We will spare no effort to free our fellow men, women, and children from the abject and dehumanizing conditions of extreme poverty.
—UN Millennium Declaration, New York, September 2000
How effective has the international community been in combating global poverty throughout and since the twentieth century? The answers—for there are many—are varied and surprising. Some experts estimate that society is well on its way to achieving the United Nations' Millennium Development Goals, which, among other things, strive to cut extreme poverty rates in half by the year 2015. Others say those estimates are overblown and the reality is far more grim. In the early twenty-first century certain natural and man-made events—including earthquakes, hurricanes, and wars—have put poverty at the forefront of international consciousness, while television and the Internet have allowed everyone to witness the experiences of the poor like never before. New anti-poverty campaigns have been developed, some headed by renowned business people or celebrities. Charitable giving reached record highs, especially in the wake of the natural disasters of 2005. Nevertheless, poverty persists in every country in the world. As explained in Chapter 2 of this book, the reasons are complex and the questions are at times unanswerable. However, to fully understand the problem of poverty, we must see where we have been to determine where we are going.
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