IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/osf/socarx/xtnfg.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Policy or Window Dressing? Exploring the Impact of Poverty Reduction Strategies on Poverty Rates among the Canadian Provinces

Author

Listed:
  • Plante, Charles

    (McGill University)

Abstract

Poverty reduction strategies (PRS) have become a popular instrument for addressing poverty globally. In Canada, all ten provinces have committed to adopting PRS. The province’s commonalities and differences provide an ideal testing ground for studying their effects. Do PRS actually reduce poverty? According to their detractors, governments use PRS as ‘window dressing’ to gloss over unsuccessful poverty reduction efforts. In this study, I identify the timing of the introduction of PRS action plans and explore whether they have coincided with changes in provincial poverty rates. I find that more often than not rates have dropped before rather than after the introduction of PRS. This suggests that governments have indeed used PRS as window dressing, but to showcase and claim credit for poverty reduction successes.

Suggested Citation

  • Plante, Charles, 2018. "Policy or Window Dressing? Exploring the Impact of Poverty Reduction Strategies on Poverty Rates among the Canadian Provinces," SocArXiv xtnfg, Center for Open Science.
  • Handle: RePEc:osf:socarx:xtnfg
    DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/xtnfg
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://osf.io/download/5af4e8cca5bbbc0012c60213/
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.31219/osf.io/xtnfg?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lars Osberg & Kuan Xu, 2008. "How Should We Measure Poverty in a Changing World? Methodological Issues and Chinese Case Study," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 12(2), pages 419-441, May.
    2. Ian Sanderson, 2009. "Intelligent Policy Making for a Complex World: Pragmatism, Evidence and Learning," Political Studies, Political Studies Association, vol. 57(4), pages 699-719, December.
    3. Ian Sanderson, 2009. "Intelligent Policy Making for a Complex World: Pragmatism, Evidence and Learning," Political Studies, Political Studies Association, vol. 57, pages 699-719, December.
    4. Notten, Geranda & Laforest, Rachel, 2016. "Poverty reduction strategies in Canada: A new way to tackle an old problem?," MERIT Working Papers 2016-057, United Nations University - Maastricht Economic and Social Research Institute on Innovation and Technology (MERIT).
    5. Unknown, 2005. "Forward," 2005 Conference: Slovenia in the EU - Challenges for Agriculture, Food Science and Rural Affairs, November 10-11, 2005, Moravske Toplice, Slovenia 183804, Slovenian Association of Agricultural Economists (DAES).
    6. Jim LEVINSOHN, 2003. "The World Bank’S Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper Approach: Good Marketing Or Good Policy?," G-24 Discussion Papers 21, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. O’Connor John, 2022. "Strengthening the science–policy interface in Ireland," Administration, Sciendo, vol. 70(4), pages 29-52, December.
    2. Crabolu, Gloria & Font, Xavier & Eker, Sibel, 2023. "Evaluating policy complexity with Causal Loop Diagrams," Annals of Tourism Research, Elsevier, vol. 100(C).
    3. Ansell, Christopher K. & Bartenberger, Martin, 2016. "Varieties of experimentalism," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 130(C), pages 64-73.
    4. Claire A Dunlop, 2014. "The Possible Experts: How Epistemic Communities Negotiate Barriers to Knowledge Use in Ecosystems Services Policy," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 32(2), pages 208-228, April.
    5. Srinivasa Vittal Katikireddi & Shona Hilton & Chris Bonell & Lyndal Bond, 2014. "Understanding the Development of Minimum Unit Pricing of Alcohol in Scotland: A Qualitative Study of the Policy Process," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 9(3), pages 1-10, March.
    6. Jessica H. Phoenix & Lucy G. Atkinson & Hannah Baker, 2019. "Creating and communicating social research for policymakers in government," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 5(1), pages 1-11, December.
    7. Walton, Mat, 2014. "Applying complexity theory: A review to inform evaluation design," Evaluation and Program Planning, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 119-126.
    8. Stucki, Iris, 2018. "Evidence-based arguments in direct democracy: The case of smoking bans in Switzerland," Evaluation and Program Planning, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 148-156.
    9. Deas, L. & Mattu, L. & Gnich, W., 2013. "Intelligent policy making? Key actors' perspectives on the development and implementation of an early years' initiative in Scotland's public health arena," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 1-8.
    10. Nguyen, Sun V. & Langston, Nancy & Wellstead, Adam & Howlett, Michael, 2020. "Mining the evidence: Public comments and evidence-based policymaking in the controversial Minnesota PolyMet mining project," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 69(C).
    11. Willis, Cameron David & Corrigan, Crystal & Stockton, Lisa & Greene, Julie Kathryn & Riley, Barbara Lyn, 2017. "Exploring the unanticipated effects of multi-sectoral partnerships in chronic disease prevention," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 121(2), pages 158-168.
    12. Belinda McFadgen & Dave Huitema, 2018. "Experimentation at the interface of science and policy: a multi-case analysis of how policy experiments influence political decision-makers," Policy Sciences, Springer;Society of Policy Sciences, vol. 51(2), pages 161-187, June.
    13. Paul Cairney, 2015. "Debate: What is complex government and what can we do about it?," Public Money & Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 35(1), pages 3-6, January.
    14. Crabolu, Gloria & Font, Xavier & Eker, Sibel, 2023. "Evaluating Policy Instrument Complexity With Causal Loop Diagrams," SocArXiv 2c83b, Center for Open Science.
    15. Paul Lewis, 2021. "The innovation systems approach: an Austrian and Ostromian perspective," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 34(1), pages 97-114, March.
    16. Yi Yang, 2021. "Critical realism and complexity theory: Building a nonconstructivist systems research framework for effective governance analysis," Systems Research and Behavioral Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(1), pages 177-183, January.
    17. Greenhalgh, Trisha & Engebretsen, Eivind, 2022. "The science-policy relationship in times of crisis: An urgent call for a pragmatist turn," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 306(C).
    18. Pierre-Olivier Bédard, 2015. "The Mobilization of Scientific Evidence by Public Policy Analysts," SAGE Open, , vol. 5(3), pages 21582440156, September.
    19. Gates, Emily F., 2016. "Making sense of the emerging conversation in evaluation about systems thinking and complexity science," Evaluation and Program Planning, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 62-73.
    20. William Ascher, 2021. "Coping with intelligence deficits in poverty-alleviation policies in low-income countries," Policy Sciences, Springer;Society of Policy Sciences, vol. 54(2), pages 345-370, June.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:osf:socarx:xtnfg. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: OSF (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://arabixiv.org .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.