Multidimensionality of Social Exclusion

Developed originally in France, the notion of social exclusion was subsequently promoted by the European Commission within its political debates and research programmes. The notion now seems to have come of age at least within Europe if not globally. Since the crisis of the welfare state in Western Europe (and in the former Soviet Union and Central and Eastern Europe for that matter) new forms of poverty, inequalities and exclusion from social rights are occurring more frequently than before. These problems are being aggravated by the fundamental structural changes necessitated by the emerging global economy.

WeD is a multidisciplinary research group funded by the ESRC, dedicated to the study of poverty, inequality and the quality of life in poor countries. The research group is based at the University of Bath and draws on the knowledge and expertise from three different departments (Economics and International Development, Social and Policy Sciences and Psychology) as well as an extensive network of overseas contacts and specific partnerships with institutes in Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Peru and Thailand. The purpose of the research programme is to develop conceptual and methodological tools for investigating and understanding the social and cultural construction of well-being in specific countries.

IDS Bulletin, 1998

This IDS Bulletin is an oddity: a publication by an institute specialising in developing countries, which consists almost entirely of papers about developed countries. There is a justification, however. It lies in the rapid growth in writing about a new concept, 'social exclusion'. Despite some pioneering work by the International Institute of Labour Studies on social exclusion in the South2, most writing on social exclusion has been in and about the North, originally in France, but now more widely3. The new writing represents new thinking on a new problem, namely the rapid growth of poverty in rich countries. Poverty has been driven rapidly up the policy and research agendas of the European welfare states, of the USA, and also of Eastern Europe's transitional countries. Increasingly, it is discussed in the vocabulary of social exclusion. Cannan provided an overview on social exclusion and French social integration policies in the April 1997 IDS Bulletin (Cannan 1997); recent work on Britain includes Walker and Walker (eds) (1997), London Research Centre (1996), and Jordan (1996). Research on social exclusion has been summarised in the annotated bibliography prepared for our project (O'Brien and de Haan 1997).

Local Economy: The Journal of the Local Economy Policy Unit, 2015

This paper provides a critical analysis of the concepts of poverty and social exclusion in three parts. First, it examines the relationship between poverty and social exclusion, a distinction that has been the subject of analysis, debate and controversy. Second, the concepts of poverty and social exclusion as used in the European policy discourse are analysed, and how changes in terminology, links to the economic growth agenda, and emphasis on employment as a response can be noticed. The recognition of the ‘territorial dimension’ of poverty and social exclusion has been an increasingly important feature of EU discourse and actions. Third, the paper explores the inherent territoriality of poverty and social exclusion, which has paved the way for localised spatial responses. The authors argue that economic concerns have triggered a continuous tendency to narrow down the focus of definition and action, in order to offer clarity of scope to researchers and policy makers, but that such n...

CWEP, 2015

European Journal of Social Theory, 2024

Amartya Sen has argued that poverty means much more than lacking income: it means that a person falls short of securing a basic level of capabilities. His main justification for this claim is that we need to look at what is important in a person's life (what a person's actual functionings are, and what alternative outcomes could be achieved), rather than just at what a person has. In this article, I argue that, although

Development, 2007

New policies against poverty in advanced countries, within a more general trend of welfare reforms, tend to replace poverty as social risk with a category of social exclusion. This accounts less for social processes producing vulnerability, than for extreme poverty as the target for humanitarian concern. Development strategies need to overcome such humanitarian shift and recover a logic of rights against poverty in order to draw public action able to reach the multiple causes of poverty.

Studies in Social and Political Thought. Vol, 2000

This paper makes a strong plea for the use of the concept of social exclusion, and argues that it has relevance for richer as well as poorer countries.1 The concept does not describe a new reality; neither is it is the only appropriate or even a radically innovative concept to ...

IDS Bulletin, 2000

Social exclusion is a complex and multi-dimension process. It involves the lack or denial of resources, rights, goods and services and the inability to participate in the normal relationship and activities available to the majority of people in a society, whether in economic, social, cultural or political arenas. It affects both the quality of life of individual and the equity and cohesion of society as a whole. This, in turn, reduces opportunities to lead a successful life and further increase the risk of poverty. Without effective education, health, social, tax benefit and employment system, the risk of poverty is passed from one generation to the next. This causes poverty to persist and hence more inequality which can lead to long term loss of economic productivity from whole group of society and hamper inclusive and sustainable economic growth. People at risk at poverty or social exclusion. " Show the number of people affected by at least one of three forms of poverty – Monetary poverty, material deprivation or low work intensity. People can suffer from more than one dimension of poverty at a time. Poverty and social exclusion are the two sides of the one coin. The issue of concern is both low income and the other factors relating to the serve and chronic disadvantage, and that these are closely connected. Its overall scope is the same whether the word poverty used in the wide and narrow sense. The causes for exclusion can vary from country to country in different times. The exclusion is practiced word wide mostly on the identity of genders, caste, religion, color, nationality and other.