Search

This document contains abstracts of papers presented at an academic conference. The papers cover a wide range of topics related to economics, history, and social development. Each paper presents empirical evidence and analysis to shed light on specific phenomena or historical events. The research is conducted using different methodologies and data sources, providing valuable insights into these complex subjects. The summaries provide a brief overview of each paper's main findings and contribute to the understanding of various social and economic phenomena. [Extracted from the article]

The Journal of Geographical Systems (JGS) has announced two initiatives to recognize outstanding research published in the journal. The first initiative is the JGS Best Paper Award, which aims to encourage and acknowledge excellent scholarship in the field of GIScience and spatial planning. The second initiative is the Editors' Choice, where the editors select their favorite paper from each issue. The winners of these awards are listed on the journal's website and their papers are made freely accessible for a certain period of time. The 2023 JGS Best Paper Award was given to Luyu Liu, Adam Porr, and Harvey J. Miller for their research on evaluating the reliability of public transit accessibility using real-time data. The paper demonstrates how even small levels of unreliability in transit services can significantly impact accessibility levels, particularly for lower income populations. The paper also promotes open and reproducible research practices. The Editors' Choice for Volume 26(1) is a paper by Chris Jacobs-Crisioni, Ana I. Moreno-Monroy, Mert Kompil, and Lewis Dijkstra, which proposes a sequential approach to estimate school provision, cost, and access using open databases of student counts. The paper provides valuable insights into the balance between cost, access, and residential values in school provision. Both papers are recognized for their significant contributions to the field. [Extracted from the article]

Seasonal Associate: by Heike Geißler, translated by Katy Derbyshire, Afterword by Kevin Vennemann, Cambridge, MA, Semiotext(e)/MIT Press, 2018, 239 pp., $16.95/£13.99 (paper) Heike Geißler's nameless female protagonist, temporary employee for the holiday season at Amazon-Germany in Leipzig, has company. The past few years have produced numerous accounts on work, both scholarly and personal, studies of labor and individual narratives of employment, jobs, gigs, the ever more dispersed realm of people's interaction with the economy, made more tenuous on account of the Covid-19 pandemic. [Extracted from the article]

Emma Saunders-Hastings, Private Virtues, Public Vices: Philanthropy and Democratic Equality: University of Chicago Press, Chicago, Illinois, 2022, 256 pp, Paper. I Private Virtues, Public Vices: Philanthropy and Democratic Equality i is a product of Emma Saunders-Hastings' assistant professorship at the Ohio State University. The theory of philanthropic paternalism is introduced in Chapter four, in which Saunders-Hastings sees philanthropy as condescending in the neutral sense of providing aid or support. [Extracted from the article]

This document discusses the current state of research on microinsurance and highlights the need for further study in this area. The microinsurance sector has experienced significant growth, particularly in Asian countries, and plays a crucial role in providing financial protection to low-income populations. However, there is still a lack of understanding regarding the theoretical benefits, practical effectiveness, and necessary regulation of microinsurance. The document introduces three articles from a special issue of The Geneva Papers on Risk and Insurance that address various aspects of microinsurance, including adoption determinants in Ghana, premium calculation for beekeeping insurance in Turkey, and the impact of microinsurance on the financial resilience of low-income households in Ghana. The articles provide valuable insights for policymakers and practitioners and suggest avenues for future research, such as exploring the role of digital technologies and mobile banking in enhancing accessibility and reducing costs, and examining the scalability of beekeeping insurance models to other agricultural sectors. The document concludes by suggesting the possibility of partnering microinsurance with inclusive insurance to improve financial inclusion. [Extracted from the article]

