About the Book

Why are so many people poor in a world that’s richer than ever before? Something must be wrong with conventional thinking about wealth and poverty. In this No-Nonsense Guide to World Poverty Jeremy Seabrook summarizes his celebrated work on the meaning of poverty, drawing on the experience of poor people themselves in both rich and poor societies. He concludes that the opposite of poverty is not wealth but ‘sufficiency’. The relatively poor majority of the world’s people do not aim to be rich, but to be safe. Economic growth will never overcome problems it is largely responsible for creating. This is a clarion call for a radical rethink, not just about poverty, but about the way we live.

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Contents

Introduction

1. The invisible poor

2. Measuring poverty

3. Defining poverty

4. The mechanisms of impoverishment

5. Wealth and poverty

6. Rescuing self-reliance

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About the Author / Editor

Jeremy Seabrook has been a teacher, social worker and lecturer, and has written plays for theater, TV and radio. He has contributed to many journals and newspapers, including the New Internationalist, Third World Network, New Statesman and The Ecologist, and at present writes for The Statesman in Kolkata (Calcutta).

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