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End of Poverty

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This film presents a challenge to the much-discussed ideas of Jeffrey Sachs. It shows that many of the causes of poverty are structural, not rooted in inadequacies of the individuals who live in poverty.

Unless we change the structures which create poverty, the efforts of many well-intended people to relieve the effects of poverty will not bring the end of poverty.

Henry George wrote about "the robber who takes all that is left" -- "Labor may be likened to a man who as he carries home his earnings is waylaid by a series of robbers. One demands this much, and another that much, but last of all stands one who demands all that is left, save just enough to enable the victim to maintain life and come forth next day to work. So long as this last robber remains, what will it benefit such a man to drive off any or all of the other robbers?" (Source: Protection or Free Trade)

Most of the efforts to reduce or end poverty do not attack the structures which create it; they are merely attempts to injure or remove one or another of those intermediate robbers: lack of drinking water; mosquitoes-borne illnesses; lack of educational opportunity; lack of capital, etc.

We ought to be seeking the source of the problem. This film is a start in that direction; it looks at structures. It is a good start. I encourage you to seek out the film's companion book Why Global Poverty?: A Companion Guide to the Film "The End of Poverty?" and two related websites: [...] and [...] for more that will illuminate the structural issues.

Thoreau, in Walden, wrote "There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root, and it may be that he who bestows the largest amount of time and money on the needy is doing the most by his mode of life to produce that misery which he strives in vain to relieve." This film will help people see part of the root of poverty. It isn't that the folks hacking at the branches are not good people; they are -- but they aren't going to end poverty. We HAVE to get to the root.

Where else might one look? Start with Henry George's landmark book on political economy (briefly, the science that deals with the distribution of wealth), Progress and Poverty - edited and abridged for modern readers by Bob Drake. It will give you fresh lenses through which to understand why we have poverty, and why most current efforts won't reduce it -- and it will give you hope and an understanding of how to end poverty, here or abroad.

"The End of Poverty? Think Again!" is beautifully photographed, and the speakers -- academics, activists and poor workers -- are eloquent. One comes away with a strong sense of the burden they carry. And the music and some scenes are haunting and memorable. See this film -- and share it with people who care about justice in the world.

Director Philippe Diaz's documentary THE END OF POVERTY? reminds us without poverty - that is, poor people the wealthy rob and enslave - those who enjoyed great affluence these past 500 years would have had to cut their own grass. In the fifteenth century, armies of the rich merely conquered foreign nations in order to plunder their resources and cart off slaves. But in modern times, the film explains, through organizations such as the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank the moneyed interests pillage by indebting countries in Africa, South America, and anywhere else they can get away with it.

Hence, today twenty percent of the world's population uses eighty percent of resources. The people of nations on the short end of that equation see starvation and disease kill 20,000 of their children every day.

Maybe I missed the explanation for calling this documentary THE END OF POVERTY?, but it strikes me as someone from the World Bank recoiling at the thought of actually making sure every human being has food, water, health care, and a decent home. "The end of poverty? Then what would we do to remain wealthy?"

See THE END OF POVERTY?.

I knew some of this but for the most part was blown away. It is astounding. I will think about this movie and what I have learned from it for a LONG time. I will feel guilty for complaining about anything knowing my conveniences come at quite a price.

Framing the root causes of poverty in an economic perspective can perhaps help these humanitarian groups and others to isolate and dismantle these destructive causes in an effort to alleviate the suffering of today's poor. In his documentary The End of Poverty?, Philippe Diaz provides just that. The film is bold in its criticism of accepted economic theory and practice. Mainstream critics, as a result, dutifully attack it on precarious grounds. New York Times film critic Neil Genzlinger dubbed Diaz's movie as a "guilt trip/history lesson" filled with "naïve" academics and public figures from all over the globe. Tyler Cowen, writing for the foreign policy magazine The American Interest, states that "the movie is blind to the world we actually live in," and then suggests that Ayn Rand had it right after all. And Peter Rainer, writing for the Christian Science Monitor, adds that the movie fails because "the talking heads in `The End of Poverty?' don't offer much." This sort of highbrow labeling is understandable and to be expected among intellectuals who consider themselves the guardians of capitalism. That's because Diaz's film, released in the States in November of 2009, is a punch in the teeth to capitalism. Offering solutions--and the movie, incidentally, makes plenty which the critics fail to recognize--is not Diaz's purpose for making the film. "Ultimately," Diaz said in the director's statement on the movie's website, "the goal of the film was to change the dialogue around the poverty debate from `poverty is a shame,' to `poverty exists for a reason'" (Diaz). As such, based on the testimonies of leading economists, politicians, activists, historians, authors, and intellectuals, the movie turns inside out the global economic system--tracing its roots 500 years back and following it up to the present--and one that causes, enables and preserves poverty.

