Beyond Income Poverty: Socio-Political and Psychological Exclusion in Jamaica-A Systematic Qualitative and Comparative Analysis of Multidimensional Deprivation, Citizenship and Human Development

Abstract

Poverty in Jamaica has traditionally been conceptualised and measured primarily through household consumption, income adequacy and material deprivation, yet these approaches may insufficiently capture the social, political and psychological conditions through which disadvantage is experienced and reproduced. Recent reductions in official poverty are important developmental achievements, but improvements in consumption-based measures do not necessarily demonstrate equivalent improvements in social belonging, political influence, psychological security, institutional inclusion or perceived life opportunities. This systematic qualitative comparative study critically examines poverty in Jamaica as a multidimensional process involving material deprivation, social exclusion, political marginalisation and psychological exclusion, while comparing the Jamaican experience with evidence from Caribbean, African, Latin American and high-income societies. Drawing on capability theory, social-exclusion theory, relative-deprivation perspectives and the psychology-of-poverty literature, the current study synthesises scholarly research, official Jamaican documents and international developmental evidence to identify mechanisms linking economic hardship with exclusion from institutions, opportunities, participation and psychosocial well-being. The principal research gap is that Jamaican poverty scholarship and policy measurement remain comparatively fragmented across economic, social, political and psychological domains, with insufficient integration of these dimensions in a single explanatory framework capable of distinguishing reduced monetary poverty from persistent exclusion. The study proposes a Multidimensional Poverty-Exclusion-Capability Framework through which poverty reduction in Jamaica should be evaluated not only by whether household resources increase but also by whether citizens acquire meaningful capabilities, institutional access, political voice, psychological security, social recognition and realistic opportunities for upward mobility.