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HIGHLIGHT

2013 Report

The Rise of the South: Human Progress in a Diverse World is available for free downloading

Let's Talk Human Development (blog)

Let's Talk Human Development (blog)

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Previous blog postings

  • A Better Future for All
  • Data challenges in estimating the HDI
  • HDI 2010: New Controversies, Old Critiques
  • The HDI Tree: A Visual Representation
  • Measuring HDI Measurements: Why the New Model Works Best
  • Subtracting GNI from the HDI: A ‘non-income’ Human Development Index
  • Interpreting Trade-offs in the HDI: A response to the critique of World Bank economist Martin Ravallion
  • Fretting over tradeoffs? A World Bank response
  • What the New HDI tells us about Africa
  • The North African Miracle
  • What's new with the new Report
  • How can human development improve your life?
  • How should we measure poverty?
  • What’s in a Report? Localizing human development
  • Do we really still need the HDI?
  • What is human development?
  • Trends in human development
  • Pushing the frontiers of human development
  • Archive of HD Insights




Thu, 11 Feb 2010 16:00:57 GMT

Pushing the Frontiers of Human Development

By Jeni Klugman
Director and Lead-author, Human Development Report Office, UNDP


2010 is a challenging and exciting time for human development. In the wake of tragedy in Haiti, the midst of a faltering recovering from major economic crises, debates about climate change and several major international events, such as the upcoming MDGs review, it is the 20th anniversary of the Human Development Report (HDR). Launching the report back in 1990, lead author Mahbub ul-Haq explained its essential purpose: “Our interest is not just in the expansion of national income, but in the extension of human well-being.” As a former Planning Minister in Pakistan, ul-Haq knew first-hand the frustrations of using traditional economic models to bring prosperity for all in a country endowed with great resources and vast potential, but wracked by equally great poverty and gaping inequalities.

Building on the work of Nobel laureate Amartya Sen, the first HDR described “Human development as a process of enlarging people’s choices.” Over the ensuing 20 years, the HDR has helped to stimulate and broaden thinking and policy debates around a range of global themes, from consumption and poverty, through gender and mobility. The global reports have inspired a whole new generation of country level analysis and debates, and over 700 national and regional reports. The Human Development Index (HDI) was a pioneer of multi-dimensional measurement and has become a widely referenced indicator of wellbeing (see graph). It tells us that income alone is an incomplete measure of well being, and that living a long and healthy life and gaining knowledge are equally critical.

However, the HDI – for all its insights and success – is crude and simple. This was recognized at the outset and now as part of the HDR’s 20th anniversary, we are exploring how to take into account some key missing dimensions in a more systematic way by taking advantage the huge explosion of micro-data around the world since 1990. In particular, we are seeking to analyse and present multidimensional poverty and inequality, showing disparities within nations, and discussing how to reflect critical dimensions of empowerment and political and civic freedoms. Environmental sustainability and vulnerability also loom large on our agenda.

Each HDR seeks to push the frontier in development thinking, by innovating in terms of concepts, measures and policy. A key aim is to provide alternative approaches and analysis and to inform and stimulate what Sen has referred to as “reasoned public debates”.

Over the course of the next few months, we will publish emerging ideas and thinking online, for feedback and also to stimulate your appetite for the upcoming report, which will be launched in the autumn. I invite you to register, to send us feedback and to stay in touch.

Graph HDR-HDI-WDR searches

Reader's comments to this article


Oscar G. Muñoz Lévano, Docente Universitario wrote:

"El Desarrollo Humano es un derecho que le corresponde al ser humano desde que surge a la vida y su aplicación material o su reconocimiento ha sido una constante en el devenir historico de la humanidad. Desde los origenes de la humanidad el ser humano se ha marcado metas de bienestar y de calidad de vida, las cuales ha conquistado con esfuerzo. Hoy, en una epoca de mundialización tecnológica, económica y política las vallas a superar aparentar estar muy elevadas, lo cual nos hace colegir que el esfuerzo para lograr la calidad de vida debe ser también mundializado. El mundo se debate en un esfuerzo económico que permita superar la crisis financiera mundial que, se quiera o no, ha traido desempleo y explotación laboral. Surge entonces una paradoja de alcance igualmente mundial que se plasma en la colisión del derecho al comercio con el derecho al trabajo. Hacia ese tema apunta el presente mensaje, que pretendo desarrollar si tienen a bien acompañarme con algunos datos estadisticos que ustedes manejan magistralmente. Mis felicitaciones y gratitud por la información que nos brindan. "

