Publication
Title
Poverty and wealth without a ladder? An appraisal of the stages of progress method among agro-pastoralists in Ethiopia's Lower Omo Valley
Author
Abstract
Is it possible to measure wealth and poverty across settings while being faithful to local understandings? The stages of progress method (SoP) attempts to do this by building ladders of wealth in locally relevant terms and using these in comparisons across groups. This approach is potentially useful among pastoralist populations where monetary income and standard asset inventories may be misleading, and where people are discriminated against by the state and neglected by formal systems of accounting. On the basis of fieldwork among Nyangatom agro-pastoralists in Ethiopia, we expose some problematic assumptions of the SoP method. Participants did not endorse ladder-like stages from poverty to wealth distinguished by material assets, nor did they reach consensus on the definition of a poverty line. We caution that the SoP method carries risks of facipulation, and instead we advocate for multidimensional measures of prosperity based on locally relevant forms of wealth.
Language
English
Source (journal)
Field methods.. - Gainesville (Fla.) :
Publication
Thousand oaks : Sage publications inc , 2024
ISSN
1525-822X
DOI
10.1177/1525822X231225904
Volume/pages
(2024) , p. 1-16
ISI
001136848900001
Full text (Publisher's DOI)
Full text (open access)
UAntwerpen
Faculty/Department
Research group
Publication type
Subject
Affiliation
Publications with a UAntwerp address
External links
Web of Science
Record
Identifier
Creation 01.02.2024
Last edited 06.02.2024
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