Human Development and Capability Association ()

Announcement:

2010 Conference of the HDCA:
Conference Title: "Human Rights and Human Development"
September 21-23, 2010
The University of Jordan Amman
Conference theme: Integrating Human Rights and Human Development

Conference Registration is now open - click here for registration

Summer School on Capability and Multidimensional Poverty
Organised by OPHI with the Human Development and Capability Association
At the University of Jordan Amman Jordan
11 September - 20 September 2010 read more

Conference Papers

The following is a list of conference papers from HDCA conferences
To submit a paper for the upcoming conference, please click the Submit Document button.


What Is My Future Anyway? ”Examining Educational Opportunity and the Deformed Choices of Impoverished Youth in the United States [Members Only]
Larson, Colleen Anderson, Noel NY university US Submitted:



School performance and child labor: An exploratory analysis on the slums of Antananarivo, Madagascar
Rajaona Daka, Karen Ballet, Jerome C3ED- University of Versailles Saint Quentin en Yvelines FR Submitted:



The capability approach, neutrality towards good life and technology
Osterlaken, Ilse 3TU.Centre for Ethics and Technology, Delft University of Technology Delft NL Submitted:		Three theses give rise to this paper. Firstly, the capability approach is often presented as largely avoiding paternalism and remaining neutral with respect to the good life. Secondly, it can be argued that technology is of immense importance for expanding people’s capabilities. Thirdly, literature in philosophy of technology and in science and technology studies (STS) suggests that technology is not neutral with respect to the good life. Together this raises the question: is the capability approach’s thesis of neutrality towards the good life tenable in a world in which technology enables so many of our capabilities? In order to answer this question, this paper will explore two further questions in more detail. Firstly, how should we exactly understand the capability approach’s thesis of neutrality towards the good life? And secondly, what is exactly the relation between technology and the good life, according to STS researchers and philosophers of technology?



Power and Pedagogy in the Higher Education language classroom [Members Only]
Crosbie, Veronica Submitted:



Technologies for Freedom: collective agency-oriented technology for development processes.
Fernández-Baldor, Alvaro Hueso , Andres Boni, Alejandra Technical University of Valencia Valencia ES Submitted:		In this work we re-examine the conceptualization of technology throughout the lens of the Capability Approach. This approach centres attention on the people’s capabilities or real possibilities of leading a life that they have reason to value and focuses primarily on the process instead of stressing the results and products of the interventions This approach allows expanding the conceptualization of technology towards a new definition that incorporates, from conceptualization to implementation, an intention to promote human development. In the paper we introduce Technologies for Freedom (T4F) as the technological processes, driven by the community, in order to generate real social transformation. After that, we point out some features of T4F community development projects. Finally, we present two different case studies of technology-oriented development aid projects implemented in rural areas of Guatemala and Bolivia, where effects and results are examined taking into consideration the T4F characteristics.



Information Technology underpinnings to Amartya Sen’s Capabilities Model: An NGO example from Lima, Peru [Members Only]
Wresch, William University of Wisconsin Oshkosh Oshkosh US Submitted:		The United Nation’s Millennium Development Goals highlight the value of Information and Communications Technologies in enhancing the capabilities of individuals and of NGOs. To illustrate the value of ICTs in development, a case study of a nutrition program established in Lima, Peru is described. The constant communication between NGO partners in Lima and in the United States enabled project leaders to overcome significant and continuing obstacles to their success. By 2008 the project was able to provide protein-rich soy milk to 3000 children each day. A review of the information and communications technologies used in the project was undertaken and an analysis of their role in participation patterns and power distribution is included.



Failure in the mandatory education fr the mexican population: normative proposals for its measurement [Members Only]
Escobar, Mariel Robles, Hector Submitted:



Moral Dimensions of a Capability Approach to Risk Analysis [Members Only]
Murphy , Colleen Gardoni, Paolo Texas A&M University US Submitted:		Risk typically refers to a set of scenarios, their associated probability of occurrence and consequences. In a capability approach, risk is defined as the probability that the capabilities of individuals will be reduced. This paper focuses on the criteria for evaluating the acceptability of a risk. Our specific interest is the relationship between a concern with the predicted impact on capabilities [and so with the probability of occurrence and consequences components of risk] and other widely recognized morally relevant aspects of risks. Among the additional, relevant moral factors to consider when assessing the acceptability of a risk are: (1) the distribution of risks; (2) who is at risk and who stands to potentially gain from risks; (3) the source of a risk; and (4) whether a risk is voluntary or not. We consider whether judgments of the acceptability of a risk should, for example, give special priority to the predicted impact on capabilities and whether a negative impact on capabilities be outweighed by other morally salient considerations. The risks on which we concentrate are those associated to natural hazards, where the societal impact is the result of the interaction between the natural hazard and the engineered environment.



Ages old-perceptios and truth about Turkish youth [Members Only]
Aytac, Aygen Submitted:



Applying the Capability Approach to the “medium of choice par excellence”: Using the Choice Framework for a holistic analysis of internet usage [Members Only]
Dorothea, Kleine UNESCO Chair/Centre in ICT4D, Royal Holloway, University of London London GB Submitted:		This paper identifies controllability and operationalisability as obstacles which prevent the capability approach from being used more widely in development studies and practice. It discusses the origins of the Choice Framework, a conceptual tool designed to help operationalise the approach. It can be used to analyze the appropriateness of development goals, to map development as a systemic process, and to plan interventions which can result in increased choice. Three examples of applying the Choice Framework in the field of information and communication for development (ICT4D) are given. These technologies can be placed at different points on a determinism continuum, depending on the degree of choice left to the user. The paper argues that while frameworks such as the Choice Framework can increase the operationalisability of the capability approach, funders need to accept the fact that people’s choices are never fully predictable or controllable. Full paper available from the author: dorothea.kleine@rhul.ac.uk



Happiness Properly Understood: The Engine of Well-Being [Members Only]
Jayawickreme, Eranda University of Pennsylvania US Submitted:



How can a Non Governmental Organization assist the efforts to achieve the Millennium Development Goal 5: The case of BRAC in the provision of microfinance and maternal health services [Members Only]
Kafantari, Georgia Harvard University US Submitted:



Health and Social Justice
Prah Ruger, Jennifer Yale School of Medicine US Submitted:		Societies make decisions and take actions that profoundly impact the distribution of health. Why and how should collective choices be made, and policies implemented, to address health inequalities under conditions of resource scarcity? How should societies conceptualize and measure health disparities, and determine whether they've been adequately addressed? Who is responsible for various aspects of this important social problem? In Health and Social Justice, Jennifer Prah Ruger elucidates principles to guide these decisions, the evidence that should inform them, and the policies necessary to build equitable and efficient health systems world-wide. This book weaves together original insights and disparate constructs to produce a foundational new theory, the health capability paradigm.



El poder de las TIC sobre el desarrollo productivo y social poder de las tic sobre el desarrollo productivo y social [Members Only]
Liliana, Ruiz de Alonso y Fátima Ponce Regalado Submitted:



Potential and limits of new international tools in water resources governance: capabilities approach [Members Only]
Makkaoui, Raoudha University of Versailles FR Submitted:		Water in developing countries (DCs) is now at the heart of the concerns of policy makers and the international community. The recent World Water Forum, held in Mexico in March 2006, emphasized the seriousness of the problem of access to water for all as the human, health and social derived from them are considerable. The second UN report on water (2006), shared that 20 percent of the world's population had no access to drinking water and 40% did not have a sanitation base. It is an obvious phenomenon that, water is closely linked to health. Poor water quality can cause many diseases. According to the report, more than five million people die each year from diseases caused by water unfit for human consumption: 90 percent of these victims are children under five years old. This alarming situation particularly affects populations in developing countries where the problem of water is mainly due to population growth, urbanization and uncontrolled development of irrigated agriculture. Faced with this situation, the international community pledged to halve, between 2000 and 2015, the proportion of people without access to drinking water and has therefore provided a major impetus to the actions of solidarity in access to drinking water and sanitation. For example, in France, since 1992, local authorities had a legal and regulatory framework that enabled them to promote cooperative relationships with communities in developing countries. These programs are known as "decentralized cooperation". More generally, decentralized cooperation refers to any form of partnership set up in developing countries by an actor in civil society. Decentralized cooperation programs ensure synergies between different actors and they promote the processes of widely participatory action. Civil society thus becomes involved in the definition and implementation of cooperation projects. This new vision of cooperation provides a new impetus to the policy of international cooperation as it allows overcoming the limitations of conventional bilateral and multilateral cooperation between North and South.



Remittances and Voter Participation: Evidence from Transition Economies [Members Only]
Cojocaru, Alexandru University of Maryland US Submitted:		There is an extensive literature on the developmental impact of remittances, including poverty alleviation, educational outcomes and small business development. This paper explores, in turn, the largely ignored relationship between remittances and political participation of recipient households. In particular, I investigate the effect of remittances on the propensity of recipients to vote in national elections, relying on individual-level data from the Life in Transition Survey for a sample of 20 transition economies with elections in 2005 and 2006. I find that reliance on remittances as the main livelihood source has a negative effect on recipients' voting in national elections. I argue that this negative effect is the outcome of the counter-cyclical nature of remittances from abroad. I further explore alternative explanations for the negative association between remittances and voting, such as whether reliance on remittances could just be a manifestation of underlying characteristics of disenchanted voters who abstain from voting due to general loss of confidence in the government, but I do not find support for this alternative claim.



Capability for social accountability: An initial exploration, employing the capability approach and critical realism as conceptual underlabourers [Members Only]
Walker, David Monash University AU Submitted:



When choosing is not a choice. Gender and ethnicity curtailing citizenship rights: the potential and limits for development organizations [Members Only]
Espinoza, Cristina Brandeis University US Submitted:



Participation Power and the poor – Pakistan’s experience [Members Only]
Baqir, Fayyaz Akhter Hameed Khan Resource Center PK Submitted:		Democratic discourse is influenced by the ways and means available to citizen’s to check and balance the power of state in shaping their choices and life patterns. This depends on the range and diversity of citizen’s institutions that articulate and energize their interaction with the state. In essence the question of discourse probes how voluntary associations negotiate their turf with associations based on coercion and hegemony. There are two most important pillars of citizen’s organizations, interest based organizations and supporting mechanism which define the contours of citizen’s discourse. Social infrastructure in all its diversity draws strength from these two sources to shape the democratic discourse. This article describes the role of social infrastructure in defining democratic discourse with reference to some very innovative cases from Pakistan.



Visible, invisible and hidden power in the decision making process of the new university curricula. Evidence from the Technical University of Valencia, Spain. [Members Only]
Alejandra, Boni Jordi, Peris Andrés, Hueso Estela, López Technical University of Valencia ES Submitted:		How the contents of the new Spanish undergraduate curricula are designed is one the most important questions in the building process of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) in our country. In this process, issues such as power, voice and participation are key points, as the capability approach suggests. But, as the question of power has not been given central attention in the seminal literature of capabilities, to examine the above referred process we would like to introduce an analytical tool proposed by John Gaventa (1986; 2005, 2006) following Steven Lukes contributions (1974): the power cube. The cube suggests three dimensions to address power issues and imbalances: how power is shaped (its forms), where it is located (local, national and global places) and which are the spaces for participation (closed, invited and claimed). In our opinion, the power cube is a complex and useful tool to analyze power issues in process of decision making, and allows us to go deeply into participation and democratic deliberation issues which are key points in the capability approach. In this paper we will like to focus on the process of decision making of the new Industrial Engineering curricula which is taking place in School of Design at the Technical University of Valencia. We will examine this local place, the characteristics of participation in this space and the forms of power it contains. Different semi-structured interviews with key informants have been conducted in order to highlight all those aspects. Moreover, our direct experience and involvement as a member of the university community will be another source of evidence of the characteristics of this process.



Whose paradise? Political repression and socio-economic possibilities of street vendors in the tourist streets of Cusco, Peru [Members Only]
Steel, Griet IOB BE Submitted:



Exploring the theory on agency or empowerment towards democratizing urban Space in India [Members Only]
Khandare, Lalit Ayyar, Varsha Indiana University/Tata Institute of Social Sciences US Submitted:



Professional capabilities, poverty reduction and transformation in South African universities [Members Only]
Walker, Melanie University of Nottingham GB Submitted:		This paper reports on a project investigating poverty reduction, understood as a 'human development transformation goal for South African universities. Specifically, professionalism and professional education is identified as a measure for evaluating the extent to which universities are contributing to social change. We take the preparation of professionals as one of the essential social functions of the university, situated at the interface of university and society. Public service professionalism and pro-poor are taken to be co-terminous in the South African context. Using the theoretical framing of the capability approach, we are exploring how professional education in universities might be understood as contributing to poverty reduction through expanding the capabilities and functionings of students in professional education, who in turn are able to expand the ‘comprehensive’ capabilities of poor individuals and communities. We are developing a human development public good professional capabilities index as a guide to action and monitoring of educational change.



A group-based measure of capability inequality [Members Only]
Wietzke, Frank-Borge London School of Economics GB Submitted:		Researchers trying to measure a person’s capabilities set face a problem related to the counterfactual nature of capabilities (Sudgen 1993): While analysts may observe actually achieved (chosen) functionings it is usually more difficult to measure outcomes that were accessible to the individual but were, for various reasons, not chosen. Previous attempts to measure capabilities have typically tried to get around this problem with the help of subjective information on capabilities. Respondents are asked whether they are satisfied with their accomplishments, or options available to them, in a range of dimensions such as personal or professional achievements, social relations or health. Inferences are then drawn about the quality of a person’s capability set, controlling for other observed covariates of a person’s wellbeing, such as age, gender, employment status and so forth (Kuklys 2005: Anand / van Hees). However, it does not seem that this approach offers a fully satisfactory solution to the well known problem of adaptive preferences / cheap tastes which may bias a person’s self reported level of satisfaction with his or her capabilities. The proposed paper puts forward the idea that a more objective definition of a person’s capability set may be obtained by analysing his or her social or physical environment. Drawing heavily on recent literature which argues that individual levels of wellbeing and opportunities are usually strongly influenced by a person’s social circumstances or ‘group membership’ (Roemer 1998, Stewart 2004), an index will be presented that defines individual capability sets at the group level, using both average and absolute achievement of a person’s group as a benchmark for his or her possible individual achievements. Differences in group benchmarks will then be used to identify inequalities in individual capability spaces (shortfalls in individual achievements relative to the group benchmark will be used in the analysis of functioning inequality) The proposed approach avoids problems of using subjective data described above because it defines a person’s choices entirely on the basis of ‘objective’ and observable information. Moreover it takes account of the important idea that a person’s level of welfare will often depend on his or her relative achievements compared to living standards in the social environment (relative deprivation).



Beyond well-becoming, towards well-being - Young people and the Capability Approach
Clark, Zoe Eisenhuth, Franziska Research School Education and Capabilities, Bielefeld University Bielefeld DE Submitted:		Until now there is only a minor debate about a capabilities perspective on childhood and youth. Whereas from a capability perspective in general it is argued for latitude of individual choices, it seems to be commonsense to a large extent in this field that during childhood and youth, freedom of choice has to be restricted in respect for developing future capabilities. Challenging the dominant perception, we are discussing why children and young people should not only be seen as future, but also as current addressees of social justice. For this purpose, we are using Nancy Fraser’s analytical distinction of the “who of justice”, the “what of justice” and the “how of justice”, considering who can be an addressee of social justice, what can be the objects of distribution for young people, and how young people can be taken into account as capable agents, even though they are dependent on care.



Equity in Mexico´s higher education institutions [Members Only]
Flores-Crespo , Pedro Submitted:



Capability and Group Inequalities:Revealing the latent structure [Members Only]
Manuel Roche, Jose University of Sussex GB Submitted:		There has been growing interest in issues of multidimensionality, diversity in preference, agency, and freedom of choice in the recent literature on poverty and inequality. The capability approach and seminal works of Amartya Sen (1999 1992 1985a 1980) and Martha Nussbaum (Nussbaum 2000 2006) have particularly contributed to this debate. They propose that capability rather than commodities or utilities should be the space for the evaluation of wellbeing and social justice. Some capability scholars argue that the approach has not paid enough attention to groups, and debate about whether an individualistic perspective is still dominant (Alkire 2008; Burchardt and Vizard 2007; Deneulin 2006; Stewart and Deneulin 2002; Stewart 2003 2005; Majumdar and Subramanian 2001; Robeyns 2005). These authors call attention to the importance that groups may have in individual well-being, in shaping individual preferences, and in generating social mobilization and collective action. This debate has important similarities with the sociological academic tradition on social stratification (cf. Grusky and Kanbur 2006; Grusky and Weenden 2007). In this paper I shall argue that the sociological academic tradition in social stratification could complement the capability approach theoretically and methodologically in order to enhance the study of group inequalities. I will argue that the study of group inequalities implies not only dealing with the complexity of multidimensional space and the measurement of capabilities, but also dealing with its multiple social determinants.



Wellbeing and Interpersonal Relations of ‘weak human beings stakeholders’:An Enhanced CA Framework [Members Only]
Biggeri , Mario Bellanca, Nicolò University of Florence IT Submitted:



Familias vulnerables, interés ciudadano y resiliencia [Members Only]
Balián, Beatriz UCA AR Submitted:



The paternalism Critique of the Capability Approach [Members Only]
Qizilbash, Mozaffar Qizilbash University of York GB Submitted:		In comparing Sen’s work with Mill’s, Sugden criticises Sen’s capability approach because it may be applied in a paternalistic way, with society judging what is best for people and potentially restricting liberty on that basis. Sugden cites Nussbaum’s work as evidence in making his case. Sugden’s critique of Sen’s approach succeeds on a narrow reading of it. On that reading Sen is also critical of it because it does not leave enough room for liberty. On a broad reading, the critique has less force, though the approach may still fall afoul of it. Nussbaum’s approach follows Mill in allowing people freedom to act on whatever desires they have if this does not harm others. This neutralises the central element of Sugden’s critique as it applies to her approach to some degree. Both Sen and Nussbaum nonetheless recognise the very real danger of paternalism which motivates Sugden’s critique.



Evaluación de la pobreza multidimensional en grandes ciudades argentinas. Una propuesta de medición basada en el enfoque de las capacidades [Members Only]
Lépore , Eduardo UCA AR Submitted:



The paternalism Critique of the Capability Approach [Members Only]
Qizilbash, Mozaffar Qizilbash University of York GB Submitted:		In comparing Sen’s work with Mill’s, Sugden criticises Sen’s capability approach because it may be applied in a paternalistic way, with society judging what is best for people and potentially restricting liberty on that basis. Sugden cites Nussbaum’s work as evidence in making his case. Sugden’s critique of Sen’s approach succeeds on a narrow reading of it. On that reading Sen is also critical of it because it does not leave enough room for liberty. On a broad reading, the critique has less force, though the approach may still fall afoul of it. Nussbaum’s approach follows Mill in allowing people freedom to act on whatever desires they have if this does not harm others. This neutralises the central element of Sugden’s critique as it applies to her approach to some degree. Both Sen and Nussbaum nonetheless recognise the very real danger of paternalism which motivates Sugden’s critique.



The paternalism Critique of the Capability Approach [Members Only]
Qizilbash, Mozaffar Submitted:



El poder de las TIC sobre el desarrollo productivo y socialL PODER DE LAS TIC SOBRE EL DESARROLLO PRODUCTIVO Y SOCIAL [Members Only]
Ruiz de Alonso, Liliana Ponce Regalado, Fátima Submitted:



Struggle for recognition as expansion of freedom [Members Only]
Pereira, Gustavo Submitted:		Amartya Sen’s capability approach has introduced a normative framework to evaluate well-being, constituted by the concepts of capability and functionings. Capability must be understood as alternative combinations of functionings (beings and doings) that are feasible for someone to achieve. As Sen says, “Capability is thus a kind of freedom: the substantive freedom to achieve alternative functioning combinations” (Sen 1999 a, 75). Functionings are constituent elements of a person’s condition, and the evaluation of a person’s well-being depends on how these elements are assessed. The notion of capability represents the various combinations of functionings that a person can develop. A person’s capability reflects her freedom to lead one kind of life or another. This means that capability can be achieved through a set of functionings, but it is up to the individual whether her capabilities are or are not realized; a person’s freedom, in this sense, lies at the level of that potentiality (see Sen 1992, 39-40; 1999 a, 75). The questions I want to present are: a) how is it possible to reach the expansion of freedom? b) how are people and social groups motivated to be protagonists of that expansion?, and c) what are the social dynamics of this process? I believe the appropriate answers to these questions are beyond the capability approach, so it will be necessary to connect it with a complementary perspective that enables to explain the social dynamics at stake. I will propose Honneth’s model of struggle for recognition as the best approach to realize my intention, and the articulation point with the capability approach will be the intersubjectivist or relational assumption of the subject that it shares with the capability approach.



The Idea of Justice and the Capability Approach [Members Only]
Alkire, Sabina Submitted:		Sen's masterful new treatise, the Idea of Justice, devotes several chapters to the capability approach. This paper will synthesize the key elements of the capability approach that are advanced in The Idea of Justice. It will distill, for readers not yet familiar with the book, how the capability approach fits within theframework for public reasoning and social choice that Sen advances. And finally it will propose key directions for future research, particularly for research in welfare economics.



