An inquiry into well-being and destitution / Partha Dasgupta.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Dasgupta, Partha.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Poverty--Developing countries.

Poverty.

Quality of life--Developing countries.

Quality of life.

Resource allocation.

Income distribution--Developing countries.

Income distribution.

Households--Developing countries.

Households.

Malnutrition--Developing countries.

Malnutrition.

Physical Description:

xviii, 661 p. : ill.

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Oxford : Clarendon Press ; New York : Oxford University Press, 1993.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Dealing comprehensively with the problem of poverty and undernourishment, this book addresses the debate over methods of estimating their incidence. It is an analytical and empirical inquiry into human well-being and the phenomenon of destitution as it occurs among rural populations of poor countries.

Contents:

Intro

PREFACE

Contents

PART I: WELL-BEING: THEORY AND REALIZATION

1. THE COMMODITY BASIS OF WELL-BEING

1.1 Welfare and Freedoms

1.2 Facts and Values in the Phenomenon of Destitution

1.3 Destitution as a Resource Allocation Problem

1.4 The Effects of Ill-Health

1.5 Institutions and Agency Roles

1.6 Theory and Policy

2. POLITICAL MORALITY AND THE STATE

2.1 The Government as an Agency

2.2 Acts and their Consequences

2.3 Utility and Rights: Public Judgements and Aggregative Evaluations of Well-Being

2.4 Commodity Needs

2.5 Freedom and Rights: Positive and Negative

2.6 Impersonality and the Public Sphere

3. THE OBJECTS OF SOCIAL CONTRACTS

3.1 Rules versus Discretion

3.2 Outcome- versus Resource-Based Evaluative Principles

3.3 Political Competition and Civil Liberties

3.4 Motivation and Choice

3.5 Social Systems: A Formulation

3.6 Contractual and Optimization Theories

3.7 Ex Post Equilibria and Ex Ante Contracts

3.8 Measures of Freedom

3.9 Social Well-Being Functions

3.10 Efficiency, Equality, and the Problem of Implementation

4. WELL-BEING: FROM THEORY TO MEASUREMENT

4.1 Constituents and Determinants of Well-Being

4.2 Income

4.3 Health, 1: Anthropometric Measures

4.4 Health, 2: Mortality Indices

4.5 Health, 3: Morbidity

4.6 Education: Numeracy and Literacy

5. THE REALIZATION OF WELL-BEING

5.1 Citizenship: Civil, Political, and Socio-Economic

5.2 Inter-Country Comparison of the Quality of Life

5.3 Political and Civil Liberties versus Economic Progress: Is There a Trade-Off?

5.4 Wars and Strife

5.5 Inequalities

5.6 The Point of Cross-Country Studies

Appendix: Political and Civil Rights Indices

PART II: ALLOCATION OF RESOURCES AMONG HOUSEHOLDS: THE STANDARD THEORY

6. RESOURCE ALLOCATION MECHANISMS.

6.1 Resources and Property Rights

6.2 Markets and Market Mechanisms

6.3 Culture and Market Transactions

6.4 Externalities: Public Goods and Common Property Resources

6.5 Infrastructure and Fixed Costs

6.6 Private and Public Realms, and Private and Collective Goods

6.7 Knowledge, Organization, and Economic Growth

*6. PUBLIC GOODS AND COMMON-PROPERTY RESOURCES

*6.1 The Theory of Public Goods

*6.2 The Problem of the Commons

7. DECENTRALIZATION AND CENTRAL GUIDANCE

7.1 Competitive Mechanisms in the Private Realm

7.2 Existence of Competitive Equilibrium

7.3 Competitive Markets and Efficiency

7.4 The implementation of Just Allocations in the Private Realm

7.5 Pluralism and Exchange Restrictions in the Public Realm

7.6 Producer versus Consumer Taxation

7.7 National Income in a Pluralist Society

*7. REAL NATIONAL INCOME AS A MEASURE OF GENERAL WELL-BEING

8. UNCERTAINTY, INSURANCE, AND SOCIAL NORMS

8.1 Environmental Uncertainty

8.2 Choice under Uncertainty and Risk Aversion

8.3 Avoiding Disasters

8.4 Trading in Risks: Pooling and Spreading

8.5 Correlated Risks in Agriculture

8.6 Reciprocity as a Social Norm in Stationary Environments

8.7 Overlapping Generations and the Transmission of Resources

PART III: THE HOUSEHOLD AND ITS SETTING: EXTENSIONS OF THE STANDARD THEORY

9. LAND, LABOUR, SAVINGS, AND CREDIT

9.1 The Peasant Household

9.2 Credit Constraints and the Organization of Production

9.3 Moral Hazard, Wage Labour, and Tenancy

9.4 Village Enclaves as Production Units

9.5 Land, Labour, and Credit Markets: Observations on Rural India

9.6 Agrarian Relations in Sub-Saharan Africa

9.7 Consumption as Investment

9.8 Lack of Credit among the Assetless

9.9 Consumption Smoothing

9.10 Unemployment

*9. HOUSEHOLDS AND CREDIT CONSTRAINTS.

*9.1 Model of the Peasant Household

*9.2 Precautionary Motive for Saving

*9.3 Credit, Insurance, and Agricultural Investment

*9.4 Why May Credit be Rationed?

