Question

In: Economics

Explain Lewis s 'solution' to the 'culture of poverty' orientation of poor Mexican families.

Explain Lewis s 'solution' to the 'culture of poverty' orientation of poor Mexican families.

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Expert Solution

Lewis theory of a "cultrue of poverty"

The theory of a “culture of poverty” was created by the anthropologist Oscar Lewis in his 1959 book, Five Families: Mexican Case Studies in the Culture of Poverty. The culture of poverty theory states that living in conditions of pervasive poverty will lead to the development of a culture or subculture adapted to those conditions. This culture is characterized by pervasive feelings of helplessness, dependency, marginality, and powerlessness. Lewis described individuals living within a culture of poverty as having little or no sense of history and therefore lacking the knowledge to alleviate their own conditions through collective action, instead focusing solely on their own troubles. Thus, for Lewis, the imposition of poverty on a population was the structural cause of the development of a culture of poverty, which then becomes autonomous, as behaviors and attitudes developed within a culture of poverty get passed down to subsequent generations through socialization processes.

The culture of poverty assumes that culture itself is relatively fixed and unchanging—that once a population exists within the culture of poverty, no amount of intervention in terms of the alleviation of poverty will change the cultural attitudes and behaviors held by members of that population. Thus public assistance to the poor, in the form of welfare or other direct assistance, cannot eliminate poverty, since poverty is inherent in the culture of the poor.

Lewis s 'solution' to the 'culture of poverty':-

It is, Lewis (1971) argues, 'an idea that people believe, want to believe, and perhaps need to believe.' They want to believe that raising the income of the poor would not change their life styles or values, but merely funnel greater sums of money into bottomless, self-destructing pits. This fatalistic view has wide acceptance among scholars, welfare planners, and the voting public. Indeed, even at the most prestigious university, the country's theories alleging racial inferiority have become increasingly prevalent. Thus, she demonstrates the way that political interests to keep the wages of the poor low create a climate in which it is politically convenient to buy into the idea of culture of poverty

Lewis's subculture of poverty idea, far from being a poor-bashing, ideological ploy, is firmly grounded in a Marxist critique of capital and its productive contradictions. As such, Lewis's work is a celebration of the resilience and resourcefulness of the poor, not a denigration of the lower class and the cultural defenses they erect against poverty's everyday uncertainty.


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