Rag paper is a common denominator for many Romantic‐era medial forms. The term "media ecology" has become increasingly accepted in media theory, and its spatial and ecological affinities connect it to the urgent topic of climate change. Media ecology invites book historians to consider the labor as well as the origins of the materials that underwrite our culture. This consideration of paper recasts the literary archive as an accretion of physical as well as intellectual labor. The physical labor necessary for the making of rag paper included increasingly industrialized agricultural work and textile production, as well as rag collecting and sorting, as many period authors were aware. At the inception of the Bank Restriction Period (1797–1821), the introduction of low‐denomination paper banknotes changed the London media ecology in ways that had a devastating effect on the English poor, including the very orders of agricultural and textiles workers, rag collectors, and papermill rag‐room women who had a hand in paper making. The Bank of England investigated and prosecuted hundreds, resulting in poverty, transportation, imprisonment, and executions. Paper notes and their forgeries invited considerations of other forms of cultural value and circulation, including literary authorship, and the article ends with the Bank of England's current celebration of Jane Austen as a literary icon by including her portrait on the polymer £10 note. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dale Barbour explores the evolution of swimming in Toronto from the time the city was a pre-railway colonial community of 30,000 souls in 1850 to its expansion into the Dominion of Canada's second largest municipality by 1935, with a population of 850,000. For the purposes of Dale Barbour's book, the commission's development of better leisure and swimming opportunities at Sunnyside in the city's west end is particularly important. [Extracted from the article]

Environmental health refers to the health effects associated with environmental factors, such as air pollution, water contamination, and climate change. Environmental hazards are associated with poor outcomes in common diseases, including diabetes and heart disease. In this position paper, the American College of Physicians (ACP) seeks to inform physicians about environmental health and offers policymakers recommendations to reduce the adverse health consequences of climate change, improve air and water quality, reduce exposure to toxic substances, and address environmental injustice. ACP affirms that all communities, including people of color, people with low income, and marginalized populations, deserve to live in a healthy environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Globalization, Poverty and Income Inequality: Insights from Indonesia: Edited by Richard Barichello, Arianto A. Patunru and Richard Schwindt. He also does not distinguish between Gini coefficients based on household income and those based on household expenditures; Indonesian estimates are usually based on expenditure figures, which are not directly comparable with other countries in Asia, let alone the OECD countries. Trade openness may well have increased less rapidly in Indonesia than in China, India and Vietnam since 1980, but in 1980 these three last economies were still largely closed to global trade. [Extracted from the article]

Generosity and selflessness from the host community in Cox's Bazar were deemed to be instrumental in supporting Rohingyas who sought refuge in Bangladesh in 2017. Thousands of Rohingyas had to flee from their own country to save lives due to state-supported military violence. Initially, Bangladeshi media and civil society were largely supportive of the Rohingyas. However, the initial sympathy later withered away and may have turned into frustration and hostility. Based on 39 in-depth interviews with hot community members and humanitarian professionals, this paper argues that protraction of the crisis, inability to access natural resources due to the refugee camps, some Rohingyas' involvement in various unlawful activities, a perceived sense of neglect from the international community, and disruption in local labour market/trade affecting cost of living conditions for low-income people seem to have played important roles in creating widespread tensions between the host community and Rohingya refugees. We contend that findings of this study will add to the critical scholarship of humanitarian development in deepening the understanding of host and refugee communities' relationships. This paper will also have a positive impact on future policies toward harmonious coexistence between host communities and displaced refugees and potential sustainable solutions to the crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most aspects of the argument of the UK government's 2000 White Paper on globalization and development stand up reasonably well to the findings of subsequent research. But there is significant new evidence in two areas: the size of the contribution of institutions to growth; and the complexity of the effects of increased openness on poor people. