Globalization and Poverty : Possible Links , Different Explanations by

Widespread social and political movements against globalization have become fashionable in the past few years, as witnessed during the violent demonstrations against global institutions at Seattle in 1999, Prague in 2000, and Quebec in 2001. Although vociferous opponents of globalization are not wholly unified in their ultimate demands, their claim that third-world poverty has become one of the most pressing moral, political, and economic issues in the political agenda of the new millennium is a legitimate one. In addition to grassroots organizations, NGOs, and fringe groups, mainstream international institutions and organizations have recognized the reality of global inequality and third-world poverty as a pressing issue, at least at the rhetorical level. For instance, the official institutions of the Bretton Woods post–World War II liberal regime, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, have focused their discussions and operative plans in the recent past on the eradication of poverty, or at least its reduction, as “the single greatest challenge of the century.”1