Economic policy, distribution and poverty: The nature of disagreements

The last 20 years have seen growing areas of agreement on poverty reduction strategies, but disagreements on economic policy, distribution and poverty seem to have intensified. This paper tries to identify the underlying nature of these disagreements, related to differences in perspective and framework between "Finance Ministry" and "Civil Society" tendencies. It is argued that the deep divisions one sees can be located in differences in the level of aggregation adopted, the time horizon considered, and assumptions made on market structure and power. Mutual understanding could be advanced by further exploration of these differences, and the adoption by both sides of the approach of dialogue rather than negotiation. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.