ISAS Working Papers

In this paper we present an overview of the social development profiles of the countries in the South-Asian region whose specific features we outline. Then we consider the region as it stands today in terms of contemporary development standards. The number of people afflicted by poverty and human deprivation is overwhelmingly large in South Asia - a region already marked by high internal migration, military conflicts and the attendant loss of life, and critical issues of livelihood and human rights. Out of the total of 1.3 billion absolute poor people in the world, 433 million live in South Asia. There are more people living in poverty in South Asia than the combined population in poverty in Sub-Saharan Africa, the Arab States, East Asia and the Pacific (excluding China), and Latin America and the Caribbean. Illiteracy rates in South Asia are two-and-a-half times these rates in the rest of the developing world: the adult-literacy rate in South Asia is 48 percent, the lowest in any region of the world. The proportion of malnourished children is three times as high and access to health-care facilities is one and half times as low as global averages for these figures of deprivation and destitution. Women in South Asia endure one-third of the world's maternal deaths. We focus on such standards of development in the countries of South Asia; and we trace the relationship between poverty and democracy here, and the roles of states and civil society in reaching high standards of governance. The situation in South Asia poses new challenges for the development of policy responses for the problem of poverty here.