¹With thanks to Tony Addison, Kate Bird, Tim Braunholz, Caroline Harper, David Hulme, Karen Moore, David Neves and Andries du Toit for their very helpful comments on the earlier drafts, and inputs into this one.

Abstract

Andrew Shepherd suggests that there is an inter-disciplinary meeting point between concepts of 'poverty traps' and 'adverse incorporation', and suggests that the cutting edge of research on chronic poverty lies in the interaction of asset dynamics, insecurity and changing social relations. The performance of the state, and, in particular, the under-performance of the state in chronically deprived countries is a critical constraint on the eradication of poverty.