Power understood as deliberative participation [Members Only]
Patrón, Pepi Submitted:		En la discusión teórica contemporánea, son muy sugerentes algunas concepciones del poder que vinculan a éste con la capacidad humana de deliberar, de ejercer la llamada racionalidad práctica en espacios públicos que permiten los acuerdos y consensos entre los agentes y el examen crítico de la vida que se considera valiosa vivir. El poder, así, se concibe no como dominación, control o violencia, sino como capacidad de acción concertada de los ciudadanos y ciudadanas (Hannah Arendt); o como poder comunicativo que se genera tanto en las instituciones del Estado cuanto en las redes de la sociedad civil (Jürgen Habermas). En la propuesta del enfoque de las capacidades, la importancia de la razón práctica también resulta fundamental. Así, Nussbaum la señala como parte de la lista de las capacidades humanas centrales y Sen insiste de manera permanente en la importancia de la deliberación y los debates públicos en la configuración de los valores y del ejercicio efectivo de la libertad. Sin embargo, y esto es lo que se propone discutir este texto, no parece haber una concepción particular de poder o de relaciones de poder vinculada al ejercicio de la razón práctica o comunicativa en espacios deliberativos. Más aún, se discutirá las razones por las que, eventualmente, el enfoque de las capacidades requiere de una concepción de poder vinculada a sus propios supuestos teóricos y a la propuesta de sociedad y de democracia que sustenta. Consideramos que (el poder) es uno de los temas que necesitan ser discutidos y desarrollados tanto para plantear sus límites cuanto para enriquecer la perspectiva del enfoque de las capacidades.



Displacement and development ethics: Theories and two Peruvian case studies [Members Only]
Gasper, Des Merino, Lenny Submitted:



Parental Consent and Children’s Rights in Europe: A Balancing Act
Kosko, Stacy J. University of Maryland College Park College Park US Submitted:		Three recent European Court of Human Rights cases of discrimination in education against Roma raise the question of what conditions must be present for parents to give “meaningful” consent in decisions pertaining to their children and whether such consent can be meaningful when a fundamental freedom is at stake. The paper investigates the nature and limits of parental consent and makes the case for a “threshold” above which respect for the dignity of the parents requires meaningful consent for any decision pertaining to their children and below which respect for the human rights of the child prohibits interference with the exercise of a right. Identifying the exact location of the threshold in any specific case requires local-level public deliberation; insisting that decisions meet those threshold conditions, and enforcing their recognition, is a job for the Court.



Social evaluation from the human rights perspective: proposal for an index of economic and social rights fulfillment [Members Only]
Fukuda-Parr, Sakiko Submitted:		Although human rights and development evolved as separate fields of study and policy over the 20th century, in the last decade, the realization of all human rights – economic, social, cultural, civil and political – has become widely accepted as an important end of the development process. The concept of ‘human rights based development’ has gained ground as a development discourse and as an operating principle of many development agencies. Sen has clarified the conceptual overlap between human rights and human capabilities, and subsequent work in the Human Development Reports and elsewhere have developed complementarity between capabilities/human development and human rights approaches to development. This paper develops a human rights based approach to social evaluation and identifies features that are distinct from the human rights approach. It uses a new index of economic and social rights fulfillment to demonstrate these differences



Entitlements Failure?Implication for Conflict and Livelihoods [Members Only]
Elgawi, Osman Submitted:		This paper examines the relationship between entitlement failure and violent conflict. Three types of potential linkage are examined: (i) entitlement failure causes violent conflicts (ii) entitlement failure has not significant effect on conflicts (iii) entitlement failure is correlated with conflicts only through its influence on institutions, environmental, economic opportunity and entitlement failure as such has not additional effect. Darfur crisis has been taken as a case study examining the above linkages. We hypothesized that the Darfur region crisis can be better understood as entitlements failure, when we assumed that the conflict occurred because different social groups share a finite remote rural area, and the current facilities management and utilization of resources in the absent of cultural harmony and state policy does not have the capacity to serve their increasingly cultural interactions.



Reparación e inclusión de las víctimas del conflicto armado interno peruano. Un modelo para armar [Members Only]
Chávez, Carmela Submitted:



How do women who experience extreme violence during conflict become agents of peace within a peace-building process? [Members Only]
Rodriguez-Carrión, Vivianna Submitted:		In post conflict situations of today there exist many women’s organizations that are working together for a common benefit for both their families and their communities. Theses associations develop significant change within their communities at a local, national and international level achieving a social, political and economic impact. Unfortunately they encounter many obstacles that don’t permit them to be at the forefront of the decision making process and sit at the table of government to be able to make further development. The problem then is often that the policy makers or/and elites are distanced (sometimes culturally, ethnically and/or socially) from the realities that are being experienced by the people who are impacted by these policies. The role that women play in the peace-building process is essential for the reconstruction of their governments and communities in order to avoid future conflict.



: Los determinantes de la oferta laboral femenina y masculina : una visión de largo plazo. [Members Only]
Espino, Alma Leites, Martin Machado, Alina Submitted:



Cultura, educación y desarrollo: Cambios en las relaciones entre genero y religión
Basterretxea, Iziar Submitted:		Desde que comenzaron a desarrollarse los estudios de opinión y los sondeos generalizados de comportamiento es una verdad universalmente aceptada que las mujeres son más conservadoras que los hombres. Desde la aprobación de la Constitución Española de 1978, y el reconocimiento constitucional de la igualdad de géneros, la educación ha conseguido ser un derecho garantizado por el estado, expandirse de forma que hoy la mayor parte de los estudiantes universitarios son mujeres y ampliarse para las mujeres a cualquier tipo de estudio. En este contexto, encontramos que entre los más jóvenes , los porcentajes de hombres y mujeres que se declaran religiosos tienden a equipararse. Además, entre quienes declaran haber abandonado la religión el porcentaje de mujeres es mayor que el de hombres. Es decir, que los cambios de patrones culturales y educativos ofrecen la posibilidad de construir nuevas identidades que rompen la relación mujer-conservadurismo religioso.



Poder y participación femenina en la economía rural. Trabajadoras temporeras agrícolas: invisibilidad económica y política. [Members Only]
Ramírez, José Antonio Submitted:		Una mirada respecto a la invisibilización de la participación femenina en la economía rural, implica ver que en dicho ámbito, ya sea en las actividades agrícolas, pecuarias o productivas existen notorios contrastes económicos y sociales. En uno de ellos, la agricultura, se distinguen escenarios modernos, de rendimientos crecientes, con elevado uso de tecnología y en donde la explotación agrícola está basada en contratos y acuerdos formales, en contraposición, la agricultura precaria o explotación informal se caracteriza por contar con baja tecnología, uso intensivo de mano de obra y precariedad laboral, en donde las personas que laboran en ella están excluidas socialmente y viven en condiciones de pobreza. En este último escenario, una de las formas más ignoradas, extensas, invisibles y precarias, es el trabajo temporal agrícola, especialmente el orientado a la exportación. Puede hablarse de la “feminización” del trabajo temporal agrícola al haberse convertido en un nicho de empleo muy extenso en mano de obra de mujeres. Alrededor del 60% del trabajo temporal en el sector es realizado por mujeres, la mayoría de ellas en situación de pobreza. Es así que la mujer campesina empieza a acceder a la economía rural, como una agente necesaria para trabajos en los predios, parcelas y para los locales de parking o embalaje de productos agroexportadores, pero este trabajo de “temporera” exhibe diversas complejidades: es ocasional, diverso, altamente informal, sin protección laboral y con fuerte presencia de discriminación racial, entre otras. Pero esta inserción se realiza en los términos de precariedad señalados líneas arriba. La desigualdad y discriminación salarial va de la mano con el escaso reconocimiento laboral y social de sus derechos. Son trabajadoras invisibles, más allá de su contribución a la economía rural.



Agencia, Género y Desarrollo Humano [Members Only]
Ruiz Bravo, Patricia Submitted:



The Measurement of Capabilities and Public Health [Members Only]
Lorgelly, Paula Anand, Paul Submitted:		In response to the lack of empirical research, Anand et al (2005) sought to measure capability by utilising data from the British Household Panel Survey. Upon finding incompleteness, they developed further indicators. The result is a set of more than 60 indicators, which reflect Nussbaum's list of ten capabilities. Anand et al found strong evidence of a link to wellbeing, but noted that further research was required, particularly in terms of tailoring samples to focus on specific issues. A subsequent project sought to reduce and refine this survey, so to provide a summary measure of wellbeing and capability in the realm of public health. The reduction and refinement of the questionnaire took place across a number of stages, using both qualitative (focus group discussions and in-depth interviews) and quantitative (secondary data analysis and primary data collection using postal surveys) approaches. The questionnaire was reduced from its original 65 questions to 24 questions (including demographic questions). Each of Nussbaum's ten Central Human Capabilities are measured using one (or more) of the 18 specific capability items which are included in the questionnaire. Analysis of the questionnaire responses found that respondents had a range of capabilities, and that these capabilities appear to be sensitive to one's gender, age, income and deprivation decile. An index of capability, estimated by assuming equal weight for each capability question, found that the average level of capability amongst respondents was 12.44 (range 3-17.75). This index was found to be highly correlated with a measure of health (EQ5D) and wellbeing (global QoL), although some differences were apparent; implying that the questionnaire has the potential to be a valid measure of outcome for public health interventions.



Using best-worst scaling to weight capabilities [Members Only]
Coast, Joanna Al-Janabi, Hareth Flynn, Terry Submitted:



The Matrix of Capabilities and Functionings (CFM) and the Human Development algorithm (HDA) [Members Only]
Gonzales de Olarte, Efraín Submitted:		Given that human development is a complex process involving multiple components and determining factors, multidimensional indicators are needed. On the basis of the extensive literature on the subject, we advance two new indicators: the Matrix of Capabilities and Functioning (MCF), and the Algorithm of Human Development (HDA). The MCF is composed of vectors of capabilities and functionings, based on Sen’s idea of Refined Functionings. It is based in a matricial framework. both static and dynamic The main purpose of constructing this index is to study how different sets of capabilities relate to alternative functionings, to produce diverse outcomes. The Human Development Algorithm (HAD) is a multidimensional index concerning the set of goods and services needed to complete a life cycle. The HDA is a socio-economic context indicator. It is composed of the main “satisfactors” or basic goods and services needed: food, health, education, housing, social security, decent employment and retirement programs, that might be available to all throughout of life cycle. This indicator shows the material progress reached by each country or region as well the institutional organization, private and public, and the degree of social cohesion and solidarity.



Rank Robustness of Composite Indices [Members Only]
Seth, Suman Submitted:		Many common multidimensional indices take the form of a ‘composite index’ or a weighted average of several dimension-specific achievements. Rankings arising from such an index are dependent upon an initial weighting vector, and any given judgment could, in principle, be reversed if an alternative weighting vector was employed. This paper examines a variable-weight robustness criterion for composite indicators that views a comparison as robust if the ranking is not reversed at any weight vector within a given set. We characterize the resulting robustness relations for various sets of weighting vectors and illustrate how they moderate the complete ordering generated by the composite indicator. We propose a measure by which the robustness of a given comparison may be gauged and illustrate its usefulness using data from the Human Development Index. In particular, we show how some country rankings are fully robust to changes in weights while others are quite fragile. We investigate the prevalence of the different levels of robustness in theory and practice and offer insight as to why certain datasets tend to have more robust comparisons.



Gender employability discrimination in Europe [Members Only]
Poggi, Ambra Submitted:		Decent work permits individuals to develop their talents and capacities to actively participate in society, and enjoy a broad equality of life-chances. Conversely, bad working conditions and discrimination reduce individual well-being, self-esteem and increase inequality of life-chances. This paper focuses on gender discrimination; in particular, it focuses on differences in the chances of accumulating employability on-the-job between men and women. In facts, accumulating employability on-the job permits to build capabilities to remain active in the labour market increasing opportunities in such a way that the entire life chances are affected. First, we assess the existence of an employability gaps penalizing females workers. Second, we try to understand whether observable characteristics help in explaining the employability gaps. Third, we identify the discriminated female workers and we study their discrimination experiences. Our aim is an exhaustive analysis of the factors (i.e. geographical areas, age groups, occupations or sectors) that characterize employability discrimination in the European Union. We find that gender employability discrimination exists in EU and it is differently spreads among countries, age groups, occupations and sectors. For example, we find that the Southern European countries have the highest proportion of discriminated female workers, the largest average employability gap and the greater severity level. Our results give useful indications to draws new policies aimed to reduce employability discrimination in EU and, therefore, to increase equality of life-chances and participation in the society.



Capability and women's well-being in Peru [Members Only]
Majumder, Amlan Chiappero-Martinetti, Enrica Submitted:		Empirical literature on women’s well-being within the framework of Capability Approach in Peruvian context is less extensive and less known. The present paper works out an wide range of indicators in five evaluative spaces reflecting well-being of Peruvian women in different dimensions of life, such as reproductive life, housing, education, autonomy, and leisure with the use of the fuzzy sets theory. It also does binary-multivariate logistic regression analyses to locate variations in the achieved levels of functionings with respect to a set of possible explicative factors, which include individual and household characteristics as well as social and environmental factors. The study utilises data from the Peruvian Demographic Health Survey (DHS) Continuous 2004 (Encuesta Demográfica y de Salud Familiar, Endes Continua 2004). By doing a comprehensive analysis the present study contributes some new knowledge and empirical evidence to the existing literature. This paper is an extension of the authors’ previously undertaken project on multidimensional assessment of well-being women in India, and later on which was generalised to assess well-being conditions of women in the developing countries utilising data from Demographic Health Surveys.



Participatory democracy in action: women in Khayelitsha, Cape Town [Members Only]
Conradie, Ina Submitted:



Participation and empowerment through self-reliant survival strategies [Members Only]
Crétiéneau, Anne-Marie University of Poitiers FR Submitted:		Facing mal-development, academicians, international institutions and development practitioners are moving towards bottom-up strategies which involve directly people in the projects and actions. These aim the livelihood outcomes which individuals and their families or communities aspire to, considering their territory's potentialities. We demonstrate which practical response forms survival strategy based on self-reliance principles. It implies participation and empowerment insofar as people are deciding to take charge of their own problem of life and as policy processes allow a community-driven development. All monographs throughout the world reveal the same essential characteristics and underlying philosophy. It enlightens on interconnections between local, national and global levels and how regeneration through one's own efforts is combined with participation and solidarity. Individual self-reliance also rehabilitates values of being and the capabilities in order to construct oneself. This dynamic movement from the 'periphery' conduces to a realizable utopian model for human development that enhances the capability approach.



Assessing Citizen Participation Spaces through a Capabilities and Power Relations Framework [Members Only]
Salinas Lanao, Gabriela Submitted:



Transformation Development [Members Only]
Murphy, John Submitted:		El enfoque de mi presentación será el trasfondo filosófico de esta metodología. Quiero ilustrar, específicamente, como esta estrategia pueda democratizar el proceso de investigación y cómo dicho resultado pueda contribuir al fortalecimiento de la sociedad civil. De esta manera, la planificación puede pasar a ser más representativa de la comunidad y más productiva. Este cambio en la filosofía y la práctica de planificación es consistente con la idea, visible hoy en día, que esta actividad debería emerger “desde abajo.” Cuando se emprende desde abajo, la investigación representa las perspectivas de una comunidad y, por lo tanto, tiene mucha credibilidad. Adicionalmente, como parte de mi discurso, voy a unir mi obra sobre el desarrollo transformación con mis experiencias en Colombia como planificador.



Dialogue and Non Violent Communication: a Capability Approach [Members Only]
Motmans, Jos Motmans, Jannes Submitted:		Democracy and political freedom are fundaments of Sen’s capability approach. In Development as Freedom (2001:145-159) he clearly illustrates not only the instrumental significance of both for the process of development but also its intrinsic importance and its constructive role in the selection and ordering of people’s needs and capabilities. Although Sen’s point of view is clear and acceptable, this is not the case with his answer to the question of ‘How to realise and how to implement democracy and political freedom?' However the need and the will for coherent and effective strategies to implement democracy and political freedom grows in a globalizing world. New notions of governance arise, new and different issues come to the fore and new mental frameworks concerning political participation are formed. As Steven Rosell (2004:47) states, traditional governance and decision making was relatively simple. The homogenous elite that was involved in policy making had, most of the time, a same social and cultural background, similar system believes and language. However, homogeneity is changing towards diversity as a result of globalisation. This change is confronting us with new challenges on the field of governance. In this article we state that dialogue and non violent communication are both necessary and complementary additional steps in decision making processes confronted with this new complexity. This does not apply to the national policy alone, but to the international policy as well. Classic interpretation and implementation of democracy and political freedom is no longer sufficient. Future orientated democracies better call on people’s natural born competences to step in dialogue, to communicate in a non violent way and to enlarge their capabilities to practice these competences in order to create a sustainable fundament for political freedom, as a mean (the instrumental contribution), an end (the intrinsic importance) and for its constructive role in development. After we explain the concept of dialogue and non violent communication both as a competence and a capability, we illustrate our central statement in the case of the Palestinian Occupied Territories. In our conclusion we also set a draft for a further research agenda.



Rio’s Favelas: informal institutions, social capital and development [Members Only]
Lessa Kerstenetzky, Celia Submitted:



Autonomy as a foundation for human development: A conceptual model to study individual autonomy
Muñiz Castillo, Mirtha Rosaura Maastricht University, Graduate School of Governance Submitted:		This paper presents a conceptual model of autonomy grounded in the theories of human needs and capabilities. The analysis suggests that autonomy can be considered a human need that requires satisfiers to secure a sufficient level of competence to effectively participate in social life, and a combined capability to make choices in significant matters and achieve positive results in one’s life. The model allows analysing individual experiences of autonomy, through attention to three determinants of autonomy: agency as an internal capacity, entitlements, and structural contexts. It highlights the relations of individuals that negotiate their entitlements and options in specific contexts. Personal and contextual, subjective and objective factors explain people’s conditions for and their feeling of being autonomous. The paper also discusses the relation between human development and autonomy and asserts that initiatives that aim at fostering human development should promote the expansion of individual autonomy and empowerment.



The Incapability of the Human Capabilities Approach: It’s Redundancy as an Operational Tool to Inform Social Policy from a Social Reality Perspective [Members Only]
Santibañez, Claudio Submitted:



Studying values and the capability approach [Members Only]
Romero, Catalina Submitted:		I would like to present a paper on how to study values from the perspective of the capability approach taking as a basis a comparison of Ronald Inglehart’s study of value change in different societies around the World, and Amartya Sen’s category of “what people value” or “evaluation”. I will do this, using as a reference the study of values with the WVS questionnaire. Sabine Alkire has introduced the comparison between Inglehart and Finnis finding a parallel between some of the categories each author use, such as materialism and postmaterialism, family and faith, on Inglehart’s side, and life/health/security and self-expression, practical reason, and meaningful work, sociability and harmony with the divine, on Finnis’s side. I have found that many authors are using Inglehart’s WVS data, without engaging in a more theoretical discussion on the adequacy of shifting from one framework to the other, and therefore without paying attention to the questions of conceptual validity and the limits of the variables used in the WVS to understand what people value following Sen’s discussion of Values and the process of valuation (Development as Freedom, pp 30-31). I would like to compare both authors paying attention to the different meanings they attach to the concept of values, coming from the theoretical perspective of each one, and to the disciplinary differences coming from economics, political science and sociology.



Self- Help group: A vehicle of poor for power and participation [Members Only]
Sultana Ashrafee, Sonia Submitted:		At the paradigm of multi-dimensional poverty context, it is wiser to accept the truth that national economic growth alone cannot prevent the growth of mass poverty. In fact a process of alarming socio-economic polarization and the deepening of social cleavages in both urban and rural areas are evident as the one sided emphasis on economic achievement by national policy-makers has set in motion. Since the rural poor have become too numerous to be helped from outside, “self-help”1 has emerged as a new paradigm for combating rural poverty, and promotion of such initiatives have became one of the main priorities for local and international NGOs in developing countries. This paper describes the findings of a study, conducted during December 2006 to February 2007, on ActionAid Bangladesh (AAB) supported self-help groups (SHG). AAB is a nationally led international NGO working in more than 35 districts of Bangladesh through partnership with around 90 community-based local and national organizations. AAB realizes poverty as a systematic problem. Most often the poor lack livelihood skills, they have little or no land and other productive asset; their access to natural resources and public services are very limited; most international and national polices are encroaching the public and natural spaces for them; and poor people are constantly either evicted or thrown out of the environment. Furthermore since poor people are in most cases, either live in place that are poor area or are part of a special group, whatever income that they have, are spent mainly on protecting their lives; in other words they and their families are more prone than others to both man and nature made disasters. Thus to ensure secured livelihood for the poor and marginalized, it is verily needed to enhance their livelihood skills, create access to natural resources and public services, raise voice to modify or establish pro-poor policies. At this juncture, AAB provides financial and technical supports to its rural and urban partner organizations (POs) for implementing poverty alleviation programmes, particularly through SHGs. AAB aims to build and strengthen poor people’s organizations as a model of good governance and democratic practice to ensure participation and transparency at every stage. Basically, the study documents the various approaches, processes and activities that the POs followed, assesses the prospects and challenges of different models and identifies best practices to work with the hardcore poor people of Bangladesh.



