
Two-thirds of the population of the world are poor, and their number is growing in the first as well as in the third world, despite billions of dollars of aid. The economic development policies of the last two decades, and the theory which gave rise to them, have been discredited...

Friedmann argues that poverty should be seen not merely in material terms, but as social, political and psychological powerlessness. He presents the case for an alternative form of development committed to empowering the poor in their own communities, and to mobilizing them for...