Understanding Poverty: The Stages-of-Progress Method

Author(s): Anirudh Krishna

Source: Economic and Political Weekly , Sep. 25 - Oct. 1, 2004, Vol. 39, No. 39 (Sep. 25 -
Oct. 1, 2004), pp. 4386-4388
Published by: Economic and Political Weekly

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 Jiscussion

Understanding Poverty
studies are likely to be comparatively less
robust than studies that adopt the stages-
of-progress method. These are:
- For reasons discussed below, any longi-
The Stages-of-Progress Method tudinal study of poverty dynamics is most
useful when the gap separating the two
observations is reasonably long, at least
ANIRUDII KRISHNA reasons much better. New and different seven-eight years and preferably longer.
methods are required for this reason alone.Unless a prior data set exists for some
Tf conventional methods and remedies But they are also required for some otherregion or locality, one will have to wait
lare indeed as good as C S Murty claims reasons. a long time before obtaining results from
(EPW, September 18, 2004) then why (2) is Inability to disaggregate: a panel
Escapesdata study.
and No such limitation
poverty still so rampant in our country? descents occur at different rates attends (and for
the stages-of-progress method.
Murty's answer is that we are not doing different reasons) in different - Whether
parts of one the
uses the stages-of-progress
enough of the things that we have been country and of each state, as method or panel data sets, one needs to
our articles
doing so far; we should be doing more show.of If we do not have these deal regionally
with the fact that some households
the same things and more wholeheartedly. separate figures for escape die and out descent,
and some new ones come into
My answer is different: we need to know we cannot formulate policy very existence during the period under study.
precisely.
much more about poverty in order to deal Murty's claim - albeit an implicit Murty suggests onethat this variation consti-
- is that it does not matter: holistic anti-
more precisely with its causes in different tutes a source of bias in the stages-of-
regions. Conventional methods and tech- poverty packages are required everywhere.progress method; he is less careful, how-
niques do not allow us to learn as much In an ideal world, unconstrained by re-ever, to point out the equivalent bias in
as we need, and new methods are required source constraints, it is quite all right tothe case of panel studies.2
that can complement and add to what we do as Murty says. But the world in which- Most importantly, panel data studies use
know. Four specific knowledge gaps are we live is not an ideal one, resource a definition of poverty provided from the
especially noteworthy. These are: constraints are real and pressing, and "a outside by experts and statisticians, so
society faced with the task of providingthey are not able to reconstruct house-
( 1) Inability to distinguish between escape
and descent: The conventional method social services to the poor may well wonder holds' strategies, as discussed next.
does not tell us how many poor people where to begin".1 (4) Inability to understand households'
were born poor and how many others It behoves us, therefore, to gain theStrategies: It is valuable to understand
became poor within their lifetimes. It also
knowledge that is required for pinpointing
poverty in the terms in which it is defined
reasons and marshalling scarce resourcesand lived by those who are themselves
does not tell us how many previously poor
people have escaped from poverty over strategically. New methods are required poor. Poverty does not exist in a vacuum.
any given period. for this reason. It exists because we - as analysts - bring
The conventional method tells us for (3) Inability to identify causes of escape it into being. Let me clarify what I mean
and descent: Policies must target causes. by this statement. The definitions we
different points in time what the net figure
for poverty was in each state and in the However, most policies are formulated on provide and the measurements we pro-
country. We do not have these figures for the basis of cross-sectional studies, which mote give poverty space and existence that
any district, leave alone any community compare
or statistics across countries or it did not have before. Yes, poverty exists
village. And we do not know, even for the
across states at a single point in time, and even without our seeing it or measuring
which cannot directly get at causes asso-
country or for any state, how this net figure it. But the ways in which we see and
ciated with escape and descent. Longi-
was arrived at in reality: how many people measure it configure the reality that it
tudinal studies are better for this purpose, takes on within policy discourse.
escaped from poverty, and how many others
became poor at the same time? Far lessbutis relatively few such studies are avail- The meanings that we provide to pov-
known about the reasons responsible for able that track households' movements erty along with the measures we adopt lead
such upward or downward movements. over any period of time. to the policies we implement in order to
Why did some households become poorThe stages-of-progress methodology thatdeal with poverty as we know it. That we
in some regions? How did other house- we developed was intended to remedy this have not been very successful in dealing
holds escape poverty at the same time? gap. Some other methods can also be with poverty over the past 50 years owes
Movements upward, out of poverty, are useful. In particular, and as pointed outsomething to the meanings that we have
responsive to one set of reasons, butin passing by Murty, panel data studies -provided to this term. We have chosen to
movements downward, into poverty, are which administer the conventional povertymeasure poverty in our terms - as a calo-
responsive to another and different set questionnaire
of to the same group of house-rific mean, as a dollar-per-day equivalent
holds at two different points of time - are- and we have elected to treat whole
reasons, as pointed out consistently in our
also useful for this purpose. There arecountries (or states) as the appropriate unit
articles under review. It is critical for policy
formulation to know these two sets of three reasons, however, why panel dataof analysis using these measures.

