Human Development Class 12 Geography

Growth and Development

• Both growth and development refer to changes that occur over time, but they differ in their nature and outcomes.
• Growth is a quantitative measure of change, and is not inherently positive or negative. Development, on the other hand, is a qualitative change that is always positive in nature.
• Growth can result in either positive or negative outcomes, while development refers to positive growth.
• Dr. Mahbub-ul-Haq introduced the concept of human development, which he defined as a process that increases people's choices and improves their lives.
• Human development focuses on key areas such as access to resources, health, and education, which are crucial for building people's capabilities and expanding their opportunities.

The Fourth Pillars of Human Development

Human development has four key elements:

• Equity aims to ensure that everyone has equal access to opportunities, regardless of their gender, race, income, or caste.
• Sustainability means that opportunities should be available for future generations by making the most efficient use of environmental, financial, and human resources.
• Productivity refers to human labour productivity, which should be constantly enhanced through skill development.
• Empowerment involves giving individuals the freedom to make their own choices and expanding their capabilities. It is especially important to empower socially and economically disadvantaged groups.

Approaches to Human Development

• The income approach is one of the important approaches to Human Development. It suggests that the level of income a person has is a reflection of the level of freedom they have. The higher the income, the higher the level of human development.
• According to the welfare approach, the government should provide basic facilities such as health, education, and amenities to the people.
• The minimum needs approach emphasizes providing six basic needs, including health, education, food, water supply, sanitation, and housing.
• The capabilities approach, associated with Prof. Amartya Sen, is another important approach to Human Development. It emphasizes building human capabilities in areas such as health, education, and access to resources, which is crucial in increasing human development.

Measuring Human Development

• The Human Development Index (HDI) evaluates the countries based on their performance in key areas such as health, education, and access to resources.
• This evaluation is done based on a score between 0 to 1 that a country receives from its performance in these key areas.
• Health is assessed by measuring the life expectancy at birth, while the adult literacy rate and the gross enrollment ratio are considered for assessing access to knowledge.
• The purchasing power in US dollars is used to measure access to resources.
• The HDI is a composite of these dimensions and their assigned weights. A score closer to one indicates higher levels of human development.
• The Human Poverty Index is closely related to the HDI, which measures the gap in human development.
• The probability of not surviving till the age of 40, adult illiteracy rate, people without access to clean water, and the number of underweight children are considered to calculate the gap in human development in a region.
• The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has been publishing the Human Development Report since 1990, which includes the HDI and the Human Poverty Index.
• Bhutan is the only country to measure its progress using Gross National Happiness (GNH), which focuses on spiritual, non-material, and qualitative aspects of development.

International Comparisons

• The relationship between the size of a country's territory and its per capita income and human development is not direct.
• Based on their human development scores, countries can be categorized into four groups.

• In the 2018 Human Development Report, 59 countries were classified under the very high human development index group.
• The high human development group consists of 53 countries, which are characterized by significant investment in the social sector.
• The medium human development group comprises 39 countries, most of which have emerged after the Second World War and have been improving their human development score by implementing people-oriented policies and reducing social discrimination.
• On the other hand, 38 countries have low levels of human development, with many being small countries that have faced political turmoil, social instability, civil war, famine, or high incidence of diseases.