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This is the final book in a three-part series entitled, "Voices of the Poor." The series is based on an unprecedented effort to gather the views, experiences, and aspirations of more than 60,000 poor men and women from sixty countries. The work was undertaken for the "World Development Report 2000/2001: Attacking Poverty." This publication is organized as follows: Each country chapter opens up with a brief life story. These life stories were chosen because they highlight concerns raised not only by poor women and men living in that particular community, but because the same concerns were echoed in other parts of the country. The chapters then unfold around particular sets of issues that emerged repeatedly in group discussions and individual interviews. While the findings reported in the chapters cannot be generalized to represent poverty conditions for an entire nation, the chapters bring to life what it means to be poor in various communities, in fourteen countries, from the perspective of poor people. In the final chapter, four major patterns emerge: Poor people need a diverse set of assets and capabilities if they are to survive and overcome poverty. Economy-wide policies and shocks deplete poor people's assets and increase their insecurity. The culture of mediating institutions often negatively distorts the impact of well-intended policies and excludes the poor from gains. Gender inequity within households is persistent and children are acutely vulnerable.

Using the lens of social capital-especially bridging or cross-cutting ties that cut across social groups and between social groups and government-provides new insights into policy design. Solidarity within social groups creates ties (bonding social capital) that bring people and resources together. In unequal societies, ties that cut across groups (bridging social capital) are essential for social cohesion and for poverty reduction. The nature of interaction between state and society is characterized as complementarity and substitution. When states are functional, the informal and formal work well together-for example, government support or community-based development. When states become dysfunctional, the informal institutions become a substitute and are reduced to serving a defensive or survival function. To move toward economic and social well-being, states must support inclusive development. Investments in the organizational capacity of the poor are critical. Interventions are also required to foster bridging ties across social groups-ethnic, religious, caste, or racial groups. Such interventions can stem from the state, private sector, or civil society and include: Changes in rules to include groups previously excluded from formal systems of finance, education, and governance, at all levels. Political pluralism and citizenship rights. Fairness before the law for all social groups together. Infrastructure that eases communication. Education, media, and public information policies that reinforce norms and values of tolerance and diversity.

Development practitioners are coming to a consensus that participation by the intended beneficiaries improves project performance. But is there convincing evidence that this is true? Skeptics have three objections: 1)"Participation is not objective -- project rankings are subjective; 2) this subjectivity leads to"halo effects"; 3) better project performance may have increased beneficiary participation rather than the other way around -- a statistical association is not proof of cause and effect. The authors show methodologically how to answer each of these objections. Subjectivity does not preclude reliable cardinal measurement. Halo effects do not appear to induce a strong upward bias in estimating the effect of participation. Finally, instrumental variables estimation can help establish a structural cause and effect relationship between participation and project performance -- at least in the rural water supply projects they studied.