P30311 Theory of Practice: Approaches and Understandings Essay Assignment II 2013
Nuhidayah Ab Razak | 13022652
“Social Justice based on the values of fairness, equality and respect for diversity is more important than ever amid a global financial and economic crisis” Ban Ki Moon, Secretary-General, United Nations.
Introduction This essay seeks to explore how this link be built between social diversity and equality through thorough assessment of practical means of executing social justice. In doing so, alternative explanations are explored where they exist; identify problems that arise and also possible solutions to create concrete linkages where they are unclear. Inequality is an element that construct the core of the current economic climate as many of the elements discussed in the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are directly or intrinsically addressing the importance of implying fairness and mutual obligation in society and members are responsible for one another, and that we should ensure that all have equal access to reaching their best capacity as described by the Action and Research Centre (RSA, 2008). These values are fundamental, and the disregard would not only hamper the larger ambitions crafted for the benefit of societies which constituents are of diverse nature, but also create a possibility that the goals would not be reached altogether. It is important to recognise the undercurrents that carry across the values of shared responsibility, freedom, equality, solidarity, tolerance and respect which has been identified in much more clarity in recent years through the consolidation of rights based approach and the pursuance of a life of dignity for all. Furthermore, equalising opportunity is fundamental to the human development goal. Diversity equality introduces a new dimension to the development agenda that are far-reaching beyond the current acceptable global and national disparities are. This approach recognises that the solution may not be to target the mass but address the voids which often call for much more attention than ordinary circumstances. Efforts that aim to be relevant and contemporary, as well as parallel with the other major development goals; should inherently do more to listen to the voices that often go unheard.
I.
Identifying Links
One of the major links of how diversity affects development is how social movements have put equality on their agenda. Although government plays a major role in disaster planning and response, traditional government emergency agencies are not equipped to respond to the essential services needed by people with a variety of functional needs (Kailes and Enders, 2006, p16). The Gulf state events confirm what has been recognised for decades – traditional response and recovery systems are often not successful at meeting many human needs (National Council on Disability 2005, National Organisation on Disability 2001). Economists, such as Professor Joseph Stiglitz of the former Chief Economist at the World Bank has long predicted, austerity has only crippled Europe’s growth, with improvements in fiscal positions that are always disappointing. Worse, it is contributing to inequality that will make economic weakness longer-lived, and needlessly contributes to the suffering of the jobless and the poor for many years. Oxfam’s report, A Cautionary Tale: The true cost of austerity and inequality in Europe, makes an important contribution to assessing the high and long-lasting costs of these ill-conceived policies (Cavero, Poinasamy & Krisnah, Oxfam, 2013, p2). These influential organisations have carefully created agendas that can be mobilised with support of formal bodies such as the United Nations and local governments. Recognised and formal bodies can benefit largely from these means, and tap into their energy,
ambition and creativity to work in parallel with the structured framework already embedded in the formal body such as the MDGs. Having social movements as a driver for development and agents of equality makes them the connecting association between them. The progress made by these organisations then would surface the shortfalls that generally include the efforts concerning inequality that appear as the major shortfall. The hampered progresses caused by large inequalities include those concerning income, ethnicity, gender, disabilities, location and realisation of human rights. One method that could enhance the effect of social movements putting equality on their agenda is to mainstreaming the strands of diversity targeted to the needs of a specific community or country and explicitly express these newly integrated goals. It is pertinent that mainstreaming may have indirect effects of being “divisive to promote identity groups in the name of diversity, in promoting group identities can fragment collective projects and the delegation of representatives” (Dawson, 2011, p14). However it is important to recognise the existence of groups with specific needs which require specific responses, such as women and indigenous groups who are excluded from the central stream of policies, but always remembering to bring these together where there are common battles to be fought, for example, against the overarching power of patriarchy.
reflect how inequality will cause disparities that are selfreproducing though policy but gives an overall picture of how this can contribute to a development that strongly lacks sustainability. Global ownership can be considered another linkage between disparities and financial development. This recognition gained from societies building from the bottom up would be reinforced through the selfmade agendas. Action, monitored and championed by the people whom it matter most be an effective approach that is a form of development that sustains itself. Helen Clark (2013) has given examples of how this can be put into practical mobilisation through United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) support of local ownership through its platforms of helping them realise their human rights commitments; empowering and engaging poor people through its agendas and; formulating policies which approach poverty as both a cause and a consequence of discrimination. Using the methodology of analysing empirical data to measure the output into quantifiable goals and predict its impact on the financial and economical institution.
