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This article provides information about the various measurements and meanings of human development:
The report addresses, as its main issue, the question of how economic growth translates or fails to translate into human development.
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The focus is on the people and on how development enlarges their choices. The report discusses the meaning and measurement of human development, proposing a new composite index.
1. 1991, Financing Human Development:
Lack of political commitment rather than financial resources is often the real cause of human development. This is the main conclusion of Human Development Report, 1991; the second in a series of annual reports on the subject.
2. 1992, Global Dimensions of Human Development:
The richest 20% of the population now receives 150 times the income of the poorest 20%. The Report suggests a two-pronged strategy to break away from this situation. First, making massive investments in their people and strengthening national technological capacity can enable some developing countries to acquire a strong competitive edge in international markets (witness the East Asian industrialising tigers). Second, there should be basic international reforms, including restructuring the Bretton Woods institutions and setting up a Development Security Council within the United Nations.
3. 1993, People’s Participation:
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The report examines how and to what extent people participate in the events and processes that shape their lives. It looks at three major means of peoples’ participation: people-friendly markets, decentralised governance and community organisations, especially NGOs, and suggests concrete policy measures to address the growing problems of increasing unemployment.
4. 1994, New Dimensions of Security:
The report introduces a new concept of human security which equates security with people rather than territories, with development rather than arms. It examines both the national and the global concerns of human security.
5. 1995, Gender and Human Development:
The report analyses the progress made in reducing gender disparities in the past few decades and highlights the wide and persistent gap between women’s expanding capabilities and limited opportunities. Two new measures are introduced for ranking countries on a global scale by their performance in gender equality and there follows an analysis of the undervaluation and non- recognition of the work of women. In conclusion, the report offers a five-point strategy for equalising gender opportunities in the decade ahead.
6. 1996, Economic Growth and Human Development:
The report argues that economic growth, if not properly managed, can be jobless, voiceless, ruthless, rootless and futureless, and thus detrimental to human development. The quality of growth is therefore as important as its quantity for poverty reduction, human development and sustainability.
7. 1997, Human Development to Eradicate Poverty:
Eradicating poverty everywhere is more than a moral imperative; it is rather a practical possibility. That is the most important message of the Human Development Report, 1997. The world has the resources and the know-how to create a poverty-free world in less than a generation.
8. 1998, Consumption for Human Development:
The high levels of consumption and production in the world today, the power and potential of technology and information, present great opportunities. After a century of vast material expansion, will leaders and people have the vision to seek and achieve more equitable and more human advance in the 21st century?
9. 1999, Globalisation with a Human Face:
Global markets, global technology, global ideas and global solidarity can enrich the lives of people everywhere. The challenge is to ensure that the benefits are shared equitably and that this increasing interdependence works for people— not just for profits. The report argues that Globalisation is not new, but that the present era of Globalisation, driven by competitive global markets, is outpacing the governance of markets and the repercussions on people.
10. 2000, Human Rights and Human Development:
Human Development Report, 2000 looks at human rights as an intrinsic part of development and at development as a means to realising human rights. It shows how human rights bring principles of accountability and social justice to the process of human development.
11. 2001, Making New Technologies Work for Human Development:
Technology networks are transforming the traditional map of development, expanding people’s horizons and creating the potential to realise in a decade progress that required generations in the past.
12. 2002, Deepening Democracy in a Fragmented World:
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This report is first and foremost about the idea that politics is as important to successful development as economics. Sustained poverty reduction requires equitable growth — but it also requires that poor people have political power. And the best way to achieve that in a manner consistent with human development objectives is by building strong and deep forms of democratic governance at all levels of society.
13. 2003, Millennium Development Goals: A Compact among Nations to End Human Poverty:
The range of human development in the world is vast and uneven, with astounding progress in some areas amidst stagnation and dismal decline in others. Balance and stability in the world will require the commitment of all nations, rich and poor, and a global development compact to extend the wealth of possibilities to all people.
14. 2004, Cultural Liberty in Today’s Diverse World:
Accommodating people’s growing demands for their inclusion in society, for respect of their ethnicity, religion, and language, takes more than democracy and equitable growth. Also needed are multicultural policies that recognise differences, champion diversity and promote cultural freedoms, so that all people can choose to speak their language, practice their religion, and participate in shaping their culture so that all people can choose to be who they are.
As we can see from the above accounts the reports have tried to capture the many aspects and choices that people have or do not have that go in to the making of development of a human being. Various indices have been developed over the time to be able to present a contrasting picture as well as to capture many aspects of human development. Thus, it seems that through these reports one can see the expanding ambit of development that addresses the changing processes, situations and choices that people have.