Moving Out of Poverty: The Promise of Empowerment and Democracy in India

Edited by Deepa Narayan, 2009
Published by Palgrave and World Bank

Much is already known about poverty in India through the invaluable contributions of statisticians, economists, political scientists, sociologists, journalists, and those in civil society and policy think tanks. Yet a great deal remains to be learned from the voices of poor people and of those who were recently poor about how and why some people manage to escape poverty and others do not.

This study brings together the life experiences of more than 30,000 women and men from 300 rural villages across four Indian states: Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Uttar Pradesh, and West Bengal during the decade from 1995 to 2005. It considers people who have fallen into poverty, those who have remained poor, and some who have never been poor but who live alongside poor people in the same communities.

Book Launch (October 13, 2009)