World Poverty Trends -Two Scenarios Towards 2030
II. Achieving diversity inequality are goals that are quantifiable and makes them suitable for the creation and progress of policy making. It is these measurements and metrics that make financial and economic relatable to values pertaining diversity equality. Reaching people at the margins of society poses a different approach than those addresses to average people. This also warns us of the properties of extreme inequality that are selfperpetuating. Disparities can often to be found to be self-reproducing through policy. Extreme inequalities produce bad policies that are bad for poverty reduction too. An example would be in Pakistan where there are needs to increase the revenue collection and where a basic health and basic education is highly needed at this point in time. Rather, the state is unable to do so as the country has one of the lowest GDP to revenue ratio. This is caused by the local Tax codes that are written by the rich for the rich to facilitate tax evasion. Political inequalities and power disparities give rise to exclusive institutions that allow powerful and advantaged to establish the ‘rules of the game’, which leads to the development of inefficient institutions and to cycles of advantage to disadvantage (Jones, 2009, p22). This is a practical example of how inequality can permeate down through the political process that does not only
|This graph shows the gap in which 430 million people will be less or more be in poverty. This is done by showing distributional shifts of wealth in one way or the other. In one situation the wealth of the richest 10% is distributed to the poorest 40%, and inversely in the other situation. The result of analyses like these could mould policies that target the issues of inequality, such as wealth distribution.
III.
Access
An important element that binds the economic climate and the distribution of development, peace, security and upholding of human rights is how both of these components are accessed and its level of accessibility. Development defined by the economic parameters are accessed by means such as adequate employment and social protection, however measurements and extents of disparities lack depth. Andy Sumner (ODI, 2013, p12) has pointed out why education or health based services are lacking because people are unable to access them easily. This is to stark contrast to the situation of inequalities affecting age, gender, the disabled and various marginalised groups are issues that are often given a high importance in the global development arena and in some instances described in a state or urgency. Some of the empirical data that is acquired are surveys and does not provide a real-time perspective of the situation. To better link inequalities as a means to create targeted solutions, the data available should reflect the present state of uncharted recognition that progress at the margins takes above-average effort in attainment. This apparent cavity in specificity in data collection also manifests itself in a demobilisation such as that disparity within the majority of countries has grown to the point of slowing down progress (Van de Moortele, 2008). Financial stability of a country also depends on other forms of turbulence that may be affecting its progress. This progress could not be achieved, nor can it can it be sustained through armed conflict, violence, insecurity and injustice which are ills that have roots in social and economic deprivation and inequality within communities. This onset of instability can be regarded as a precursor to poverty. Not all external factors directly affect one another as they can have interlocking qualities. Interlocking disparities can even generate multiplier effects and should not to be treated different silos. One example of where changes occurred across different strands where a targeted programme was initiated is the Progresa programme (now called Oportunidades). This programme, implemented by the Mexican government, provides in-kind benefits to people in extreme poverty in rural areas. The transfers are structured to that they help alleviate poverty but also encourage investment in education, health and nutrition. An independent impact evaluation of the programme (Skoufias and McClafferty, 2001) robustly showed that the programme has had significant impact in a number of ways. The programme was found to significantly increase school enrolment, particularly of girls, leading to 8% higher earnings on entering the workforce. It was found to have a strong impact on health as well, lowering the incidence of illness by 12%
and reducing the number of ‘sick days’ by 19%. In terms of nutrition, the programme fostered a higher calorie intake and lower incidence of stunting. Finally it had significant effect empowering women, by placing them in control of the benefits (Jones, 2009, p30). Through this we can see that strands of the poor and living the rural areas have engaged in this programme to empower women, boosted their efficiency at work and create a healthier living environment.
IV.