Design Is Ceremony: Knowledge, Culture and Power in Indigenous Design
Nichols, Crighton University of Sydney Sydney AU Submitted:		The notion that different cultures will have different perceptions on what it means to ‘do’ design seems intuitive, yet to date scant attention has been paid to non-Western interpretations. This paper demonstrates the applicability of the process of re-interpreting the meaning of the interrelated dimensions of agency, culture and knowledge from an Indigenous perspective, and explores how these interpretations can inform an understanding of contemporary Indigenous design. The purpose is to help address the chronic under-representation of Indigenous Australians in the technical design professions, such as architecture, engineering and product/industrial design, by making them more relevant and accessible to Indigenous Australians. This has the potential to create meaningful employment opportunities whilst maintaining cultural integrity, leading to a greater sense of self-determination. Additionally, being capable of technical design is a necessary (though not sufficient) requirement to democratise the technology transfer process, which will inform government investments in areas such as Indigenous housing and the roll-out of high-speed internet connectivity in Australia. Finally, the decolonising process is likely to yield significant policy implications in terms of how to best empower Indigenous communities and strengthen their cultural identity. In essence, Indigenous technical design appears to be more consensual, harmonious and subtle in nature. The profit motive is less emphasised, and the context more so, allowing a deeper meaning, or story, to influence the design. The next step of future research in this area will be to critique, evaluate and refine the proposed understanding of design through detailed discussions with Indigenous Australian technical designers professionals. This work may be complimented by identify relevant case studies, possibly in the Indigenous housing design or Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) fields. Finally, the appropriate methodologies required to support an Indigenous design pedagogy also require further investigation.



Mediating Power Through The Lens of Social Capital In Informal Water Market: A Case Study Of Rural Gujarat, India [Members Only]
Naz, Farhat Submitted:



Eastern European way of political and social-economic transformations
Genyk, Mykola Senych, Maria Subcarpathian National University named after V.Stefanyk Ivano-Frankivsk UA Submitted:		The struggle for political changes was the main substance of the activity of oppositional movements of East Central Europe (ECE). ECE was the region of the greatest geopolitical changes. For the period Cold War ECE was the weakest region of Soviet Bloc. The turning-stage in Cold War became Helsinki Conference. The fixation of borders inviolability and human rights guaranteeing created preconditions for liberal evolution of Soviet totalitarianism. After Helsinki Conference organized oppositional movements emerged – Polish Independency Mutual Understanding, Ukrainian Helsinki Group, Czech Charter’77, Confederation of Independent Poland, Association of Independent Trade-Unions “Solidarity” etc. Emigration had a great influence on elaboration of transformation conceptions. The task of disassembling of Pax Sovietica was also provided for solution of complex of problems of national and social character in post-communist period. It included formation of a new geopolitical order, solution of the borders problem, national minorities, the overcoming of international stereotypes and international reconciliation.



The Foster-Greer-Thorbecke Poverty Measure: Twenty Five Years Later [Members Only]
Foster, James Submitted:		The paper gives a retrospective of this well-known class of indices, describing its genesis, subsequent research, and fruitful directions for new research.



[Members Only]
Arndt, Christian Strotmann, Harald Volkert, Juergen Submitted:		Among affluent countries in Europe Germany was among the first to adopt Amartya Sen’s capability approach (CA) as a theoretical framework for official German government’s poverty and wealth reporting. As the German reporting system, the process of its implementation and the reactions from scholars and the public might provide interesting insights for current and future realizations of similar reporting systems in other countries it is the aim of this paper to inform about the German experiences with a CA oriented reporting system. The paper gives an overview of the framework of main determinants of capabilities applied in German poverty and wealth reporting. Moreover, we describe the capability-related basic structure of the latest 3rd German Government’s Report on Poverty and Wealth and illustrate some of its major findings. Finally, the paper discusses both positive benefits of CA orientation for the German poverty and wealth reporting system and existing shortcomings and challenges.



Poverty in Mexico from an Ethnic Perspective [Members Only]
Gonzalez de Alba, Ivan Submitted:



La brecha educativa en el Perú como freno al desarrollo humano: entre la educación rural y urbana, entre la estatal y la privada [Members Only]
Ansión, Juan Submitted:



La incidencia de la educación media en la desigualdad de capacidades en Uruguay y Chile [Members Only]
Méndez, Nadia Zerpa, Mariana Submitted:



Movilidad de ingreso, educación y trampas de pobreza: nueva evidencia para los países del Cono Sur [Members Only]
Salas, Gonzalo Leites, Martín Arim, Rodrigo Dean, Andrés Submitted:



Looking for long-run development effectiveness: An autonomy-centred framework for project evaluation
Muñiz Castillo , Mirtha R. Gasper, Des Maastricht University / International Institute of Social Studies (of Erasmus University Rotterdam) Submitted:		This paper proposes an analytical framework to assess project effects on human lives. It goes beyond looking at project outputs and short-run effectiveness in terms of project-specified objectives, and proposes a development effectiveness criterion that looks at whether and how projects positively influence participants’ autonomy: a human autonomy effectiveness criterion. The focus is on individuals as agents of change, and on their goals and values, rather than on projects as designed to directly produce other changes. The framework identifies relevant processes, practices and relationships during a project cycle. It aims at contributing to design, implementation and evaluation of aid projects so that participants are able to achieve valuable goals, with greater chance of sustained positive effects. The paper is based on a study of four infrastructure projects in Nicaragua and El Salvador supported by Luxembourg’s aid agency, between 1999 and 2005.



From results to agency. Exploring possibilities for an operative framework for conceiving development projects
Peris, Jordi López, Estela Cuesta, Iván Boni, Alejandra Grupo de Estudios en Desarrollo. Universidad Politécnica de Valencia Valencia ES Submitted:		Given a background of complexity, dynamism and uncertainty, this paper assumes that, rather than being oriented towards achieving preconceived results, aid programmes and projects should be oriented towards strengthening the agency of actors with the potential to influence and support development processes and social change dynamics. Therefore, we draw on the idea of collective agency based the notion of responsibility and the two-way relationship with structure. This leads us to suggest some key elements in the project process for expanding collective agency such as: 1) incorporating the relational perspective between actors, 2) generating deliberative processes and 3) introducing critical reflection and power analysis. While examining the Logical Framework Approach (LFA) and stating its limitations in relation to promote collective agency, we point out some possibilities for a new framework for conceiving development programmes and projects as instruments to support development processes through the expansion of collective agency.



Oral History as a Method to Enhance Sustainable Human Development through the Capabilities Approach. Theoretical Assumptions and Implementation Methodology of a Development Project in rural Tamil Nadu
de Heering, Alexandra Leyens, Stephane University of Namur Namur BE Submitted:		Our aim is to show that oral history is an interesting method to implement development projects using the Capabilities Approach (CA). We show this in three steps. First history is a necessary dimension to be taken into account in ethical reflections and hence in development strategies using the CA. Indeed an historical approach allows tackling the adaptive preference problem which is a stumbling block of the CA. Second we show how oral history as a qualitative inquiry methodology can bring possible benefits to action policy and development project. Combining CA and oral history methodology seems particularly promising in framing development projects. Third the rationale of a development project we carry out in Tamil Nadu (India) based on those theoretical assumptions is presented in order to illustrate the place oral history methodology can hold in sustainable human development projects using the CA.



Child Poverty as Capabilities Deprivation: a case study in a slum area on New Delhi [Members Only]
Biggeri, Mario Trani, Jean-Francois Submitted:		In this paper the capability approach perspective is used to satisfy the multidimensional nature of child poverty and wellbeing. The objective of this paper is twofold. The first is to understand the level of deprivation of children in a slum area of New Delhi and the second to evaluate the impact of a community based projects named Project Why (PW) on their wellbeing. PW is an Indian community based NGO operating in New Delhi. PW benefits about 600 children, spread in 6 different localities in the southern part of Delhi: Govindpuri, Nehru Camp, Giri Nagar, Sanjay Colony, Okhla Phase I, Khadar. This NGO offers different services, depending on the child’s age and needs. There are crèche sections for children from 2 to 5 years old; children between 5 and 15 years old are supported by a tuition service aimed at complementing and strengthening the poor education they receive at school: according to their age they attend a primary or a secondary section or a computer centre. Furthermore, in the locality of Govindpuri two relevant structures have been created: a disabled section for about 20 disabled people of very different ages, mainly with learning difficulties, and a foster care centre hosting 4 children with very difficult backgrounds and 3 disabled people. In the neighbourhood of Khadar, there is also a women’s centre. The data used in the analysis were collected throughout an ad hoc survey just after the international workshop2. The survey based method is based on the procedure developed by Children Capabilities Thematic Group of the HDCA. The surveyl interviewed 120 children between 12 and 16 included (20 children in every location of Project Why). The children interviewed were from two groups: the first group from PW and the second a control group in the same areas. Children were randomly selected. The results and data elaboration evidence the level of subjective deprivation and the impact of the project in terms of capability expansion/reduction.



Children's development, a way for human development in Peru [Members Only]
Thorne, Cecilia Submitted:		El camino hacia el desarrollo humano está indefectiblemente ligado al desarrollo del niño. Como muchos países en vías de desarrollo, el Perú se caracteriza por una población joven, donde el 40% se encuentra por debajo de los 19 años y el 10% está por debajo de los 5 años. Más del 50% de los niños vive en condiciones de pobreza, lo que no permite su evolución favorable. Se presenta un panorama de la situación de la niñez en el Perú y el contexto en que crecen muchos niños. Se enfocan aspectos socioeconómicos, de salud y nutrición y de educación, que de una u otra manera afectan negativamente su desarrollo. Existe suficiente evidencia empírica en la que se destaca la importancia de los primeros años en la evolución favorable de la persona. Un buen inicio conlleva una serie de ventajas como el aumento en el éxito escolar, mejor empleo y una tasa de retorno significativa. A pesar de la evidencia, no existe en el país políticas sostenidas ni inversiones significativas que presten atención a los niños y niñas desde el nacimiento. Se discuten algunas propuestas y programas que promueven el desarrollo humano.



Early Childhood, Agency, and Capability Deprivation: A quantitative analysis using German socio-economic panel data
Wuest, Kirsten Volkert, Juergen Hochschule Pforzheim Pforzheim DE Submitted:		Based on a recent extension of the German Socio-Economic Panel (GSOEP) data for children aged zero to three years old, we assess the situation of 1,067 babies that were born in Germany between 2002 and 2006 as well as the follow-up results for 457 children who were two or three years old in and after 2005. Besides income poverty we analyzed the health situation of children as measured by the participation in preventive medical examination for infants, the infant education and the social participation. Although income poverty and a deprivation in the childrens’ health care and education are highly correlated, our findings based on logistic regession analysis, suggest that it is first of all the household type and the mother’s educational degree that affect the non-income childrens’ functionings.



The Endurance of the Andean Gods: Virtues of the Andean Ethos [Members Only]
Vega-Centeno, Imelda Submitted:		For more than 500 years the majestic cults of the Andean people – of which we learn through the chroniclers of the XVI century – have not been acknowledged. Yet these cults survive found in numerous peasants’ rites, thereby connecting the Andean people to their ancestral gods. They survive in Catholic rituals fast as well as the celebration of Corpus Christi. Hidden in these rituals one encounters solar cults, the gods of the old religion and their faiths as well as manners of relating to the sacred and to nature. Moreover, ancient Andean cults also provides an ethic that seeks social cohesion, leading to a sense of ‘group or community’ as separated it from the others. The author looks at the survival of the original cults, faiths and conceptions of social relations, today hidden in the wrapping of Roman Catholicism. The paper aims to go beyond Eurocentric concepts and descriptions of indigenous religions; in particular when analyzing the original Andean religion. It thus seeks to understand its ethic of social relations and the value-based connection of people to nature.



Broadening our Look: a New Approach to Poverty and Human Flourishing [Members Only]
Boltvinik, Julio Submitted:		The paper will present a radically new approach to poverty/human flourishing, founded positively on Marxist philosophical anthropology and on systematic reflection on human needs, and negatively on the critique of both what can be called the political economy of poverty and of existing answers to the question of the constitutive elements of human flourishing. The approach adopts as constitutive element of human flourishing, conceived as a multi-perspective conceptual axis, the development of what Marx called the human essential forces: needs and capacities. By cutting off all other perspectives than the economic one from the axis of human flourishing, one derives the standard of living axis, which looks at the development of human essential forces from the perspective of economic (in a broad sense) resources, conditions and opportunities. The paper presents the conclusions of a book of the same name as the title of this presentation (in two volumes) being prepared for printing. In each axis two dimensions of being: structural and circumstantial. This allows for the construction of four concepts of poverty/wealth (or human flourishing): structural being human poverty; circumstantial being human poverty; structural being economic poverty; and circumstantial being economic poverty. The paper presents three main sections each relating to a feature of the new approach: the negative foundations; the positive foundations; and a synthetic view of the new approach.



Ethics, Politics and the Poor [Members Only]
Dussel, Enrique Submitted:		The presentation builds on Enrique Dussel’s recent book Twenty Theses on Politics 8Duke University Press), a groundbreaking manifesto charting new terrain toward de-colonial political philosophy and political theory. It is based on the experience and interpretation of current events in Latin America. Synthesizing a half-century of his pioneering work in moral and political philosophy, Dussel presents a succinct rationale for the development of political alternatives to the exclusionary, exploitative institutions of neoliberal globalization. In twenty short, provocative theses he lays out the foundational elements for a politics of just and sustainable co-existence. Dussel first constructs a theory of political power and its institutionalization, taking on matters such as the purpose of politics and the fetishization of power. He insists that political projects must criticize or reject as unsustainable all political systems, actions, and institutions whose negative effects are suffered by oppressed or excluded victims. Turning to the deconstruction or transformation of political power, he explains the political principles of liberation and addresses matters such as reform and revolution.



Catholic Ethics and Empowerment in the Popular Sectors: A View from Argentina [Members Only]
Mallimaci, Fortunato Submitted:		The paper looks at the diverse roles and presence that Catholic and Evangelical groups have in popular sectors and in empowering them. It examines the ways in which these faiths impinge in popular groups’ conception of culture, of conflicts, and their relations to the state; a state that either ‘privatizes’ or ‘permits’ public space for these groups and their faiths. The paper aims to show religious plurality and the role of faiths in people’s refusal to participate in what is a common tendency to ‘individualize,’ and disembody people from institutions. The paper further examines what type of ethics flows from various religious movements and its relationship to empowerment. This is of particular important at a time of disenchantment and loss of credibility of in educational, political and union institutions.



Reproducing Oppression: The Criminalisation of Indigenous Children [Members Only]
Cunneen, Chris Submitted:		The paper explores the extent of criminalisation of Indigenous children?and its function in reproducing systems of oppression.?In particular the paper explores the outcomes of criminalisation through?denial of education attainment, employment opportunities,?non-oppressive socialisation and the undermining of Indigenous methods of child-rearing and conflict resolution.?



: About measures preventing Family violence among indigenous communities: Developing instruments and mechanisms for a participative observation and evaluation [Members Only]
Nziou, Yolande Grace Submitted:



Indigenous children Rights. Parents and Teachers in the Life of Indigenous Children [Members Only]
Llanos, Martha Submitted:



Te Whare Roimata - Participatory Evaluation of a New Zealand Urban Indigenous Development Agency
Schischka, John Christchurch Polytechnic Institute of Technology Christchurch NZ Submitted:		Te Whare Roimata ( the English translation of Te Whare Roimata is “the house of tears”) which describes itself as a bicultural community trust run through the Christchurch City Mission. This organisation is involved in a number of projects centred around healing, reconciliation and inclusion of groups marginalised in society. One section of the Te Whare Roimata Group works through the Christchurch City Council Community Gardens Programme and aims to provide gardening skills and to increase the confidence of those involved in the programme. This paper reports on the application of a capabilities based participatory evaluation methodology to determine the changes that are occurring in the lives of those involved in the Te Whare Roimata Community Gardens Programme.



Making the Case for Collective Capabilities: What does it really mean? [Members Only]
Ibrahim, Solava Submitted:		Collective capabilities, social capabilities, relational capabilities, group capabilities and external capabilities, all these are concepts that have been recently introduced by various scholars to extend the analysis of the capability approach from the individual to the collectivity. These concepts emphasize the importance of collectivities, social structures, communal relations and groups for the expansion of human capabilities. However, are these concepts inherently different or are they describing – more or less- the same ‘type of capabilities’. For example, are these capabilities simply the sum of individual capabilities in a particular group or are they new kinds of capabilities that go beyond the individual ones. In case of the latter, what is then the difference between each of these ‘types’ of capabilities? The aim of this paper is to undertake a ‘conceptual exploration’ of these concepts. The paper first reviews these concepts and examines how each of them describes the relationship between individual capabilities and social/ collective structures. Section two analyzes the strengths and weaknesses of each of these concepts. Section three streamlines these concepts by introducing the ‘criteria’ and ‘conditions’ for the building and expansion of these capabilities at the collective level. Section four demonstrates the importance of these capabilities for the poor’s well-being. The last section concludes by demonstrating the importance of these concepts for enriching the analysis of human capabilities and the capability approach.



Generating Collective Capabilities in Vietnam: How to encourage the participation of the rural poor within the poverty reduction process? [Members Only]
Thi Hoang Mai, Dao Submitted:		Over the last few years, Vietnam achieved a rapid economic growth, resulting in a remarkable progress in the reduction of poverty. Between 1993 and 2004, with real GDP per capita grew by 5.9 percent a year on average. The ratio of poor people dropped by two thirds and approximately 30 million people were lifted out of poverty. However, this poverty reduction appears to be more and more costly, because the marginal poverty reduction effect resulting from economic growth become smaller than that it was before. Therefore, a higher growth rate is required to reduce each percentage point of the poverty rate while, in turn, each percentage point of economic growth requires a higher level of investment. In the mean time, Vietnam is expecting to graduate out of the list of the poorest countries by 2010, and as an emerging country is likely to be confronted to a series of challenges in the coming years due to the change in the international context. Even if they receive various supports from the Government and other development institutions, the poor still have to fight hard when they want to escape from poverty. Unfortunately, for many Vietnamese people, especially in remote rural areas, poverty is still considered as a natural component of their lives since a long time. Overcoming the poverty reduction challenge requires the willingness and activeness the poor themselves. Without their participation the progress in poverty reduction will slow down and may even never succeed. Moreover, there are strong disparities in the poverty rates and in the pace of poverty reduction among regions and ethnic groups. This is a serious cause of concern. In 2004, the ethnic minorities, who represent approximately 14 percent of the population, account for 39 percent of the poor. In the same way, the Northern Mountains, the North Central Coast and the Central Highlands, make 57 percent of the poor while they only represent less than 20 percent of the whole population. This paper shows, with some case studies, how the poor, especially in some ethnic groups, are becoming more efficient by acting collectively within the poverty reduction process. It is bases on qualitative interviews and quantitative surveys conducted among the poor in the Northern part of Vietnam. The first section will explain why participation is required by the poor. The second section will describe the situation of the poor and the current poverty reduction process. The last section will argue for new perspectives in poverty reduction by associating the poor to the reinforcement of collective capabilities.



A new Style of Development to face the current Crisis: Solidarity Economy, Collective Capabilities and Sustainable Development [Members Only]
Dubois, Jean-Luc Lasida, Elena Submitted:



Assessing human resource development needs to empower an indigenous group of people: The case of Papuans in Indonesia. [Members Only]
Imbun, Ben Submitted:		The Indonesian province of Papua has a chequered political history. The significant events that profoundly shaped the province had been mostly products of external powers which had scrambled to control its resource abundant land and its people. Up until late 1969, Papua was a colony of the Dutch and controversially became a province of Indonesia thereafter. Despite the province of Papua generating significant revenue to the Indonesian government coffers from its vast natural resources, the indigenous Papuans have largely remained subsistence farmers and poverty stricken all their lives. Almost all human development indicators put the Papuans at the lowest level relative to other provinces of Indonesia. This picture is beginning to get some attention after some political administrative changes were made, to the Indonesian political system in the 1990s, with the passing of a special autonomy law for the province. One of the achievements had been the election of an indigenous Papuan as the governor of Papua. Amongst other endeavours to empower the people of Papua, particularly the indigenous Papuans, the governor has embarked on an ambitious program to improve the province’s human resource development (HRD) opportunities. This paper discusses a rapid assessment of HRD in Papua in light of the governor’s development goals and programs as a way forward to understanding the critical human resource issues and identification critical areas for intervention by the government. The paper does this in the context of general discussion of the socio-economic contentions of the province and assessing ongoing/current relevant HRD activities and policies. Consequent of the analysis, gaps, challenges, problems and priorities are identified and suggestions for intervention made.



Participación, poder y agenda de la eficacia de la ayuda: retos y oportunidades [Members Only]
Ferrero, Gabriel Baselga, Pilar Submitted:		Tras la “agenda del cambio social” en los años 90 y la emergente “nueva agenda de la pobreza” de principios de 2000 (Maxwell, 2003), desde la comunidad donante se está realizando un importante esfuerzo para lograr la “eficacia de la ayuda al desarrollo”. La Declaración de París y el trabajo desarrollado en el seno de la OCDE-CAD y la UE, suponen la máxima representación de esta tendencia. La nueva “agenda de la eficacia de la ayuda” puede entenderse de dos maneras diferentes: por un lado, como un enfoque de gestión dirigido por el donante que busca más valor en las inversiones de la ayuda. Por otro, como una sólida herramienta para, precisamente, tener en cuenta una visión más amplia del desarrollo, y como una redefinición totalmente diferente de la relación donante-receptor tradicional. Se pueden identificar varias “ventanas de oportunidad” para un cambio en profundidad en este nuevo contexto, que plantea un indudable reto al rol tradicional de las ONGD. En este artículo se discuten los antecedentes, enfoques subyacentes en la agenda de eficacia y los retos y las oportunidades que ésta presenta para la sociedad civil.



