SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
Qazi Kholiquzzaman Ahmad
Chairman, Bangladesh Unnayan Parishad (BUP)
President, Bangladesh Economic Association (BEA)
Email: [email protected]
SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 Scope of the paper
 The focus of this paper is South
Asia, but the arguments and
suggested way forward should apply
to other parts of the developing
world
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 Social exclusion defined
 Social exclusion, as used in this paper,
implies various dimensions such as
economic, social, political, judicial,
and so on
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 Unprecedented advancements but
increasing disparities
 World is scaling unprecedented
advancements in science, technology,
particularly ICT, and global wealth and
trade
 This is happening under the aegis and
control of the developed countries and
MNCs and TNCs
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 Divides as between rich countries and
poor countries as well as between the rich
and the poor in individual countries have
been widening and deepening
 Also, within the small global rich class,
there are differentiations and so are
among the deprived people at large
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 Social exclusion—dimensions and
implications
 Inequality, poverty, and deprivations are
concomitants of social exclusion, widely
prevalent in developing countries
 The socially excluded are constrained
from all directions such as human
capability, access to resources, access to
institutions, participation in socio-political
processes, and so on
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 The socially excluded are so condemned due to
systemic injustices which are even more
entrenched in the wake of neo-liberal reforms
and globalization
 The excluded are not a homogeneous category.
In fact, they are divided in many ‘societies’,
depending on the level of deficits of their
economic and social circumstances
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 They are also at the forefront of the adverse
impact of natural disasters
 Moreover, it is they who are particularly in
harm’s way of HIV/ AIDS, malaria,
tuberculosis, and other deadly diseases
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 Dimensions and depth of social
exclusion in South Asia
 South Asia has a major constraint to start
with—it contains 22.4% of the world’s
population, while only 3.4% of the world’s
total lands
 Moreover, population growth is still high; it is
in the populous South Asian countries (which
account for 96% of South Asian population),
1.5% (India), 1.9% (Bangladesh), and 2.4%
(Pakistan)
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 In South Asia, about one-third of the
population lives on less than PPP$1 a day and
about 83% under PPP$2
 While the overwhelming majority (83%)
suffer from human dignity deficits of different
degrees, the most disadvantaged and hapless
are those people who are extremely poor
(i.e. those who are under PPP$1 per day per
→
person
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 South Asia is prone to natural disasters
(flood, cyclone, storm surge, tornado,
drought); to worsen under climate change
 Each such disaster creates sudden poverty
involving significant numbers of people and
causes many of the already poor to be
further pauperized or become destitute
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 The MDG targets of halving the proportion
poor and number hungry by 2015
compared to 1990 is sure to remain
unfulfilled to a significant extent in South
Asia
→
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 The following conditions in South Asia are
prevalent mostly among the socially excluded
or affect them the most
 Some 40% of the regional population is illiterate and
more are functionally illiterate
 Public primary health services are very limited and
very poor when available
 Public expenditure on education remains limited,
mostly between 2% or 3.4% of GDP
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 Undernourishment among adults and
children and underweight among
children are also high
 So are infant and maternal mortality
→
rates
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 South Asian children also face other types
of crisis including insecurity against
preventable and curable diseases,
trafficking, forced by poverty to join the
labour force, turning into street urchins
and eventually drifting into nets of armed
social elements
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 Women of the socially excluded category
suffer from low capability (in the absence
of effective public education, health
services, and training), little participation
in tertiary education as well as in politics
and decision-making positions in public or
private sectors
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 Moreover, dowry requirements, torture at
home, and trafficking are also prevent
widely among women of the socially
excluded category
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 In South Asia, governance generally
remains less democratic and more extrademocratic
 Moreover, politics of the countries of the
region is generally confrontational
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 The kinds of politics and governance that
prevail in the South Asian countries in fact
abet and cause social exclusion
 More so, because of adherence to principles
and compulsions of neo-liberalism and
→
globalization
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 Two specific examples:
 On one hand dotcom revolution has flourished in
Bangalore, India; on the other hundreds of
farmers commit suicide in the same Indian state
in the face of crop failure and due to inability to
repay debts
 Micro-credit in Bangladesh has not only failed to
lift most of the micro-credit takers from their
poverty but in fact large numbers have fallen into
debt traps and pauperized further
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 Finally, still on diagnosis in South Asia, let
it be noted:
 Poverty reduction and social development
programmes being implemented usually
- treat people to be served as target groups or
objects; and
- the underlying basic causes of their exclusion
are not addressed
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 Conceptual framework for way
forward
 The goal may be construed as well-being
of all on an equitable basis, as opposed
to present situation of exclusion of and
ills for the majority
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 Focus on key concepts on which the
framework is anchored:
 Freedom and empowerment
- The excluded must be enabled to free themselves
from their subservient and hopeless conditions
- Empowerment (economic, social, political) initially
to an extent will enable them to articulate their
demands and mount efforts for those be fulfilled,
and then move forward in terms of further
empowerment and expanding freedom
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 Shared prosperity
- Reorientation of investment and production pattern,
which facilitate participation and employment of the
now socially excluded
- Demand of products and services produced should be
kept in perspective
- High tech activities, as appropriate, should also be
promoted, but corporate social responsibility should be
codified and observed
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 Unity amidst diversity
- Diversity (social, cultural) must be celebrated
and upheld for the proper rooting of and
strong support for the changes being
→
introduced
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 People’s (participatory) democracy
- People-centred democratization at all levels of
society
- Effective local governance
- Macro-micro policy congruence
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 Note: A word on Imagine a New
South Asia (INSA)
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 From framework to action
 Research
 Policy briefs
 Campaign
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SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
 A list of suggested themes for
research and action
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Suggested Themes for Research and Action
* Human capability development, focusing on children and youth (both female
and male) of the socially excluded families through an integrated approach
involving education, health, training, and at appropriate stages of their lives
access to resources including credit, employment, and markets
* Alternatives to the prevailing political order: the aspects to be investigated may
include democratization at all levels of society, human security, human rights,
peace, people’s power, values and diversity of interest, and ethnic and religious
minorities
* Agriculture and industrialization: aspects to cover may include interrelationships
and coordination, implications of globalization, food security, and employment
promotion
* Overcoming discrimination and establishing social cohesiveness: issues to
focus on may include gender, minority groups, disabled people, and other
disadvantaged groups including people affected by HIV/AIDS and other sever
diseases
* Ownership and management of land and other resources, focusing on people’s
perspectives
* Economic growth, environmental sustainability, social development, and social
equity
* The nature and roles of state and market in the context of inclusive social
transformation
* International order, international
institutions, and people’s sovereignty
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* Community approaches to managing
climate
and sea level rise impacts
Beijing, 17-19
Octoberchange
2007
SOUTH ASIA: TACKLING SOCIAL
EXCLUSION
Thank you
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