1. Tauhid Hossain Khan
Lecturer, Department of Sociology
Jagannath University,
Dhaka-1100

2. Accumulation by dispossession
Harvey’s (2003) accumulation by dispossession (ABD) is an
inspiration from Marx’s seminal analysis of primitive accumulation
– ‘the historical process of divorcing the producer from the means
of production’ (1976: 875).
Accumulation by dispossession : the neoliberal capitalist policies
in many western nations, from the 1970s and to the present day,
as resulting in a centralization of wealth and power in the hands
of a few by dispossessing the public of their wealth or land.
These neoliberal policies are guided mainly by four practices:
I. Privatization
II. Finacialization
III. Management and manipulation of crises
IV. State redistribution

3. Objective of the Study
To show how does ‘accumulation by dispossession’ influence poverty
through widening inequality in Bangladesh.
Data and Methodology
Secondary data are main resources since there is a rich amount of researches
and studies related to inequality and poverty and their dynamics that I could
collect for this study. These resources were collected from many websites,
scholarly articles, books, dissertations, and unpublished research reports,
newspapers, and magazines, annual or monthly reports of different ministry or
departments of Bangladesh government. Data produced by the Household
Income and Expenditure Survey (HIES) of Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics
(BBS) are predominately adopted in this study.

4. Inequality and Poverty Nexus
‘Inequality, rather than want, is the cause of trouble’ (Ancient Chinese
saying)
Inequality is necessary for society or not: Philosophical debate
Gerhard Lenski (1966): conservative thesis and radical antithesis
Conflict theorists
Functionalist sociologists
Harvey (1990): flexible accumulation
Anthony Giddens (2000): runaway world
Economic growth and inequality
Unequal accesses to different forms of services hamper the expected
level of growth in reducing poverty.
Unequal growth pattern has a weaker poverty alleviating effect and has
been shown to be harmful to growth, and it will also reduce the growth
and thereby exacerbate poverty.

5. Dynamics of Accumulation by Dispossession in Bangladesh
Labor exploitation
In the case of rural areas:
Privatization or commodification of rural land: transfer of agrarian land
to capital for industrial, commercial and residential development
Capitalist rentiers (corporate developers) who commodify land for
industry and urban growth and capture windfall profits from the artificially
cheap land acquired by the state, e.g., EPZs developers.
 Extraction of natural resources
 Restructuring of rural class structure: drawing certain classes into a
chain of land-based rentiership
Widening inequalities in the rural class structure: process of
modernizing the countryside creating industrial proletariat
Breaking up the traditional rural class structure –third party (locally known
as dalal): getting richer than the original owners of land- gearing up getting
landlessness of the rural farmer and widening the rural inequality.
Remittances: Who is the receiver of remittances?
Labor market: getting deskilled and losing their jobs

6. In the case of urban areas:
Creative destruction –process of displacement -the mirror –image of capital
absorption thorough urban redevelopment
House rent
Income Inequality in Bangladesh
Source: Author’s Calculation Based on HIES 2005 and 2010 Data
Table: Income Inequality in Bangladesh (Gini co-efficient)
Year Rural Urban National
2000 0.393 0.497 0.451
2005 0.428 0.497 0.467
2010 0.430 0.452 0.458
Growth rate 0.94% -0.91% 0.16%
In rural areas, income has increased from 0.393 in 2000 to 0.430 in 2010 with the
growth rate of 0.94 percent, whereas it has decreased from 0.497 to 0.452 at the same
time in urban areas with the growth rate of -0.91 percent.
It has increased from 0.451 to 0.458 at national level with a growth rate of 0.16
percent during the period.

7. Incidence and changing trends of poverty in Bangladesh
Table : Incidence and changing trends of poverty in Bangladesh
2000 2005 2010 Annual
change
(%)200
0-2005
Annual change
(%)2005-2010
Annual
change
(%)2000-
2010
Head Count Index
National 48.9 40 31.5 -3.64 -4.25 -3.35
Urban 35.2 28.4 21.3 -3.86 -5.00 -3.94
Rural 52.3 43.8 35.2 -3.31 -3.93 -3.27
Poverty Gap
National 12.8 9 6.5 -5.93 -5.55 -4.92
Urban 9.1 6.5 4.3 -5.71 -6.77 -5.27
Rural 13.7 9.8 7.4 -5.69 -4.89 -4.59
Squared Poverty Gap
National 4.6 2.9 2 -7.39 -6.20 -5.65
Urban 3.3 2.1 1.3 -7.27 -7.61 -6.06
Rural 4.9 3.1 2.2 -7.35 -5.80 -5.51
Source: Based on HIES-2010, BBS; Hossain and Khan, 2011:120aa

8. Discussion and Conclusion
According to United Nations (2010), more than 80 percent of the
world’s population lives in countries where income differentials are
widening. The poorest 40 percent of the world’s population account
for only 5 percent of global income. On the other hand, the richest 20
per cent account for 75 per cent of world income.
Significant reduction in poverty has taken place in the last four
decades
Despite notable progress in poverty reduction Bangladesh faces
the stark reality that about 45 million of its population still live under
poverty (BBS, 2010).
The other dimensions of poverty which make poverty reduction
more challenging in the future are rural-urban divide in poverty,
regional variations in poverty.
17.6 percent of the total population live in extreme poverty or
chronic poverty (BBS, 2010).
Growth-induced degradation of these resources can adversely
affect livelihoods of poor people; the poor can themselves be partly
responsible for overexploitation and degrade natural resources.

9. Poverty and Youths in Bangladesh
School drop out
Juvenile delinquency
Risky behavior such as commercially sex working, victim
trafficking and risk of HIV/AIDS infection and so on
Organized violence
Abuse of drug and other substances
Because of widening inequality by accumulation by dispossession,
youths are being deprived of productive activities. And mounting poor
youths in Bangladesh are out of reach of resources,
Since potentialities of youths are being debacle by the unequal
distribution of the resources and services.
Poverty among the youths and adolescents is the crucial factor behind:

10. Thank you !