Fundamentos éticos para una política pública del desarrollo. El ejemplo de España [Members Only]
Ferrero, Gabriel Pedrajas, Marta Submitted:



La democracia deliberativa como marco de la política pública de desarrollo. El proceso de elaboración del III Plan Director 2009-2012 de la Cooperación Española. [Members Only]
Ferrero, Gabriel Pedrajas, Marta Cortés, Javier Baselga y Mateo Ambrosio-Albalat, Pilar Submitted:



La importancia de los procesos participativos en las políticas de desarrollo rural. El caso de Nicaragua [Members Only]
Luz Ortega, Maria Ambrosio-Albalat, Mateo Submitted:		El escaso éxito obtenido en la reducción de la pobreza rural durante las últimas décadas, y en particular en América Latina, pone de manifiesto la necesidad de buscar nuevos enfoques, estrategias y políticas para promover el desarrollo rural. La Nueva Ruralidad Latinoamericana y el Enfoque Territorial constituyen un nuevo marco desde el que entender la ruralidad y proponer modelos alternativos para el desarrollo rural en la región. La presente comunicación pretende aportar elementos y criterios que puedan facilitar la formulación de políticas de desarrollo rural apropiadas en América Latina, como son una interpretación en profundidad del propio fenómeno de la formulación e implementación de dichas políticas y el estudio de las variables que influyen en la calidad y el impacto de las mismas. Para ello se ha empleado una estrategia cualitativa de investigación basada en la triangulación, alrededor del estudio de caso de Nicaragua, empleando observación participante de larga duración, análisis documental de marcos de política y evaluación comparativa ex post de dos procesos de incidencia en las políticas de desarrollo rural. Los resultados de la investigación han sido la aportación de un marco para la caracterización y el análisis comparativo de políticas de desarrollo rural, la construcción de un modelo representativo de las variables presentes en el fenómeno y sus interrelaciones y propuestas derivadas de su aplicación empírica. Las principales conclusiones de la investigación apuntan a que no sólo los “marcos de principios teóricos” constituyen las variables clave para el éxito de las políticas de desarrollo rural de entre sus atributos y características: la influencia del “proceso de elaboración” es igualmente importante y puede ser mayor. Por ello, es necesario adoptar un Enfoque de Proceso, que enfatiza la formulación e implementación de políticas e intervenciones como una actividad ascendente, abierta, flexible, adaptada y adaptable al contexto, abierta al aprendizaje, donde la participación de la población es un fin en sí mismo al abordar la formulación e implementación de políticas de desarrollo rural



Evaluación de la pobreza multidimensional en grandes ciudades argentinas. Una propuesta de medición basada en el enfoque de las capacidades [Members Only]
Lépore, Eduardo Submitted:		Es conocido que el crecimiento económico experimentado por la Argentina en los últimos cuatro años se ha visto acompañado por un importante proceso de creación de empleos, que permitió una sostenida reducción del desempleo y de la pobreza por ingresos. Sin embargo, cabe preguntarse en qué medida dicho proceso hizo posible una mejora sustantiva en las condiciones materiales de hábitat, salud y subsistencia, especialmente en los grupos de mayor vulnerabilidad. El Indice de Hábitat, Salud y Subsistencia arroja resultados novedosos acerca de lo ocurrido en la coyuntura socioeconómica reciente, alternativos a los obtenidos por la medida oficial de pobreza, centrada en los ingresos requeridos por los hogares para comprar una canasta esencial de bienes y servicios valorizada según el Indice de Precios al Consumidor del INDEC. Siguiendo una reconocida corriente de estudios en el campo de las capacidades del desarrollo humano, el marco teórico que sustenta esta propuesta metodológica sitúa las necesidades de hábitat, salud y subsistencia en el espacio de análisis de las condiciones materiales de vida. Desde una aproximación multidimensional a dichos contenidos se busca conocer en qué medida las personas y los grupos familiares de los principales centros urbanos de la Argentina lograron acceder en los últimos cuatro años a condiciones de vida suficientes para asegurar un apropiado resguardo y habitación, un mínimo nivel de consumos básicos y un buen estado de salud psico-físico. Se trata sin duda de un elenco de necesidades estrechamente emparentadas con las capacidades de conservación de la vida en el orden biológico, cuya destitución da cuenta siempre de la denegación de derechos humanos fundamentales. Se presenta aquí una síntesis de los principales resultados obtenidos sobre la base de los datos recogidos por la Encuesta de la Deuda Social Argentina entre los años 2004 y 2008. Las evidencias encontradas indican que los problemas asociados a las dificultades de realización de consumos básicos han tendido a retroceder, acompañados de una ligera merma de los problemas de acceso a una vivienda adecuada. Sin embargo, las condiciones de salud psico-física de la población adulta no cambiaron de modo significativo. En ese marco, siete de cada diez personas de 18 años y más localizadas en el estrato socioeconómico más bajo de los centros urbanos estudiados continúa sin poder acceder a oportunidades mínimas de hábitat, salud y subsistencia.



El desarrollo de la sociabilidad en la población de Buenos Aires: un aporte para su operacionalización enmarcado en el enfoque de las capacidades
Lépore, Silvia Pontificia Universidad Católica Argentina Capital Federal AR Submitted:		Este documento se inspira en el enfoque de las capacidades de Sen, que enriquece Nussbaum. Se propone una operacionalización de la Sociabilidad concebida como el conjunto de relaciones sociales horizontales y verticales que las personas manifiestan en una pluralidad de vínculos que se diferencian según el estrato socioeconómico. Esta natural capacidad de relacionarse caracteriza a todos los individuos, pero no todos logran convertirla en un funcionamiento valioso, originándose efectos de aislamiento, especialmente en los sectores más desaventajados. A su vez la población exhibe una marcada preferencia por mantener relaciones cercanas mientras son poco propensas a involucrarse en emprendimientos colectivos. Esto ratifica la segmentación y polarización de la sociedad estudiada y la heterogeneidad entre los estratos bajos. Los indicadores fueron elaborados con los microdatos de la Encuesta de la Deuda Social Argentina (EDSA) de la Pontificia Universidad Católica Argentina correspondientes al Área Metropolitana de Buenos Aires.



Desafíos teórico-metodológicos en el abordaje de la segregación residencial [Members Only]
Suárez, Ana Lourdes Universidad Católica Argentina Buenos Aires AR Submitted:		La segregación residencial es un proceso por el que se van conformando territorios polarizados basados en coordenadas sociales de diferenciación, que se visualizan especialmente en los ámbitos urbanos densamente poblados y desiguales. El paper presenta una discusión teórico-metodológica en torno al tema. Se presentan las dos dimensiones constitutivas de la segregación residencial: la concentración territorial de la pobreza, y la insuficiente articulación de los territorios en la trama urbana (geografía de oportunidades), y sus implicancias para la cohesión social. Desde una perspectiva metodológica se presentan dos tipos de indicadores. Los primeros analizan la evolución de asentamientos precarios y de urbanizaciones cerradas; los segundos describen los procesos socioterritoriales a través de índices de segregación. Se discuten las implicancias, dificultades y desafíos vinculados a la utilización de estos indicadores.



Capabilities and the functionings production function with an application to the quality of the first job [Members Only]
Defloor, Bart Van Ootegem, Luc Verhofstadt, Elsy Submitted:		This paper is about transformation efficiency in the capabilities and functionings framework. Some individuals are functionings poor because they are lacking resources, others are functionings poor because of low transformation efficiency. They don’t manage to transform resources into valuable functionings. The former might be helped with an expansion of their resources, the latter might be helped by creating circumstances under which they can use his resources more efficiently. The theory is applied to an individual’s first job after graduation. We investigate causes why some individuals are more efficient in transforming (job) resources into (job) functionings than others. We use a distance function approach and stochastic frontier analysis to measure individual transformation efficiency. The results show that individuals are on average 46% efficient. In the next phase we regress these efficiency numbers on 13 ‘conversion factors, aspects influencing the transformation process. There are individual, social and environmental conversion factors. The results suggests that individuals who make a better impression, who are motivated for the content of the job and not only in material aspects of the job, who are male, who don’t live in a rural area with recent urbanisation, who are member of a club and who didn’t use many search channels to find the job are more efficient in transforming resources into functionings



Giving a Step Further: A Proposal of Going Beyond the HDI
Piza, Caio Cicero Toledo Kuwahara, Monica Yukie Mackenzie University São Paulo BR Submitted:		TThe aim of this paper is to explore the multidimensionality of quality of life in 39 municipalities of Sao Paulo Metropolitan Region in Brazil. The main concern has to do with the appropriate procedure for making an indicator of quality of life distributive sensitive. In order to deal with this challenge, we propose a multidimensional index life quality (MIQL) which could be seen as an extended version of HDI. The index is based on six dimensions: (1) health, (2) education, (3) income, (4) housing, (5) infrastructure and environment, and (6) access to information. To make MIQL distributive sensitive, we follow the same steps of Foster et al (2003) by estimating the Atkinson index of welfare for each dimensional separately. There are two main results. First, the inequality sharply changes the ordering of municipalities in terms of life quality. Second, public policies should be concerned with the distribution of public resources.



Predecessors of HDI
Hirai, Tadashi Comim, Flavio Submitted:		Human Development Index (HDI) has gained prominence as an alternative index to GDP. The fact is worth noting given that the earlier indices created for similar purposes (i.e. predecessors of HDI) ceased to exist. Overall, the HDI has three main strengths: simplicity for universality; inclusion of income indicator for receiving attention from the public; institutionality by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). However, it seems standstill vis-à-vis the predecessors in terms of the degree of explicit normativeness; selection of variables, weighting and distribution is specifically relevant. To this issue, however, the response by the UNDP seems rather passive despite constant critiques outside. Given the controversial nature, such a normative issue is better to be treated in national and regional level rather than international level. To this extent, the UNDP National and Regional Offices have much potential to make the HDI correspond to the original concept of Human Development / Capabilities.



An heterogeneity index for the analysis of equality of opportunity and economic mobility [Members Only]
Yalonetzky, Gaston Submitted:		A recent literature on inequality of opportunity offers quantitative tools for comparison and measurement based on stochastic dominance criteria and traditional inequality indices. In this paper I suggest an additional way of assessing inequality of opportunity and operationalizing Roemer’s (1998) notion of equality of opportunity with an index of heterogeneity across distributions based on a traditional homogeneity test of multinomial distributions. I propose two similar indices: one is useful for the general analysis of (in)equality of opportunity and the other is helpful to compare discrete-time transition matrices. In its application of (in)equality of opportunity the index is more helpful than other tools when both circumstances and advantages / outcomes are multidimensional. It also highlights the correspondences between heterogeneity in outcomes across set of circumstances and the degree of association between circumstances and outcomes. An application to educational mobility in Peru shows that the transition matrices of males and females are more similar among the youngest cohorts of adults.



Natural Disasters, Resettlement and Human Development: A Post- Earthquake Experience from India [Members Only]
Kumar, Ashok Submitted:



policies and Sustainable Development: The Freedom of Strategies [Members Only]
Mendez, Paola Submitted:		The objective of this paper is to analyze how energy impacts sustainable and social development and how important is to clarify the relationship between social aspects and energy at the household level. To do so, we will take as basis the concept of development as freedom and the concepts define by the Brundtlandt report1. This will help us to clarify how energy sustainable policies should look like and what issues must be included when designing national energy policies. Sustainable Development as defined by the Brundtland report focuses on meeting needs of the current generation without compromising the possibilities of the future generation. However this is not the only condition for Sustainable Development mentioned in this report. In this way, not only the discussion of needs fulfillment as a central part of SD should be consider when discussion about sustainable development but also the other social concepts of SD also mentioned in the Brundtland report as • Extending to all the opportunity to fulfill their aspirations for a better life. • Ensure that the poor get their fair share of the resources. • Assure more equitable access to resources. All these concepts are closely related to the Sen´s capability approach since, the capability approach emphasizes everybody’s freedom to choose their own life as a goal for development. The way persons live their lives is a continuous set of decisions which are made everyday and according to the available options. Taking the definition Rauschmeyer (2008)2 made about needs; we should consider that people choose among different strategies to fulfill their needs continuously which influence their development path. The strategy chosen to fulfill a need may impact the quality of life of a person’s life, it is not the same to have access through tap water than walking hours to get water from a well. Thus, we may link the concept of development as freedom with the daily aspects of decision strategies within a sustainable development framework. In order to define what should be taken into account when designing an energy sustainable policy at the local level, an analysis to the interaction between strategies, needs, options and social impacts is needed. Is Energy an essential need as Brundtland report declares or should it only be consider as a strategy following the definition of Rauschmeyer (2008). Secondly, how impacts energy strategies to the social aspects of development and what should take in account a sustainable energy policy. This forces us to include concepts as inter and intra generation equity, vulnerability from an energy social perspective.



A human development approach for the construction of safe and healthy adobe houses in seismic areas [Members Only]
Blondet, Marcial Submitted:		The Pisco, Peru, earthquake of August 15th 2007 caused the death of 593 persons, the destruction of almost one hundred thousand houses and many historical monuments, built mainly with adobe. The Peruvian government promptly created a special agency to manage the reconstruction process (FORSUR). All the citizens who lost their homes would receive a universal reconstruction bonus (about US $2000), and those who qualified would be offered a low-interest loan to buy new housing made with confined masonry. Unfortunately, many thousands of families do not qualify for the loan, and will have to rebuild their homes only with the small bonus offered by the government. This paper presents a proposal developed by the Catholic University of Peru and CARE Peru for the dissemination, training and construction of new earthquake-resistant and healthy houses made of reinforced adobe, to be built by low-income families. The philosophy behind the proposal is that the communities involved in the reconstruction process should not be mere recipients of external aid, but should be agents of their own development. An important goal of the process is therefore the development of the capacities of the participants in such a way that in the future they will be capable of building safe and healthy adobe houses. The proposal involves the development of educational materials, dissemination strategies for improving adobe construction, training of the community builders, logistics of materials purchase, and supervision of the construction by the home owners, and follow-up of the quality of future construction with adobe.



Impactos Potenciales del Cambio Climático en el Desarrollo Humano: Un Análisis con base en el Abordaje de las Capabilidades [Members Only]
Correa, Esmeralda Comim, Flavio Submitted:		This paper reviews the processes by which climate change influences human development. Its original contribution lies on a proposed structure to classify and characterize the potential impacts of climate change on different dimensions such as health, education, security, livelihoods, cultural values and social relations. The analysis suggests direct and indirect relations, as well as mechanisms that link components of the climate and well being, which are the natural resources of water, soil and biodiversity and ecosystem services. This study is based on the vision of human development as characterized by the work of Amartya Sen



Mobility and Human Development: the National Perspective: Insights from National and Regional Human Development Reports on Mobility and Migration [Members Only]
Pagliani, Paola Submitted:		Migration has a different impact on migrants, their families and country of origin according to the characteristics of migrants (e.g. skilled or unskilled), their social networks in both country of destination and country of origin, the type of migration (forced or voluntary), and other dimensions which have a profound impact on human development achievements. Migration issues are analyzed from different perspectives in 2 regional (RHDRs), 15 national (NHDRs) and 2 sub-national human development reports. In three cases (Albania, El Salvador and Mexico) migration was the central theme of the NHDRs, while in most cases migration was mentioned as one of the issues with an impact on a specific topic relevant to human development in that country or region. This paper highlights national HDR work in applying the Human Development analytical framework to the analysis of migration issues, particularly with respect to gathering data, including through surveys and their analysis to convey related policy recommendations. We offer a comparative analysis to showcase how NHDRs can be used as tools to assess the impact of migration at the country level, what is the value added of applying the human development methodology, what are the main shortcomings and the potential to overcome them. The paper also explores various definitions of migration: who are migrants and how to understand the continuum of choices and policies characterizing internal and international, legal and illegal, and voluntary and forced migration? Measurement issues that have emerged during the preparation of the HDRs are highlighted, including the use of proxies to determine the value added of migration, capturing migration through a revised version of the HDI, elaborating targeted surveys to collecting migration-relevant information and other migration-specific statistics. We conclude by offering a comparative analysis of national policy recommendations, which reflect sending countries’ diverse perspectives, but also the relative availability of data and information, which ultimately influence the debate linking migration and human development.



Health Care and Health Outcomes of Migrants : Evidence from Portugal [Members Only]
Pereira, Isabel Pita Barros, Pedro Submitted:		This paper studies the performance of immigrants relative to natives, in terms of their health status, use of health care services, lifestyles, and coverage of health expenditures. We base the analysis on international evidence that identified a healthy immigrant effect, complemented by empirical research on the Portuguese National Health Survey. Furthermore, we assess whether differences in health performance depend on the personal characteristics of the individuals or can be directly associated with their migration experience.



Is There a Numbers vs. Rights Trade-off in Immigration Policy? : What the Data Say [Members Only]
Rodríguez, Francisco Cummins, Matthew Submitted:		This paper explores the empirical support behind the idea that there is a trade-off between the size of the migrant population and the rights and entitlements enjoyed by immigrants. We first look at the empirical correlation between measures of migrants’ rights and the size of the stock of immigrants in a number of existing databases. Using data on migrants’ rights from three recent studies—the Economist Intelligence Unit’s Migrant Accessibility Index, the Migration Policy Group and British Council’s Migrant Integration Policy Index (MIPEX) and the Human Development Report Office’s Migrant Entitlements and Services Index—we fail to find a systematic correlation of any sign. We then turn to regression analysis using OLS and instrumental variable techniques and again fail to find evidence in favor of the existence of a correlation. The numerical magnitudes of the correlations suggest a quantitatively small relationship which in several cases is positive rather than negative.



Modeling Martha Nussbaum's human capabilities framework for policy-making: survey design to measure basic capabilities of migrant seasonal agricultural workers in Mexico [Members Only]
Aguilar Bellamy, Alexandra Submitted:



Subsidiarity: Power, theology and human flourishing [Members Only]
Walker, David Vanderloo, Ted Submitted:		In theories of governance and of development evaluation there are tensions between approaches that stress or imply power is most legitimate when deriving ‘from the bottom up’ and those that emphasise rather the effectiveness and efficiency derives from starting from the macro picture ‘top down’. Of course these are not exclusive approaches; but a kind of ‘complementarity’ or ‘in all things moderation’ compromise between the two often ends up with a de facto legitimation of the existing elite interests and power structures. This paper sets out to review the broad habitat of the newly-popular linkage concept of ‘subsidiarity’. Can it help to deliver practical development outcomes and human flourishing, or is it likely to be a mixed blessing like some of its preceding linkage concepts such as ‘participation’? Participation: Since the 1960s, the answer to this ‘top/down vs. bottom up’ power dilemma has primarily focussed upon the concept of ‘participation’ – involvement of people in their own governance. This territory has been well reviewed. In practice it led to such grand social programs as for example in the USA, the ‘war on poverty’ and ‘The Model Cities Program’; while in the Australia of the 1970s there emerged a plethora of ‘community development officers’ associated with the Australia Assistance Plan. These were grand plans; high on rhetoric and idealism; but low on concrete returns for the most marginalised people involved. How could such good-sounding social theory go so awry in practice? Probably the most famous answer was Arnstein’s 1969 presentation of a ‘ladder of participation’ – which distinguished a series of types or levels of what ‘participation’ could mean in practice (1).



Multiple deprivation, vulnerability and governance: The case of Macedonia regions [Members Only]
Peleah, Mihail Ivanov, Andrey Submitted:		The paper examines the relationships between multiple deprivation, social exclusion and involvement in local governance process. The paper is based on the data from the second round of representative survey conducted in Macedonia in 2008. The data is representative for the eight Macedonian regions as well as for major groups (defined by ethnicity, gender, education and age). To analyze multiple deprivation and vulnerability we propose a set of composite indicators, which include monetary and non-monetary aspects of poverty and aggregate estimates of social exclusion. The list is based on consensus building in the process of report preparation. Using composite indicators of multiple deprivation and vulnerability computed for the overall sample and individual sub-samples, correlation between levels deprivation and other factors like social exclusion, involvement in local government are investigated. The paper assesses the ‘input’ and relative weight of individual determinants of deprivation into overall ‘exclusion from governance participation’. Based on the analysis of these relationships between deprivation, exclusion and governance, the paper suggests areas of priority involvement that could offset certain severe deficits individual groups are facing in regards their involvement in the governance process



The Struggle for the Consolidation of Democracy: Exploring Perspectives on Reconciliation and Citizenship in Multicultural Post-Colonial Societies [Members Only]
Acha, Elisabeth Submitted:



Political equality in deliberative democracy and capability
García Valverde, Facundo Universidad de Buenos Aires Buenos Aires AR Submitted:		The recognition and fulfillment of the principle “one person, one vote” by most contemporary democracies would seem to minimize the relevance of the justification of political equality. However, the upcoming of deliberative democracy conceptions implies the need of a reinterpretation. Here we offer a non-instrumental justification for the substantive dimension of political equality which demands that every participant have a fair opportunity for political influence. First, we show that non-ideal contexts supposed by Bohman’s theory obscure our intuitions about political equality. Next, we show that Rawlsian theory, designed under ideal contexts, justifies a demand of political equality on the grounds of self-respect; to clarify these grounds, we distinguish three possible interpretations each one related to an egalitarian metric and we show that institutions of political participation should guarantee capabilities to participate in deliberations. Finally, we show why Crockerian account must develop a specific space for deliberative agency.



