Global Poverty and the Main Roots of Its Persistence

Abstract

Despite the growing intensity of international trade in the last decades and
the work of global economic institutions, we still face a global poverty
problem. Almost half of the global population lives in poverty. Moreover,
there are many examples of growing poverty in developing countries
during the 1990's. In the first part of this article, I will analyze the change in
the global poverty situation between 1990 and 2001. The truth is that in
many cases developing countries are themselves responsible for their
underdevelopment. Yet there is some evidence that the developed world
bears a certain amount of responsibility for global poverty, too. The
purpose of this paper is not to analyze the concrete roots of poverty in
specific developing countries, because the variability of possible factors is
infinite. I will therefore try to identify only the most important (the most
common) roots of poverty in developing countries - this is why I use the
term "global poverty" (meaning the poverty as a global problem). I will
focus more on the international (external) causes of poverty in the
developing world than on the internal ones. In the final part I will explore
the arguments in favour of poverty reduction.