We have chosen to synthesize these insights through a set of eight hypotheses that seems to capture the main elements of the diverse views of urban poverty. The hypotheses are driven by four underlying themes of urban poverty that occur repeatedly across the mul- tiple literatures on the subject of poverty. These themes are economic structure, popula- tion characteristics, societal institutions, and location. 1 Although the themes are reflected in our hypotheses, they do not fit neatly into the broad categories. Rather we see them as reflecting the ways in which research on urban poverty has developed, often drawing from multiple sources. Thus they offer a useful way.
