Entitlement failure
Also called: Entitlement approach, Sen's entitlement theory · Topic: Poverty and Inequality: Measurement and Policy · NCERT: Beyond NCERT
Meaning
Entitlement failure is Amartya Sen's explanation of famine. People starve because they can no longer buy or get food. It does not have to mean that the country has less food. A person's entitlement is the set of food bundles they can command. It depends on their endowment, meaning what they own, such as land, tools or their own labour. It also depends on exchange conditions, meaning wages, prices and any state support. When wages fall, jobs vanish or food prices jump, a group's entitlement can collapse even while the shops still have grain. This idea shifted famine policy away from just raising food supply. The focus moved to protecting people's purchasing power, through public works, cash or subsidised grain.
Example
In the Bengal famine of 1943 there was no major fall in food production. Wartime prices rose sharply, and landless labourers, fishermen and artisans could no longer afford rice. They starved while rice was still on sale. Relief that gives such groups wage employment or cheap grain repairs their lost entitlement.
Don't confuse with
- Food availability decline (FAD) view: this view says famine happens because total food supply falls. Entitlement failure says famine can happen even when supply is normal, because some groups lose access to that food.
- Capability approach: this is Sen's wider idea of poverty as a lack of real freedoms, such as being healthy, literate and well-fed. Entitlement failure is a narrower idea. It explains why particular groups lose access to food during a famine.