Human Development
NCERT Class 12 Geography chapter 3 | One Liner Notes
Growth and development both refer to changes over a period of time, but they are not the same.
Growth is quantitative and value-neutral, meaning it can be positive (increase) or negative (decrease).
Development means a qualitative change that is always value-positive.
Development requires an increment or addition to existing conditions, and occurs when positive growth takes place.
However, positive growth does not always lead to development; development occurs with a positive change in quality.
For example, a city's population growth without improvement in basic services and facilities does not constitute development.
For many decades, a country's development was measured only by its economic growth, often without much change in people's lives.
The idea that quality of life, opportunities, and freedoms are important aspects of development was clearly articulated in the late eighties and early nineties.
The works of South Asian economists Mahbub-ul-Haq and Amartya Sen are significant in this regard.
The concept of human development was introduced by Dr. Mahbub-ul-Haq.
Dr. Haq described human development as development that enlarges people's choices and improves their lives, with people being central to this concept.
The basic goal of development is to create conditions where people can live meaningful lives, which means being healthy, developing talents, participating in society, and being free to achieve goals.
Dr. Mahbub-ul-Haq created the Human Development Index (HDI) in 1990.
According to Dr. Haq, development is about enlarging people's choices to lead long, healthy lives with dignity.
The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has published the Human Development Report annually since 1990, using Dr. Haq's concept.
Nobel Laureate Prof. Amartya Sen viewed an increase in freedom as the main objective of development, also seeing it as an effective way to bring about development.
The works of these economists have successfully placed people at the center of development discussions.
Leading a long and healthy life, gaining knowledge, and having enough means to live a decent life are the most important aspects of human development.
Therefore, access to resources, health, and education are the key areas in human development.
People often lack the capability and freedom to make even basic choices due to inability to acquire knowledge, material poverty, social discrimination, or inefficient institutions.
Building people's capabilities in health, education, and access to resources is crucial for enlarging their choices.
The idea of human development is supported by four pillars: equity, sustainability, productivity, and empowerment.
Equity means ensuring equal access to opportunities for everyone, regardless of gender, race, income, or caste.
Sustainability refers to the continuity in the availability of opportunities, ensuring each generation has the same opportunities by using resources mindfully for the future.
Productivity, in the context of human development, refers to human labor productivity, which must be constantly enriched by building people's capabilities.
Efforts to increase knowledge and provide better health facilities ultimately lead to better work efficiency, as people are the real wealth of nations.
Empowerment means having the power to make choices, which comes from increasing freedom and capability.
Good governance and people-oriented policies are necessary to empower people, especially socially and economically disadvantaged groups.
There are several approaches to human development: Income Approach, Welfare Approach, Minimum Needs Approach, and Capabilities Approach.
The Income Approach links human development to income, suggesting higher income reflects higher freedom and human development.
The Welfare Approach views human beings as beneficiaries of development activities, advocating for higher government expenditure on education, health, and amenities.
The Minimum Needs Approach, proposed by the ILO, identified six basic needs (health, education, food, water supply, sanitation, housing) with an emphasis on their provision.
The Capabilities Approach, associated with Prof. Amartya Sen, focuses on building human capabilities in health, education, and access to resources as key to increasing human development.
The Human Development Index (HDI) ranks countries based on their performance in health, education, and access to resources, with scores ranging from 0 to 1.
Life expectancy at birth is the indicator chosen to assess health in the HDI.
Adult literacy rate and gross enrollment ratio represent access to knowledge.
Access to resources is measured in terms of purchasing power (in U.S. dollars).
Each of these dimensions (health, education, resources) is given a weightage of 1/3 in the HDI calculation.
A score closer to one indicates a greater level of human development.
The HDI measures attainments in human development but is not the most reliable measure as it doesn't reflect distribution.
The Human Poverty Index (HPI) is related to the HDI and measures the shortfall in human development.
The HPI considers the probability of not surviving till age 40, adult illiteracy rate, lack of access to clean water, and the number of underweight small children.
Often, the Human Poverty Index is more revealing than the Human Development Index.
Looking at both HDI and HPI together provides an accurate picture of a country's human development situation.
Bhutan is unique in officially proclaiming Gross National Happiness (GNH) as the measure of its progress, prioritizing happiness over material progress.
International comparisons of human development show that territory size and per capita income are not directly related to human development.
Smaller and relatively poorer nations often rank higher in human development than larger or richer neighbors.
For example, Sri Lanka, Trinidad, and Tobago have higher HDI ranks than India despite smaller economies, and within India, Kerala outperforms Punjab and Gujarat despite lower per capita income.
Countries are classified into four groups based on their human development scores: Very High (above 0.800), High (0.700-0.799), Medium (0.550-0.699), and Low (below 0.550).
According to the Human Development Report 2023-24, there are 69 countries with very high human development.
Countries with high human development often invest heavily in social sectors and exhibit good governance.
Many high human development countries are former imperial powers, largely located in Europe, and represent the industrialized Western world, with a relatively low degree of social diversity.
The largest group of countries, 42 in number, have medium levels of human development.
Many medium human development countries emerged after World War II or the breakup of the Soviet Union, and are improving their scores by adopting people-oriented policies and reducing social discrimination.
These countries generally have higher social diversity than those with high human development scores and have often faced political instability or social uprisings.
As many as 33 countries record low levels of human development, often small countries experiencing political turmoil, social instability, civil war, famine, or high incidence of diseases.
To understand varying levels of human development, it is crucial to examine government expenditure on the social sector and the country's political environment and freedoms.
Countries with high human development invest more in social sectors, are generally free from political turmoil, and have more equitable resource distribution.
Conversely, places with low human development tend to spend more on defense than social sectors, indicating political instability and inability to achieve accelerated economic development.