The tone of the movie is set in the opening remarks of the movie. "Why, in a world with so much wealth," asks the narrator Martin Sheen, "do we still have so much poverty, where billions of people live on less than one dollar a day?" The answer is hard to swallow: the majority of the movie's audience, most likely, are beneficiaries of the economic system perpetuating poverty. Global poverty, the movie demonstrates, started with military conquest, slavery, and colonization. From this point forward, the movie should be understood in the context of dealing with two distinct historical periods: European colonialism and today's repackaged form of neocolonialism in the guise of a neoliberal model based on free market principles.

"The capitalist system and modern times started at the moment of the Conquest of the colonization and the submission of the people of the Americas by the Spanish and Portuguese" says Edgardo Lander, a professor and historian from Venezuela (3:00). This started 500 years of the expropriation of resources and at the same time the colonization of the land and people. The movie script reads as if it were written by Howard Zinn if he had ever written the people's history of the world. At other times, one feels as if Eduardo Galeano's Open Veins of Latin America had been made for the silver screen: "The European empires were built on the riches stolen from the colonies and on cheap or fee labor provided by the slave" (18:40). The movie continues by tracing back European colonization into Africa. "In Kenya," notes the narrator, "at the end of colonial times, the white 1% owned about 50% of the arable land" (11:00).

Starting from the past and moving to the present, the filmmakers highlight eye-opening trends of colonialism. For example, "The gap between the richest and the poorest country was: 3 to 1 in 1820; 35 to 1 in 1950; 74 to 1 in 1997" (18:29). Bolivian Vice President Alvaro Garcia Linera explains further the elementary principles of colonialism: "Because of colonialism, the riches generated either by human efforts or from natural resources are not retained in the country, but are externalized, sent to the outside. Sadly, colonialism is always part of the expansion of capitalism."

After having provided its audience with valid history of colonialism--something even the critics can agree on (see Cowen)--the filmmakers connect the past with the modern. Eric Toussaint, President of CADTM, explains that "During the second part of the 19th century, what we call the `Triad,' meaning Occidental Europe, Japan and North America...They start to dictate to the rest of the planet the rules of the game and impose an economic model that is capitalism" (24:10). It is at this point that colonial imperialism begins to fade and what emerges are the remnants of a mercantile society followed by the rise of capitalism and the subsequent rise of poverty. Remnants of colonialism remain, however. Author and historian Clifford Cobb explains: "One of the legacies of colonialism is that the poor countries of the third world are continuing to export raw materials and the countries of Europe and North America produce and export finished products. This stems from a practice that was developed long ago and the intention was that the countries of the Third World would remain backwards and dependent and would never be able to develop" (33:30).

Eric Toussaint and David Ellerman, a former economic advisor at the World Bank, describe the global economic order as neocolonial. While countries remain politically independent, they fall within an institutional system which imposes policies dictated from Washington via the WTO and IMF. After borders were split open to create markets for the North, the only solution offered by the North was more debt with high interests to pay off initial debt. The result is that developing countries lose sovereignty since they lose control over how to manage the agricultural and manufacturing sectors of their respective economies.

In the post World War II period, the U.S.-born neoliberal model emerged "which forced all economies to let the market govern everything" (55:30). Industry was heavily privatized which appropriated resources such as health care based on wealth, not need. Due largely in part to privatization and the concentration of resources toward the wealthy, today "Almost 1/3 of the world's population has no access to affordable clean water" (1:04:23). Also, the movie points out, "The richest 1% of the world's population owns 32% of the wealth" (42:07). Others die of curable diseases like malaria because they cannot afford the proper health care. "In 1970," for example, "434 million people were suffering from malnutrition. Today, there are 854 million" (1:10:00).

