“P3>Q2” in Northern Orissa: An Example of Integrating “Combined Methods” (Q2) Through a “Platform for Probing Poverties” (P3)

On the use of socioeconomic status indicators in the analysis of health inequalities and poverty in Africa

“…The later approach often leads to paternalistic solutions to social problems because the researchers assume they have ‘objective truth’ about the subject of the study. When the researcher's conceptual framework is at variance with the subjects' conceptual framework, the result is prescription of policies and solutions that do not address the problems of the subjects (Krishna, 2006; Rew et al ., 2007) and attempts to impose such solutions on the subjects may even be resisted.…”

“…Understanding this structural insertion in turn requires understanding the complexity of communal memory, collective experience, social institutions and values of the community. This approach will require greater use of dialogic techniques such as focus group discussions, life‐histories and other similar techniques which have found increasing use in poverty analysis (see for example different innovative approaches to identifying the poor based on community's self knowledge as shown in Krishna, 2004, 2006, 2007; Adato et al ., 2007; de Haan and Dubey, 2007; Hargreaves et al ., 2007; Rew et al ., 2007). Krishna (2006), for example, notes in the context of poverty analysis that ‘… what households target through their strategies is poverty as this condition is understood and defined locally’ (p. 273).…”