4386 Economic and Political Weekly September 25, 2004

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 These are not the only ways that we That, in brief, is our rationale for depart-of time. While it is possible that a period
could have selected to study poverty. Yet ing from the conventional methods andof 25 years might be too long, perhaps, and
we did so because they have allowed us electing to study poverty using a different,recall can be fuzzy over such a long period,
to standardise poverty and to compare more participatory, and community-basedand while we are in more current admin-
progress across different countries and
method. The stages-of-progress methodo-istrations of the stages-of-progress method
across different states in a country. The
logy presented in our three articles in EPWalso considering additionally an inter-
definition and measures that we have is an emerging methodology,3 which can mediate period of 8-10 years ago (in Uganda
selected are particularly useful for these
certainly be improved upon and elaboratedand Peru and also in a second Rajasthan
purposes. But they also prevent further.
us But even in its present shape, itproject), I nevertheless maintain that a
helps significantly to bridge the know- period corresponding to one generation is
from seeing more clearly what poor house-
holds are doing to combat povertyledge
in gaps indicated above. important to examine.
their midst. There is also reason to believe that any
Households in poverty do not usually Poverty
sit over Time bias arising on this account will be rela-
idle, waiting for growth or programme tively small. The stages-of-progress
benefits to come their way. Rather, they Murty critiques this methodology be- method asks people to think back to a very
adopt numerous strategies to cope with cause the 25-year period that it considersspecific period, 1975-77, the period marked
and tide over their difficult situation. is too long, according to him. Respondentsclearly by the national emergency, which
Household strategies are not guided, can quite easily mis-state their povertyis well remembered in these Indian
however, by any standardised statistician-status of 25 years ago, he claims, especially villages - it is not some vague or fuzzy
provided definition of poverty. Instead,if they tend systematically to glorify the past.period. Further, the methodology does no
locally relevant understandings and defi- Let me mention first that we selected to ask each household separately about it
nitions give rise to the strategies that they work with a period of 25 years because own situation 25 years ago. Rather, rep
adopt. Accepting and working with theseit corresponds roughly to one generation resentative community groups are aske
local definitions is important, therefore, toin time. Families invest in educating their to consider the situation individually o
learn more about household strategies. Newchildren, for example, not expecting any each household in their community and t
methods are required that can work better immediate or overnight gains. Such strate- locate each household at a specific stage o
with these local understandings. gies bear fruit over much longer periods level within a clearly defined progression

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Economic and Political Weekly September 25, 2004 4387