Economist John Perkins describes how large loans are offered from the World Bank to poor countries. The money, however, never goes to the countries in need but rather to large companies and multinational corporations. The loans are made knowing full well that the developing countries are unable to repay (The developing world spends $13 on debt repayment for every $1 it receives in grants [54:27]). In return, "economic hit men" working for the creditor countries demand their "pound of flesh" by demanding resources like oil or the Panama Canal, UN votes, or troops for Western military excursions. When these jackals are unsuccessful, the military is sent in. Consequently, according to Susan George, to look at the flow of money from South to North and vice versa, one sees that "the South is financing the North to the tune of $200 billion a year" (52:30). Leaders of developing countries who do not comply, describes historian Chalmers Johnson, are driven out by CIA operatives or by brute military force. Given the prevalence of poverty, it is sad then that "To cut global poverty and hunger in half would cost $20 billion. Annual military spending in the U.S. is more than $500 billion" (1:22:40).

By the 1970s, the neoliberal model was firmly in place. Over the next several decades, it would receive some fine tuning in the interests of Wall Street. In 1997, explains Nobel laureate in economist Joseph Stiglitz, the IMF tried to change its charter to force countries to liberalize and open up their capital markets (1:04:30). By liberalizing capital flows, capital could be shifted to avoid being taxed. Accordingly, $11.5 trillion in capital is held offshore to avoid being taxed. That's a tremendous amount of money that could go back into restoring health care, food programs, and educations systems. The liberalization of the market, moreover, pits heavily subsidized multinational corporations against small farmers, thus driving down wages and driving local farmers out of business. The protection of intellectual rights, furthers Stiglitz, has made access to life-saving drugs virtually impossible to obtain by the poor.

The movie closes with a powerful message that today's economic system is in complete imbalance. "Our chosen economic model has created a global situation in which today less than 25 percent of the world's population uses more than 80 percent of the planet's resources while creating 70 percent of its pollution" (1:23:00). Furthermore, the global economic model is financed by the poor. It was the poor who first by gave up their land and access to natural resources. It was the poor who financed the expansion of this global economic order through debt repayment, unfair trade and unjust taxes on their labor and consumption. And it was the poor and still is the poor who overpays for energy, food, and other basic necessities. The power structures have been firmly established and the "North ensures that poverty will deepen and inequalities will increase" (1:37:00).

So is there any hope for humanitarian groups interested in ending poverty? Is there an end to poverty? The movie title ends with a question mark suggesting that there may or may not be a solution. The burden is on the movie's audience. Martin Luther King Jr. shed light on a strategy to end poverty when, in his speech "Beyond Vietnam," he said "True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar. It comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring." Cobb echoes a similar strategy when he says that "Poverty in the world cannot possibly be eliminated unless the poor themselves say `we insist on justice not charity'" (1:31:45). He calls for an end to the privatization of natural resources, suggests that developed countries forgive debt, argues that the tax system be changed, proposes a need agrarian reform and a need to restore the idea of the commons.

To leave it up to the market is suicidal. "Famines are effective market solutions," says one of the activists in the movie. "They reduce demand." (1:34:00).

Really phenomenal documentary. If you have recently taken an interest in learning how the world truly operates then I recommend this documentary.

MUST VIEW for every single person on this planet. Especially the youth of the urban world forced into a web of consumerism, from which they can never escape.

I'm not really sure why those who made "The End of Poverty?" felt compelled to include a question mark in their title, since around 90% of the movie is devoted to defining the problem and only about 10% to offering solutions.

For much of the movie, director Philippe Diaz and narrator Martin Sheen keep hitting us with a litany of shocking and depressing statistics: that over 9,000,000 people die of starvation each year, that millions around the world earn less than a dollar a day, and that 60 to 80 million people work for nothing but room and board, making them virtual slaves in a 21st Century world. And that`s just for starters. And just as you're about ready to throw in the towel and declare there's no hope for the world, the interviewees begin exploring possible answers (a fairer tax structure, returning land ownership to indigenous peoples, etc.), but it still seems an insurmountable task overall.