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper isolates the causal impact of neighborhood environment on the credit outcomes of low-income borrowers by analyzing the participants of the Moving to Opportunity (MTO) experiment. MTO was a unique, large-scale experiment that offered families vouchers to move to better neighborhoods via randomized lottery. We find higher credit scores and use among those required to move to the lowest poverty areas as young children. For those who moved as adults, we find that better neighborhoods lead to a reduction of overdue debts and delinquencies, but only among those given unrestricted neighborhood choice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The first ten-year implementation plan (TIP) of Agenda 2063: The Africa we want drew to a close this year. Member states of the African Union and the AU institutions, led by the AU Development Agency (AUDA-NEPAD) as well as the AU Commission (AUC), have worked closely and collaboratively over the past five years to galvanise implementation of the plan. Empirical findings of continental reporting concerning the aims of Agenda 2063 revealed some progress towards implementing most of its aspirations, particularly as regards improving governance and promoting the rule of law in Africa. This commentary paper argues that African leaders and organs need to embrace Agenda 2063 as a social contract between African citizens, leaders and AU organs if the aspirations of Agenda 2063 are to be achieved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The land of Himachal is well-known as "Dev Bhoomi " which is the well-suited name authored for Himachal Pradesh, being the place that is known for divine beings, Goddesses and nearby Gods overseeing the neighbourhood life and customs of individuals in the state. Himachal Pradesh has a rich social legacy and gastronomy which presents the anthropological, cultural, environmental and topographical diversity of the state. The influence on culinary culture reflection is seen in the variations of local destination development, movement of local populations, and architecture of houses, clothing styles, food and food habits, availability of raw materials, environmental conditions, and traditional knowledge of the local people. This paper is about how the food culture in Himachal Pradesh, especially in Hamirpur and Una districts, has been influenced by various things like history, geography, culture and how rich or poor people are. The paper talks about how the researchers studied it, such as how they chose who to talk to, how they collected information, and how they looked at the information to learn more. This study will be based on how people eat in Himachal and what food they like. We will be asking 110 people from two different districts about their eating habits, where they like to eat out and how they cook. We will use both new information we collect ourselves and information we get from other sources such as books and websites. We'll use a survey to ask people questions and we can also look at things like diaries and articles to find out more. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Children, digital inclusion, disability, immigrants, intersectionality, refugees, sex workers, vulnerability, young people, formerly incarcerated people While we should acknowledge that all humans and populations are potentially subject to conditions of vulnerability, there are some groups that persistently face conditions of vulnerability, such as ethnic minorities, refugees, elderly, people with disabilities, homeless people, one-parent households, unemployed people, Gypsy-travellers and others. The three papers acknowledge this alongside the complicated patterns of intra-disability variability and how these patterns portray a complex picture of the digital inclusion of people with disabilities. Keywords: Children; digital inclusion; disability; formerly incarcerated people; immigrants; intersectionality; refugees; sex workers; vulnerability; young people EN Children digital inclusion disability formerly incarcerated people immigrants intersectionality refugees sex workers vulnerability young people 271 278 8 02/15/22 20220201 NES 220201 Background and vision This special issue constitutes a timely and diverse collection of papers that present original insights into the digital inclusion of those who experience socio-demographic, economic, geographic, political or other vulnerabilities. [Extracted from the article]

