Empowerment as an approach to poverty

This paper seeks to clarify the role of empowerment in anti-poverty policies by addressing the following questions: what is empowerment and how does it relate to participation and botom-up approaches? why is empowerment a useful concept when addressing poverty? what are the potential and pitfalls of an approach based on empowerment? It makes the argument that economic, social and political factors interact to perpetuate the experience of poverty; thus deprivation/marginalization/oppression occur along more than one dimension. While this makes the experience of poverty more encompassing, it also means that positive changes can be effected through actions that address the multi-dimensional nature of poverty. An anti-poverty strategy that focusses on empowerment can address this intrinsic multi-dimensionality better than a standard welfare-driven programme to create assets or generate incomes. Background paper for the 1997 Human Development Report [author]