Social Inequalities and the Crisis of Development in Nigeria: Rivers State Experience, 2010-2021
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.31150/ajshr.v3i11.1747Keywords:
Inequality, Social Inequality, Rural Communities, Rural DevelopmentAbstract
The crux of this paper is to examine the impact of social inequalities on development in Rivers State. The study relied on the Marxian political economy approach. The descriptive survey design was adopted for the study, while the Taro Yamane formula was used to streamline the population to a manageable size of 400. After distribution and retrieval of the questionnaire, 320 questionnaires were accepted and used for the study, while 80 were rejected. Statistical tools such as simple percentages, means, and standard deviation were utilised for the analysis. The paper revealed that social inequality is a product of bad governance, insecurity, ethnic politics and marginalization, a lack of social welfare services, and incessant community clashes and chieftaincy tussles. The study further revealed that there are great discrepancies between the rural and urban populations. Furthermore, the study revealed that some manifestations of social inequality in Rivers State include a decreasing rate of life expectancy, an increasing crime rate, armed robbery, infant mortality, and cybercrime. The paper suggests that the different groups in Rivers State should come up with ways to reduce social inequality by balancing social development in all communities. This can be done by using a "macro-policy redistributive framework" to improve how resources are shared and make it easier for poor people to get to those resources, as well as by building the State Governments' ability to deal with local problems and making them stronger through "devolution".
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