Multidimensional Theory of Poverty

This article explores the multidimensional theory of poverty, focusing on its key components and its appropriateness in Australia and globally. It discusses the nature, causes, and impact of poverty, as well as the strengths of the multidimensional theory. Gain a comprehensive understanding of poverty and its complexities.

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Multidimensional Theory of Poverty
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Introduction and Description
The theory views poverty as a convolution in social phenomena involving several
dimensions and focuses on the relationship between the agency and the structure. The
multidimensional theory is the interaction of several factors and the effects of these factors which
has to be understood, analyzed and addressed (Cobbinah, Erdiaw-Kwasie, & Amoateng, 2015).
Lister also stated that the groups and the individuals experience poverty because they have
forged their own lives in the structural restriction that face them and they do react in different
ways towards these structural constraints. The multidimensional theory of poverty can
encompass a range of determinants that measure the complexity of the approach so that to ensure
the strategies which aim to reduce the poverty and deprivation of a nation (Martinez, & Perales,
2017). There are different indicators that can be used to reflect upon the priorities and the needs
of a country including its provinces, regions and districts. These indicators depend on the
objectives of the measure and the context of the country. Lister described poverty through the
multidimensional theory as the function of the political structure and social economic status of a
nation and the processes which are responsible for or lead to unequal distribution of resources
within the individuals, the societies and in a global context (Saunders, 2018).
The Key Components of Multidimensional Theory of Poverty
The component of the multidimensional theory of poverty are the indicators and
measures that are used internationally to survey, compare, analyze and determine the dimensions
of poverty in the household, regional, district and at the national level. The Multidimensional
Poverty Index (MPI) is a tool used globally to indicate and give a multidimensional picture of the

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level of poverty and it measures poverty at the individual level. The MPI involves measurement
of poverty in the dimensions which include in health, education and in the levels of standards of
living of an individual (Maslach, 2017).
The poverty dimension goes beyond inadequate income to the deprivation of the
fundamental of human development and thus termed as multidimensional as it involves; poor
housing conditions, poor health, low education, inadequate livelihoods, social exclusion, poor
nutrition, low skills and education and lack of participation and empowerment. There are
indicators of poverty which corresponds to the three dimension of health, education and the
standards of living are composed in the Global MPI (Rogan, 2016). The indicators are described
as follows;
In Education – it is measured in terms of the years of schooling and it determines whether there
is any member of a specific household has attended the school for 5 years. It also determines
whether there is any school-aged child who does not complete the school up to class 8.
In Health – it involves the determination of a child’s mortality and nutrition. They determine
where there is an individual who has died due to malnutrition or if there is any child who has
died the family.
In Standards of Living – this one evaluate on the presence of clean drinking water, availability of
electricity, household sanitation, cooking fuel, the flooring whether dirty, has dung or sandy and
the assets such as radio, bike, televisions and telephones (Annoni, Bruggemann & Carlsen,
2015).
The indicators of each of the three mentioned dimensions are equally weighted. A
household can be said to be multi-dimensionally poor if more than 30% of the indicators

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weighted on it are deprived. The Global MPI of a region, district or a country is the outcome of
the proportion of the poor population and the average number of the deprivations faces by the
[poor households at the same time. While income is known to be the major determinants of the
social and economic wellbeing, the six components that indicate the social rights dimensions are
health, housing, food security, social security and basic services. The methodology used in the
components enhances the identification of the total population of the poor and the nature of their
poverty. It also determines the dimensions in which these people are affected most, and the most
deprived in terms of both social rights and income (Aaberge, & Brandolini, 2015).
Some of the Essentials of Multidimensional Theory to Understanding Poverty
Employment
As a dimension, the employment involves both the informal and formal employment pays
attention to the safety, the quality of work and the accessibility of the basic social protection
while at the workplace. Employment is an important tool which guarantees people to have
regular income and sustain their household basic needs. Measuring the employment status of a
population is a very crucial strategy to understand the availability and unavailability of job
opportunities, how they are being created and distributed across the country (Bell & Adams,
2016).
Empowerment
This is an agency with the capacity to advance an individual’s goals and values. The
importance of empowerment as a dimension is that it enables one to understand his/her rights
and be aware of the strategies to claim for them. Empowerment enables a person to define
his/her vision in the future, plan strategies to achieve it, and thus it includes the poor to