The path to participatory freedom: Depersonalizing power [Members Only]
Cruz, Loren Submitted:		“Governments produced by elections may be inefficient, corrupt, short-sighted, irresponsible, dominated by especial interests, and incapable of adopting policies demanded by the public good. These qualities make such governments undesirable but they do not make them undemocratic.”1 These qualities make such governments polyarchies2 - regimes incompletely democratized- whose power structures need to be improved through the enhancement of institutions within each State with the aim of protecting human dignity and overcoming un-freedoms. There is a special need to strengthen institutions and render them independent from elected governors that claim to be legitimate based on the suffrage of the majority3, since this has an impact on what citizens can positively achieve 4. For these measures to become operative, the power of the State must not be concentrated in the population‘s representatives: power must not be personalized. Furthermore, the State has made it possible to overcome the “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short”5 kind of life that people used to live. Men do not have access to their rights without a State that guarantees them, hence “to weaken or to destroy the State [is] to threaten the future of the human race.”6 Nevertheless, currently not only do our States need to survive or to remain strong and “fulfill the mandate given”7 to them, but they also need to improve their governance, to avoid the abuses towards the population, and to enhance living standards for society so people can have the standard of living they aspire to. In this sense, difficult as it might be, the State must acknowledge the responsibility entrusted to it to make those who are invisible visibles8. While the State holds the power of command, it is also obliged to obey its mandate.



Empowerment and Human Development [Members Only]
Singh Shekhawat, Prahlad Submitted:		The concept of human development emerged as an alternative to definitions of development focused on economic growth. The World Bank and many development theorists have been emphasizing the combination of growth in per capita income with special assistance to the poor. One of the strategies was described as redistribution with growth, another was labeled as the basic needs approach. In all these strategies it was assumed that economic growth and increase in real incomes would by itself lead to over all development. This approach was disputed by development thinkers like Amartya Sen, Paul Streeton, Mahbub Ul Haq and others who believed that increased income should be regarded as a means to human welfare and development and not as an end in itself. Mahbub Ul Haq under whose leadership the first human development report was prepared in 1990, proposed that the main difference between the economic growth and human development schools was that the first focused exclusively on the expansion of one choice i.e. income, while the second embraces the enlargement of all human choices whether economic, social, cultural or political.1 It was argued by Sen and Haq with the help of evidence from many countries that income growth does not automatically lead to expansion of human capabilities, choices, and freedom.



Improving capability, empowerment and responsibility to face the political crisis in Côte d'Ivoire [Members Only]
Boussou, Viviane Submitted:		Since the agreement concluded at Ouagadougou in March 2007, the government of Côte d'Ivoire has been engaged on a path to peace. It wishes to use the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) to draw up a new social contract and to reinforce social cohesion, the only solution leading to a long-lasting peace. In this context, an equitable reinforcement of people's capabilities, aiming at making them less vulnerable to internal and external shocks, would make it possible to take part in the rebuilding of the country and the maintenance of peace. After the 2000 presidential election, Côte d'Ivoire's authorities decided to work out a PRSP. It was unfortunately interrupted in 2002, due to the political crisis that splitted up the country in two parts. However in 2007, the government took over a process that led to the design of the PRSP 2009-2013. This PRSP was finally accepted on January 7th, 2009, by the Bretton Woods institutions. It was a big step ahead; however all remain to be done. In fact, according to this PRSP, the peoples who have income less than 241.145 FCFA, i.e. $480 per year or $1.35 per month, are considered poor. For the first time since 1998 official data are available on poverty in Côte d'Ivoire and the reality appears to be worst than expected. These data are based on a household living conditions survey conducted in 2008. According to it poverty has considerably increased in Côte d'Ivoire. In monetary terms, the poverty rate increased from 33.6 percent in 1998 to 48.9 percent in 2008. This means that today, one person out of two is poor. Côte d'Ivoire's political authorities have a big responsibility in the worsening of the poverty situation and there is now much to do to decrease the poverty rate and to procure better conditions of living to the population. To achieve this, they have to take into account the population needs and what the people really want in order to see their well-being improve. This requires a reinforcement of both individual and collective capabilities in order to change the current power relationships between the various groups of people that have led to the country North-South divide.



La organización para la sobrevivencia y el trabajo: los jornaleros agrícolas migrantes en México [Members Only]
Rojas Rangel, Teresa Submitted:



: Los desafíos para la construcción de una ciudadanía efectiva [Members Only]
Cristina Teixeira , Tania Royo, Isabel Submitted:		En el análisis de lo “global” se destacan los niveles estructurales, pero estos no agotan el conocimiento de la realidad. Al analizar lo “local” se encuentran aspectos que le son específicos y que no son una reproducción a pequeña escala de los niveles estructurales globales. Los procesos de empoderamiento, mediante el desarrollo de capacidades, se expresan en la dimensión local, al menos, en dos niveles: socioeconómico y sociocultural. Desde esta doble dimensión situamos el análisis de experiencias de participación “participativa”, que toman el pulso en los diferentes grados de participación según nos referimos a sociedades desarrolladas y en desarrollo, a través del análisis de sendos proyectos: Emprendimientos solidarios y ciudadanía: mujeres, hombres y jóvenes. Contra la pobreza y la desnutrición” y “Generación de renta y trabajo. Creando una puerta de salida de la pobreza y de la dependencia de la tutela gubernamental”. En relación al nivel socioeconómico, sostenemos que en todo ámbito local se genera un sistema de relaciones productivas de ‘riqueza’, por mínima que ésta sea, que da lugar a negociaciones entre los actores, en relación a la inversión y redistribución de excedentes. Y, de otra parte, la dimensión socio- cultural nos habla del sentido de pertenencia expresado en términos de identidad colectiva de los sujetos sociales. Cuando los individuos y grupos sienten una ‘manera de ser’ que los distingue de otros.



La pobreza como crítica política a la democracia
Ponce Leon, Fernando Pontificia Universidad Católica del Ecuador Quito EC Submitted:		En esta ponencia intentaré mostrar cómo la pobreza, entendida como privación de libertad individual, podría convertirse en una crítica conceptual al sistema democrático en el que supuestamente vivimos. Para esto identificaré algunas implicaciones filosófico-políticas que resultan de concebir la pobreza según el enfoque de las capacidades. Con esto sostendré que la existencia de la pobreza pone en duda que vivamos en sociedades democráticas porque cuestiona la finalidad y la esencia de estas comunidades, a la vez que les urge a pensar cómo pueden ser realmente sociedades justas. Comenzaré con una interpretación filosófica de la pobreza a partir de algunas ideas de Sen (sección 1). Seguiré con el análisis de la relación que se podría establecer entre la privación de libertad y la comunidad política según Aristóteles, Espinosa y Locke (sección 2), y terminaré presentando tres desafíos que la pobreza presenta a nuestras democracias (sección 3).



UNDP-LAC, Regional Human Development Report: How to break with the transmission of inequality in human development in LAC countries [Members Only]
Soloaga, Isidro Felipe Lopez Calva, Luis Submitted:		The goals of this Report are: a) To describe recent developments of income, education and health inequalities in LAC countries. b) To develop and apply an inequality sensitive Human Development Index (HDI) in several LAC countries. This modified HDI will be sensitive to inequalities between dimensions of the index (income, life expectancy and education) as well as inequalities between individuals. c) To make progress in our understanding of the determinants of the level of inequality in human development and the mechanisms trough which this inequality is inter-generationally transmitted. These mechanisms are being analyzed by taking into account idiosyncratic as well as systemic determinants of the transmission. We think that, in particular, this last goal of the Report makes it particularly suitable for this HDCA 2009 Conference. The Report takes the functionings and capabilities approach, and the intergenerational transmission of inequality in human development is assessed by explicitly taking into account the transformation function that converts goods and services into functionings. The empirical application of this approach is done trough ad hoc surveys in three LAC countries. These surveys contain questions regarding to the agency and to the aspirations of parents and children.



Academic diversity re-examined: caste-based discrimination in Indian higher education and affirmative action in the context of the capability approach [Members Only]
Watts, Michael Rout, Bharat Submitted:



Evaluation for freedom, justice and capability development: a case study of India [Members Only]
Kant Jha, Krishna Submitted:		Education may be progressive or regressive. Progressive education is an input for human development if it is designed and planned appropriately. Countries with high levels of human development certainly encourage their citizens to participate in such education and this gives them the opportunities to make informed choices. On the other hand, for example, the Taliban are the outcome of a regressive education. The young rank and file Taliban were typically Koranic students in Afghan refugee camps whose teachers were often “barely literate,” and did not include scholars learned in the finer points of Islamic law and history. The refugee students, brought up in an extremely male dominated society not only had no education for a better quality of life but learned that women should be subordinated and that people in general should be deprived of many modern amenities. So the regressive education of Madrassas creating the Taliban, SIMI (Students Islamic Movement of India) and al Qaeda on the one hand and the progressive education of modern educational institutions on the other frame an environment of educational injustice. The objectives of this paper are to examine the impact of the existing education system in India and to suggest a new model of education guaranteeing freedom, justice and capability development. Positive freedom in terms of increased Individual Income leading to good health in general, and freedom for women in particular, both matrimonial and economic, is a pre-condition. However, there are problems. It appears that the denial of access to knowledge, which is a denial of justice, to a substantial number of Indians is the first and the most important problem in this country. It is knowledge which enlightens an individual to explore avenues for a decent standard of living necessary for long and healthy life. Freedom from addiction will improve the quality of life. Corruption is a significant hurdle in the way of capability development. Problems of religious blind faith have contributed to the enslavement of women and to a population explosion. A meaningful education system will ensure attitudinal changes towards women and population control. Pictures of human development are viewed in this paper through the lenses of Attitudinal Change, Women’s Empowerment and Population Control. It is argued that well planned Education and Training facilities for all will provide people with employment and the knowledge necessary to change their attitudes, support the empowerment of women and curb the population expansion.



Freedom of choice and poverty alleviation
Lessmann, Ortrud independent scholar Submitted:		The Capability Approach (henceforth CA) views poverty as a multidimensional phenomenon and emphasises that restricted freedom of choice is a crucial aspect of poverty. If poverty is seen in this way there are two ways to improve the situation of the poor: by broadening the set of opportunities open to them or by strengthening their ability to choose. The paper concentrates on the latter. The paper summarizes which circumstances are seen in the CA as suitable for strengthening freedom of choice, namely the market, democracy and participatory projects. Two shortcomings of the CA are identified by this: first, the social embedding and secondly, the process aspect of agency. These two shortcomings are intertwined as is shown in a model for social work stemming from a different approach which may serve as a point of reference.



Opportunity or impoverishment? Expansion in Ethiopian higher education [Members Only]
Ridley, Barbara Submitted:		In 2003, only 1% of the population was enrolled in higher education in Ethiopia. With the higher education sector review came an agenda for change linked to the reduction of poverty: new universities were planned, colleges merged and up-graded, private sector institutions flourished and enrolment increased. But the speed of these developments has left the HE sector in disarray with few material resources, a lack of academic and management expertise to implement government policy and poor quality assurance mechanisms. Put together, these undermine the very concept of a meaningful university education. Poverty alleviation might be the rhetoric, but impoverishment of university provision remains the reality. From a capability perspective, increased tertiary provision should enable more individuals to realise their valued functionings, but as Sen asserts, those institutions ‘not only…contribute to our freedoms, their roles can be sensibly evaluated in the light of their contributions to our freedoms’ (1999, p. 142). At the macro level, disagreements between government and donor agendas and between national and federal responsibilities have impacted on institutional roles. In addition, at a more local level, differences between academics and their superiors, and the rights students have to make choices (whether academic or situational) have all contributed towards, or detracted from, freedoms. This paper looks at the tensions within the expansion programme, the opportunities it could enable, but within a context of distrust and dissent.



Changing the balance of power: can education increase the chances of political participation for all? [Members Only]
Sarojini Hart, Caroline Submitted:		This paper explores the conceptualisation of participation from both political and educational perspectives. It questions the assumption that increased participation in political processes by people from diverse groups will lead to a greater balance of political power. This assumption has tended to be coupled with the notion that broadening the scope of state education will overcome traditional socio-economic stratifications and will contribute towards the goal of shared political power. It is argued that participation in both educational and political processes does not guarantee greater power for marginalised socio-economic groups and furthermore affirmative action can cause harm as well as good. Striving to include the disempowered in political processes can mean these individuals unwittingly become complicit in their subjugation furthering longstanding injustices. It is vital that strategies to involve all citizens in the power structures of society acknowledge the cultural depth of stratifications and inequalities. Educational provision using a capability approach provides a starting point for developing citizens who may be able to begin to meaningfully address the political disempowerment of the poor and other marginalised groups. A range of global examples will be used to examine these issues and to consider how we can work towards meaningful political participation for all.



Children's development, a way for human development in Peru [Members Only]
Iguiñiz, Javier Submitted:		Substantive freedoms are the result of the interaction of, among others, economic, political and social instrumental freedoms. Two types of questions emerge. The first one relates to how free are agents in each sphere from those in the rest, and how helpful and limiting are such interactions. The second ones relate to how free are agents operating in the economy, and particularly inside the rules of the markets. This paper deals with the second type. How free can the economic agents be to participate in the market? But freedom in the economy has both instrumental and substantive freedom aspects. It is having both in mind that the problem of the distribution of substantive freedoms has to be addressed to face the challenge of markets. In this paper we are going to carry out a partial approximation to the analysis of such challenge, focusing our attention in one aspect of the workings of the market: competition among firms. We analyze three aspects of market competition. Although in each one of them one can appreciate different aspects of the freedom to compete, they also contribute specially to some of them. We propose that the “neoclassical general equilibrium” framework mainly contributes to the discussion of the outcomes of an economic activity, the “barriers to entry” approach calls for a study of the resources necessary to compete, and the “competition as a process” approach emphasizes the competitive activity itself. As we move from the first onwards, enriching the meaning of competition, the possibility of gaining and losing opportunities to participate in the market, and of doing it adequately becomes more evident. Entry and exit are after all part of the competitive process, but also are improvements and deterioration of capabilities. Each concept of competition responds to theories that specify or allude to certain types and distribution of freedoms of manoeuvre of economic agents in the competitive arena. Finally, we use the above distinctions to suggest some more causal connections between economic competition and development as expansion of freedom.



The shift of focus in development economics from the 1990s: the return of Morals [Members Only]
Pellé, Sophie Submitted:



A Plea for Responsible Pluralism [Members Only]
Drydyk, Jay Submitted:		For their effective realization, human rights must be perceived as culturally legitimate, which in turn requires that they be justifiable pluralistically, engaging all reliable moral discourses. Insofar as a human right calls for a specific capability to be respected, protected, and fulfilled, the capability approach can contribute to this task of pluralistic justification in two ways. First, it abstracts from particular goods to valuable functionings and capabilities in a way that affirms the particular conceptions of the good that affirm them. However, the model of justification adopted by Nussbaum – Rawls’s reflective equilibrium – needs to be replaced by anchoring this discussion in knowledge of care and neglect. Second, Nussbaum proposes that equal entitlement to central capabilities can be justified on grounds of equal human dignity, which, as I read it means that everyone’s striving to live well in the company of others matters, and matters equally. This affirmation of equal dignity, however, will be undermined if it is treated (as Nussbaum does) as a ‘purely political’ idea excluding public support from particular moral discourses. An alternative approach, responsible pluralism, enables us to enlist the support of all reliable moral discourses in support of equal dignity, rather than confining them to the background culture or the private realm.



Humanist vs. Political Conceptions of Human Rights [Members Only]
Gilabert, Pablo Submitted:		This paper arbitrates the current debate between two conceptions of human rights. According to the associativist, or others call it, political, conception, human rights are primarily claims that human beings have against certain institutional agencies, in particular states. According to the humanist conception, human rights are primarily claims that human beings have against all other human beings as such. The humanist view does not deny the importance of institutions to promote or violate human rights, but it sees their significance and role as largely instrumental. This paper defends the humanist view by proposing an articulation of human rights in terms of the capability approach. Such approach also helps, however, to identify and absorb some important intuitions on which the associativist conception relies.



Philosophy, Constitutions, and Democracy: Who Should Decide on Capabilities and Rights? [Members Only]
Crocker, David Submitted:		Who should select which capabilities, functionings, and rights are most valuable, and how should they do so? Nussbaum emphasizes the role of philosophers but leaves some room for the methods of global dialogue and Rawlsian reflective equilibrium. Sen, who employs reflective equilibrium to argue philosophically for the evaluative space of freedom and achievement (both agency and well-being varieties), argues at least since the mid-1990s that groups as well as individuals themselves should select and weigh various freedoms and rights and that groups should do so by expressing their agency through rational scrutiny, public deliberation, and democratic deliberation. The “evaluative exercises” and moral authority that, with some qualifications, Nussbaum gives to philosophers and, -- derivatively -- to constitutionally-enshrined rights, Sen gives to democratic publics. In this paper I examine both Nussbaum’s and Sen’s evaluations of the roles of philosophers, constitutions and judges, democratic bodies, and individuals in evaluating capabilities and functionings and the rights that protect those deemed most urgent. Often in response to the charge of paternalism—Nussbaum does assign a role, albeit limited, to philosophical dialogue, public discussion, democratic decision-making, and individual freedom or autonomy. However, these concessions to democratic processes, while important, are insufficient; she and we should, like Sen, give a much more robust role to democracy conceived as an inclusive and deliberative process. In a concluding section, I will illustrate my theoretical argument by drawing on civil society efforts in Morocco and Latin America to defend and protect rights to active citizenship and democratic decision making.



Deprivation and Social Exclusion in Switzerland : An Analysis of the Swiss Household Panel [Members Only]
Macculi, Iris Submitted:



Escaping Poverty in Rural Mewat [Members Only]
Gandhi, Valentine Submitted:		The Mewat region of Haryana falls under the semi-arid zones and were not benefited by the green revolution. Agriculture is the major livelihood option. It is inhabited by Meo – Muslims who are a unique ethnic group. Due to their cultural practices, they still use traditional farming techniques and have not ventured into non farm livelihoods such as migration even during drought years. This ‘closed’ culture has kept the region extremely poor. The Institute of Rural Research and Development has been implementing a Integrated Sustainable Village Development (ISVD) model for the last 8 years in 17 villages in the Mewat region. The components of the ISVD are interventions in the areas of Rural Health, Alternative Energy, Life Skills Education, Income Enhancement and Water Resource Management. The approach followed by ISVD is community empowerment, the programs are designed to enable people of Mewat to come out of their shells and participate in their development. This paper will present success stories of households moving out of poverty as well as case studies of households that could not move out of poverty. The findings are based on an ongoing study being conducted in 7 intervention villages. The study uses both qualitative and quantitative tools for measuring the impact of these programs in bringing people out of poverty. The analysis is still on, initial findings suggest that ‘education’ as well as ‘migration’ play a major role in helping the people of Mewat come out of their ‘closed’ nature and work towards improving their livelihoods.



Doing Business With The Poor: Beneficial For Profits AND The Poor? [Members Only]
Volkert, Juergen Zoll, Florian Submitted:



Adaptation and income. The case of Uruguay [Members Only]
Vigorito, Andrea Salas, Gonzalo Instituto de Economia. FCEA. Universidad de la Republica (Uruguay) Montevideo UY Submitted:		Empirical studies of adaptive preferences for developing countries are scarce. Based on Burchardt (2005) we analyze adaptation to income in Uruguay considering the role of past income and reference groups. We use two different panel data surveys to check the validity of our results. Our main findings show that adaptation to the preferences of reference groups is significant whereas past income is not.



Promoción de capacidades desde sectores eclesiales en el Perú. [Members Only]
Felipe Zegarra, Luis Submitted:		En 1967 Pablo VI escribió una encíclica sobre el desarrollo de los pueblos (Populorum Progressio), en la que señaló varios aspectos muy cercanos al enfoque del Desarrollo Humano, en una perspectiva que partía de la problemática internacional de la pobreza, la injusticia y la violencia. Esta presentación, destaca en una primera parte algunos conceptos más relevantes; en un segundo momento, ante la pregunta frecuente sobre el escaso compromiso de muchos sectores del catolicismo al respecto, recuerda el impacto de la Conferencia de Medellín y de la teología de la liberación en la iglesia latinoamericana, y presenta –en un nivel “micro”, pero bastante ubicuo- diversas experiencias de crecimiento en capacidades, promovidas por las comunidades eclesiales de base en el Perú.



The triangle of inequality: a challenge for a socially sustainable development, Application to rural Madagascar
Razakatiana, Sahondra University of Versailles Saint Quentin en Yvelines FR Submitted:		What could be the link between poverty-inequality, inequality of capability, and inequality–equity, when they are considered in measurement terms? In rural West-Madagascar, "poor" and "rich" seem have the same living conditions. The way of defining and characterizing poverty and inequality, is based on the following question: am I capable to honour my ancestors through the usual traditional ceremonies? The capability to perform traditional ceremonies which corresponds to a "power to do" in order to reach a "power to be" makes a person respected and recognized in the society. Panel household’s data collected by the Rural Watch System Network of Madagascar, are used to build multidimensional poverty and inequality indicators.



