The Poor are Not Us

Reviews / Votes

... essential reading ... -- Roderick P. Neumann * AFRICAN AFFAIRS * This book's great merit is to have managed to make the study of what are minority communities in eastern Africa interesting and relevant to those who are concerned with the ways in which the continent has tackled the thorny question of development. -- Patrick Chabal * INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS * The papers make it clear that pastoralist communities throughout eastern Africa are aware of the changing nature of poverty. There is a lively and robust indigenous discourse about how poverty should be understood, and how it can be ameliorated. Pastoralists increasingly recognise that the poor are now among them. But, although the alleviation of poverty is a central tenet of the development dialogue, there is still much to be done to engage the pastoralists themselves in that dialogue... . For those who are interested in, and concerned with, this subject, this book is essential reading. -- D.J. Shaw * DEVELOPMENT POLICY REVIEW * ... the readableand provocative fashion ... with which various approaches have been pulled together between one set of covers. -- John Wood * AFRICAN STUDIES REVIEW * ...this insightful edition reviews most of the significant factors concerning the slide of pastoralists down the continuum from prosperity to impoverishment... .Through excellent case studies, the volume paints a sad but convincing canvas of pastoral poverty, but also establishes an argument, often only implicitly developed, for giving support to the productive enterprise of raising livestock in rangelands best suited for that purpose - precisely the terms on which pastoral communities are prepared by tradition, knowledge and commitment to encounter modernity. Structural poverty today can best be reduced by strengthening the animal economy and securing herders' rights over resources, as well as selectively pursuing settlement, commercialization and diversification. Such shifts in policy also require reconfiguring the metaphorical state-of-mind, long propagated through misguided interventions by international and national agencies, that has too long associated pastoralists with poverty rather than their wealth of land, livestock and adaptability. -- John Galaty * JOURNAL OF AFRICAN HISTORY *