Human Development Reports – still not developmental
The contributions that the human development reports make is tremendous. Since 1990, the Report has been challenging the neo-liberal doctrine that development was about economic growth and returned us to the truth that underlies much of Western philosophy since at least Aristotle: social arrangements must be judged by the extent to which they promote the ‘human good’. It has re-centralized human beings as the essence of development and reminded us that we must not confuse means with ends – and that humans are both means and ends. Sen in particular redefined development to be the freedom of choice – and won the Nobel Peace Prize for it. It focuses on four ‘pillars’: equality, sustainability, productivity and empowerment. Of great use – if also of great debate and controversy – it produces a way of measuring qualities outside of GNP around four rations: public expenditure, social allocation (social servies), social priority and human expenditure. In particular, it looks at education, life expectancy, literacy and GDP. Dr. Haq the HDR’s chief architect, says its greatest contribution is not only in its numbers but in its courage.
On that last part, I would have to agree: the HDR, which is often an eloquent and inspirational document, puts forth policy proposals and blunt, risky statements hard to find elsewhere. My concerns with it are not in the realm of its value in comparison to where it comes from but the extent to which it a) focuses on individual choice as the end all of human development; b) doesn’t really look into the why of the way things are (and whose interests are being served by maintaining the current system); c) it focuses too much on the individual without recognizing the social dynamic of development; d) it is not developmental.
Without going in-depth on these concerns, let me out line a few points.
On choice: It is easiest to make this one personal. Yes, I want more choice – I want to be able to choose my job and to choose where I am going to live and to choose whom I shall marry. Freedom and choice are inherently linked. But I want more than choice – dare I say I want more than freedom (though perhaps I am only beginning to understand freedom.) I want unity through diversity. I want harmony, synergy, wisdom, serenity. These things are not merely about choice. But they are about development.
Why are things the way they are? It is not random that some people have choice and others do not. This fact is a reflection of essential concepts of choice and freedom, and we can not hope to tackle these issues until we reconceptualize what it means to develop – and the nature of social development, and the basic tent of freedom so eloquently described in the old freedom song: none of us are free until all of us are free.
Society: related to the last point, this focuses too much on the individual and what the society can do to support individual freedom. But we are not merely individuals. To return to Aristotle, it is only the realization of the polis that the individual can be fully realized.
Developmental: for too long developmental discourse has forgotten that development is developmental. We can not realize education before we have realized greater health. We can not expect that the process of economic democratization that succeeded in Brazil will be successful in the Congo – the two countries are at radically different stages of development. We need not only to rank countries (something Americans are slightly obsessed with) but to re-think how it is that societies and inidviuals, together, can develop – as a process.
These here are questions of philosophy – the philosophy of the political flesh, where what we think will change everything.