Agency, Empowerment and the Integenerational Transmission of Inequality: A Preliminary Exploration [Members Only]
Emma Santos, Maria Submitted:



Ages old-perceptios and truth about Turkish youth [Members Only]
Aytac, Aygen Submitted:



Gender differences in Italian children capabilities. [Members Only]
Maria Laura Di Tommaso, Addabo Submitted:		The paper will explore gender differences among Italian children capabilities. In a previous paper on children capabilities in Italy (Addabbo, Di Tommaso 2009) , we have found that there are many gender differences and in this paper we analyze these differences and explore the causes. The capabilities analysed in this paper are 1. Living an healthy life; 2. Senses Imagination and thought 3. Play We will use data from ISTAT 1998 FSS (Famiglie, Soggetti Sociali e Condizione dell’Infanzia) and ISTAT 2006 multipurpose survey matched with Survey on Household Income and Wealth (1998, 2006) , and data from the OECD Programme of International Student Assessment (PISA) for 2006. First, we utilize descriptive statistics to assess different achievements for the above capabilities by gender for children in different age groups (6-10 and 11-14). We also consider different areas of the country to take into account the effect of different institutions. Secondly, we will use the tools offered by Structural Equation Models. We estimate a SEM model where the three above capabilities are estimated as latent variables which are intrinsically interrelated. For each of these capabilities, a set of indicators of functionings is utilised. We explore the freedom of choice dimension, utilising information on the availability and quality of infrastructures which can influence children choice sets. Moreover, in order to take into account gender discrimination embedded in the society, we utilise gender gaps in labour force participation and gender pay gaps across regions as proxies of the differences that girls and boys may have in their choice-freedom. These structures of the capabilities will be related to parents’ employment and personal characteristics to analyse the effect of family conversion factors on children’s well being.



Approaching Capabilities with Children in Care [Members Only]
Bernhard, Babic Germes Castro, Oscar Graf, Gunter Submitted:		With their programmes and services organisations like SOS-Kinderdorf International (SOS-KDI) are working to enable people to live a life they have reason to choose and value. That is why these organisations have to know which capabilities are valued by the children, youths and families they care for, especially if they agree that (not only) in developing countries the assessment of their policies, programmes and services should not only take place “on the basis of their impact on incomes, but whether or not they expand the real freedoms that people value” (UNESCO 2003, p. 33). But generally the question how to select relevant capabilities is not clearly answered yet (see Schokkaert 2008, p. 16f) although there are already promising approaches to identify capabilities for children well-being (see Biggeri 2004; Biggeri et al. 2006). Therefore, SOS-KDI and the International Research Center Salzburg (Austria) started a research project in March 2009 that aims at analysing to which extent the capability approach could serve as a framework for assessing and optimising youth and family related services (e.g. family strengthening programmes) in different cultures. After reflecting theoretically about the meaning of the capability approach for child and youth development, especially in developing countries, two field studies will be conducted in cooperation with the national associations of SOS-Kinderdorf in Nicaragua and Namibia. As a part of the mainly qualitative, quasi-experimental investigations, young people living inside and outside facilities run by SOS-Kinderdorf will be asked for their values, the life they would like to lead, how they assess their chances to realize their plans, what kind of support they already get and what kind of support they need (additionally) to achieve their goals. Further more their families of origin, co-workers of SOS-Kinderdorf and partner organisations as well as others shall also be involved to realise a multiple-perspective approach. The goal of the project is to learn which capabilities are valuable for the respondents from two different cultures and how well the support they receive by SOS-Kinderdorf and others meets their needs in this context. This Knowledge shall also enable the organisation to create processes and tools to assess its work and optimise its programme development.



Early childhood development as a foundation of Human Development [Members Only]
Llanos, Martha Submitted:



Explaining and overcoming marginalization in education: a focus on ethnic/language minorities in Peru [Members Only]
Cueto, Santiago Guerrero, Gabriela León, Juan Seguin and Ismael Muñoz, Elisa Submitted:		Inequality is one of the main social challenges for Latin America and other developing regions. Education is often seen as a way to overcome inequalities, but often times it does exactly the contrary. There are many predictors of educational inequality, such as parental education (the educational results of children correlate positively with that of their parents), area of residence (rural children often time have lower indicators than urban children), and first language learnt at home (children learning an indigenous language have lower educational indicators than children who have learned Spanish), among others2. The focus of this paper will be on the educational gaps in primary and secondary education between the Spanish- and Indigenous-speaking populations of Peru but will include analysis of the other predictors. The main goals of this paper are to: a) document the gap in educational opportunities and outcomes between the Spanish and Indigenous populations; b) present statistical analysis with predictors of the gaps in achievement; and c) discuss the educational policies targeting bilingual populations in Peru and explore alternatives based on the data analyzed in the paper.



Parents at Play; Participation and Empowerment in Arts-Based Development Research in Two Communities of Peru
Nigrini, Melissa Submitted:		Effective development should respond to and improve the lives of people and to do so, it must promote their active participation and lead to empowerment. This paper discusses the use of participatory arts-based research in a comparative study on child participation in the highlands and coast of Peru. The experience demonstrates the potential of arts-based research methodology both in the quality of information it gathers and in the possibilities for participation and empowerment that it offers. The methodology explicitly values the experience, perceptions and desires of the beneficiaries. They are considered active subjects, experts who participate throughout the research process of data collecting, analyzing and proposing through the use of accessible and engaging artistic activities. Moving away from ‘prescriptive’ development, this methodology holds a constructive and respectful position towards development. This approach is essential for effective and sustainable development and should be fostered through regular use of participatory development methodologies.



Tort Law and Capabilities [Members Only]
Zanitelli, Leandro Submitted:



The Promise of Well-being: Social Work, the Capability Approach, and Useful Applications [Members Only]
Southwell, Psyche Peipert, Devin Grimm, Elaine Adedoyin, Christson Submitted:



A Capability Approach to Microcredit Programs in Bangladesh: Why Legal Empowerment of the Poor is Important for Long-Term Poverty Reduction [Members Only]
Uddin, Tanvir Submitted:		Microcredit has facilitated an alternative and innovative attempt at poverty reduction in many developing countries. However, it cannot singularly achieve long-term development of fragile and unstable communities. In countries such as Bangladesh, recurrent severe flooding and external economic shocks such as food price rises exacerbate the poor’s vulnerability. These forces can undermine the achievements and benefits of microcredit programs. A more severe and underlying problem is institutional weakness in the social, economic and political structures of society and the rule of law. More than economic gains, the poor often value legal empowerment as part of an expanding capability set to address long-term problems related to legal identity, political participation and access to basic human rights. The capability approach to development focuses on the ‘capabilities’ of an individual which covers their potential well-being and human development through enhanced functioning in society through economic, political and social means collectively. Thus, a capability approach to microcredit can assist in analysing the situation of the poor in terms of their economic, political and social capability needs and to develop appropriate policies to expand capability sets. This is particularly important for women, for whom neither the acquisition of credit nor constitutionalising and legislating rights can address underlying societal and environmental factors. Microcredit needs to be reconceptualised to incorporate notions of capabilities. Hence, a holistic and long-term oriented development program can be initiated to address the challenges of poverty alleviation in politically and socially unstable environments.



International Business Immigration Law & The Neuroeconomics of Free Movement Within The CSME, EEC and USA: Comparing Socio-Legal Behaviours & Cultural Values in People Trade [Members Only]
Brathwaite, Terrence Submitted:



Indigeneering: Promoting Diverse Knowledge Systems in Technical Design [Members Only]
Nichols, Crighton Submitted:		In simple terms, engineering can be defined as the application of mathematics and science to solve problems of a technical nature. However, Western science and technology are seen as having little relevance to the lives of many Indigenous Australians, of whom very few are attracted into engineering and related programs at university. As an unfortunate and largely unintentional consequence, Indigenous Australians have been almost completely excluded from participating in the scholarship and practice of engineering, and in doing so, denied the benefits and opportunities offered by this profession. These benefits and opportunities would be especially welcome given the poverty and disadvantage faced by so many Indigenous Australians. By adopting a conceptual framework that is based on the capability approach, this paper explores a novel approach to attracting more Indigenous Australians into the engineering profession that is centred around opening-up the engineering culture to be more inclusive of Indigenous values, knowledge systems, and perspectives. Consideration will be given to both the content and pedagogy of engineering education, as well as the process of design in engineering practice. Precedent for a similar approach has been established with the recent trend to encourage more women into engineering by attempting to change the perceived masculine culture of the profession. Indigenous communities will benefit from more engineers be able to understand, engage and effectively participate with them in the design and development of critical infrastructure such as housing, resource management and transport. As communities become more familiar and comfortable participating in design process, it is contended they will become increasingly empowered to design innovative solutions to local issues that require a greater understanding of the specific context and tacit knowledge that may not be available to external design professionals. In turn, this will help address the woeful track record of poor infrastructure and service delivery by external parties in many remote Indigenous Australian communities. The benefits to health and wellbeing that will arise out of improving the provision of infrastructure and services may then create a positive feedback loop that will encourage an increasing number of Indigenous youth into meaningful education (such as more Indigenous engineers) and assist in the creation of innovative employment opportunities, helping to ensure the increased community empowerment is sustainable. Also, this approach is expected to benefit the engineering profession, and economy in general, by engaging a wider diversity of perspectives than would traditionally be considered, potentially resulting in more innovative solutions.



Aboriginal traditional medicine in South Australia: interpreting evidence based results through the capability approach [Members Only]
Panzironi, Francesca Submitted:		This paper aims to provide an analysis of the extent to which Aboriginal medicine is integrated into mainstream and Aboriginal health services in South Australia. The paper focuses on Indigenous medicine as being the areas of indigenous knowledge most affected by exclusion and discrimination in Australia. The paper will provide some preliminary results drawn from the ongoing fieldwork in South Australia. The paper will discuss the participative approach adopted to identify how Aboriginal health services can contribute to advance the inclusion of Aboriginal traditional doctors and their medicine within South Australia’s health policy frameworks and the delivery of health services. The results presented in this paper will be considered as the foundational evidence-based rationale to deconstruct the power relations underlying the current mainstream health delivery system offered to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders in Australia.



Indigenous Law and Capabilities from a Gendered Perspective [Members Only]
Duff, Danielle Submitted:		The states of Oaxaca and Chiapas in southern Mexico are poor, indigenous, and developmentally marginalized from the northern beneficiaries of the modern political economy. The “indigenous question” has been a popular point of discussion in the international community over the past decade. There has been an international recognition that indigenous populations have specific needs that have not been adequately addressed by their respective nations, particularly in the realm of development. This paper will look specifically at the development of indigenous women in southern Mexico through justice. Seeing development as an expansion of human capability, the judicial system provides a new institutional space in which women can challenge structural factors of gender inequality, ideally resulting in greater economic, social and political opportunity. Beginning with an examination of the existing policies and mandates in Mexican law and politics, this paper seeks to determine the reality of these policies in practice. Once the framework for judicial reform is in place, the change happens in the enforcement. The existence of indigenous institutions creates a respectful and familiar space for dialogue, especially for women. On the other hand, indigenous law and custom maintains traditions of staunch patriarchy and cemented gender roles.



Outline of a method for discovering philosophy in development policy: Bangladeshi poverty reduction and the capability approach
Stru Schmidt, Troels Submitted:		This article outlines a method with which an aspect of development policy can be analysed as philosophical conceptions of the good life. It puts the method to use by discussing whether Bangladeshi development policy has norms equal to those of the capability approach. The interdisciplinary method seeks to combine elements of social anthropology and welfare economics. In order to see what conceptions of the good life are present in a given development policy, two steps must be taken. Firstly, diverse, context-sensitive descriptions of the development policy must be made, equal to those found in social anthropology. Secondly, the development policy must be operationalised as a set of values to make it comparable with a conception of the good life. Testing the method, a field work on Bangladeshi development policy is described and operationalised as the degree to which the policy values agency, equality and universalism.



Ethical Dimensions of Targeted Poverty Programs [Members Only]
Vinay, Claudia Submitted:



Fines éticos y desarrollo social [Members Only]
Quintanilla, Pablo Submitted:		Esta ponencia se propone discutir la justificación de los presupuestos éticos que subyacen a la concepción del desarrollo en términos de ampliación de las capacidades. Se intentará mostrar que la justificación ética de este enfoque proviene de un modelo consecuencialista de regla que no está filosóficamente comprometido con el utilitarismo sino con el liberalismo. El consecuencialismo, sin embargo, ha sido objeto de agudas críticas de parte de muchos autores. La ponencia discutirá esas críticas e intentará defender al modelo de las capacidades de ellas. El objetivo último, sin embargo, será mostrar que aunque hay importantes diferencias conceptuales entre un consecuencialismo utilitarista y uno liberal, en el mediano plazo las consecuencias prácticas de abrazar uno u otro son las mismas, dado que la ampliación de la libertad en principio conduce a la mayor felicidad del mayor número de personas.



Desarrollo humano y políticas de reconocimiento [Members Only]
Tubino, Fidel Submitted:		El desarrollo humano es una normativa que se propone la ampliación de las libertades y las capacidades de las personas para que puedan realizarse de acuerdo a los valores y al modelo de vida buena que han elegido. En este sentido, la “libertad cultural” ocupa un lugar medular en la propuesta del desarrollo humano pues consiste en “ poder optar “ por un plan de vida de acuerdo a un modelo de vida y una jerarquía de valores no impuesta desde fuera. En el lenguaje de Martha Nussbaum, la libertad cultural es una capacidad combinada pues involucra el desarrollo tanto de una disposición interior como de un conjunto de condiciones externas que hagan posible su actualización efectiva. Y si dichas condiciones externas no existen entonces hay que generarlas. Desde este punto de vista , la estigmatización social, la discriminación y el racismo son obstáculos externos que bloquean el desarrollo de la libertad cultural de las personas pertenecientes a los grupos injustamente menospreciados de la sociedad. Se hace por ello necesario implementar desde los actores “ políticas de reconocimiento “ de la diversidad , tanto multiculturales como interculturales, que generen aquellas condiciones que hagan posible que los sectores discriminados accedan al ejercicio de la libertad cultural y con ello, del desarrollo humano que merecen.



El enfoque de derechos en el desarrollo rural [Members Only]
Guerrero, Grace Larenas, René Submitted:		El enfoque de derechos, concebido como la posibilidad de exigir el cumplimiento de los deberes del Estado y de ampliar las capacidades de las personas para ejercer sus deberes y derechos humanos, se torna una tarea impostergable para las Agencias de Cooperación y todos los actores que trabajan en el desarrollo rural en América Latina. Ello supone un esfuerzo por declinar las agendas propias y volcarse a apoyar las iniciativas locales con una visión y práctica que respete la integralidad que implica el desarrollo, teniendo como centro a la persona humana. Varias agencias de cooperación al desarrollo están reactivando la discusión de su cooperación, los impactos que han generado, los montos que están destinando para cooperación al desarrollo y sus enfoques. Como ejemplos de esta necesidad está la firma de presidentes de los estados miembros de la ONU para conseguir los objetivos de desarrollo del milenio (ODM) y de la reunión de París, parte de los encuentros que periódicamente realiza la OCDE. Los enfoques de apoyo a los sectores más pobres se han realizado tradicionalmente como medidas sectoriales, en los campos de educación, salud, seguridad social, vivienda, protección de grupos vulnerables (mujeres, niños, jóvenes, indígenas, afro-descendientes) o en “situación de riesgo”. Esta visión sectorizada, y de hecho fragmentada, socava las posibilidades de lograr cobertura, impacto y eficiencia en el acceso a mejores condiciones en dichos campos “sociales”. Muchas veces, estos enfoques se han dado desde una perspectiva “paternalista”, desde el que más tiene hacia el “pobre o empobrecido”, y muchas veces, como una “concesión o dádiva”.



Derechos para libertades: El caso del derecho a la salud [Members Only]
Saco, Alexandro Submitted:



The measurement of well-being. The case of nonstandard workers [Members Only]
Bizzotto, Giulia Submitted:		The aim of this paper is to evaluate well-being. Well-being is a multidimensional concept and its evaluation can not simply be reduced to access to material and non-material resources, because individuals differ in their capability to convert them into well-being achievements (Sen, 1992). We share this argument with Sen (1985, 1992, 1997) and we find support to these ideas also in Roemer’s writings about equality of opportunity (Roemer, 1998) and in the requirements of the Nussbaum’s liberal individualism (1999). We choose to follow the approach of Sen (1985, 1992), because evaluating well-being in the space of capabilities allows us to take in active consideration not only the achievements but also the freedom to achieve. According our thought, this latter aspect is the most important in explaining individual heterogeneity. Our empirical study area is nonstandard workers. We define as nonstandard those workers that have a different employment contract to full time permanent workers (part- time, temporary, short term, job-on-call, flexible arrangements contracts and so on). Since the Seventies many new job contract forms have been introduced to the labour market as an answer to the demand for higher flexibility and lower labour costs. These new contractual forms imply different and, in some cases, reduced job and social guarantees for workers. Moreover they do not only represent a different way of working, but imply new forms of burdens for the worker, such as limited possibilities to plan the future and to formulate both short and long term projects with respect to professional, existential and familial aspects of life, few opportunities and low portability of training and professional growth. However, from a different perspective, these flexible forms of work may also present new opportunities, if the plurality of the employment contract could mean a better match between the employee’s needs and the employer’s requirements.



Towards an operationalisation of capability approach for measuring quality of urban life and evaluating urban policies [Members Only]
Blecic, Ivan Cecchini, Arnaldo Talu, Valentina Laboratory of Analysis and Models for Planning (LAMP), Department of Architecture and Planning, University of Sassari Alghero IT Submitted:		The paper explores possibilities of operational application of the capability approach in an evaluation model for measuring quality of urban life and evaluating urban policies in developed countries. We first discuss the approach, which we call “countabilistic”, adopted in many methodologies commonly used for measuring quality of urban life. We then try to make the case for better suitability and usefulness of an alternative approach, grounded on the capability theory. The basic structure and the conceptual framework of the evaluation model is presented in the paper. Finally, we present some preliminary products of our first attempt to put into practice this framework, through measuring the quality of urban life of children.



A social indicator for the state of Rio Grande do Sul based on Capability Approach [Members Only]
Barden, Julia Elisabete Comim, Flavio Submitted:



Using Multicriteria Analysis as an operational framework for valuing capabilities [Members Only]
Monterde Diaz, Rafael Submitted:



Challenges and Achievements in Capability Approach based Participatory Monitoring of Community Development Programmes in Christchurch, New Zealand.
Schischka, John Christchurch Polytechnic Institute of Technology Christchurch NZ Submitted:		This paper summarises the results of a participatory appraisal methodology study carried out with groups of participants in two urban based community development programmes operating in low socio-economic areas of Christchurch. Based on the capability approach the methodology extends strategies used in previous studies of participant perspectives in development initiatives in Vanuatu and Samoa. Analysis of the transcripts of the focus groups conducted in these studies reveals significant outcomes from both programmes. Discussion is provided of the limitations and difficulties encountered during the course of the study as well as significant outcomes. Particularly important was the ability of the participatory methodology used to gain the perspectives of a wide range of participants, a number of whom are marginalised from mainstream society. The predominant views among participants in all groups are reported. A major theme in all of the discussions was that participants had experienced a significant increase in their confidence.



Science & Technology and Participation: The case of Rio Grande do Sul [Members Only]
Lahorgue, Maria Alice Submitted:		Science & Technology (S&T) policies have been decided by governments and scientific communities, without the participation of the general community. As there is no neutrality of S&T, the decisions made have benefited the status quo (big industry, international standards of S&T excellence, and so on). With an already long history of participatory experiences, the government of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, has launched a program for S&T that is based on the decisions of regional communities on what to research and how much money the region will put in the program. The presentation submitted shows how this process works and what are the actors perception about it (we made a survey with the researchers and the regional political actors). Our results show that the internal standards of scientists are very resilient and, even when the researchers are fully satisfied with the participatory process, their opinion is mostly guided by the traditional rules of S&T meritocracy and technical progress and much less by societal needs.



Labour as an Instrumental Freedom. The Case of ‘Work Care’ in Flanders [Members Only]
Motmans, Jos Submitted:		In this article we explore the meaning and importance of Sen’s concept ‘instrumental freedom’ in the case of ‘work care’ in Flanders (the Northern Dutch speaking part of Belgium). Work care is a rather literal translation of the specific Flemish and difficult to translate topic ‘arbeidszorg’. Work care is about work and occupational opportunities for people who in fact have no ‘real’ access to the normal labour market due to different reasons. Using ‘Supported employment’, a better known concept as a translation would be misleading since in work care workers do not have a labour contract. Furthermore work care is more than voluntary work due to the fact that the government supports specific and necessary guidance and coaching of the workers in work care programs. A case study of seven work care projects was at the core of this research project. We only used qualitative research methods. In each case (work care project) we had an in-depth interview with a coordinator, a coach and a worker. Interview data were analysed by using Sen’s five instrumental freedoms. In fact we used six instrumental freedoms, based on Anantha Duriappah (2004) and Jurgen Volkert (2007). We added ‘ecological security’ as the 6th, which seems to be a relevant option based on our analyses. Most literature on work care emphasizes the importance of participating in work care project because it enforces the latent functions of labour (Jahoda). In the different cases, we illustrate that work care clearly has social functions besides its personal importance. Projects in work care can make a huge difference for their workers between being included in society or being excluded and/or being subjected to (even extreme) poverty. When several instrumental freedoms (in their mutual coherence), are implemented in work care projects on the work floor, on guidance as on the organisational level, they clearly fulfil functions of social integration. Based on these findings we advised the Flemish government not to approach work care as a simple instrument of activation in the labour market. When work care is evaluated only in terms of (social) economic value – as is usually done nowadays in neo liberal economic policy – it is reduced to a labour market instrument. Such a reduction prohibits work care to play its potential and strongly inclusive role.



