IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/jdevst/v42y2006i4p541-558.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Entitlement failure and deprivation: a critique of Sen's famine philosophy

Author

Listed:
  • Khandakar Qudrat-I Elahi

Abstract

This paper insinuates the conceptual foundation of Sen's entitlement approach by pinpointing its major weaknesses. First, Sen's critique of FAD is inadequate because speculative, not actual, supply and demand forces determine short-run commodity prices. Second, Sen's idea of 'exchange entitlement' is inconsistent with the principles of capitalism, since this economic system operates on the conceptual and legal framework of voluntary exchange. Third, if food is considered as an entitled commodity, other basic necessities of life, such as healthcare, education etc. could claim the same status. Finally, the approach is founded on a hidden hypothesis that income distributions in non-communist states are economically and politically optimal.

Suggested Citation

  • Khandakar Qudrat-I Elahi, 2006. "Entitlement failure and deprivation: a critique of Sen's famine philosophy," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 42(4), pages 541-558.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:jdevst:v:42:y:2006:i:4:p:541-558
    DOI: 10.1080/00220380600680771
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00220380600680771
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/00220380600680771?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
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Stephen Devereux, 2001. "Sen's Entitlement Approach: Critiques and Counter-critiques," Oxford Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 29(3), pages 245-263.
    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. Rashid, Shahidur & Gulati, Ashok & Mahendra Dev, S., 2008. "Parastatals and food policies: The Indian case," IFPRI book chapters, in: Rashid, Shahidur & Gulati, Ashok & Cummings, Jr., Ralph (ed.), From parastatals to private trade: Lessons from Asian agriculture, chapter 3, pages 51-76, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    2. Plümper, Thomas & Neumayer, Eric, 2009. "Famine Mortality, Rational Political Inactivity, and International Food Aid," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 37(1), pages 50-61, January.
    3. Dung, Le Canh & Ha, Vo Van & Tuan, Vo Van & Nhan, Dang Kieu & Ward, John & Brown, Peter, 2017. "Financial Capacity of Rice-based Farming Households in the Mekong Delta, Vietnam," Asian Journal of Agriculture and Development, Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture (SEARCA), vol. 14(1), June.
    4. Elahi, Khandakar Qudrat-I, 2018. "Amartya Sen, Fad And The 1974 Famine In Bangladesh: A Closer Look," Bangladesh Journal of Agricultural Economics, Bangladesh Agricultural University, vol. 38(1-2), September.
    5. Moon, Wanki, 2011. "Is agriculture compatible with free trade?," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 13-24.
    6. Sam Geens, 2018. "The Great Famine in the county of Flanders (1315–17): the complex interaction between weather, warfare, and property rights," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 71(4), pages 1048-1072, November.
    7. Rojas, Mariano & Guardiola, Jorge, 2017. "Hunger and the Experience of Being Well: Absolute and Relative Concerns," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 78-86.
    8. Muñiz Castillo, M.R. & Gasper, D.R., 2011. "Human autonomy effectiveness and development projects," ISS Working Papers - General Series 22692, International Institute of Social Studies of Erasmus University Rotterdam (ISS), The Hague.
    9. Gasper, D.R., 2007. "Problem- and policy-analysis for human development," ISS Working Papers - General Series 18743, International Institute of Social Studies of Erasmus University Rotterdam (ISS), The Hague.
    10. Nicola Ansell & Elsbeth Robson & Flora Hajdu & Lorraine van Blerk & Lucy Chipeta, 2009. "The new variant famine hypothesis," Progress in Development Studies, , vol. 9(3), pages 187-207, July.
    11. Tata Ngome, Precillia I. & Shackleton, Charlie & Degrande, Ann & Nossi, Eric Joel & Ngome, Francis, 2019. "Assessing household food insecurity experience in the context of deforestation in Cameroon," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 57-65.
    12. Phatra Samerwong & Hilde M Toonen & Peter Oosterveer & Simon R Bush, 2020. "A capability approach to assess aquaculture sustainability standard compliance," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(1), pages 1-19, January.
    13. Miikka Voutilainen, 2022. "Income inequality and famine mortality: Evidence from the Finnish famine of the 1860s," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 75(2), pages 503-529, May.
    14. León Tamayo, Dorian Fernando, 2016. "Enfoque de capacidades en Amartya Sen: Aproximaciones y reflexiones [Capabilities approach in Amartya Sen: Approaches and reflections]," MPRA Paper 120324, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 03 Dec 2016.
    15. Lindsay Stringer, 2009. "Reviewing the links between desertification and food insecurity: from parallel challenges to synergistic solutions," Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, Springer;The International Society for Plant Pathology, vol. 1(2), pages 113-126.
    16. Mamoon, Dawood & Ijaz, Kinza, 2017. "How Climate Change and Agriculture Fares with Food Security in Pakistan?," MPRA Paper 81346, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    17. Antonio Ioris & Carlos Irigaray & Pierre Girard, 2014. "Institutional responses to climate change: opportunities and barriers for adaptation in the Pantanal and the Upper Paraguay River Basin," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 127(1), pages 139-151, November.
    18. Rashid, Shahidur & Gulati, Ashok & Cummings, Jr., Ralph, 2008. "Grain marketing parastatals in Asia: Why do they have to change now?," IFPRI book chapters, in: Rashid, Shahidur & Gulati, Ashok & Cummings, Jr., Ralph (ed.), From parastatals to private trade: Lessons from Asian agriculture, chapter 2, pages 10-47, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    19. Lopamudra Banerjee, 2016. "Catastrophes And Consumption Failure," The Singapore Economic Review (SER), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 61(01), pages 1-25, March.
    20. León Tamayo, Dorian Fernando, 2018. "Enfoque de las capacidades," EconStor Preprints 182466, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.

    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:taf:jdevst:v:42:y:2006:i:4:p:541-558. 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: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/FJDS20 .

    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.