What is Missing in the Process of Poverty Alleviation?

Abstract

Taking alleviating extreme poverty as the top priority, the World Bank has conducted many projects in achieving this goal, such as increasing health, promoting educational access for girls, and so on (World Bank, 2018). All these projects that invest in human capital work to boost the economy and reduce poverty. However, a close look at the World Bank projects revealed that that ethics education is missing in these projects. Even though the Bank has its own Ethics Department guiding the behaviors of its employees, the projects it conducted in countries in poverty does not involve ethics education, an essential element in poverty alleviation. Other than explaining why extreme poverty exists and why certain groups of people keep returning to the poverty stage while receiving support from the government, this article takes China as an example based on scholarly publications to explain why ethics education is necessary in the World Bank poverty alleviation projects. Based on the literature review, this article argues that it is crucial to offer opportunities for those who do not have access to discover alternative lifestyles due to limited resources and low socioeconomic status and to facilitate people to determine a life goal in order to eliminate extreme poverty effectively.