Development?

I often get reminded of a radiant sunrise when people talk about development. Development, like sunrise, is a highly positive word. You feel happy when you see both of them. They don't just shut down darkness, they throw light into people's lives. But development, unlike sunrise, still lacks a universally accepted definition.

Debates defining development are endless. Mahbub ul Haq, the founder of the Human Development Report, UNDP, has a fabulous answer:

"The basic purpose of development is to enlarge people's choices. In principle, these choices can be infinite and can change over time. People often value achievements that do not show up at all, or not immediately, in income or growth figures: greater access to knowledge, better nutrition and health services, more secure livelihoods, security against crime and physical violence, satisfying leisure hours, political and cultural freedoms and sense of participation in community activities. The objective of development is to create an enabling environment for people to enjoy long, healthy and creative lives."

This way of looking at development, often forgotten in the immediate concern with accumulating commodities and financial wealth, is not new. Philosophers, economists and political leaders have long emphasized human well-being as the purpose, the end, of development.

As Aristotle said in ancient Greece, “Wealth is evidently not the good we are seeking, for it is merely useful for the sake of something else.”

The world today is looking at development with this new eye. Development is not just charity. If charity alone can address development, then the 2.3 trillion dollars of money pumped by the west into the developing world in the last 2 decades should have eradicated poverty. But all good that charity did was to create a meager 8% social impact. Instead, it stole dignity. It constricted people's choices. It bred dependency.

Today, entrepreneurs talk about market-based solutions to poverty, foundations are shifting their focus from traditional charity to "social investments" in for-profit entities and corporates aim at achieving double and triple bottom-lines protecting the social and environmental contexts. Business in the social sector is the norm of the day and people celebrate the idea of social entrepreneurship.

This blog will contemplate, celebrate, debate and disseminate information about the fabulous things happening in the developmental sector. It's a huge and happening space, yet very little is known to the world outside.

My hypothesis is that everybody loves to make amendments, but ignorance curtails action. Mere awareness can actuate amazing things.

Let me demonstrate!