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Poverty has been reduced by too little, or not at all, in recent years. A fifth, perhaps a quarter, of the world's population are living in extreme poverty. The measurement of the phenomenon, and especially of annual trends in the rates and severity of poverty, is not acceptably precise, consistent, and generally agreed. Nor is policy being analyzed and justified in precise correlation with such trend reports as have been published.

The first Millennium Development Goal — to halve world poverty by 2015 — has become an unlikely prospect. The reasons lie in the present form of the globalization of the market, together with continuing preference shown to neo-liberal economic and social policies. If poverty is to be systematically reduced, the orthodoxies of definition, measurement, explanation and resolution, which as key elements of the problem necessarily reinforce each other, have to be re-examined and re-formulated quickly.

In re-examining approaches to measurement and policy the new human rights instruments, endorsed by a majority and in some cases by an overwhelming majority of governments, must play a vital role. Their potentialities are considerable for the measurement of poverty, deprivation, exclusion and development. But, crucially, they can help to engineer an international, as well as scientific, consensus in the war on poverty. One priority illustration would be a UN Child Investment Fund to finance the universal right of children to social security.

This paper reviews the extent to which feminist viewpoints are incorporated in NGO interventions aimed at women's development in Bangladesh by examining major feminist perspectives alongside NGO intervention strategies. Based on fieldwork experiences in four NGOs, it determines that NGOs are not following any specific feminist theory, but rather interventions are influenced by development paradigms engrossed in western feminist perspectives. The paper finds that third world feminism is more pertinent to the socioeconomic context of Bangladesh. However, this perspective is alone insufficient to bring desired change, rather the blending of feminist views may be more conducive to women development in Bangladesh. It concludes that the understanding of feminist theories is of greater importance for NGO practitioners and social workers to effectively address the issue of women's development.