Adrian Wood is right to note a significant shift in official thinking since the publication in 2000 of the DFID White Paper on globalization. This is confirmed by the 2004 White Paper on the same subject, published by the Department for Trade and Industry: there is more emphasis on the institutional pre-conditions for successful liberalization, more on the specificity of individual country experience, more on the plight of losers, and more on the need for social protection. These themes are important and require some re-thinking of aid policy. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: The purpose of this article is to identify the ideological functions of economic theory using the historical case of the opinions of classical economists on the poor law as an example (treating ideological sets of ideas as justifications for the social order). Research Design & Methods: The research method adopted in this paper is an analysis of the text carried out in the context of its social function. Findings: The article analyses some moral and social aspects of the emergence of economic theory and shows classical economists' criticisms of the Old Poor Law as rationalisation of social prejudices of upper classes of society. The essence of the discourse of mainstream economists has been to show low moral resources in the working class as the cause of poverty, together with the thesis that social assistance perpetuates this condition. The opposite of these theories were John Barton's arguments, portraying welfare as an investment in the moral resources of the poor, allowing them to return to the ranks of working people. This dispute was forgotten for many years, but seems still relevant in the 21st century context. Implications / Recommendations: This paper supports the opinions of eminent scholars (like Blaug or Lindert) that the main problems with poverty are essentially the same in our times as in the 19th century. Blaming poor people for their poverty seems as familiar to us today as it was two hundred years ago. Thus the issue of the welfare state is more moral and political than it is theoretical. Contribution: This paper is a contribution to the identification of the role of social prejudice in the emergence of economic theory. Article type: review article. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Aims: Two main problems the globe currently facing are migration and weather variation. Weather change has a significant impact on the agricultural industry, which affects the majority of poor people. There is a dearth of adequate methodological documentation when examining the relationship between weather variation, agricultural output, and migration. We aimed to identify methodological reporting difficulties by reviewing the quantitative literature on weather‐related migration through agricultural channels. Methods: A systematic evaluation was conducted using papers published between January 2010 and June 2022, indexed in the SCOPUS, PUBMED, and Google Scholar databases. Using inclusion/exclusion criteria, we selected 22 original research articles out of 18,929 distinct articles for review, in accordance with the PRISMA guidelines. We extracted data from each study to understand how various concepts, research designs, and investigative techniques influence our understanding of migration patterns related to weather in the agricultural sector. Results: The majority (64%) of the study's data consisted of time series data. In 50% of the studies, secondary data were used. Additionally, 55% of these studies did not state the sample size. In 40% of the studies, model assumptions were fully adhered to, whereas in 36% of the studies, they were not followed at all. The majority of the articles used the Ordinary Least Squares technique, while about 41% applied the Two‐Stage Least Squares technique. Various tests were conducted across these studies, such as robustness checks (59.1%), endogeneity tests (31.8%), omitted variable bias tests (22.7%), sensitivity analyses (22.7%), and weak instrument tests (13.6%), to name a few. In the research we selected, the methodology section had various shortcomings and lacked organization. Furthermore, the justifications for deviations from model assumptions were unclear, potentially affecting the study outcomes. Conclusion: This study has important indications for researchers in studying climatic (weather) migration through agricultural channels besides for policymakers by giving a thorough review of the methods and techniques. Key points: Providing narrative insights on how various issues, research designs, and analytical techniques shape our understanding of the association between weather variation and migration via agricultural production.Providing a broad overview of the pertinent literature, covering 22 articles, as a complement to earlier studies.Our study has important ramifications for researchers studying climatic (weather) migration through agricultural channels as well as for policymakers by giving a thorough review of the methods and techniques currently used in this sector.Future studies on weather variation, agricultural production, and migration should use prudent and comparable models that capture whole climatic (weather) impacts on migration through mediating factors like agricultural production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climatic events and other natural-related disasters experienced in the arid and semi-arid lands of northern Kenya negatively affect the pastoral livelihoods of the communities. Addressing vulnerability to climate shocks among pastoral communities of Kenya's Arid and Semi-lands presents a persistent challenge. Cash transfer programmes have increasingly grown as one mode of building household resilience. Understanding the role of cash transfer interventions on household resilience to climate shocks is key to policy programming. This paper aimed at determining the effects of cash transfers on household resilience to climate shocks. The