On an instructional level, the movie traces the roots of modern poverty to the colonial era that began with the discovery of America, when countries - and now mega-corporations with no moral compass beyond the bottom-line - could exploit someone else's resources and amass huge stores of wealth at the expense of the lower classes. And that doesn't even include the robbing of the culture and the feeling of self-worth from the original inhabitants of these lands.

Diaz shows how the "haves" in the Northern Hemisphere have built and continue to build their fortunes primarily on the backs of the "have-nots" in the Southern Hemisphere. He interviews both economic theoreticians and common folk struggling for survival in both South America and Africa to drive home his point. He provides example upon example of how the policies of First World nations - neo-liberalism, unfettered free trade, multinational corporatism - have devastated the economies and peoples of the Third World.

It's a depressing experience sitting through this film, but the shards of hope it provides towards the end do provide some comfort. And you might even be inspired enough to rouse yourself off the sofa and work on doing something about the problem. Now, if only anyone knew what that solution was.

Although a little one-sided, it is definitely worth watching and paying attention to the wealth of arguments. Next time you hear the other side of the story (if there is one), you will be well prepared. It did not explore how poor investment in education makes this miserable system last so long, though. Watch it: you too will realize the days of capitalism are half counted already.

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"For decades, poverty reduction and development programs have failed to confront the different forms of power and the structural violence that hold more than two-thirds of the world['s population] in dire straits. Our chosen economic model has created a global situation in which today less than 25% of the world's population uses more than 80% of the planet's resources while creating 70% of its pollution."

The above is told to the viewer by the narrator of this eye-opening documentary. The narrator is activist and actor Martin Sheen.

This is a phenomenal discourse on why poverty exists when there's so much wealth in the world. This documentary is a must-see for anyone wanting to understand not only the United States' economic system but the foundation of today's global economy.

It features comments from such people as Nobel Prize winners in economics, authors, activists, and former World Bank employees. Brief interviews are conducted with people that live in such places as Bolivia, Brazil, Tanzania, Kenya, and Venezuela.

Peppered throughout this film are thought-provoking factoids. Here are three of my favourites:

(1) "The gap between the richest and poorest countries was: (3 to 1) in 1820, (35 to 1) in 1950, and (74 to 1) in 1997"

(2) "In 1970, 434 million people were suffering from malnutrition. Today, there are 854 million"

(3) "16 thousand children die each day from hunger or hunger-related diseases"

Finally, the DVD itself (the one released in 2008) has excellent picture and sound quality. It has several good extras.

In conclusion, this is a mesmerizing documentary. The one basic and sad thing you will learn from it is that poverty IS NOT an accident.

(2008; 1 hr, 45 minutes; 14 chapters)

<<Stephen Pletko, London, Ontario, Canada>>

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"The End of Poverty" is a documentary that everyone should watch. It begins with the coming of the Conquistadors who robbed native people in South and Central America of their land and their riches. Gold, silver, religious objects from the Incas and Maya people were stolen. Later came colonization and exapropriation of land that belonged to the people.

This film can outrage, especially when the topics of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund come up, along with big corporations that want to privatize businesses that before were run by governments. Most of the countries getting the raw end of the deal are in the Southern Hemisphere. In Bolivia, the people rose up in anger over the privatization of water. They were not allowed to use rainwater in cisterns, but had to pay higher prices for water, and for some people buying water took a week's wages and there was no money left for food, rent or medicines. Evo Morales, president of Bolivia, supported the people in their uprising and Bolivia controls their own water now. How can rainwater be denied to people when it is part of nature and the Earth and is there for us to use? It's all about the big corporations making money and keeping the people in debt.

When the IMF gives loans to countries, it isn't a guarantee that the people are going to get the benefit of the money. Most of the time it goes to the top, and when the time comes to repay the loan, it's the people without who must pay with their taxes.

I recommend this movie to anyone who cares about those living in severe poverty in the world, and in learning how uneven the distribution of wealth, food and resources is. This film is most definitely an eye opener.