Subjective poverty

Subjective poverty is an individual's assessment of his or her own welfare. It challenges the mainstream view of poverty that it is an objective, money-metric and uniformly applicable concept. Instead, subjective poverty aims to capture the inherent subjectivity and multidimensionality of poverty.

Often, development professionals define, measure and address poverty without the insight and voice of the poor themselves. The use of subjective measures involves the poor in the debate on poverty reduction from the beginning – from the assessment phase.

The literature on subjective poverty is growing rapidly. It points to a renewed interest for a wider and deeper understanding of poverty. This key issue guide provides some background information to these issues, and suggests a number of useful further reading resources.

Dimensions of subjective poverty

If she lives on more than a dollar-a-day, is she non-poor? The subjective poverty approach contends that a personal assessment of well-being goes beyond an externally defined income or consumption level. Rather, poverty is understood as multi-dimensional. This is well documented in both psychology and socio-economic literature. More...

Policy implications of using subjective poverty measures

Poverty reduction is a complex issue. Effectively addressing it requires a comprehensive understanding of a multifaceted phenomenon. Poverty, defined by the poor, and understood as a subjective economic, social, cultural, psychological and political condition can inform policy for effective poverty reduction. More...

Methods for measuring subjective poverty

The poor themselves seldom use the metric of a dollar-a-day to asses their wellbeing. What methods and tools do development practitioners use to capture and measure subjective poverty? More...