modo existencial de viver é próprio aos humanos, configurando-se na busca de ser com os outros, possibilitando a comunicação, a convivência e a experiência compartilhada realizada na mediação das ações em torno do mundo. Na imediata leitura de mundo é que reside a experiência existencial primária e fundamental dos humanos, em que se experimenta o existir inédito e se apreende subjetivamente a realidade. Para o autor, é impossível a educação que desconsidere a cotidianidade transcorrida nessa esfera existencial. Por fim, a situação, que se constitui num dos aspectos indispensáveis relacionados à experiência existencial, não se constituem aspecto caro aos agentes educativos bancários que apresentam sua proposta em pauta pronta, padronizada, montada sobre premissas fixas cujos questionamentos são tidos por improdutivos.Palavras-chave: Experiência. Existência. Freire.Existential experience in freirian thoughtABSTRACTA bibliographical study in order to understand the existential experience in Freirean thinking, considering three main questions: 1. What is the existential experience in Freire? 2. Why is it fundamental to work that is meant to be truly educational? 3. Why do existential experience, as an educational principle, and banking education, do not correspond? These questions led to the deepening of the concept, around which basic notions of the Pedagogy of Humanization gravitate. Based on the educability of men and women and their incompleteness, the Freirian theory is hopeful, loving towards the world. It is a continuous search for human awareness and liberation in relation to the empire of drowning actions of their real experiences, disrespecting men and women as unmistakable interpreters of their own existence. The existential way of living is proper to humans, configuring itself in the search of being with others, enabling the communication, the coexistence and the shared experience realized in the mediation of the actions around the world. In the immediate reading of the world lies the primary and existential experience as humans, in which one experiences the unprecedented existence and subjectively grasps reality. For the author, it is impossible education that disregards the everyday life passed in this existential sphere. Finally, the situation, which constitutes one of the indispensable aspects related to existential experience, does not constitute an important aspect for the banking educational agents who present their proposal according to a ready agenda, standardized, based on fixed premises whose questions are considered as unproductive.Keywords: Experience. Existence. Freire. Experiencia existencial en el pensamiento freirianoRESUMENEstudio bibliográfico que pretende comprender la experiencia existencial en el pensamiento freiriano, respondiendo a tres cuestiones principales: 1. ¿En qué consiste la experiencia existencial en Freire? 2. ¿Por qué es fundamental para el trabajo que pretende ser realmente educativo? 3. ¿Por qué la experiencia existencial, como principio educativo, y educación bancaria no se corresponden? Estos cuestionamientos condujeron a la profundización del concepto, en torno al cual gravitan otras nociones básicas de la Pedagogía de la Humanización. En la educación de los hombres y de las mujeres y en su inacabado, la teoria freiriana es esperanzada, amorosa en relación al mundo. Se trata de una continua búsqueda de la concientización y liberación humana em relación al imperio de acciones ahogadas de sus experiencias reales, desatendiendo a hombres y mujeres como intérpretes insofi ables de su propia existencia. El modo existencial de vivir es propio a los humanos, configurándose en la búsqueda de ser con los demás, posibilitando la comunicación, la convivencia y la experiencia compartida realizada en la mediación de las acciones en todo el mundo. En la inmediata lectura de mundo es que reside la experiencia existencial primaria y fundamental en cuanto humanos, en que se experimenta el existir inédito y se aprehende subjetivamente la realidad. Para el autor, es imposible la educación que desconsidere la cotidianidad transcurrida en esa esfera existencial. Por último, la situación, que se constituye en uno de los aspectos indispensables relacionados con la experiencia existencial, no se constituye en un aspecto caro a los agentes educativos bancários que presentan su propuesta en pauta acabada, estandarizada, montada sobre premisas fijas cuyos cuestionamientos son considerados por improductivos.Palabras clave: Experiencia. Existencia. Freire.


JURNAL LUXNOS ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Yane Octavia Rismawati Wainarisi

Abstract: This article discusses the study of the problem of poverty based on the narrative of the offering of the poor widow in Mark 12: 41-44. By using qualitative methods or more precisely literature review, the authors conclude that there needs to be an encounter with them beforehand so that through encounters with poor people, both writers and we can also gain a deeper understanding of God's heart, not only for ourselves, for the poor and the weak, but also for everyone around the world. However, because poor people are the most vulnerable people to be treated unfairly, it is necessary to formulate solidarity with the poor in order to realize the Kingdom of God in the world. Abstrak: Artikel ini membahas tentang telaah persoalan kemiskinan yang didasarkan pada narasi persembahan janda miskin dalam Markus 12: 41-44. Dengan menggunakan metode kualitatif atau lebih tepatnya kajian pustaka, maka penulis menyimpulkan bahwa perlu ada perjumpaan terlebih dahulu dengan mereka agar melalui perjumpaan dengan orang-orang miskin, baik penulis dan kita juga dapat memperoleh pemahaman yang lebih tentang hati Allah, tidak hanya bagi kita sendiri, bagi orang-orang miskin dan lemah, namun juga bagi setiap orang diseluruh dunia. Namun karena orang-orang miskin merupakan orang-orang yang paling rentan untuk mendapat perlakukan tidak adil, maka perlu suatu formulasi solidaritas terhadap kaum miskin demi mewujudkan Kerajaan Allah di dunia.  


Author(s):  
David Brakke

Recent scholarship has undermined the traditional picture of desert monasticism as originating with Antony of Egypt and then spreading to Palestine and Syria, as consisting of the poor and uneducated, and as developing in complete separation from the world. This essay discusses key trends in the study of late ancient desert monks including: the decentring of Egypt and the turn away from single founders; philosophy as the source of and background for monastic practices and literary forms; scepticism about the myth of the desert; the engagement of monks with wider society; rethinking the concept of the holy man; and attention to women and gender. Publications of new sources (such as the works of Evagrius Ponticus and Shenoute), more theoretically aware readings of old sources, and studies of archaeological and papyrological remains have contributed to these developments.


2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 30-62
Author(s):  
Yetimwork Anteneh Wondim

Men and women in general, male house heads and female house heads in particular experience poverty in different ways and use different mechanisms to overcome it. This is mainly because of the different roles they play in their community, which exposes them to different constraints, opportunities, and needs. Therefore, men and women experience poverty differently. Therefore, the very purpose of this study was to assess the gender dimension in the living condition of poor female and male-headed households in Sefen-Selam Sub-city, Bahir Dar. To meet these objectives, the study used a Sequential Explanatory Mixed Method design. Survey questionnaires and Semi-structured interviews were used to gather data. Descriptive and thematic analysis was used for quantitative and qualitative data analysis. The analysis of the study was based on 175 households, of which 129 were female-headed and 46 male-headed households. Accordingly, the monetary and non-monetary poverty indicators pointed out the poor living condition of the study population in general. Nevertheless, problems were found to be more severe among households headed by women. Therefore, the national, regional, and local poverty reduction programs and strategies should give special attention to the poor in general and the female-headed families in particular for its success.


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