Rural poverty is often unseen or misperceived by outsiders. Dr Chambers contends that researchers, scientists, administrators and fieldworkers rarely appreciate the richness and validity of rural people's knowledge or the hidden nature of rural poverty. This is a challenging book for all concerned with rural development, as practitioners, academics, students or researchers.

'Chambers has successfully combined a lucid style and powerful use of words with a high degree of academic rigour ... written with a directness and honesty.' (Community Development Journal)

• Preface 1. Rural Poverty Unperceived 2. Two Cultures of Outsiders 3. How Outsiders Learn 4. Whose Knowledge? 5. Integrated Rural Poverty 6. Seeing what to do 7. The New Professionalism: Putting the Last First 8. Practical Action References Index