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participate in the public spaces. The group of the population where the empowerment dimension
is of significance are; women, immigrants population and to the minority ethnic groups
(Donohue & Biggs, 2015)
Physical Safety
This form of dimension includes the security of an individual from the property and the
perception of violence. Physical safety interrelates with empowerment and the ability to go about
without shame. The insecurity among citizens hinders them from achieving their potential thus
leading to inadequate income which results in deprivation of households. The dimension is
influential to a person’s physical and mental health and also the descent shelter (Schiefer & van
der Noll, 2017).
Shame
Every individual desire to go about without shame and this highlights a person’s dignity,
freedom from humiliation and respect. Shame interlinks with dimensions like ignorance, human
rights unawareness and low levels of education. It is important to know the dominant social and
moral values of a certain culture or a country because these are the determinants of international
comparability. Many people refuse to declare themselves as poor due to the factors like
stigmatization and social exclusion and this interferes with the survey identification process
(Efimova et al, (2015).
Psychological well- being
The psychological well-being leads to perspective with the notion of values which
defines how people perceive their destiny and their existence in the community. The importance
of age and gender in the well- being has to be considered while cross-cutting element in all

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dimensions. The children are more influenced by poverty because it affects the future well- being
and opportunities as it is mostly experienced in Britain. The elderly also suffer a lot due to the
consequences of poverty in many societies such as in China (Leu, Chen & Chen, 2016).
The Appropriateness of Multidimensional Theory of Poverty in Australia and Globally
The Nature, Causes and Impact of Poverty
In Australia, poverty is associated with the people in the society who are unable to cater
for the basic needs of life. Many Australians living under the poverty level have hard times while
making choices in their daily lives, for instance, a family may choose to skip a meal so that to
buy a textbook for the schooling child. The nature of poverty in Australia corresponds to the
population livening in relative poverty line and whose standards of living are below the overall
standards of the community. The people under the poverty line in Australia not only have low
earnings but they also access little or no resources and opportunities such as adequate health,
housing, employment opportunities, recreation, dental care, quality education, and both sufficient
and quality food (Liu et al, 2015).
Globally, more than 3 billion people live under the poverty level, whereby they survive
on less than $2.5 in a day. Approximately 1.3 billion of the world population operates under
extreme poverty and can be estimated to live on $ 1.25 or less in a day. In today’s world poverty
is clarified as a big issue affecting a large number of people. In 1990, 36% of the world’s
populations were categorized to be living under the poverty line as compared to the recent
improvement in 2010, whereby only 18% of the world’s population live below the poverty level.
The World Bank has strategized on ways to decrease the global poverty to 9% by 2020 and by
2030 to be as low as 3% (Myers et al, 2017).

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Lister’s contributions to poverty are very useful in the multidimensional theory of
poverty in a comprehensive way as it involves both the individual and structural approaches.
Lister stipulated some of the dimensions that can be helpful in understanding and explanation of
the impacts and causes of poverty;
Social Divisions – these are differences that exist in all the populations. They include gender,
disability and race.
Geographical and space – these are the aspects that survey the environment and the locations in
which people line in including rural, urban and globally.
Structural Inequalities – these include the measure of material deprivation, the socioeconomic
status, class and the wealth and income of individuals.
The life course – these are the human developmental stages in life that determine the full cycle of
a person. It includes the childhood, youth stage, parenthood stage and the older age.
Individual and groups opinions – there are the responses of the public including human agency
and differences experiences in life (Carter, Barr & Clarke, 2016).
Appropriateness of the Theory
The multidimensional theory of poverty is appropriate in the following ways discussed below:
Studies show that poverty based on monetary measures can lead to a big loss. This is
because the overlap between the non-monetary measures and the monetary measures are not
perfect in poverty measurements. All the individuals with poor income are not la who is
multidimensionality poor and vice verse. Both the monetary and non-monetary measure is
required to address the deprivations and the needs of the poor populations (Bantjes et al, 2016)

