Some time ago, we at NextBillion had the pleasure of facilitating a debate about how - and how much - bottom of the pyramid strategy can improve the plight of the poor. The University of Michigan's Aneel Karnani wrote a very insightful paper critiquing various points about the BoP proposition. This paper then received a response by Michigan's C.K. Prahalad and Al Hammond (then at WRI; now at Ashoka).

Recently, a new critique was published by "Innovations: Technology|Governance|Globalization", a journal we have praised already here. The critique, entitled "The Fortune at the Bottom or the Middle of the Pyramid?" is authored by Anand Kumar Jaiswal, from the Indian Institute of Management in Ahmedabad.

As I read his paper, I found myself agreeing with many of his points, similar to when I read Karnani’s publication. This is because Jaiswal, like Karnani, doesn't refute BoP strategies as a means to approaching poverty problems, but rather contends that reality is sometimes more complex than theory, which is why I find it refreshing to read such articles.

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