The Crab Mentality vs. Bahala Na: A Consensus Analysis of Local Views of Poverty in the Rural Philippines.

Timothy J. Benner
SOUTHERN METHODIST UNIVERSITY

Anthropologists have traditionally relied upon qualitative methods to support their assertions. In fact, one of the strengths of our discipline is that we are able to offer "contextual" data where other disciplines are not. However, the converse side of this reliance upon qualitative methods can result in an inability to "back up" or prove the impressions that we receive about our informants through these methods. This is an increasingly important issue as more and more anthropologists work in multidisciplinary or policy-making contexts where we need to back up our contextual data with "numbers." In this paper I will present a consensus analysis that rigorously examines how people conceptualize poverty, the relationship between poverty and environmental degradation, and possible causes and solutions to poverty within a rural Philippine community. By using a consensus analysis I was able to gather quantitative, statistical data to support the qualitative, contextual data gathered through participant observation. Using both qualitative and quantitative methods provides triangulation of methods that enables one to present data in a manner far more acceptable to non-anthropologists, thus strengthening the assertions of the anthropologist in multidisciplinary contexts. By using a consensus analysis I was able to prove that there is significant variation in how people conceptualized poverty due to age, education, and socioeconomic status, even within a fairly culturally homogenous community. This variation has serious policy and implementation implications for poverty alleviation programs since development professionals have traditionally overlooked variation entirely and treated poverty as a monolithic concept.