paper evaluated the Hunger Safety Net Program, which is one of the largest unconditional cash transfer programs in Kenya. The Hunger Safety Net Program targeted poor people in northern Kenya including the counties of Turkana, Wajir, Marsabit, and Mandera. To establish the impact the paper compares households which received cash transfers with those that did not receive transfers. The panel fixed effects model was used to determine the effects of cash transfers on household resilience. The results indicate that cash transfers have positive significant effects on household resilience to climate shocks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSPs) are currently at the centre of development assistance and planning in many countries and donor agencies. As such, they are potentially of enormous significance for children living in poverty. Based on a review of PRSP documents, authors' experiences and other evidence, the paper explores the main policies of economic growth and social sector investment laid out in PRSPs and some likely implications for children's lives and equitable development. It examines how far PRSPs recognize childhood poverty as a priority, and the strategies' often limited commitments to tackle it. The paper reflects on changes in policy planning, budgeting and review processes associated with PRSPs and examines their potential to contribute to effective poverty reduction. It concludes that, to date, changes in these processes are the most significant contribution of PRSPs; while the potential for more effective policy is strong, much work is required by all involved before they are a comprehensive or strategic approach to reducing childhood poverty or securing the wellbeing of future generations. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The aim of this paper is to analyze which sustainable supply chain management (SSCM) arguments are addressed in the base of the pyramid (BoP)-related research. BoP projects address how companies contribute to fulfilling the needs of the poorest populations; increasingly, academics are applying theory to explain these projects. The need for integrating the BoP population into value-adding activities is widely acknowledged, but this is not yet reflected in supply chain management (SCM)-related concepts. The links to SSCM are frequently mentioned but in a scattered manner. Design/methodology/approach – The paper presents a structured literature review of BoP papers published between 2000 and 2014 in peer-reviewed, English-speaking journals available on Web of Science. A content analysis of BoP papers is conducted based on SSCM constructs from the framework presented by Beske and Seuring (2014). Findings – The frequencies of SSCM constructs identified in the BoP papers indicate the prevalence of SSCM arguments in the BoP discourse. Technological integration emerges as the core SSCM practice frequently identified and is contingent with a number of other practices. Further, SSCM practices including long-term relationship development, partner development, joint development, enhanced communication, learning, stakeholder management and innovation have regularly been referred to and are considered important by respective BoP scholars. The contingency analysis shows significant correlations among various pairs of categories and allows us to point to major lines of related arguments. Research limitations/implications – The paper offers insights into the potential links between the SSCM and BoP research streams and sets ground for further theoretical exploration of the subject. Limitations are the uptake of one particular conceptual framework, the selection of BoP papers for the review process and the interpretation of the frequency and contingency analysis. The paper offers a foundation for developing a research stream where BoP-related issues are integrated into research on (S)SCM. Practical implications – SCM has many practical applications, which help to establish and improve supply chain design and operations. This would benefit BoP projects and should improve their practical outcomes. The relevance of technological integration seems straightforward, but needs a lot of effort to be implemented in each single project. Social implications – BoP-related research has gained increasing attention in recent years and should help drive the global sustainable development agenda further in the respective geographic locations. Establishing capable supply chains that deliver sustainable outcomes will be at the core of such projects. This paper highlights fundamental practices for firms targeting BoP markets with an effort to alleviate poverty. Originality/value – The paper applies SSCM theory to analyze BoP issues and thereby interlinks the two research streams. Until now, research amalgamating the two concepts has been disconnected. Therefore, by providing an overview of existing publications, more focus for future studies is created, which is valuable and necessary for advancing both fields. Additionally, assessing BoP-type projects in low-income countries will allow the SSCM agenda to look beyond what is so far typically researched. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In resource poor environments, identifying those most in need of limited available resources is challenging. Kenya's older persons cash transfer programme (OPCT) targeted at the most poor used a 2-stage targeting process to identify beneficiaries, combining community-based selection with a proxy means-test. This paper investigates whether the process "correctly" identified targeted vulnerable older people in Nairobi's informal settlements and whether receipt of the OPCT resulted in an improvement in perceived financial wellbeing. Regression results show that individuals with greater need were covered under the OPCT. Using propensity score matching, the paper evidences that the OPCT improved subjective financial wellbeing among beneficiaries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

