Bosco,
Many thanks for the link to the work by Sen and Dreze. I had no idea as to the breadth of the information you had linked but it kept me up until 1 a.m. last night and I am back at it this morning. A fascinating report with incredibly concise conclusions.
Some excerpts for those who have not read it yet:
<<This is a book about hunger. Not just about the extent of it, or about the havoc it causes--debilitating and killing people, enfeebling and devastating societies>>
<<We have tried to take full note of other points of view. But a practical treatise on the role of public action has to be, ultimately, rather assertive, and it is fair to say that we have not been afflicted by excessive shyness regarding what we recommend and why.>>
And though written in 1989 one has to call to mind the stories we hear of present day Indonesia when reading the following:
<<Fourth, the importance of the institution of wage labour is a particular aspect of this general problem. People who possess no means of production excepting their own labour power, which they try to sell for a wage in order to earn an adequate income to buy enough food, are particularly vulnerable to changes in labour market conditions. A decline in wages vis-a-vis food prices, or an increase in unemployment, can spell disaster for this class. While hiring labour has existed for a long time, its relative importance--especially in the form of wage labour--has dramatically increased with the spread of capitalism, even in developing countries. The class of landless wage labourers has indeed recurrently produced famine victims in modern times. For example, in the Indian subcontinent, the majority of famine victims in this century and the last has come from this group.>>
Best,
Stitch
Best,
Stitch |