Sustainable Development
Inequality and empowering diversity directly addresses the difficulties of societies where resources are not distributed equally, this implies redistribution of opportunities, although the shape that such redistribution should take remains contested. This process should redirect into the sustainable development to contribute to the prosperity of a nation’s economy and financial status. Taking on an agenda which strings together equal distribution, social empowerment, which positively reinforces the economy, can produce an economy that can endure more shocks that may affect the cycle. The application of a poverty eradication programme into this cycle can better ensure that the intended impacts of the programme reach its targeted groups. A sustainable development is one that is able to endure shocks and has the capacity to recover because of the resilience measures of social security and organised. It can be found in unexpected vessels such as climate change that disparities is congruent with many development agents, at times coinciding closely with the economy of a state. As well as central role that equity plays alongside growth in determining the rate of poverty reduction, certain types of inequalities – in access to health care, education or markets, or in civil and political rights – have a direct causal effect on poverty. They also reinforce intergenerational transmission of poverty and reduce individuals’ chances of escaping poverty (Jones, 2009, p23). Through its multiplicative relationship with growth, inequality directly determines the rate of poverty reduction. Holding the level of growth constant, a reduction in equality will reduce poverty while an increase will increase it. Similarly, for a given growth, this will translate into greater poverty reduction where there is less inequality and lesser poverty reduction where there is more. Climate change has recently affected people with varying amounts of capacities to recover, but in most cases the rich are far more able to recover compared to the poor and marginalised which continue to be vulnerable and are not able to recover. This reflects on how it is the poorest in the world that depend on natural resources, therefore development
programmes should aim to address the environment as well as the poor when informing the climate change trends. Diversity very much takes a multi-disciplinary platform in the sense that there are many approaches to “respecting, valuing and harnessing differences so that all individuals can make their full contribution in order to make development work better for excluded groups� thereby increasing their effectiveness in poverty reduction by addressing imbalances, challenging injustice and tackling prejudice (DFID, 2009).
V. Solutions for poverty eradication are usually bold and simple in design; however diversity is a complex and context-driven subject, usually involving long term issues that do not easily untangle itself. Beginning to create solutions for the many strands of inequality, it can be found that links between poverty and the ongoing inequalities are embedded in piecing resolves together. For this correlation to begin to consolidate, solutions must be able to be universal in nature, responsive to complexities, needs and capacities of individual countries. Its framework should have unique and relevant contribution that would make a more significant impact on the situation of the current drivers of the market are that it should implement a rights based approach, with a particular emphasis on women, young people and marginalised groups. It must also address the other dimensions that also contribute to means of sustainable development through protecting planets resources, emphasizing sustainable consumption, production and support action to ultimately curb the effects of climate change that creates unprecedented shocks in vulnerable groups. It is important after recognising these differences to establish which diversity is more important and what kind of strategies could take place to prioritise different diversities. Another major issue is how to prioritise the strands of diversity of a given organisation. However, according to Jones (2009, p26), the identification of priorities should be directed towards an equity agenda
through providing universal public services for fair treatment, targeted action for disadvantaged groups, providing social protection, implementing redistribution and challenging embedded power imbalances.
Conclusion In conclusion, links between fairness , equality as well as respect for diversity and the global financial and economic climate can be identified firstly in the way in which social movements build and continually shape their agenda; secondly, the measurements and metrics of how both elements can be quantified; thirdly, access to information and operationalization of programmes; how both are essential elements to a sustainable development; and finally is also embedded in the challenges and potential solutions addressing disparity to gather economical prosperity. Types of relationships differ in each situation, identifying more than just direct and indirect correlation but ones that are mutually reinforcing, interlocking, relationships that generate multiplier effects, relationships that are not in isolation or should be confined to different silos causing implicit separation. A point that this essay wishes to emphasize is the use of methods that end implicit separation of different strands of diversity. Organisations, bodies that form the state and the United Nations should realise the potential of having bold and ambitious goals that are mutually reinforced by the importance of distribution, and context-driven solutions of the most marginalised at the end of the spectrum, which means a more complex and thorough approach. Ultimately, if organisations will the eradication of absolute poverty, they would ignore the many distributional sides at their peril because the goals will be even more far-reaching than possibly met. Each strand of diversity inequality should be address with specificity as we would like individual persons to be in control of their dignity and have their own voice.
References
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Images http://www.jm.undp.org/files/u80/mdgs.jpg http://www.zw.one.un.org/sites/default/files/imagecache/new_feature-670x265/gender.jpg