Over the past two decades, the percentage of the world’s population living on less than a dollar a day has been cut in half. How much of that improvement is because of—or in spite of—globalization? While anti-globalization activists mount loud critiques and the media report breathlessly on globalization’s perils and promises, economists have largely remained silent, in part because of an entrenched institutional divide between those who study poverty and those who study trade and finance. Globalization and Poverty bridges that gap, bringing together experts on both international trade and poverty to provide a detailed view of the effects of globalization on the poor in developing nations, answering such questions as: Do lower import tariffs improve the lives of the poor? Has increased financial integration led to more or less poverty? How have the poor fared during various currency crises? Does food aid hurt or help the poor? Poverty, the contributors show here, has been used as a popular and convenient catchphrase by parties on both sides of the globalization debate to further their respective arguments. Globalization and Poverty provides the more nuanced understanding necessary to move that debate beyond the slogans.

The process of globalization has implications for human rights, though the relationship between the two is not always clear. How does globalization effect human rights in local contexts? Globalization, Poverty, and Income Inequality examines the relationships between globalization and trade liberalization, and poverty and income inequality, using Indonesia as a case study. This empirically rigorous investigation finds that although increased trade tends to reduce poverty, there are exceptions. For example, globalization via trade in certified organic coffee has not helped low-income farmers. And globalized access to treatments for visual problems has been countermanded by rising digitization that negatively affects the visually disabled poor. Ultimately, the chapters describe an ambiguous relationship between trade liberalization and inequality, both of which can increase or decrease in proportion to one another depending on region and sector. This empirically driven work provides a nuanced view of the trade-poverty relationship, contributing balanced testimony to policy debates being held internationally.

Globalization is characterised by persistent poverty and growing inequality. Conventional wisdom has it that this global poverty is residual - as globalization deepens, the poor will be lifted out of destitution. The policies of the World Bank, the IMF and the WTO echo this belief and push developing countries ever deeper into the global economy. Globalization, Poverty and Inequality provides an alternative viewpoint. It argues that for many - particularly for those living in Latin America, Asia and Central Europe - poverty and globalization are relational. It is the very workings of the global system which condemn many to poverty. In particular the mobility of investment, and the large pool of increasingly skilled workers in China and other parts of Asia, are driving down global wages. This poses challenges for policy makers in firms and countries throughout the world. It also challenges the very sustainability of globalisation itself. Are we about to witness the implosion of globalisation, as occurred between 1913 and 1950? Using a variety of theoretical frameworks and drawing on a vast amount of original research, this book will be an invaluable resource for all students of globalization and its effects.

Globalization - the growing integration of economies and societies around the world, is a complex process. The focus of this research is the impact of economic integration on developing countries and especially the poor people living in these countries. Whether economic integration supports poverty reduction and how it can do so more effectively are key questions asked. The research yields 3 main findings with bearings on current policy debates about globalization. Firstly, poor countries with some 3 billion people have broken into the global market for manufactures and services, and this successful integration has generally supported poverty reduction. Secondly, inclusion both across countries and within them is important as a number of countries (pop. 2 billion) are failing as states, trading less and less, and becoming marginal to the world economy. Thirdly, standardization or homogenization is a concern - will economic integration lead to cultural or institutional homogenization?

Citing a paucity of empirical evidence on the poverty and distributional impacts of trade policy reform in Ghana as the main motivation for this volume, the editors (both of the Institute of Statistical, Social and Economic Research at the U. of Ghana) present eleven papers that combine theory and econometric analysis in an effort to assess linkages between globalization, trade, and poverty (including gendered aspects). Specific topics examined include manufacturing employment and wage effects of trade liberalization; the influence of education on trade liberalization impacts on household welfare; trade liberalization and manufacturing firm productivity; the impact of elimination of trade taxes on poverty and income distribution; food prices, tax reforms, and consumer welfare under trade liberalization; impacts on tariff revenues; and impacts on cash cropping, gender, and household welfare; Distributed in the US by Stylus. Annotation ©2012 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com).

This book examines the various channels and transmission mechanisms, such as greater openness to trade and foreign investment, economic growth, effects on income distribution, technology transfer and labour migration through which the process of globalization affects different dimensions of poverty in the developing world.

Free trade can help 500 million people escape poverty and inject.

Refer a critical discussion of the content in this book by Martin Ravallon in 'Economic and Political Weekly'. Vol. 37, 46, 2002. pp. 4638-4645.

For most people except the world’s very richest, globalization is failing–catastrophically. If we don’t act, its failure will lead to a global upheaval worse than any in human history. But there’s another, better path. Isaak shows how a new globalization can give the poor a powerful stake, both here and abroad. Isaak's ideas can lead toward a more stable, peaceful world, in which we can all build our futures–rich and poor alike.

In the passionate debate that currently rages over globalization, critics have been heard blaming it for a host of ills afflicting poorer nations, everything from child labor to environmental degradation and cultural homogenization. Now Jagdish Bhagwati, the internationally renowned economist, takes on the critics, revealing that globalization, when properly governed, is in fact the most powerful force for social good in the world today. Drawing on his unparalleled knowledge of international and development economics, Bhagwati explains why the "gotcha" examples of the critics are often not as compelling as they seem. With the wit and wisdom for which he is renowned, Bhagwati convincingly shows that globalization is part of the solution, not part of the problem. This edition features a new afterword by the author, in which he counters recent writings by prominent journalist Thomas Friedman and the Nobel Laureate economist Paul Samuelson and argues that current anxieties about the economic implications of globalization are just as unfounded as were the concerns about its social effects.