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The deprivation and reduction of poverty do not only depend on economic growth. The
research has shown that economic growth alone cannot reduce the deprivation for example child
mortality and child malnutrition. Beyond the measurement of poverty and well being, the Alkire-
Foster method of multidimensional approach can be efficient in terms of conditional cash
transfers, to adopt the targeted services and monitor the implemented programs performance.
The better and well-equipped policymakers are capable of reducing poverty and thus the poverty
reduction requires more policy-relevant information (Kern, Waters Adler & White, 2015).
The use of multidimensional is appropriate as most of the poor people describe the state
of poverty in a multidimensional approach. Some of the experiences have been revealed that
poor people describe poor health, poor nutrition, unclean water and inadequate sanitation, low
education, violence disempowerment deprived shelter conditions and shame as the state of
poverty. The concept of multidimensional theory correlates with social exclusion in that it uses
both the individual and structural elements in analyzing poverty. Social exclusion focuses on
how structural and individual factors increase the risk of social divisions towards economic and
social participation of particular communities and how it can be reduced (Chakravarty & Lugo,
2016).
In Australia, poverty is considered as a factor of exclusion where it is seen to result due to
exclusion. In the global context, Amartya Sen’s stipulated that poverty as the worst form of
human deprivation. Sen’s showed that the multidimensional theory of poverty is based on
traditional forms of welfare economies and it is influenced by human rights and principles. The
theory brings together local, structural and individual aspects into the proper understanding of
the multidimensional approach of poverty. These aspects include the global governance and its
functions (structural), the governance and geography (local), and the agency, motivation and

SOCIAL WORK AND UNEQUAL WORLD 9
abilities (individual). The traditional measurement of poverty in Australia focuses on the
dimensions of living standards and individuals income which are not important in contemporary
society in Australia. Health and education remain the capabilities that an individual require so
that to live in good standards. In modern society, the two capabilities require basic functioning
(Rahman, Shahbaz, & Farooq, 2015).
In order the two capabilities to function properly, there is a need for multidimensional
strategies whereby an individual has to participate in several essential dimension of activities to
fulfil life desires. For the Australian poverty level to be understood and addressed appropriately
it has to build upon and focus on the holistic poverty measures instead of only concentrating on
the income. There is a need to incorporate the assessments of education, health and all other
dimensions so that to improve the living standards of individuals (Chakravarty & Lugo, 2016).
Strength of Multidimensional Theory
The relationship of multidimensional theory and the social exclusion concept argue on the basis
of the theoretical grounds and corporate the driven ideologies of both individual and structural
approaches.
As the multidimensional approach concentrate on the agencies in the structural and individual, its
factors are considered more realistic and provide the actual background for the practical
identification of the poverty responses, exclusion factors and other related issues (Grigg &
Manderson, 2016).
The use of multiple dimensions reveals that the populations, families, groups and individuals are
affected by both the poverty and inequality in different and similar ways.

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The multidimensional theory is regarded as the most contemporary approach to explain
poverty as it involves several other theories such as post-structuralism, post-colonial theory,
feminism, critical theory and Marxism theory. The makes it more efficient to explain the nature,
dimensions, causes, and impact of poverty in modern society.
The theory extends to explain beyond behavioural and material aspects by focusing on the effects
of other factors like gender, location, race, education, employment, empowerment, age, disability
and social support.
The theory also focuses on the experiences lived by individuals who are responsible for
the poverty and inequalities. This helps the surveyors with information and understanding the
perspectives of poverty in developing countries through their experiences (Saunders, 2015).
Limitations of Multidimensional Theory
Being the most modern theory, the multidimensional involves several interpretations
which may result in misuse of factors like ideologies in social exclusion and may promote
conceptual vagueness.
The realistic examples of the multidimensional approach may give agency and structural
considerations that not equal measures that cause poverty. These can lead to the favour of some
poverty dimensions than others as it may not be possible to give equal attention to all dimensions
(Meyer, Weigelt & Kreft, 2016).
Concentrating on several dimensions of poverty can result in inequalities on fundamental
structural factors between regions, society and countries. This is where these structural
backgrounds, may be overlooked, considered unrealistic to change or may be ignored.

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Through uses, multiple dimensions there can be a presumption that the included majority in the
society have relative wellbeing and this may lead to minor changes strategized to bring the
excluded minority( Alkire, 2018).
Conclusion
In conclusion, the essay has discussed the multidimensional theory of poverty and
analyzed its appropriateness including its limitations and strength. The theory focuses on the
virtual concepts of factors like social exclusion and deprivations and it incorporates both material
and non-material aspects of poverty. The multidimensional approach aims at developing an
understanding of the nature of various poverty dimensions and their relationship through
qualitative and quantitative research. The theory is influential in developing and developed world
societies. Poverty is mostly measured in one dimension and it is described in terms of income.
The multidimensional approach of poverty involves the several deprived experiences of poor
people in their life. These deprived experiences include inadequate or lack of educations,
disempowerment, violent threat instances, living in hazardous environments, poor health, poor
living standards, poor working conditions and poor quality of work.

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