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Introduction

The need to lend a voice to suffering is a condition of all truth.

Adorno, 1973: 17-18

In both richer and poorer countries, millions still suffer the indignities and hardships of poverty, described in the UN Agenda for Sustainable Development as 'the greatest global challenge' for 'the entire world, developed and developing countries alike' (UN, 2015: 1, 3). Poverty as a material reality disfigures and constrains the lives of millions of women, men and children. As a preventable 'social harm' (Pemberton, 2015), its persistence diminishes those among the non-poor who acquiesce in or help sustain it. It is therefore not surprising that many who write about poverty emphasize the word's moral and political claims:

If the term 'poverty' carries with it the implication and moral imperative that something should be done about it, then the study of poverty is only ultimately justifiable if it influences individual and social attitudes and actions. This must be borne in mind constantly if discussion on the definition of poverty is to avoid becoming an academic debate worthy of Nero - a semantic and statistical squabble that is parasitic, voyeuristic and utterly unconstructive and which treats 'the poor' as passive objects for attention, whether benign or malevolent - a discussion that is part of the problem rather than part of the solution. (Piachaud, 1987: 161)

I write this book with that warning ringing in my ears. There are also ethical issues involved when writing a book about poverty from a position of relative affluence. These include the danger of silencing or taking up what we might call voice-space on the issue and treating as objects those with the everyday experience of poverty who are rarely in a position to have their thoughts published. To 'lend a voice to suffering', as Theodor Adorno puts it, should not mean erasing the voice of suffering in speaking the 'truth' of poverty. It is therefore important to acknowledge that, in addition to traditional forms of expertise associated with those who theorize and research poverty, there is a different form of expertise borne of experience.

My aim is to draw on both forms of expertise. My own understanding of poverty derives not just from the academic literature but also from 16 years of working with the Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG), a campaigning charity; from participatory research with Peter Beresford; and from my membership of an independent Commission on Poverty, Participation and Power (CoPPP), half of whose members had direct experience of poverty. The last experience involved 'an extraordinary journey' in enhanced comprehension, as those of us without direct experience of poverty learned from those who live it daily (CoPPP, 2000: v; del Tufo and Gaster, 2002). I have also subsequently learned from meetings with members of ATD Fourth World (a human rights organization working with people in persistent poverty) as well as from the academic work of 'poverty-class scholars' (Adair, 2005: 817), writing 'from the inside' (McKenzie, 2015: 108), and more popular attempts 'to walk you through what it is to be poor' from both the inside and outside (Tirado, 2014: xx; McGarvey, 2017; Carraway, 2019; Hudson, 2019; Arnade, 2019).

The importance of incorporating the perspectives of those with experience of poverty into the theorization of and research into poverty, through participatory methods, has tended to be recognized in the context of poverty more in the global South than in the global North. The use of such an approach in the global South has provided new insights into what poverty means and feels like for those experiencing it. The results also offer important lessons for poverty analysis in the global North, which is the main, though not sole, focus of this book, at a time when globalization means that the causes and consequences of poverty are increasingly common to both (Townsend, 1993; Townsend and Gordon, 2002; Atkinson, 2019; Spicker, 2020), and the UN has emphasized the universal applicability of its sustainable development goals (2015: 13-14; Bennett, 2019). The disproportionate impact of the 2020 Covid-19 (CV19) pandemic on people in poverty and other marginalized groups throughout the world has served as a brutal reminder of that commonality. Breaking down the intellectual barriers between global South and North has helped to enrich and revitalize thinking about poverty (Maxwell, 2000; Chase and Bantebya-Kyomuhendo, 2015a).

While I write from a UK perspective, I will attempt to apply these lessons from the global South to my own analysis. I will also be referring to material from the wider continent of Europe and from the US. Nevertheless, it has to be remembered that what it means to be poor can be very different in different societies, not just as between global North and South but also, for instance, as between the US and Scandinavia. Socioeconomic structural and cultural contexts shape the experiences and understandings of poverty. Yet a major global study, which bears out a central theme of this book, 'demonstrates that, despite massive differences in material conditions, the psychosocial experience of poverty is very similar and is much shaped by the shaming to which people in poverty are exposed and the stigmatizing and discriminatory practices to which they are frequently subjected' (Walker, 2014b: 197; see also Bray et al., 2019). Thus 'poverty is at the same time culture-bound and universal' (Øyen, 1996: 4).

Concepts, definitions and measures

This means that there is no single concept of poverty that stands outside history and culture. It is a construction of specific societies. Moreover, different groups within a society may construct it in different ways. Yet, 'to suggest that poverty is socially constructed is not to deny its reality, but to implicate the whole of society in the nature of its meaning' (Dean, 2016: 13). For these reasons, and because of the moral imperative of poverty and its implications for the distribution of resources both within and between societies, it is a political concept. As such it is highly contested. In the words of American historian Michael B. Katz, 'poverty remains a national disgrace in part because of the way we define and think about it - which, in turn, shapes the energy we put into its eradication' (2013: xiii). Concepts of poverty have practical effects. They carry implicit explanations that, in turn, underpin policy prescriptions. The emphasis placed upon socioeconomic structural conditions, power relationships, culture and individual behaviour varies. The policies developed to tackle poverty reflect dominant conceptualizations. In practice, concepts are mediated by definitions and measures and it is important to differentiate between these three, as they are frequently conflated and used interchangeably. A clearer separation between the three terms helps to avoid confusion and unnecessary polarization between broader and narrower notions of poverty.

Concepts: the meanings of poverty

Concepts of poverty operate at a fairly general level. They provide the framework within which definitions and measurements are developed. In essence, they are about the meanings of poverty - both to those who experience it and to different groups in society. An example would be a 'lack of basic security', understood as 'the absence of one or more factors that enable individuals and families to assume basic responsibilities and to enjoy fundamental rights' (Wresinski, 1994: 2). As we will see, insecurity associated with poverty is experienced more acutely than insecurity as it is increasingly found among those on middling incomes (Hacker, 2019).

A study of concepts of poverty also embraces how people talk about and visualize poverty: 'discourses of poverty' as articulated through language and images. These discourses are constructed in different forums, most notably politics, academia and the media. Each of these influences the ways in which poverty is understood by the wider society. In general, it is the understandings held by more powerful groups, rather than by those who experience poverty, that are reflected in dominant conceptualizations. The box below contains some examples of how people living in persistent poverty completed the statement 'poverty is'. They bring out both the material and psychosocial dimensions that I will be exploring.

Poverty is:

'Having all the same dreams for the future that everyone else has, but no way on earth to make them come true.'

'Saying no to my kids every day of their lives.'

'Dreading every Christmas and birthday because of the disappointment in the children's eyes.'

'Sleeping in a bed that used to be someone else's, wearing cast-off clothes, and being expected to be grateful.'

'Being just one crisis away from collapsing - every day.'

'Being treated like nothing, less than nothing, and accepting it.'

'Having no hope left in me at all.'

Source: ATD Fourth World workshop, Surrey, n.d.

Definitions: distinguishing poverty from non-poverty

Definitions of poverty (should) provide a more precise statement of what distinguishes the state of poverty and of being poor from...