Editorial - June 2000

As I sat at my computer wondering what to write, I picked up an email message announcing a new World Bank study. Voices of the Poor, it is claimed, 'gathers the voices of 60,000 poor men and women from 60 countries'. This reminded me of something I know only too well: that if there is one thing in which Alliance is failing (I'm sure there are many), it is in reaching sufficiently into these and other poor countries, in terms of both writers and subject-matter. It is something I am constantly trying to put right.

Having said that, I have just returned from Los Angeles, where I was shocked to learn that 40 per cent of the population of the richest city in the world's richest country live on or below the official poverty line. The so-called developed world must surely have much to learn from strategies to combat poverty used in developing countries. I know of one Indian NGO currently working with UK agencies to help them deal with homelessness here – I'm sure this is only one example among many.