Aspects and Evaluation of Development and Sustainability Notes

Understanding Development and Sustainability

1. It encompasses:
   1. Economic Growth: Increasing a country's wealth through industrialization, trade, and investment.
   2. Social Progress: Enhancing education, healthcare, and equality.
   3. Political Stability: Building effective governance and institutions.

1. It involves:
   1. Environmental Protection: Preserving natural resources and ecosystems.
   2. Economic Viability: Maintaining long-term economic growth.
   3. Social Equity: Ensuring fair distribution of resources and opportunities.

Dimensions of Development

1. Economic Development

1. GDP and GNI: Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and Gross National Income (GNI) measure a country's economic output.
2. Industrialization: Transition from agriculture to manufacturing and services.
3. Trade and Investment: Integration into global markets.

2. Social Development

1. Education: Access to quality education improves literacy and skills.
2. Healthcare: Reducing mortality rates and improving life expectancy.
3. Gender Equality: Empowering women and marginalized groups.

3. Political Development

1. Governance: Effective institutions and rule of law.
2. Democracy: Participation, accountability, and human rights.
3. Stability: Peaceful conflict resolution and security.

4. Environmental Sustainability

1. Resource Management: Sustainable use of water, energy, and land.
2. Biodiversity Conservation: Protecting ecosystems and species.
3. Climate Action: Reducing carbon emissions and adapting to climate change.

Assessing Development and Sustainability

1. Human Development Index (HDI)

1. Components: Life expectancy, education, and per capita income.
2. Purpose: Provides a holistic view of development beyond economic metrics.

2. Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

1. Overview: 17 global goals adopted by the UN in 2015.
2. Focus Areas: Poverty eradication, gender equality, climate action, and more.

3. Environmental Performance Index (EPI)

1. Purpose:
   1. Assesses and ranks countries on environmental sustainability
   2. Focuses on climate change, environmental health, and ecosystem vitality
2. Structure:
   1. Uses 40 performance indicators across 11 issue categories
   2. Grouped into 3 policy areas
   3. Ranks 180 countries, scores converted to a percentage (100 = most sustainable)
3. Significance:
   1. Reflects the growing global importance of environmental sustainability in development debates
   2. Its broad range of indicators makes it a strong, balanced composite index (less reliant on narrow data sets)

4. Gross Domestic Product (GDP)

1. Total value of goods/services produced annually.
2. Can be expressed as total GDP or GDP per capita (per person).
3. Adjusted for purchasing power parity (PPP) for cross-country comparison.
4. Strengths:
   1. Simple and widely available
   2. Useful for comparing overall economic size
5. Weaknesses:
   1. Ignores well-being: Does not consider happiness, health, or environmental sustainability.
   2. Assumes equal distribution: GDP per capita implies every citizen receives the same income, which is unrealistic.

5. Gini Coefficient

1. Measures income inequality within a country.
2. Scale from 0 (perfect equality) to 1 (perfect inequality).
3. More insightful than GDP alone, as it shows how wealth is distributed, not just how much is produced.
4. Limitations: Purely economic: doesn’t account for well-being, environmental quality, or social cohesion.

6. Happy Planet Index (HPI)

1. Purpose: Measures sustainable well-being rather than just economic output.
2. Formula: HPI = (Life Expectancy × Experienced Well-being) / Ecological Footprint
3. Key Features:
   1. Focuses on “Happy Life Years”: How long and how happily people live.
   2. Includes environmental sustainability (ecological footprint).
   3. Well-being is measured subjectively (survey-based ladder scale).
   4. Ecological footprint = land required per person to support consumption (measured in global hectares).
4. Strengths:
   1. Integrates health, happiness, and sustainability.
   2. Moves beyond economic growth as a development goal.
5. Criticisms:
   1. Subjective well-being hard to compare across cultures.
   2. Often misunderstood as an individual “happiness” score.
   3. Not always useful for economic or policy-specific development planning.

7. Social Progress Indicators (SPI)

Purpose: Measures social and environmental outcomes, not just economic ones. Based on 57 indicators across 3 dimensions:

1. Basic Human Needs
   1. Nutrition & medical care (e.g. child mortality, TB prevalence)
   2. Water & sanitation (e.g. access, satisfaction)
   3. Housing (e.g. electricity, air pollution)
   4. Safety (e.g. violence, road injuries)
2. Foundations of Well-being
   1. Education (e.g. enrolment, attainment)
   2. Information & communications (e.g. internet access, press freedom)
   3. Health (e.g. life expectancy, service access)
   4. Environmental quality (e.g. air pollution, recycling, species protection)
3. Opportunity
   1. Rights and voice (e.g. freedom of speech, legal equality)
   2. Access to higher education (e.g. academic freedom, university quality)
   3. Freedom and choice (e.g. corruption, vulnerable employment)
   4. Inclusive society (e.g. minority rights, discrimination, equal access)
4. Strengths:
   1. Broad and multidimensional.