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Emmanuel Wagama, Student Uganda Christian University wrote:

"Lets put our minds together and have a story to tell with togetherness.We should act to our environment in the way that we always receive positive actions to our daily reaction. Finally we should consider our surrounding as our protection to guard as our lives for the future generation in vain. "

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Allison Barnaba Yacub Mangu, Ibba Charitable Organization for Development wrote:

"We need this kind of the programme for the future HD in Southern Sudan. "

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Shubham Kapoor, Student IMT Ghaziabad, India wrote:

"I agree the more important situation facing us is not the economic development but the "Human Development".The gap between rich and poor is increasing more so in developing countries and the onus lies on us to bridge this gap and think more on the "Human Perspective" "

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Menevis Uzbay, Assistant Professor Ege University, Department of Economics wrote:

"The HDI information has always been of valuable help to our development studies, hence I would like to express my many many thanks to the staff of UNDP . Similar to Sen's "reasonable public debate" suggestion, I would also quote from Habermas, "communicative reason theory which rests on the idea that private people (like us) came together to form a public sphere whose "public reason" would work as a check on state power . Thank you for all your efforts on the issue of development "

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Prize F.Y. McApreko, Student UNESCO Chair of Philosophy for Peace, Universitat Jaume 1, Spain. wrote:

"The centrality of our common humanity is inextricably linked to upholding the tenets of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Yet for over 60 years, human rights is still a mirage. By "Pushing the Frontiers of Human Development", human rights with all its appertaining human development, will blossom in profound profusion. Thanks for this timely theme, UNDP. "

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Charaf Eddine Mansouri, Secrétaire général & Agent de developpement Administration térritoriale wrote:

"L'idée du Rapport mondial sur le développement humain est trés importante vu le nombre d'information qu'on peut en tant qu'agents de développement et dédéistes utilisé dans la gestion des projets de développement et de lutte contre la pauvreté. En tout cas, je vous félicite pour tout l'apport du RMDH dans mes activités et professions liées au développemnet de ma région et de mon pays. "

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Carlos Ortiz Arias, Master en gestion social del habitat Mexico wrote:

"Comprometamonos con los que nada tienen, para que logren lo que mas desean."

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Léa Malutama, Chef de travaux et Secrétaire du département des relations internationales en charge de la recherche A.I. Université de Kinshasa wrote:

"Nous sommes heureux dans notre pays que ce programme soit opérationnel dans le cadre de l'autonomisation de la femme, pour surtout mettre un accent sur le développement humain avec la dimension "GENDER" ou genre; dans la mesure où le développement humain dépend aussi de l'impact des femmes dans les pays post-conflits comme en République démocratique du Congo. Nous souhaiterions que ce thème de développément humain soit traité dans cet angle à cause de la vulnérabilité des femmes dans un tel contexte."

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Dario Betancourt, Ingeniero Civil Asociacion Ecuatoriana Ingenieria Sanitaria wrote:

"Esta pagina y estos artículos son una invalorable fuente de informacion que han servido para elevar el conocimiento sobre cuales son las reales condiciones del desarrollo humano de la poblacion mundial y de cada uno d e los paises en particular, pero se hace necesario, presentada la tragedia de Haiti, que se de un diagnostico de como quedara el Indice de Desarrollo Humano de su poblacion y cuales son las directrices principales a las que se debe acometer a corto, mediano y largo plazo, para que este pais y su poblacion puedan salir, en un periodo no muy lejano, del estado de postracion en que ha quedado."

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Aminata Barry, Professeur de lycée, Chargée d'études Ministère Enseignement Pré-Universitaire/Service Statistique et Planication wrote:

"Il faudrait tenir compte du changement climatique qui un drame écologie qui n'a pas de frontières qui touche toute la planète. Et qui menace tout dans la globalité (humanité, faune, flore, mers, Terre...)."

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Hemant Varun, Department of Human Rights BBA University, Lucknow India wrote:

"Development, health and poverty are interdependent with one another. For example, if we talk about development, then we should analyze interconnections between these terms, as development is a means to address the basic needs of a human being and we can achieve this target by empowering poor sections of the people through different ways as by providing education, good health, nutritious food etc. If a person be developed then he will get essential need, sources of income will also increase. In this way the standard of living will change & he will attain good health. The components of human development contain health, education and food. In various international conventions human development is declared as a ‘Right to Development’. In the case of India, the Supreme Court of India declared the rights to food, health and education as fundamental rights under Article 21 of the Indian constitution. It is an obligation of the state to provide these. The preamble of our constitution talks about the importance to ensure justice, social, economic & cultural, which reflects in to fundamental rights and directive principles of state policy, by which a person can develop. Today in our country every day the people have to die due to starvation and this number is increasing day by day. A large number of unemployed people are here, shortage of medical aid, infant mortality rates are increasing as well as mother mortality rates are also increasing, farmers are also constrained to commit suicide, why? Because we are poor, we have no resources, we have no basic infrastructure for development. If we want to eradicate poverty then the State should provide education, security of food, guarantee of employment, free medical aid, through programme and policies. For implementation of these programme and policies there should be transparent implementing bodies, which has no relation with corruption. There is a need to spend all income of India on people of India, eradicating corruption. It will surely ensure the development of poor and poverty will be eradicated by this way. The achievement of real democracy in India is possible only when we will fulfill the desire of our constitution makers expressed in the preamble of the constitution. After that human development in India will certainly flourish."

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Claudia Freire, Researcher (Neurosciences) MCTES/PT USAL/ES wrote:

"Olá a todos, Gostaria expressar antes de mais a minha gratidão, pelo facto de existir um indicador, que embora ainda sustentado em padrões prévios, servirá de base à propagação futura da nova ordem mundial! Falar de indicadores que remetam à Felicidade é um tema importantissimo, dada a especial conjuntura sociológica actual, que antes de mais será um momento de transição para este espaço global, em que as sinergias mais que nunca terão que se reactivar num modelo pró activo e despido de outro sentido senão o do progreso da Humanidade rumo a uma nova Base de convivencia e existencia. Considerar a Felicidade como um indicador de suporte económico é um pilar de sustentabilidade à sua expansão, mas convém no entanto observar que todo o eixo Trans Económico se encontra em processo energético de neutralização no que respeita aos velhos modelos de gestão global. Activar uma visão onde a Felicidade não se sustente num modelo económico para servir de indicador à qualidade de vida da população seria o passo seguinte, ou seja, não permitir que o cerebro humano entre em colisão emocional devido a factores de "posse" de bens desnecessários à sua existencia e a partir deste eixo promover a eficiente selecção dos agentes económicos que cooperem num sistema onde a responsabilidade social se verifique e não se remeta à formulação de um mito com a apresentação de actividades de visibilidade pública atípicas e saneadores de limites de percepção individual de consciencialização do dominio global que estes detêm, seria um novo objectivo a propor para os objectivos do Milenio. A educação sempre foi um instrumento de compensação e correcção de formulas sociais dinamitantes e coercivas no que concerne ao nivel de bem estar da população em modo global, no entanto , o que hoje se pretende é educar o Ser Humano a retomar o seu propósito de missão sobre um espaço cada vez mais carente de recursos, neste nivel de consciencialização publica importa neste momento esclarecer e devolver a autonomia ao individuo como parceiro social e agente de desenvolvimento e progresso, sem que este factor se relacione com modelos económicos externos massivos. Assim e neste quadro teórico, afirma-se a necessidade urgente de utilizar a variavel do "conhecimento" como indicador de desenvolvimento para o individuo, em que este operando em modelo de rede possa dilatar todo o seu valor como participante pró activo apontando irremediavelmente para a base de formação de uma nova estrutura social, em que o bem estar ideológico, mais que o bem estar económico configure um verdadeiro indicador de Felicidade e Progresso rumo ao Futuro com dividendos onde a inovação, imaginação e criatividade fundamente os bens maiores do legado do Homem para o Novo Mundo. Obrigada a todos pelo trabalho realizado e pela procura de uma nova abertura à capacidade de pensamento Humano. Os melhores cumprimentos, Claudia f"

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Ssozi George William, Headteacher St. Andrew's SSS Matale wrote:

"UNDP Reports are instrumental in not only providing vital data and information on various human development aspects but also getting deeper into individual country's development questions and needs or call attention to its failures to register development goals. It is indeed vital to compare notes and stop the lame excuses usually advanced by politicians for countries' failures to attain certain levels of development while others do. In this 21st century, politics play a vital role in defining the destiny of a country's trend of human development. So let the politicians be made an integral part of human development and be made accountable to the people."

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David Moore, Research Associate Global Footprint Network wrote:

"Using the concept of development as "enlarging people's choices" requires that no ecosystem be degraded at all, as this would restrict local people's choices. Even if proceeds from natural resource exploitation are usefully invested, this locks people into a specific development pathway: that of financial wealth acquisition. Sustainable development is therefore a pleonasm; development must always be environmentally sustainable. It is great, therefore, to see the UNDP moving away from the crude HDI measure. I am very curious, though, to see how they maintain the broad appeal of a simple indicator."