Discussing Development Planning and the Capability Approach: Capturing Complexities and Safeguarding Participation. [Members Only]
Ferrero, Gabriel Osorio, Loma Apsan Frediani, Alexandre Submitted:		In the field of Development Planning, since the end of the Second World War different strategies have been put forward to support the practice of development. Approaches have been elaborated and implemented, influenced by assumptions, pragmatic needs and underpinning conceptualizations of poverty and development. As international donors aim to increase their budgets for aid and the development industry become more concerned with the effectives of their programmes, the field of development planning has become increasingly important, by providing reflection and operational guidelines for practitioners in this industry. The tendencies in the new generation of tools from the field of development planning aims at capturing the multi dimensions of poverty, absorbing complexities of social realities while safeguarding participatory methods from its instrumental and limited application. However there is still a need for a conceptual framework that can address those tendencies while also being applicable for development initiatives. This paper hopes to contribute such debate by making the links between development planning literature and the Capability Approach. It aims to assess how far the Capability Approach can contribute to the theoretical discussions underpinning the new generation of development planning tools. Meanwhile, it hopes to contribute to the operationalization of the Capability Approach, by assessing particular tools from development planning literature that can support the application of the concept of capabilities in the practice of development.



Bridging Human Rights and Capabilities: A Critical Analysis of Promises, Limitations and Challenges for Advancing Social Transformation [Members Only]
Valencia Vargas, Areli Benoit, Cecilia Submitted:		The human rights discourse undoubtedly constitutes one of the most powerful rhetorics of current times. Underpinning the appeal of human rights rhetoric is the idealism that human rights can effectively solidify social equity and global justice goals. The language of human rights is currently spread across multiple levels of our social reality, sheltering a wide variety of claims. Activism in this sphere constantly seek redress for injustices and the reversal of the circumstances and factors that place people at risk of suffering rights abuses. Actions are taken with the hope of transforming the genesis of injustices as opposed to accommodating the “status quo” that produces them. However, the strong reliance on legal instruments along with the two common strategies employed by human rights advocates –the violation approach and the methodology of naming and shaming- have proven inadequate in effectively achieving this purpose. These mechanisms are designed to expose the outcomes of a situation rather than targeting its genesis; therefore, they provide a limited capacity for readily exposing the root causes of human rights abuses embedded in long-standing social processes. This identification is a crucial step to foster substantial social transformation. This paper explores to what extent the capability approach is able to assist us in addressing the aforementioned shortcomings of the human rights paradigm. Although the capability approach should not be seen as the panacea for resolving all unanswered questions and problems within the human rights discourse, it does locate human rights advocates in a better position to advance their social transformative goals. In effect, the capability approach has the potential to orient us in a particular manner that we argue will assist us to better understand human rights; specifically, in the case of socio-economic and cultural rights. We suggest viewing the capability approach’s potential contribution as a continuum that incorporates conceptual underpinnings and the richness of integrative methodologies. The last part of the paper briefly describes a community-based research project conducted in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, in order to draw attention into the research methodology utilized and how that contributes to the realisation of human rights and capabilities. This particular case illustrates the research benefits of the incorporation of the voices and validation of experiences of vulnerable population and exemplifies the benefits of capacity building social research.



Access to Justice: a human right essential to the capability approach as seen by the theories of Sen and Nussbaum with data from IBSA vulnerable groups [Members Only]
Figueiredo, Ivanilda Submitted:		he access to justice is a human right essential to the improvement of people capabilities. To verify the truth of this assumption, two approaches will be analyzed: one, theoretical; the other, empirical. At last year’s conference, I presented a paper about the illations made at the very beginning of the research. This year, I have been going deeply into the theoretical analysis in order to demonstrate the importance of access to justice to the improvement of people’s capabilities. The value of access to justice will be explored as it applies to both the approaches of Sen and Nussbaum. The objective of my PhD study is to demonstrate that when people have access to justice, they are able to improve their capability in two perspectives: people can enlarge their‘functionings’ (SEN, 2005, p 30) through the struggle for rights and for public policy; and people can also increase the scope of capability itself with the enhancement of their power of choice. Where Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum agree and disagree will be explored in the paper in order to show the importance of access to justice in both approaches of capability theory. At this point in the study, I have concluded that access to justice is a device by which people can improve their standard of living and gain practice in exercising their capability. In other words, access to justice is not a ‘functioning’ or a capability: access to justice is a tool to improve ‘functionings’ and capabilities. Therefore, as Amartya Sen commonly says, the success of a society could be measured according to the substantive freedom which their members enjoy (SEN, 2000, p. 32). And it is this very enlargement of the substantive freedom is one function of the access to justice that I have suggested. The study of these authors’ theories, as well as their followers and critics, will be analyzed to prove this contention. A grant from the Ford Foundation in a national contest allowed me to apply empirical research, so that the study would not only be confined to the realm of theoretical analysis, which would not have been consistent with my path as an academic and practitioner. For more than one year, I have worked with a team of academics and students analyzing and evaluating data compiled from three countries: India, Brazil and South Africa (called IBSA countries), whose constitutions include access to justice and access to rights1, and thus, have a commitment to access to justice in many international human rights instruments2.



Human Rigths and Capabilities: A Bridge Towards Social Inclusion [Members Only]
Camlot Reicher, Stella Submitted:		As Hannah Arendt says, is through the process of understanding that we become adjusted and 3 reconciled with reality, that is, we try to feel well in the world." So, in a moment where geographical boundaries are no more obstacles to the construction of a global citizenship, progress in terms of human rights requires understanding their new contours. After the Second World War, human rights became the only ethical paradigm able to reestablish a reasonable logic when human beings value was forgotten. A bound effort was established between nations in order to develop a new ethos based on human rights and States were lead to think about international mechanisms to avoid the repetition of crimes against humanity. The international human rights era was started and human rights contemporary conception, based on the ideas of universality, indivisibility and interdependency, was formally recognized by the Universal Declaration on Human Rights, allowing rights protection to transcend domestic jurisdiction reaching a global dimension and stressing the idea that all human beings are human rights holders. Even though last year the Universal Declaration celebrated its 60th anniversary, human rights still faces several challenges such as the recognition of equal value for civil, political, social, economic and cultural rights and human rights interpretation that still request a closer analysis. For understanding human rights we must take into account that to guarantee such rights it is necessary to go beyond the legal texts that apparently protect all human beings. It shall be understood that the meaning of “to be entitled to” involves besides the legal provisions, the possibility of each and every person to put such rights into practice, according to their own will in view of flourishing as a free human being.



Gasto público y desarrollo humano en Uruguay [Members Only]
Perazzo, Ivone Submitted:



Power Dynamics of Children Participation in Local Public Budget/ El dinamismo del poder en la participación de los niños en el presupuesto público [Members Only]
Mendoza García, Rosa Submitted:



Design, implementation and evaluation of public management systems/ Diseño, implementación y evaluación de los sistemas de administración pública [Members Only]
Roquette, Francisco Submitted:		This thesis aims at overcoming a gap identified in the design, implementation and evaluation of public management systems: an explicit focus on and embedding of human development outcomes. Building on Sen's capability approach, the thesis explores the delivery of agricultural extension services in the Amhara region of Ethiopia. Through survey work and in-depth interviews it builds up a detailed picture of how user groups rank and value particular capabilities, understood as their ability to achieve certain functionings, and how far public services contribute to the accomplishment of these functionings. It then examines a recent business process reengineering initiative of the bureau of agriculture from the point of view of its contribution to capability expansion. Similarly, the measurement and evaluation system of the bureau is critically reviewed. The thesis analyses an emergent alternative to existing approaches based on the use of real time feedback from users to service providers and it demonstrates how the informational richness that stems from impact evaluation - including the process of choice, functionings and capabilities - can be used to enhance the effectiveness of service delivery. This emergent approach, labelled here the Public Sector Impact approach, can be seen to provide a superior management philosophy and system for public services in developing countries.



Measuring the well-being of Lithuanian Households [Members Only]
Ivaskaite-Tamosiune, Viginta Submitted:		This paper describes the first attempts to measure overall well-being of households in Lithuania. Despite simple economic indicators such as gross domestic product (GDP), per capita average income, expenditures and etc. are widely accepted and easy accessible, they lack comprehensiveness in terms of well-being measurement. Traditional income or expenditure-based approach is one-sided, not taking into consideration very complex structures of everyone’s life. In recent decades a well-being or quality of life issue has been investigated not only in economics but also in other social sciences (sociology, political science, psychology). Growing literature on indicators and dimensions of well-being attempts to reveal the various aspects of well-being of deprivation. However, no single measure can be proposed in order to capture the complexity and multidimensionality in terms of relevant dimensions and indicators. The paper describes measurement methodology employed to create an index of well-being in Lithuania and presents the first results of well-being. The approach taken in this paper is based on the A. Sen’s capability approach, which enables to create an index by looking at households’ resources, functionings and utilities. The dataset used for the construction of a well-being index is Generation and Gender Survey, which was conducted in 2006, covering over 10 thousands households in Lithuania (a multi-stage random sample design was used for this Survey). Despite the dataset was not collected for the purpose of the measuring well-being, it was chosen because it contains relatively rich micro-level non-monetary information on households. Making use of information from the Generation and Gender Survey and following A. Sen’s capability approach 4 domains of well-being, consisting of a number of indicators were finally combined to form an overall index of well-being of Lithuanian households. These domains are material welfare, health, employment and education. Material domain contains indicators such as incomes, various durables and fulfilment of basic needs. Health consists of group of indicators, which reflect disabilities that interfere with daily routines, experiences and feelings of respondents’. When looking at employment dimension we examine whether respondent is engaged with any formal activity (she or he is an employee, employed, a students, a pensioner, in a military, is on maternity or paternity leave, etc.) or is unemployed or helping in a private household. Finally we look at the highest educational level achieved by a respondent. At first we have included the fifth, housing dimension, consisting of indicators such as property of the dwelling and number of rooms per person, but after reliability test was performed this dimension was excluded from the further analysis of the well-being.



Tales of Deprivation Underneath Records of Success: the multi-faceted complexities involved in human development initiatives – a case from Kerala, India [Members Only]
Verghese, Bindu P Submitted:		This paper is an attempt to critically analyse and bring into foci the problems involved in the much celebrated Kerala development model from a human development perspective. It raises concerns over not only the development pattern adopted by the state but also identifies the opaqueness of empirical data assigned with the task of unveiling the state’s achievements. The situation of tribes in Kerala is explored here from the perspective of their capableness to participate in the mainstream social and political life in order to identify areas of serious disparity in a comparative perspective with that of the wider society. An in depth analysis of empirical data pertaining to the condition of tribes is undertaken to examine the effectualness of the general approach assumed from within a theoretical account of human development and to locate the inherent problems associated with such an approach. The nature of problems may vary, depending upon the context, from methods adopted while implementing the welfare programs to the nature of the programmes as such from a broader perspective taking into consideration the social, cultural, traditional and geographical factors and differences specific to the target community. The conventional social indicators of education, health, employment and other livelihood opportunities are significant to the extent they can provide useful insights concerning the overall situation and particularly the reasons, causes and other factors involved in the marginalisation, if any, of a particular community. These are precisely the indicators that are crucial to substantiate and to make a community capable of participating in the larger decision making process. With respect to tribes in Kerala attainments in this regard together with relevant background details provides one with a dismal portrait that has resulted from lack of a perspective to sufficiently consider the specificities associated with these backward groups. The paper discusses these issues with the support of primary and secondary data and field observations pertaining to the living conditions of scheduled castes and scheduled tribes1 in Thrissur district, in the central part of Kerala. The disparities embedded within the mainstream approaches towards capability building/empowerment initiatives cutting across differences of sex (gender) and race (tribes) is the focal point here. Hence the issues raised in this paper cuts across the geographical parameters irrespective of confining the discussion here to the glaring ‘Kerala model for social and human development’. Kerala has received worldwide attention for its remarkable achievements in literacy, life expectancy, fertility level and other social indicators of development with relatively low per capita income (Centre for Development Studies 1975; Jeffrey 1992; Patnaik 1995). This ‘high profile performance’ of the state in terms of living standards owes to several factors that are specific to its history and culture. Government policies pertaining to land reforms, health and education and their successful implementation have played very crucial roles in framing conditions that are conducive to such a remarkable growth in the domain of human development (Oomen 1979; Panikar and Soman 1984; Kurien 1995; Ramachandran 1996). Public investment in human capital and its efficient utilization have also been other major sources behind this achievement which in turn has provided useful lessons for other states (Raj 1998). Against the back ground of this ‘central tendency’ of the Kerala experience, where human development is considered to be very high in general, there exist some ‘outliers’ in development whose living standard is far below the general standard of living in Kerala. The fishing community constitutes one such instance of an ‘outlier’ where the apparent specificity of the Kerala development experience i.e., low income and high standards of life is starkly absent and the general and positive relationship between low income and poor living conditions again recur amidst celebrations in the name of the former (Kurien, 1995). There are other marginalized groups to whom the benefits of development have hardly trickled down. Scheduled castes and Scheduled tribes consist of majority of this deprived section in the state. The social and economic condition of the people belonging to the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes has been a source of major concern of the Indian political and social movements even before Independence. Article 46 of the constitution lays down that “the State shall promote with special care the educational and economic interests of the weaker sections of the people, and in particular, of the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes, and shall protect them from social injustice and all forms of exploitation.” Low level of living among a major section of people belonging to these groups have been, and still continues to be, a pre dominant concern and a subject matter for intense discussions and debates since early 1960s. (Kattakayam 1983; Luiz 1962; Kunhaman 1982; and Lal 2000).



Determinants of Poverty in Developing Countries: Factors that Effect the Human Poverty Index
Prince, Heath The Heller School for Social Policy and Management, Brandeis University Waltham US Submitted:		This paper is a preliminary exploration of factors that theory and the development literature suggest should contribute to changes in the United Nation Development Program’s Human Poverty Index (HPI) for developing countries. It is primarily concerned with inteventions that relate to economic growth, the expansion of human capabilities, and the development of assets. The study focuses on the outcomes of a panel data set of HPI scores for a set of 108 developing countries, between 1998 and 2007. Several models are created to empirically test the relationship between the HPI and indicators relating to economic growth-based, capabilities-based and asset-based approaches to development. Preliminary findings suggest that growth-based interventions have a mixed effect on poverty reduction, depending on the level of a country’s deprivation. Education, livestock value, and the employment to population ratio all tend to reduce deprivation, while other variables included in these models suggest no relationship to deprivation.



Relational Capability: A Dynamic Indicator of Collective Empowerment applied to the Niger Delta [Members Only]
Renouard, Cécile Giraud, Gael Submitted:		We de?ne a new index for the collective empowerment of populations, based on the capability of individuals to have relationships and to enter into networks. This index, called “relational capability”, is dynamic in the sense that the weight of its various components varies across time, according to how close the population is to some poverty threshold. We apply this index to the analysis of the impact of oil companies on local development in the Niger Delta (Nigeria). A region such as Eastern Obolo, which is much poorer with respect to any income-oriented measure, turns out to exhibit a higher relational capability than the alternate, and much richer, region of Onelga. We argue that the inequalities in terms of relational capability among citizens may play a pivotal role when evaluating the human development of a population, and show this to be the case for oil host communities in the Niger Delta.



Informacion a escala local, recurso clave para el diseño de estrategias orientadas a la ampliacion de las capacidades humanas [Members Only]
Pol, María Albina Universidad Nacional de Cuyo - CONICET Mendoza AR Submitted:		Con base en la concepción del desarrollo como un proceso centrado en las personas y territorialmente localizado, el artículo sostiene la importancia estratégica de contar con información acerca de las capacidades a las que las personas pueden acceder en el particular entorno en que se desenvuelven cotidianamente. Se introduce, en primer lugar, una breve reflexión sobre la noción de “territorio”, en tanto espacio de ampliación de las capacidades humanas, y sobre la relevancia de la información para el diseño de estrategias de desarrollo humano en ámbitos territoriales específicos. En segundo lugar, se exponen los resultados del análisis crítico aplicado al cúmulo de información socioeconómica disponible a escala local a partir de un estudio de caso. Finalmente, se esbozan algunas consideraciones generales orientadas a avanzar en la elaboración de “Sistemas Integrados de Información Territorial”.



Estrutura espacial do índice de desenvolvimento de família das regioes rural e urbana de estado de Minas Geris- Brasil [Members Only]
Eduardo Rocha, Luiz Submitted:		This article aims at estimating the Family Development Index (FDI) in both urban and rural areas in the State of Minas Gerais. Due to a heterogeneous social-economic situation of the State, the index will be separated from the micro-regions, a fact which will allow for better evidence of regional differences. The FDI is composed by six dimensions: a) non-existing vulnerability, b) access to literacy, c) job opportunities, d) available services and resources, e) infant development, f) housing conditions. To one extend, each one of such dimensions represents the access to resources in order to satisfy the families’ needs. To another extent, they also cater for a complete and effective satisfaction of the families. This article implement the exploratory spatial data analysis through the Moran’s I statistic and also through the cluster analysis. On showing the welfare level in the Mineira’s families, this article will contribute to identitying both the needs of specific public policies as well as the regions in need, differentiating them from more developed regions and areas.



Evaluación Participativa e Incremento de Capabilidades Humanas Agencia colectiva y procesos de influencia en las política públicas contra la pobreza: Un estudio comparativo de indicadores múltiples e [Members Only]
Gutiérrez, Ramón-Antonio Submitted:		El vínculo entre evaluación y políticas presenta una oportunidad para la participación social como modalidad de expansión de las capabilidades de ser y hacer de las personas. En general, la relación entre evaluación y políticas públicas es un vehículo, si bien arduo, no por ello menos oportuno de fortalecer la eficacia de las acciones para el desarrollo humano. Por su parte, se ha venido insistiendo - desde hace ya casi 40 años (1970s)- en la relevancia de la "evaluación participativa" en los procesos de desarrollo, y destacando con ello su función de "empoderamiento" de los beneficiarios de las políticas públicas. Se afirma también, que la institucionalización de la "evaluación participativa", enfrenta a los beneficiarios con su propia responsabilidad (deber) de encarar los problemas que les afectan, y con la tarea de decidir (derecho) bajo cuales criterios deberan resolverse, y mediante cual diseño apropiado de procedimiento (un particular programa social). Asimismo, se ha avanzado ampliamente en el establecimiento de la efectividad de los procedimientos de participación social, en materia de incremento y degradación de las capabilidades (Gutiérrez, 2005 y 2007), y especialmente en lo atingente a la "libertad de participación", y de los diferentes grados de contribución que realizan (Kumar, Roddy y Parry, 2005). En consecuencia, la "evaluación participativa" no solamente apuntaría a incrementar la transparencia y efectividad de las políticas públicas (de aquellas "sociales", muy especialmente), sino que haría más relevante el rol en materia de decisiones y acciones que atañe a los beneficiarios; incrementando su poder real de insidir en los diferentes momentos del proceso, político-técnico, de la planificación para la intervención social.



Un mapa de posiciones geosociales. Estratos sociales y ámbitos urbano-regionales en Venezuela [Members Only]
Gruson, Alberto Submitted:		Se hace operativa la idea de diagnosticar un desarrollo nacional de acuerdo con las capacidades de desarrollo humano de sus habitantes. Eso implica discernir las posiciones típicas en las que se plasma el orden social nacional; a estas posiciones habrá de asociar un esquema de las capacidades-oportunidades de un desarrollo humano que no oblitere las diferencias culturales. Las posiciones deberían ser significativamente distintivas y, en conjunto, exhaustivas, aunque no exageradamente numerosas, en forma tal de ser operativas y constituir un buen mapa social del país. Se aplica este programa de investigación al caso venezolano, utilizando los datos de Encuestas de Hogares recientes. El desarrollo desigual se nota tanto por estrato social, como por localización urbano-regional (urban bias); por eso, las posiciones son ciertamente geosociales.



Social Action, Women Empoerment and Sustainable livelihoods; A Study of Kudumbashree projects in Kerala,India [Members Only]
Raghavan, V P Submitted:		Poverty alleviation schemes based on micro- credit system have been implemented in many of the developing countries in recent years. The Government of Kerala State in India has introduced a novel scheme of poverty alleviation based on micro-credit and self help grouping. Paraphrased as Kudumbashree ( ‘Prosperity of the Family’), the scheme aims at improving the living levels of the poor women in rural and urban areas. It seeks to bring the poor women folks together to form the grass root organizations to help enhance their economic security. The project aimsat removing poverty among rural women households through setting up of micro-credit and productive enterprises. The activities such as micro-credit and micro-enterprises under the scheme were undertaken by the locally formed Community Development Societies consisting of poor women. The State Poverty Eradication Mission-Kudumbashree- launched by the Government of Kerala in India is a massive poverty eradication programme in contemporary history. It has proved without doubt that women empowerment is the best strategy for poverty eradication. Women, who were regarded as voiceless and powerless started identifying their inner strength, opportunities for growth , and their role in reshaping their own destiny. The process of empowerment becomes the beacon light to their children, their families and the society at large. It opens a new vistas in development history. A new paradigm of participatory economics has been found emerging in “God’s Own Country”. Kudumbashree presents a unique model of participatory development , which can very well , be emulated other developing countries.