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which is itself defined by these very same studies that use different methods. In a
group of communities. Suitably located
community groups. second study that we are currently and managed, these stations should help
I doubt whether community groups will planning for some regions of Kenya, to we
gain new knowledge about poverty and
systematically either overestimate or to stay current with region-specific rea-
intend to conduct in parallel both a stages-
underestimate the situation of each and sons associated with escape and with
of-progress investigation and also a panel
every individual household. So I do not data study (a prior data set exists for descent.
some
expect to find any considerable bias in of these villages). Third, because we relyI thank Murty and other correspondents
these estimates. Even this extent of bias upon commonly shared community memo- for pressing us to think harder. I have
learned much in the process. I invite other
is further reduced as a result of the trian- ries, we are constrained to working among
gulation and cross-checks built into the readers to contribute their suggestions
relatively long-standing and close-knit
methodology. and ideas. [I
communities. Such communities are easier
It is also appropriate to recollect that to find in more rural areas, and they are
poverty is not like altitude or blood pres- Notes
less prevalent in metropolitan areas, which
sure that can be measured accurately and limits somewhat the reach of the methodo-
finally by a single instrument that answers logy in its present form. 1 Kanbur, R and L Squire: The Evolution of
Thinking about Poverty: Exploring the Inter-
all relevant questions. No single method Finally, it is very important, in my view,
actions', http://people.cornell.edu/pages/sk 145/
of studying poverty - neither the 'ortho- to track poverty and its reasons consis-
papers/evolutionofthinkingabout_poverty.pdf
dox' method, nor panel data studies, nor tently over multiple years. Understanding
2 Studies comparing households over time have
even our stages-of-progress method - will poverty comprehensively in any region to make some assumptions about holding
ever provide a complete set of answers to will require undertaking such continuing
households constant. Panel data studies resolve

all aspects of poverty. Each method is re-learning. I am currently working on this

a conundrum in one manner, the stages-of-
progress method does so in another manner,
more useful for studying some particular proposal intended to set up in collabora-
and equal but opposite biases are the result.
facet of poverty. Rather than being viewed tion with NGOs and academic institutions,
3 I will not present the details of this methodology
as competing with one another, it is much a set of poverty-tracking stations in 6-7
here. Interested readers can refer to any of the
more useful to regard different methods different regions of India, where a com- three articles cited by Murty, or they can view
as complementary. bination of methods can be used at
these steps and the resulting papers at the
The field is too narrow at present and periodic intervals, say, every three years
following website: www.pubpol.duke.edu/
too concentrated within one limited (and or so, to track poverty within a selected
krishna/householdpoverty.
limiting) understanding of poverty. Disag-
gregating by trend (escape and descent),
by reason (why escape and why descent),
and by region and method will help us
to uncover new facts about poverty and Letters
to triangulate and verify some old facts.
Why people fall into poverty needs to
be known much better, and why only (Continued from p 4286) are mostly bhadralok brahmins and
some people (and not others) are able to other upper castes. And for their
benefit from growth also needs to be West Bengal, echoing the positions of provenance towards anti-Muslim
investigated more closely. Suitable the Advanis, he recurrently raises the communalism, better read Joya
methodologies need to be developed for bogey of Bangladeshi infiltrators and Chatterji's Bengal Divided: Hindu
this purpose. demands paramilitary forces to crush Communalism and Partition, 1932-47,
That is the main point of the exercises the voices of the rural poor in the Cambridge, 1995, 2003 (reprint). This
I have been undertaking together with my state. Most of these poor happen to be lucidly written book has a chapter,
colleagues. And that is why we have Muslims and one of the main reasons 'Culture and Communalism of the

presented in our three EPW articles one for the rise of Mamata Banerjee's Bhadraloks'.

such methodology - though hardly the Trinamool is this rural poverty. That isThe Left's inactivism and its
only one possible - that is currently why the Trinamool has many Muslimobsession with hackneyed class-debate
being adapted and implemented in diverse activists in its fold. And its base is and dogged refusal to understand
domains. more in those districts which are of the issue of caste/community/identity
I do not agree fully with the limitations Muslim concentration and where there and failure in accommodating the
that Murty has suggested, which does not is a huge disjunction between the aspiration of the dalits and other
mean that I believe there are no limitations quantum of land acquired by the underprivileged sections including
in this method. Let me mention four limi- government from the landlords and itsMuslims, has led to its almost
tations, which I feel are quite importantre-distribution to the landless poor. complete extinction from Bihar and
and will need to be addressed. This has been demonstrated by UP. I would therefore, reiterate that the
First, the methodology needs to Dipankar deal Basu, a research scholar of CPI/CPM like forces are incapable of
better with intra-household differences, JNU's Centre for Economic fighting the menace of the Sangh
particularly those based on gender. In Development
its and Planning (EPW, parivar.
present form, the methodology doesApril not 21, 2001).
disaggregate below the household level. Look at the social base of the M SAJJAD
Second, we need to build better links with leadership of the CPM in Bengal. They Aligarh

4388 Economic and Political Weekly September 25. 2004

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