Neo-liberal model has failed to address poverty

Dear Editor,

The economic and financial crisis that has gripped a number of Western countries has demonstrated in no uncertain terms that the neo-liberal model of development has failed to address in any fundamental way the issue of poverty and human misery.

This essentially is the message that Pope Francis is bringing to the peoples of Brazil and the world as a whole during his visit to Brazil.

The market model to development has resulted in an ever widening gap between the rich and the poor. People are poor not because they are lazy or born poor but basically because the economic and social structures in a market-led environment militate against them and limit their prospects of development.

As the Pope correctly observed, an entire generation of young people in several Western economies are unable to find gainful employment and are therefore condemned to a life of unfulfilled expectations due to no fault of theirs.

What the world needs is a new and enlightened approach to development in which people and not profits are placed at the centre of all productive efforts.

In other words there is need for a new global human order along the lines suggested by Dr Cheddi Jagan.

The world has an abundance of resources to provide a decent life for all of its inhabitants, but it is the skewed nature of the distribution of those resources that is responsible for the mass hunger and deprivation that afflicted so many millions of people globally.

Yours faithfully,
Hydar Ally