A methodological approach to do research on tertimonios of female social leaders of Peru: experience, reflexivity, intersubjectivity, intersectionality and the other’s knowledge [Members Only]
Morote Ríos, Roxanna Submitted:		This study suggests a methodological framework to do feminist and semiotic research on female social leader’s testimonios. The key concepts are experience, reflexivity, intersubjectivity, intersectionality and the Other’s knowledge. The theoretical framework is based on postcolonial and feminist theories as well as on psychoanalytic theory. The analysis of forty life testimonios show that female social leaders represent their identities, national belongings, postcolonial condition and ideas of truth, fact and experience in a particular way. Latin American female narratives destabilize canonical understandings of the subject through their representations of the self, the Others and the symbolic and real bonds created between them. Therefore, it is needed a methodological an ethic framework to analyze women’s self-representations and the representations of their personal empowerment. This framework was constructed in order to answer the following central questions: How can Peruvian women’s self-representation be characterized and analyzed through their testimonial life narratives? And, how do they represent their sources of empowerment? In order to answer these questions I acknowledge women’s experience as a privileged source of knowledge which has to be criticized in terms of the context and history; reflexivity as a hermeneutic tool to locate the researcher throughout the research process; empathy and intersubjectivity as a tools based on reason and emotion and also on the imaginary encounter of the subjects; the intersectional dialogue of diverse categories of analysis and the located comprehension of those categories; and finally, the relevance of the Other’s knowledge as an analytic and ethic principle not exempt of controversy.



Bodily Integrity of Italian women: exploring freedom of choice Tawheed Reza Noor: Voices of Vulnerable Women under Multi-component Food Security Project: Bangladesh Experience [Members Only]
Tommaso, Di Dagsvik, J Submitted:		Italy has a very low position in terms of gender inequality respect to many other industrialised countries (Human Development Report 2008). It has position 17 in terms of the Gender Related Development Index and position 21 in terms of Gender Empowerment Measure. According to the World Economic Forum (2008), Italy is ranked number 67 in the Global Gender Gap Index. While there are great difficulties in making international comparison, these indexes provide evidence for a high gender inequality in Italy. Economic studies on Italian gender inequality have until now focussed on wage differentials, lack of women’s participation to the labour market, different distribution of un-paid work within the households. In this paper, we measure an aspect of inequality utilising the capability approach focussing on the capability of bodily integrity. In Nussbaum’s definition: “Being able to move freely from place to place; to be secure against violent assault, including sexual assault, marital rape and domestic violence; having opportunities for sexual satisfaction and for choice in matters of reproduction.” (Nussbaum, 1999, pg 41). In this paper, we explore this capability for Italian women. We would ideally need information on some functionings and on women freedoms. Not only, we need to take into consideration a list of functionings (if the woman has suffered from domestic violence, of which type, rape, etc) but also if the woman feel free to leave the house whenever she wants, if she feels safe to move freely, if she can decide about contraception. This set of functionings and indicators of capabilities depend on personal characteristics: for instance, a woman may be more restricted in terms of moving from place to place because of religious or social constraints, not working women may have less means to exit a violent relationship, etc; Moreover, they depend on external characteristics: for example, an individual could live in a more dangerous district than another; law enforcement could be different across regions, etc.



Breaking power structures through NGO collaboration for a more inclusive participatory development: an application to post-conflict South Sudan [Members Only]
Picon, Mario Submitted:		How is the success of participatory programs conditioned by local power structures and aid governance? What strategies can an NGO follow to improve the chances of success of participatory programs? These are the key questions the present case study explores. The transition from humanitarian assistance to development programs is seen by international organizations and donors as a key step in consolidating peace processes and re-building local capacity through human and physical capital. Previous research (Collier and Sambanis, 2002) has shown that the probability of a return to conflict is high in the years following a ceasefire. A preferred approach among donors and NGOs for starting development programs in a post-conflict environment is the through participation. Participatory development involves the community from the onset in the identification of priorities, promotes a sense of ownership of the outputs and outcomes of the development program (Mansuri and Rao, 2004), and generates functional capabilities, the ‘substantive freedoms people have reason to value’ (Sen, 1999). Critics of participatory development consider that the approach might slow down the development process and, moreover, either legitimize the local power structure, or create new dominant elites (Cooke and Kothari, 2001). This paper explores the challenges a well-recognized (and relatively well-funded) international NGO faces while moving from humanitarian to development programs in South Sudan’s Upper Nile State. After fifty years of almost uninterrupted war between the North and the South, the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) in 2005 allowed thousands of South Sudanese to return to the lands they and their kin occupied before war. Most returnees have lived their whole lives in refugee camps, surviving only with food provided by donors. The CPA created a very particular status for Upper Nile State. While the area is part of autonomous South Sudan, and will participate of the 2011 Referendum to decide the independence of the region, Upper Nile is one of two states whose administrative authorities are still appointed by the Sudanese Government in Khartoum. Meantime, development coordinators are appointed by the autonomous government of South Sudan, in Juba.



Creating Empowering Environments: How Action on the Urban Built Environment Can Enhance Basic Capabilities and Freedoms [Members Only]
Luxion, Mona Oxford Brookes University Oxford GB Submitted:		In a world with growing urban poverty, urban environmental considerations are increasingly important. This paper looks at the impacts of built environment projects on six basic capabilities: health; safety; association; livelihood; senses, imagination, and thought; and control over one's environment. Drawing on design theory, case studies from Indonesia, Kenya, and South Africa, and a review of the literature in a number of fields, the author makes the case for practitioners to incorporate actions on the built environment as a tool to promote human development. Further, this paper examines the role of citizen participation in empowering environments, finding that successful projects need a balance of training, participation, and leadership to be sustainable. In conclusion, the author presents a model of empowering environments, with implications for both practice and academia, and calls for further research on the topic.



Indigenous Peoples and the Amazon Forests in route to Copenhagen 2009 Their participation in building a post-Kyoto World regime [Members Only]
Páez-Acosta, Guayana Submitted:		Indigenous Peoples are the traditional dwellers of the Amazon territory, an ecosystem that has sustained their lives both physically and spiritually, providing shelter from wood and alimentation from fishing, hunting, and non-timber resources, and basis of their Cosmovision. Their history has been one of struggle and of socio-political, cultural and economic discrimination until not long ago. While over the last two decades Indigenous Peoples have began to see their efforts come to fruition, with their rights having experienced an unprecedented legal recognition2, theirs remain an ongoing fight for self-determination and for building a world that actively embraces ethnic and cultural diversity. By the end of 2009, the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen will set the stage for a post-Kyoto regime that will have a profound impact on Indigenous Peoples lives. An ongoing and heated debate at the core of the negotiation towards the Copenhagen conference revolves around a forest related market-based mechanism, the so-called Reduced Emissions for Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD) mechanism, which if approved will commit Nations towards reducing deforestation - currently responsible for 25% of the greenhouses gasses emitted to the atmosphere - on the basis of assigning economic value to the standing forest of each Nation. To ensure sustainability of such scenario, economic benefits derived from Forests that are left standing and for which a carbon based crediting system is being discussed will have to, firstly, be able to demonstrate that in the absence of a REDD mechanisms the expected emissions will be higher than those under business as usual forests based activities and to some degree compensate for the opportunity cost of such other economic activities often purely extractive and depleting (i.e. gold-mining, large scale agribusiness, and illegal logging), and secondly, effectively be able to direct benefits towards those populations whose livelihood is dependent or somehow relate to Forest use, as their existing relationship with Forests will most likely change. Addressing key issues like who will benefit from keeping forests standing; what are the rules and mechanisms to compensate those avoiding deforestation; how and by whom can forests use be made sustainable; how and by whom reforestation efforts can be undertaken, will determine whether a market-based mechanism might be feasible or not as a response for moving forward a climate change mitigation agenda based on protecting and restoring forest.



Advancing human development: values, groups, power and conflict [Members Only]
Deneulin, Severine Submitted:		The question of values is central to the human development and capability approach. Yet, the capability literature says little about where values come from, how they are shaped and change. Exploring the dynamics of value formation and change is critical to advancing human development, for different sets of values lead to different sets of policies, and hence different capability outcomes. The paper argues that the human development and capability approach needs to pay greater attention to the different groups which construct the value frameworks from which people derive their values. This requires a more critical analysis of the power dynamics between groups. The paper proposes some analytical tools to examine the dynamics of value formation and its influence on policy. It concludes by discussing some ways in which the kinds of values which are necessary for advancing human development can be nurtured.



Radical Impact of Dalit Power [Members Only]
Seth, Piyush Sharma, Vinay Submitted:		This paper focusing on the emergence of a Dalit Chief Minister alongwith her political party as a power center is indicative of the radical changes in the political participation, reduction in the levels of identified discrimination or a form of social inclusion and the enhancement of the levels of social confidence of Dalits and its preliminary effects on the socio-economic structure of the largest state of India i.e. Uttar Pradesh. The word ‘dalit (a)’ comes from the Indo-Aryan root dal and means ‘held under check’, ‘suppressed’, or ‘crushed’, ‘oppressed’ but largely has become synonymous to ‘discrimination’ , which has been deep rooted in the social and caste structure of India.



A Comparative Analysis of Global Faith-Based and Secular Civil Society Organisation(s) in Pakistan and Bangladesh [Members Only]
Sajjad Sheikh, Karim Submitted:		The purpose of this research paper is to examine two global organisations: one faith based and one secular, in Pakistan and Bangladesh each. In this context it will subsequently investigates the cross-country cross-sectional faith-based and/or secular organisations practical applications of the notion of civil society in Pakistan and Bangladesh by evaluating the social and economic policies of national civil-society organisations that are designed to help to eradicate poverty in the countries. The research will contribute to reducing the gap in regional knowledge using a sociological perspective. It will generate new information about the different ways and how those actions are effective for the operation of different types of civil society institutions. The study will explore the successes and achievements of global civil society organisations as independent variable(s), and on the other hand, it will analyse faith-based and secular civil society organisations in two different countries independent variable(s). Then in each country, assessment will be made of the effectiveness of each kind of civil society organisation in the eradication of poverty. The time covered in the study is twelve years, from 1996 to 2007, because this period has witnessed a wave of globalisation of the economy and the appearance of several global-level institutions in the region. A complex, multi-level comparative analysis involved in this investigation is based on qualitative analysis of data and interview that I conducted with civil society organisation leaders in 2006-07 (find the information about my doctoral research project as an attachment).



Multidimensional Poverty in Cameroon: An Alternative Approach via the Principal Component Analysis [Members Only]
Manga, Nadine Submitted:		Based on Micro and Macroeconomic data ECAM II, (Cameroon Household Consumption Survey in 2001), this paper evaluates the extend of poverty in Cameroon, confronting the uni-dimensional and multidimensional impact of poverty in Cameroon. Computing multidimensional poverty, we use the Principal Component Analysis approach which aggregates different dimensions of poverty and aids in creating a welfare composite index used to gauge poverty. Based on non-monetary indicators of well-being obtained via the data analysis approach, we compare results obtained with the orthodox monetary approach. Results obtained reveal that non-monetary poverty is severe than monetary poverty along geographical and household characteristics. Additionally, multidimensional poverty contributes more to total poverty than monetary poverty. Policy implication entails that government tilts its attention of policies and programs that go beyond simply income activities to asset based enhancement programs that contribute to welfare as posited by Armatia Sen’s capability approach.



A basic income grant: An appropriate anti-poverty strategy in countries such as South Africa, Namibia and Rwanda? [Members Only]
le Roux, Pieter Submitted:



Deprivation and capability: Poverty measurement in a European context [Members Only]
Hick, Rod Submitted:		In providing a framework for engaging in interpersonal analysis of well-being, the capability approach makes a significant shift away from the dominant traditions of poverty analysis in welfare economics. However, within the field of social policy a range of approaches to conceptualising and measuring poverty and deprivation exist, some of which share important similarities with the capability approach. One particular tradition of poverty measurement in Europe is the use of deprivation indicators in large scale social surveys as a direct measure in order to identify the poor. The deprivation indicators that are used typically relate to a range of activities and commodities that a person does / has. Furthermore, the question wording that is typically adopted looks not just at participating in certain activities (do you do x?) but for those who do not participate in such activities asks whether this is by choice or whether they have been constrained due to a lack of income. Thus, these do look at one specific constraint on a persons ability to engage in specific activities (namely due to lack of resources) but clearly exclude all other potential constraining factors (e.g. disability or discrimination). While there are broad similarities in the deprivation items used in the major UK and EU social surveys, there is less agreement about how to use the information these gather to determine a poverty line, with a variety of approaches adopted (e.g. Townsend, 1979; Gordon et al, 2000; Saunder and Adelman, 2006; Whelan and Maitre, 2007). However, it may be useful to formally compare such approaches to the capability approach in terms of poverty measurement. To what extent do the current deprivation indicators measure capability failure? Does capability measurement require completely new measures or could some of the existing measures that are used in poverty analysis in Europe be used or amended to measure capability deprivation? The paper will (i) outline some poverty concepts and measures that are common in the European context that share some similarities with the capability approach, (ii) examine specifically the deprivation indicators approach from a capability perspective, (iii) discuss the possibility of using deprivation indicators to measure capability failure and (iv) highlight the challenges that exist in constructing a poverty measure using deprivation indicators. The paper draws on the doctoral research of the author which examines the possibilities and limitations of capability approach for the measurement of poverty in a European context.



: Multidimensional Measurement of Poverty in Morocco: The Case of Urban Poverty in the City of Marrakech [Members Only]
Mansouri, Brahim Ejjanoui, Fouzia Submitted:		Recent studies of poverty in Morocco have heavily relied on the monetary approach adopted by the World Bank. To characterize and measure the poverty phenomenon in Morocco, the Direction de la Statistique in Rabat uses the households’ expenditures as the leading variable. Well, this approach has proved its shortcomings in Morocco and the whole developing world as well, especially because of its particular mono-dimensionality. Indeed, a universal consensus has been occurred about the fact that poverty is somewhat a multiple privation. Thus, it would be interesting to take into consideration all monetary and non-monetary dimensions when measuring and analyzing poverty. The present paper project seeks to measure multidimensional poverty in the Moroccan city of Marrakech, using raw data from the 2000-2001 National Survey on Households’ Expenditures (Enquête Nationale sur les Dépenses des Ménages), and the 2004 General Census of People and Housing (Recensement Général de la Population et de l’Habitat). More precisely, we aspire to constructing a composite indicator of poverty for each household in the city. Two mean objectives have to be achieved through this research: i) analyzing the interaction between monetary and non-monetary poverty; and ii) to elaborate a multidimensional poverty map in Marrakech, using our multidimensional approaches. To do this, we have used two advanced empirical methodologies: the Multiple Components Analysis (Analyse des Correspondances Multiples), and the Classification Ascendante Hiérarchique. Our empirical results reveal that the monetary and non-monetary measures of poverty are weakly correlated. Results show also that certain households who are not subjected to monetary poverty suffer from multidimensional poverty. As far as the geographical distribution of monetary poverty through the various city districts is concerned, we have observed a strong disparity. The gap in terms of poverty between the richer district of Gueliz and the poorer district of Annakhil is estimated to be around 18.4 percent. Our empirical results from the multidimensional poverty map are largely different from those obtained by the monetary poverty map elaborated by official studies, especially those of the Haut Commissariat au Plan (Rabat, Morocco). On the basis of our empirical results, we confirm the shortcomings of the monetary approach to poverty in identifying the poor and its tendency to under-evaluate the phenomenon. When they rely heavily on the monetary approach, poverty alleviation policies would very probably be inefficient. Even when we assume that such policies are well-targeted, they would likely not benefit for the households considered as non-poor according to the monetary approach, while they are seen to be as poor following the multidimensional approach. This permits to conclude that it is necessary to take into account all dimensions of poverty, not only the monetary dimension, based on households’ expenditures (or income). As we have done, all available surveys and censuses should be exploited in order to grasp all the dimensions of poverty. The marginal cost of multidimensional approaches to poverty is low while their informational gains are particularly considerable.



What does the human rights approach add to efforts to eliminate poverty? [Members Only]
Karimova, Nilufar Submitted:



Fecundidad y pobreza en Uruguay 1996-2006 [Members Only]
Perazzo, Ivone Submitted:		En esta investigación se busca profundizar en la relación entre fecundidad y pobreza. Para ello, se analizan las diferencias en la fecundidad por estrato socio-económico, y el efecto del tamaño del hogar en la probabilidad de ser pobre. También se intenta comprender los determinantes a nivel micro-económico de las decisiones reproductivas en los hogares uruguayos. Se analizan los determinantes de la fecundidad en base a la estimación de modelos econométricos sobre las decisiones de fecundidad. En esta investigación se busca profundizar en el estudio de la evolución de la fecundidad en Uruguay en las últimas dos décadas, considerando las diferencias por estratos socio-económicos. El análisis se aborda con un enfoque fundamentalmente económico. En primer término se presentan los principales aspectos de la discusión sobre determinantes de la fecundidad desde la perspectiva económica (sección I). A continuación se describe la evolución de la tasa global de fecundidad en los últimos veinte años, así como la de indicadores asociados (sección II). Para profundizar en el conocimiento de la relación entre fecundidad y pobreza se analiza el rol del tamaño del hogar en la probabilidad de ser pobre, a través de la estimación de modelos de variable binaria para diferentes momentos del tiempo (sección III). Se intenta luego comprender los determinantes a nivel micro-económico de las decisiones reproductivas en los hogares uruguayos, a través de la estimación de un modelo econométrico (sección IV). Finalmente, se presenta una síntesis y conclusiones (sección V).



Medición multidimensional de la pobreza en la infancia y la adolescencia en Uruguay [Members Only]
Zerpa, Mariana Nathan, Mathías Submitted:



La necesidad de incluir la dimensión del tiempo en el enfoque de capacidades [Members Only]
Damian Gonzalez, Araceli Submitted:



La desigualdad de oportunidades de acceder a un trabajo decente en México
Sánchez Pérez, Hidalia Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México Ciudad de México MX Submitted:		This paper analyzes the effect of Mexican economy’s structural inequality in the opportunities to access a decent work. A cluster analysis was made for drawing a map which shows regional differences between groups of federative entities. The analysis also considers employed population’s, sex, educational level and age. It was built a Decent Work Index (DWI) as a dependent variable based on Sen´s human capabilities approach and ILO´s notion of decent work. Results show that the opportunities to access a decent work are greater for employed population who lives in federative entities that have the highest rates of growth in tertiary sector. In turn, in poorest federative entities, where opportunities to access a decent work are lower, the inequality gaps between employed population with different educational levels are higher. Education plays an important role in enlarging people’s opportunities to access a decent work, but, this is true particularly for women.



Solidarity Economy Movement and Capability Approach: some similarities [Members Only]
Mascarenhas, Thais Submitted:		The Solidarity Economy Movement started in Brazil in the last few decades, proposing an alternative mode of production and distribution, based upon workers’ possession of all means of production and self-management. Economic and political equality, diversity respect, tolerance, confidence, and the fight against social exclusion, are the movement’s most important values. However, how is this experience related to Amartya Sen’s development perspective? This paper aims to present and explore the Solidarity Economy Movement employing Amartya Sen’s ideas on development. For this purpose, firstly, we present the movement, examining its historical formation, its theoretical and practical basis, and its recent experiences. Then, we discuss it in relation to Sen’s theory on development as freedom, mainly bringing his ideas on substantive and instrumental freedoms, agency and public discussion.



Determinants of Student Achievements in Primary Education in Paraguay [Members Only]
Otter, Thomas Villalobos, Carlos Submitted:		The idea that schooling scores depend on a combination of family background characteristics, ability and school (institutional) variables is quite clear. Regarding the issue of intergenerational transmission of inequality in the educational system, the most important question would be if and to what extent could a better institutional performance of the school service compensate for problems related to family background. By means of the estimation of a reduced form equation for selected scores, we investigate the impact of institutional performance on scores after controlling for family background and individual characteristics. We do this by using a novel data set and an OLS and quantile regression approach to analyze how heterogeneous the process of score generation can be. By providing integral health solutions, minimizing under-nutrition and providing ideal conditions in the classroom, training teachers can impact positively on low and mean learning outcomes, thus contributing to an improved educational quality and breaking cycles of intergenerational transmission of inequality. Increasing learning outcomes for levels above the median, only strengthens the transmission of inequality. Consequently, the equality approach should focus on trying to improve the worst scores and our results show that this can be reached at a significant level closing teacher training gaps, improving classroom conditions and improving health and nutrition.



Sen meets Schumpeter: Towards an agent oriented theory of inequality and qualitative change
Hartmann, Dominik University of Hohenheim - Stuttgart Submitted:		This paper aims to combine the basic insights of Amartya Sen’s agent oriented view on development and inequality and Schumpeter’s concept of economic development as qualitative change driven by the introduction of new combinations. The final goal is to contribute to the elaboration of an evolutionary agent based theory on inequality and development. We consider that the very enriching concept and work of Amartya Sen and other social choice, human development and inequality related authors tend to emphasize insufficiently evolutionary aspects of socioeconomic systems and their impacts on the opportunities of the actors to be active agents in the development processes. The evolution of the variety of local economic activities and social network structures (e.g. power, access to non-redundant information and finance) are decisive determinants for the people to be active agents and to adapt to the evolutionary changes of the socioeconomic systems they are living in.



Generating Collective Capabilities in Vietnam: How to encourage the participation of the rural poor into the poverty reduction process? [Members Only]
Mai Thi Hoang, Dao Vietnam Institute of Economics/University of Versailles Hanoi VN Submitted:		Considering the participation of the rural poor in the poverty reduction process, there are a strong linkage among their individual capabilities. In acting collectively, the collective capabilities of the group is created. This paper aims to analyze how the poor are able to become more active in acting together in the reducing poverty campaign, through some case studies. The first section analyses why the participation is needed for the poor. Next section describes the situation of the poor and the poverty reduction process. The last section demonstrates some perspectives on poverty reduction and poor’s participation in Vietnam.

The HDCA is on:
	Facebook	Flickr	LinkedIN