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capability, fuzzy sets, poverty, South Africa, well-being,

Economists have often attempted precise measurement of phenomena which involve vague predicates. Difficulties emerge in such attempts if vagueness is not explicitly acknowledged at the methodological level. In this paper, various accounts of vague concepts are used to think about the economics of poverty measurement. Approaches to dealing with vagueness in this context tend to involve 'epistemic' and 'fuzzy set theoretic' approaches. Indeed, only the fuzzy set theoretic literature takes on vagueness explicitly. It is argued that both these approaches encounter significant difficulties, and that fuzzy set theoretic measures are hard to interpret intuitively. A 'supervaluationist' approach to the vagueness of poverty is developed. It is argued that this approach has much to recommend it and that some fuzzy measures can be interpreted intuitively as measures of vulnerability on this account.Poverty, Vagueness, Fuzzy Sets, Supervaluationism, Methodology,

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It is sometimes argued that poverty is multi-dimensional and that the borderline between the poor and the non-poor is vague. In this paper fuzzy set theoretic poverty measures are used to examine vulnerability and 'definite poverty' in various dimensions of the quality of life. The focus of the paper is on inter-provincial rankings in these dimensions at the time of the 1996 Census in South Africa. While various methodological difficulties are noted, the analysis suggests that the distinction between human and financial poverty, and that between definite poverty and extreme vulnerability, are important for policy, in particular as regards the inter-provincial distribution of funds. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.