Chattier, Priya (2014) Assessing development: designing better indices of poverty and gender equity in Fiji. Journal of Pacific Studies, 33 (2). pp. 87-108. ISSN 1011-3029
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Abstract
This paper explores gender and feminist aspects of an ongoing multi-year, multi-country,
interdisciplinary research project, that seeks to develop a new measure of deprivation, that is
genuinely gender-sensitive and responsive to the expressed interests and views of poor women and
men. The rationale for engendering the measurement of poverty and deprivation, and the ways in
which feminist research approaches inform the research methodology and methods will be discussed.
Key findings to date regarding the gendered dimensions of poverty and hardship will be presented
in this paper, and what these suggest as potential dimensions of a new gender-sensitive measure of
deprivation that can be used to construct poverty indices and gender equity indices. The paper presents
findings from two phases of fieldwork from Fiji which was conducted as part of this international
research project. Based on these two phases of research, it is hoped, that future academic research
into poverty measurement and social valuation, will lead towards the design of an individual level
of measure of multidimensional deprivation. This individualised level measure of deprivation can be
used for two purposes. The first is to identify those who should be categorised as poor. The second
is to construct population level indices that reflect the level of poverty and gender inequity in that
population. The paper also aims to contribute more broadly to our knowledge of how people with
experience of poverty think it should be defined and measured. It is hoped that the gender perspective
will contribute to widening the concept of poverty by identifying the need to measure poverty in a way
which accounts for its complexity and multidimensionality.
| Item Type: | Journal Article |
|---|---|
| Subjects: | H Social Sciences > H Social Sciences (General) H Social Sciences > HN Social history and conditions. Social problems. Social reform H Social Sciences > HV Social pathology. Social and public welfare |
| Divisions: | Faculty of Arts, Law and Education (FALE) > School of Social Sciences |
| Depositing User: | Generic Account |
| Date Deposited: | 04 Jun 2014 04:37 |
| Last Modified: | 12 Sep 2016 04:07 |
| URI: | https://repository.usp.ac.fj/id/eprint/7438 |
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