So were his 2003 paper with Shaohua Chen on "Measuring Pro-Poor Growth", which first introduced the now widely used concept of growth incidence curves (Ravallion and Chen [6]) and his solo paper in the I American Economic Review i on "Why Don't we see Poverty Convergence?" Third, and perhaps most influential of all, was Ravallion's work on international poverty comparisons and global poverty measurement. GRAPH Martin Ravallion, a leading development economist and poverty scholar, died on 24 December 2022 in Washington, DC, at the age of 70. [Extracted from the article]

Purpose: This paper seeks to contribute to the debate on the usefulness of institutional theory to critical studies. It pursues this topic by exploring some of the possibilities for allocating local authority funds more fairly for poor residents. This paper aims to shed light on the institution of budgeting in a democratically elected local government under austerity. Design/methodology/approach: This paper uses world culture theory, the study of the devolution of cultural authority to individuals and organisations through which they turn into agentic actors. Based on a field study of Newcastle City Council's (NCC's) budget-related practices, the paper uses the notion of actorhood to explore the use of fairness in austerity budgets. Findings: This paper documents how new concerns with fairness gave rise to new local authority practices and gave NCC characteristics of actorhood. This paper also shows why it might make sense for a local authority that is managing austerity budget cuts and cutting back on services to make more detailed performance information public, rather than attempting to hide service deterioration, as some prior literature suggests. This paper delineates the limits to actorhood, in this study's case, principally the inability to overcome structural constraints of legal state power. Practical implications: The paper is suggestive of ways in which local government can fight inequality in opposition to central government austerity. Originality/value: To the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the first qualitative accounting study of actorhood. It coins the phrase fairness assemblage to denote a combination of various accounting technologies, organisational elements and local government practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rag picker, is a term for someone who makes a living by rummaging through refuse in the streets to collect material for salvage. Scraps of cloth and paper could be turned into cardboard, broken glass could be melted down and reused, and even dead cats and dogs could be skinned to make clothes. In India alone, there are approximately 4 million women in this profession. However, this huge number in no way implies that it is a comfortable profession in any way. Some common problems faced by the rag pickers are, Poor and marginalized, Unhealthy environment, Poor living condition and Victims of abuse. The main purpose of this paper is to find out the extent of population engaged in rag picking world wide and the nature of social, health problems they face. The paper also reflects on the interventions tried out to uplift the rag pickers in different parts of the world. This study aims to hold out a systematic scientific review of national and international literature reporting different skill and vocational training programmes and elucidate their effectiveness in improving the job opportunities and living conditions of various marginalized, vulnerable and underprivileged people group. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the last two decades of democratic governance in Nigeria, the civil society organizations (CSOs), which form a large group of vocational, social, political, cultural, educational, and religious volunteer activists, are reputed for building local capacity and advocating with and for the poor, with a relatively visible impact on policy and practice. This paper builds on existing literature concerning how the empirical realm of civil society, to which advocacy is most directly related, has been utilized within the three different components of a comprehensive advocacy strategy--transformational (citizen empowerment), developmental (civil society strengthening) and instrumental (policy influence). Drawing from the perspectives of multi-sectoral, territorial, and local approaches, the paper also examines how development partners, practitioners and researchers can actively enhance civil society's resilience and sustainability to influence pro-poor policies and promote the developmental agenda in southwestern Nigeria. It specifically focuses on the mechanism for connecting the objectives and resources developed by Nigeria's six southwestern states through their Development Agenda for Western Nigeria (DAWN) commission at the regional level as they relate to the problems and priorities that apply at the rural community level where the majority of the citizens reside. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research, as well as mainstream culture, may be too quick to label parenting young people of color (which we define as being under or near the age of 20 when having a child) as delinquent and "at risk". Using qualitative data, we offer anti-deficit framing surrounding students of color with children, highlighting the unique achievements of a set of "parent-strivers" despite the natural challenges of unexpectant parenthood. Our findings suggest that the parenting and academic identities of low-income people of color can be mutually beneficial and reinforced through positive schooling influences; we challenge the idea that education becomes a secondary priority after one becomes a parent. This paper answers the call for a better "articulation of agency" within exclusionary institutions. It contributes a rare acknowledgment of positive family outcomes to offset the concept of risk monopolizing the field and leaving us without support-oriented thinking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Historia Agraria is the property of Historia Agraria and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The aim of this paper is to analyse the evolution of Spanish households' indebtedness and financial vulnerability over the course of this century using micro-data from the Household Finance and Consumption Survey. Our results show a growing debt participation of Spanish households and an increase in the stock of outstanding debt of indebted households, a trend that reversed with the end of the Great Recession. Moreover, the percentage of financially vulnerable households according to three indicators grew dramatically until the end of the downward phase of the last economic cycle and showed considerable signs of improvement during the second half of 2010s. These results, nonetheless, call attention to the number of Spanish households being unable to service their debts in the face of an economic downturn. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the current climate of welfare reform, it is important to understand how perceptions of the poor affect policy decisions. This paper examines how people distinguish between the undeserving poor and the deserving poor, and how this differentiation affects policy decisions. Survey respondents rated each policy in a set of hypothetical policies on a liberal-conservative continuum. Analyses were then conducted to explore differences in the respondents' likelihood of recommending the most liberal and the most conservative of these policies. Study I demonstrated that liberal policies were more likely to be recommended and conservative policies were less likely to be recommended when the target group was perceived to be deserving rather than undeserving. Study 2 replicated this effect of perceived deservingness and demonstrated an effect of attribution of responsibility. That is, liberal policies were more likely to be recommended and conservative policies were less likely to be recommended when the responsibility for the target's poverty was attributed to society rather than to the individual. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Starting with a brief review of why all post-industrial societies tend to be inegalitarian, this paper develops two main themes: (1) how the idea that people are individually responsible for their own fates reduces poverty but impedes redistribution, and (2) how both the loose ties of individuals to their societies and the selective nature of their empathy and pity for others reduces compassion for the poor, making redistribution unlikely. The first theme is elaborated through psychological research on dispositional versus circumstantial attributions, showing their effects on the widely shared belief in a just world and more generally on the prevailing theory of the justice of deserts. The attribution-affect-action model is used to show how dispositional attributions evoke either anger or pity for victims and, if anger, then unwillingness to help. The development of the second theme shows how people divorce their own fates from those of their nations, how the basic tendency to favor the familiar and similar limits support for redistribution, how converting concern regarding deprivations of the self to concern for (fraternal) deprivation of people like the self excludes those who most need help, how envy fails to lead to redistribution, and finally, how people's ideas of the privileged and the disadvantaged reflect market values and often mark the poor and the different as overprivileged. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]