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Why Are the Poor Poor? Explanations of poverty, likeexplanations of inequality in general, differ in several ways. Theymay focus on individuals or on social structures. They mayinterpret poverty as inevitable—perhaps even necessary—or as theproduct of the efforts of the powerful and wealthy to protect theirown inter- ests. Let’s look at some of these explanations, keepingin mind that despite their differences, each may contain elementsof validity and therefore may offer at least a partial answer tothe question of why some people are poor. Individual-FocusedExplanations In explaining poverty, individual-focused theoriesstress the personal respon- sibility of people in determining theirplace in the social hierarchy. These theories fall closely in linewith the popular thinking about the poor in America. This isbecause they complement well the dominant ideology of individual-ism. The essential idea is that if people are poor, it is mainlybecause of their own actions or inaction, as well as their personaltraits. The source of poverty, in other words, lies with the poorthemselves. The two major individual- focused theories emphasizeeither biological traits or cultural traits. BiologicalExplanations A theory once widely held maintains that people arepoor because of inherent deficiencies in their character or mentalmakeup—that is, they are biologically less “fit” than others.Because they are genetically handicapped, they are bound to bepoor. This biological deterministic explanation was popular earlyin the last century and was a basic part of the notion of socialDarwinism. Some social scientists and commentators held that one’swealth or poverty was a dem- onstration of one’s inherentcapabilities. This idea was put forth by those such as Britishsocial scientist Herbert Spencer, who asserted that the emer- genceof the poor, as well as the emergence of an elite at the top of thesocial hierarchy, was a natural development. Spencer drew ananalogy to Darwin’s notion of survival of the fittest among animalspecies. Applying the idea to human societies, Spencer maintainedthat through a process of free and natural competition, the mostable would rise to the top and the least able would sink to thebottom. In this way the social Darwinists ratio- nalized theextreme inequality that typified the newly industrialized societiesat the turn of the twentieth century, like Britain and the UnitedStates. If the poor were a natural development, so the theory went,there was nothing that could be done to alleviate their condition.Giving assistance to the poor would only extend their inevitabledecline. Indeed, the most desirable occurrence would be the rapidextinction of this element of the society. Calls for social welfareprograms of one kind or another to help lift the poor from theircondition were therefore met with the argument that these werefruitless and wasteful efforts. Social Darwinism in its most crudeform is an idea that no longer holds much weight among socialscientists or even the general public. Yet there are remnants of agenetic explanation for poverty that occasionally surface. In 1994psychologist Richard J. Herrnstein and sociologist Charles Murrayauthored a controversial book, The Bell Curve, in which theyproffered a theory of poverty that is well within the tradition ofsocial Darwinism. The essence of their position is that IQ is themost significant factor in determin- ing people’s place in thesocial hierarchy. Herrnstein and Murray posit that intelligence, asmeasured by IQ, is in large part genetic. They see strongrelationships between IQ and various social pathologies. Those withlower IQs have a greater proclivity toward poverty, crime,illegitimacy, poor edu- cational performance, and other socialills. Because IQ is mostly genetic, they argue, there is no way tochange the condition of those with low intel- ligence througheducational reforms or welfare programs. Because lower-intelligence people are reproducing much faster than arehigher-intelligence people, the society is faced with thepossibility of a growing underclass increasingly dependent on themore intelligent and productive classes. Her- rnstein and Murrayhold that such an underclass is apt to remain in a state ofdependency on the nonpoor and continue to engage in antisocialactivi- ties. Thus, they question the value of welfare payments,remedial educa- tional programs, affirmative action, and otherefforts designed to raise the social and economic levels of thepoor. Herrnstein and Murray’s arguments were countered by mostmainstream sociologists, who claimed that their methods were flawedand their reason- ing specious (Fischer et al., 1996; Fraser, 1995;Jacoby and Glauberman, in and adapt to the mainstream. The poor,then, are attuned to a dysfunctional culture. Although poverty isnot seen as biologically based, it is nonetheless attributable, inthis view, to personal characteristics of the poor. The idea of aculture of poverty was first put forth in the early 1960s byanthropologist Oscar Lewis, who studied poor families in MexicoCity, San Juan, Puerto Rico, and New York City. Lewis lived amongthose families and concluded that there were basic behavioraltraits and attitudes that typified the poor everywhere, whichtogether constituted a coherent “culture of poverty.” Some of thekey features of that culture, Lewis explained, were a present ori-entation (rather than the future orientation typical of the middleclass), a fatal- istic view of the world and one’s place in it, atendency toward female-headed families, authoritarianism within thefamily, a high rate of abandonment of wives and children, frequentuse of violence in settling disputes and in disci- pliningchildren, a high rate of alcoholism, a belief in male superiority,and a martyr complex among women (Lewis, 1961, 1965, 1966). Lewismaintained that these values and behaviors are responses to theconditions of poverty but that in the process they becomewell-entrenched cultural traits that are passed on from onegeneration to the next. “By the time slum children are age six orseven,” Lewis wrote, “they have usually absorbed the basic valuesand attitudes of their subculture and are not psychologicallygeared to take full advantage of changing conditions or increasedopportunities which may occur in their lifetime” (1965:xlv). Lewisexplained, however, that not all poor people necessarily live in ordevelop a culture of poverty. A related view of poverty and thepoor is suggested in the work of political scientist EdwardBanfield (1968, 1974). Banfield asserted that the plight of theurban poor was a result of their failure to adopt conforming,specifically middle-class, social values. He focused primarily onthe urban black poor, claiming that their situation and theirbehaviors must be seen not as a product of racial discriminationbut as class behavior. European immigrants of earlier decades, hepointed out, were also mostly poor and manifested high crime rates,unstable families, and low school performance, but they eventuallyassimilated to the dominant culture and improved their economicstanding. Poor blacks are therefore simply experiencing the sameprocess of transition to a higher class position. The problems ofthe urban black poor, in this view, will abate once they aresolidly part of the middle class and have embraced middle-classvalues and lifestyles. As part of the culture-of-poverty thesis,structural factors and the “acci- dent of birth” may beacknowledged, but these are not seen as unconquer- able obstacles.People may not choose to be poor, but through their personalefforts, the road out of poverty is open to them. They need onlysubscribe to the mainstream culture. Critics of this culturalexplanation of poverty have pointed out that the basic argumentblames the poor themselves for being poor. That is, their conditionis essentially a product of their failure to adopt middle-classnorms and values rather than of a restructured economy or ethnicdiscrimination (or both) that makes escape from poverty, for most,difficult at best (Ryan, 1975; Valentine, 1971). Moreover, muchdebate has centered on the culture-of-poverty concept itself. Somesociologists and anthropologists took issue with Lewis’sconceptualization of the poor as a “culture.” Are the behaviors andvalues of the poor a culture in the sense of a way of lifeconsciously passed on from one generation to the next, or are thesetraits simply adaptive mechanisms that would be discarded once thematerial conditions of poverty were removed (Gans, 1968; Lewis,1967)? Critics of the culture-of-poverty thesis suggest the latterand contend that its exponents confuse cause and effect. Even ifpoor families could somehow be transformed culturally into somemiddle-class ideal (both parents present, working, religious), thiswould have very limited impact on preventing future poverty.Researchers Jens Ludwig and Susan Mayer (2006) explain that thereis a dearth of evi- dence to support the idea that parents whochoose to marry, work, and regularly attend church are more likelyto produce children who will experience long-term economic success.Moreover, they show that a majority of poor adults have grown up injust such “pro-social” households.

Question

Which theory do you think best explains why people are poor inAmerican society?

Why?