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Jean-Marie Ayefounnik, Conseiller en IEC, Président Association Ici Agir Pour Demain / Lomé-TOGO wrote:

"Nous ne pouvons pas imaginer le développement humain sans le développement personnel ou le développement individuel de chaque personne. La notion "d'ici et le maintenant", agir sans procrastination, n'est pas encore acquise par la plupart des personnes qui s'occupent du développement. Tous les objectifs seront atteints si nous mettons l'accent sur le développement individuel, le développement personnel. Transmettre, diffuser et inséminer les graines du travail bien fait, du projet mené à bon port... tels sont nos priorités. Semer les graines de la citoyenneté et du respect des droits humains sont une autre partie de nos priorités. Pour changer les gens, changeons leur mode de pensée. Car c'est la pensée qui fait l'humanité."

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Jorge Campoy Rodriguez, Desarrollo Humano y Politicas Publicas Universidad de Guadalajara wrote:

"Coincido con las opiniones vertidas respecto de la importancia del IDH como elemento de medición del desarrollo humano en el mundo. El problema de estos indicadores es que también de manera muy fácil pueden encubrir de manera númerica elementos de desigualdad regional importante, además que los gobiernos también pueden manipular a través de los criterios estadísticos la pobreza y el descenso en el Desarrollo real de las comunidades dotandolas de recursos y elemntos de crecimiento real como la generaciónd e empleos y satisfactores que eleven la calidad de vida de las poblaciones.
"

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Juan Mora, Hacia la construcción de un Modelo de Desarrollo Integral y Humano Escuela de Líderes Sociales wrote:

"Quiero, hacer llegar, el primero, de cuatro comentarios, con los que pienso contribuir a la definición de otros aspectos, que debe incluir, a mi juicio, el informe de desarrollo humano. Para poder presentar de manera integral, una realidad y desafíos que deben ser mirados en otras claves y con otras notas Creo y los pobres y desposeídos del mundo así lo reclaman que, es imperativo, cambiar el modelo de desarrollo imperante, de corte neo-liberal, porque es necesario que recuperemos el equilibrio entre la razón y la libertad para organizar tanto la economía como la política y las relaciones sociales. No es posible que sigamos manteniendo un ordenamiento mundial donde la distribución de los costos y los beneficios del desarrollo no sean equitativos y menos aún que sigamos tolerando que la factura, los costos, de las ineficiencias sean pagadas sólo, o en la mayor porción, por los que menos tienen. La búsqueda de Libertad e Igualdad para todas y todos los ciudadanos, es una tarea y hoy por hoy es un grito que, pronto, debemos escuchar. Avanzar o construir un Modelo de Desarrollo Integral y Humano es lo único que hará sostenible la vida e incluso – aunque parezca contradictorio – las posibilidades de seguir generando empresas y, por lo tanto, las condiciones para acumular, riqueza y conocimientos. Por lo que, el cambio será provechoso para todos. Hoy, las sociedades reclaman una distribución cada vez más equitativa de los costos y beneficios de las propuestas y modelos de desarrollo que se impulsen, reclaman tener voz y capacidad de decisión. Podemos decir, incluso, que ésta es una nueva manera de reclamar el Poder. Hay una primera dimensión que debe ser incluida: La Dimensión Ética: Que partiendo del reconocimiento de la igualdad de los seres humanos. Re – inserte la importancia y el “valor del otro” – nuestro prójimo – en el entendido que todos y en todos los campos en los que transcurre nuestra vida necesitamos del otro. La comunicación, el trabajo, el aprendizaje, la generación de riqueza, el deporte y hasta el ocio, al que pocos hoy tienen derecho; Todo esto lo hacemos en relaciones de colaboración con otros. Tener la Ética como el barómetro más importante del nivel de desarrollo alcanzado por cualquier nación garantizará que los planes de desarrollo de las naciones sean medidos, prioritariamente, por: el nivel de satisfacción de necesidades y mejora de la calidad de vida de toda la población. La justicia con la que se cobran los impuestos, la equidad en la distribución del ingreso, las capacidades logradas y las oportunidades generadas, la responsabilidad social de las empresas, el equilibrio en las relaciones de género, etc. Cómo, podemos ver, otra forma de conceptuar, planificar, medir y alcanzar el desarrollo para todos y todas es posible y la ética nos ayuda, qué duda cabe, muchísimo en esa dirección."

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