10. POVERTY AND THE ENVIRONMENTAL RESOURCE BASE

10.1 The Resource Basis of Rural Production

10.2 What Are Environmental Resources?

10.3 Needs, Stress, and Carrying Capacity: Land and Water

10.4 Environmental Shadow Prices, Project Evaluation, and Net National Product

10.5 Markets and their Failure: Unidirectional and Reciprocal Externalities

10.6 Property Rights on Land

10.7 Public Failure and the Erosion of Local Commons

10.8 Work Allocation among Women and Children and the Desirable Locus of Environmental Decisions

*10. NET NATIONAL PRODUCT IN A DYNAMIC ECONOMY

*10.1 The Economics of Optimal Control

*10.2 NNP in a Deterministic Environment

*10.3 The Hamiltonian and Sustainable Well-Being

*10.4 Future Uncertainty

11. FOOD, CARE, AND WORK: THE HOUSEHOLD AS AN ALLOCATION MECHANISM

11.1 Gender Differentials among Adults

11.2 Allocations among Girls aod Boys

11.3 Bridewealth and Dowry

11.4 Regional Patterns of Household Allocations: The Case of India

11.5 Marriage and Inheritance in India

11.6 Bargaining Theory as a Framework for Household Choice

11.7 The Nash Programme: A Formalization

11.8 Bargaining vs. Well-Being Maximization within the Household

*11. AXIOMATIC BARGAINING THEORY

*11.1 Nash Bargaining Solution

*11.2 The Kalai-Smorodinsky Bargaining Solution

12. FERTILITY AND RESOURCES: THE HOUSEHOLD AS A REPRODUCTIVE UNIT

12.1 Income, Fertility, and Food: The Environmentalist's Argument

12.2 The Population Problem

12.3 Population Externalities: Household versus Societal Reasoning

12.4 Birth Control and Female Education

12.5 Children as Consumer and Insurance Goods.

12.6 Environmental Degradation, and Children as Producer Goods

12.7 Some Special Features of Sub-Saharan Africa

12.8 Modelling Fertility Decisions

12.9 Allocation Failure and Public Policy

*12. STRATEGIC COMPLEMENTARITIES IN FERTILITY DECISIONS

*12.1 Atmospheric Externalities

*12.2 Why Nash Equilibria?

13. POPULATION AND SAVINGS: NORMATIVE CONSIDERATIONS

13.1 Parental Concerns

13.2 The Genesis Problem and the Repugnant Conclusion

13.3 Is the Repugnant Conclusion Repugnant?

13.4 Actual Problems and an Underlying Asymmetry

13.5 Rational Ends

*13. CLASSICAL UTILITARIANISM IN A LIMITED WORLD

*13.1 The Model

*13.2 The Solution

PART IV: UNDERNOURISHMENT AND DESTITUTION

14. FOOD NEEDS AND WORK CAPACITY

14.1 Complementarities among Nutrients

14.2 Nutrition and Infection

14.3 Energy Conservation

14.4 Energy Requirements, Nutritional Status, and Productivity

14.5 Basal Metabolic Rates and Maintenance Requirements

14.6 Special Requirements, 1: Growth and Development

14.7 Special Requirements, 2: Pregnancy and Lactation

14.8 Determinants of Work Capacity and Endurance

15. ADAPTATION TO UNDERNOURISHMENT

15.1 The International Incidence of Calorie Deficiency

15.2 Adaptation: Genetic, Physiological, and Behavioural

15.3 Short-Term Adjustment, or Homeostasis

15.4 Homeostasis and the Magnitude of Undernourishment

15.5 Long-Term Adaptation

15.6 Metabolic Disequilibrium

15.7 Food Intake, Efficient Productivity, and Stature

15.8 Activity Possibility Sets

16. INEQUALITY, MALNUTRITION, AND THE DISFRANCHISED

16.1 Asset Ownership, Maintenance Costs, and Labour Power

16.2 The Labour Market and Involuntary Unemployment

16.3 Efficiency Wages and Piece-Rates

16.4 Competitive Market Allocations

16.5 Development Regimes

16.6 Growth with Redistribution.

16.7 Robustness and Extensions

16.8 Involuntary Unemployment and Surplus Labour

16.9 Who Resists Wage Cuts?

16.10 The Appeal of Nutrition-Based Theories of the Labour Market

*16. ANALYSIS OF ALLOCATION MECHANISMS WHEN NUTRITION AFFECTS PRODUCTIVITY

*16.1 Characteristics of Equilibrium Allocations in the Timeless World: Proofs

*16.2 A Two-Class Example

*16.3 The Speed of 'Trickle-Down'

*16.4 The Coexistence of Casual and Permanent Labour

*16.5 Food Distribution within Poor Households

17. INCENTIVES AND DEVELOPMENT POLICIES

17.1 Agrarian Reform

17.2 Food Subsidies

17.3 Employment Guarantee Schemes and Rural Infrastructure

17.4 Community Participation and Credit Facilities

17.5 Health and Education

17.6 Envoi

References

Index of Names

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

Index of Subjects

Z.

Notes:

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Includes bibliographical references (p. [546]-625) and indexes.

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

ISBN:

0-585-37393-0

9786611978297

0-19-159609-4

1-281-97829-9

OCLC:

252579843