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At the end of 1993, the International Institute for Labour Studies (IILS) of the ILO launched an interregional project, co-financed by the UNDP, on "Patterns and causes of social exclusion and the design of policies to promote integration". The overall objective was "to improve the basis of action at the local, national, and international levels, aimed at the eradication of poverty and the promotion of social integration". The project was designed to inform the World Summit for Social Development, as well as other national and international bodies concerned with social development, on the relevance of the concept of social exclusion for the design of anti-poverty strategy outside the European context, where it was created and is extensively used.

The implementation of this project was guided by two basic questions. First, is how can the notion of social exclusion be introduced into the debate about anti-poverty strategy in developing countries and countries in transition; and second, if social exclusion is not simply a relabelling of an old problem ­ poverty ­ what analytical, policy and operational benefits arise from introducing this notion into the formulation and implementation of national and global anti-poverty strategies.

The notion of social exclusion is a complex one. On the one hand, it can denote a situation or process experienced by individuals, namely their marginalization; and on the other, a situation or process which occurs in societies as a result of the malfunctioning of their institutions, and which leads to the breakdown of social cohesion and the fragmentation of social relations. Moreover, rather than focusing on the poor or the outcomes of poverty, the social exclusion approach emphasizes the multidimensionality of, and the processes which result in, poverty, as well as the agents and institutions associated with these processes.

The core activity of the IILS/UNDP project has consisted in empirical work to analyze exclusion processes in various developing countries and countries in transition. Evidence was gathered on the various meanings of exclusion, on their relationships to poverty and their implications for anti-poverty strategy. Under the coordination of the IILS, this was undertaken by multidisciplinary research teams in the countries selected to participate in the project. These countries were taken from different regions of the world and represented a variety of societal and developmental models.

This publication is based on the findings from one of the eleven country case studies carried out and published in the framework of this project. As such, it represents a first and innovative research work which approaches social disadvantage and inequality from a social exclusion perspective in low income and non-Western European contexts.

José B. Figueiredo

International Institute for Labour Studies