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| Listen to Michael Green on TED by clicking1 pn225 |
First, a description and overview, and then more detail on NZ, Fiji, Solomon Islands and PNG.
The wellbeing of people in different countries relative to their past performances and each other is most often measured by a nation's GDP per capita, the distribution of incomes or similar economic indicators.
The Social Progress Index has a very different and arguably more accurate measure of wellbeing, because it is based on a large number of direct social and environmental outcomes.
Published by the US nonprofit Social Progress Imperative ─ and based on the writings of Amartya Sen, regarded as the greatest ever Indian economist, the late Douglass North, American economic historian and Nobel prize winner,and Joseph Stiglitz, another American Nobel prize winner and former World Bank chief economist now critical of the management of globalization, the "free market" and international institutions such as the World Bank and the IMF ─ it measures the extent to which countries provide for the social and environmental needs of their citizens. It complements, and does not seek to replace, economic measures such as GDP.
The SPI, first published in 2014, uses 51 indicators grouped in three categories to show
the current status and progress of 146 countries which together account for over 98% of the world's population. The categories, and their indicators, are:
1. Provision of Basic Human Needs
Food security
Basic health care
Personal safety
Adequate water, sanitation and shelter
2. The foundations of Well-being
Access to knowledge, information and communications
Extended health services
Quality of environment - air, rivers, renewable energy
3. Degrees of opportunity
Personal rights, choice, inclusiveness for minorities
Access to disability services
Advanced education
The 2018 report saw 133 countries had improved their level of social progress since 2014, some significantly despite economic and geopolitical challenges, while six, including the USA, declined, and overall progress was slow and uneven. The world is underperforming compared to what global average GDP per capita suggests is possible. This signals that we have the resources to be better and that rising GDP figures are masking the real problems societies face and struggles of ordinary people. Worldwide progress was uneven. Shelter, access to information and communications, and advanced education were fast improving, while personal rights and inclusiveness declined.
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Listen to Michael Green on these TED videos for the best introductions click 1 and then 2 and this link for ten articles on New Zealand, which show its meaning for business, cities and regions, Maori wellbeing, helping at-risk families, and other matters.
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The 146 counties are grouped in six tiers, from best to worst.
In 2018 Tier 1.had Norway first. NZ came 10th, followed by Sweden, Ireland, the UK and Canada 14th.
Tier 2 was headed by Australia 15th, with Singapore 22nd, the USA 25th, Israel 30th.
Tier 3 included the UAE 45th, Russia 60th, and Cuba 63rd.
Tier 4, had South Africa at 77th, Fiji 84th, China 87th and India 100th.
Tier 5 included the Solomon Islands, and Tier 6 had PNG at 138th.
In 2018 NZ was underperforming, relative to expectations (SPI 1oth of 146; GDPpc 25th of 146), on child mortality, gender parity in secondary schools, equality of political power by social group, greenhouse gas emissions and biome protection. It overperformed on most basic human needs, access to information and communications, personal freedom and choice, and inclusiveness (acceptance of gays and lesbians, discrimination and violence against minorities, and equality of political power by gender. https://www.socialprogress.org/?tab=2&code=NZL
Fiji was underperforming on maternal mortality, gender parity in secondary schools, freedom of expression, property rights for women, access to online governance, access to independent media, life expectancy at 60, premature deaths from non-communicable diseases, equality of political power by gender, and by socio-economic position, biome protection.
It overperformed on low child stunting (impaired growth and development due to poor nutrition, repeated infection, and inadequate psychosocial stimulation), access to quality education, personal safety, and few deaths from air pollution. https://www.socialprogress.org/?tab=2&code=FJI
Solomon Islands underperformed on access to essential health services, premature death from non-communicable diseases, life expectancy at 60, rural sanitation, deaths from household air pollutants, freedom of religion, equality of political power by gender, biome protection. It overperformed on nutrition and basic medical care, maternal and child mortality and child stunting, deaths from infectious diseases, and oudoor pollutants, average women's age at school, and access to advanced education,
https://www.socialprogress.org/?tab=2&code=SLB
PNG is a vast country with considerable natural resources but most parts only became part of the world economy in the 1930s, and many areas are still basically remote and tribal. Understandably, it is the least developed country in the South Pacific. Its social progress indicators showed it underperformed on nutrition and basic medical care, maternal and child mortality and child stunting. Secondary school enrolments, especially for girls, was low, and access to
quality education limited. It had poor access to safe and piped water and basic sanitation. Most dwellings lacked electricity and deaths from household air pollution was higher than expected. Also poorer than expected were life expectancy at 60, deaths from non-communicable diseases, and access to essential health services. For environmental quality there was poor wastewater treatment and biome protection and high levels of greenhouse gas emissions. Personal rights and freedoms were much as expected except for poor access to justice and poor political equality by gender.
PNG did not overperform on any indicator but most were "neutral" or as expected.
https://www.socialprogress.org/?tab=2&code=PNG
--ACW
Comment too big to put in comments
Dear Croz,
I don’t know where these sentences came from in your latest posting but it is nonsense to say that ` PNG is a vast country with considerable natural resources but most parts only became part of the world economy in the 1930s, and many areas are still basically remote and tribal. Understandably, it is the least developed country in the South Pacific’.
It would take too long to say how and why this is inaccurate in nearly all respects but it really is a replica of late colonial imagery `the land that time forgot’ and other clichés, including the country of hundreds of languages, riven by tribal fighting. If this is the sort of conclusion the Social Progress Initiative comes up with, your readers would be advised to spend their time doing serious reading about the subject and ignore such drivel. The amalgam of Amartya Sen, Douglas North and Joseph Stiglitz is not just a quaint one, given their vast political ideological differences but one over-burdened with economists, practitioners of the dismal science. Please keep in mind what another economist J K Galbraith said about economic forecasting, that its only function is to make astrology look respectable. Social progress indicators for explaining and predicting are a bit like tarot cards.
A few current details about PNG. The cash economy includes over 90% of the country’s population, and shells are now used, if at all, for display and tourist souvenirs. In the 1960s in the Highlands, shells with little commercial value were ground up for chicken feed.The use of mobile phones, tablets etc, for a country many times larger and more difficult to cover than any other in the South Pacific, is widespread. Much of the poverty is not due to the fact it is least developed but precisely the opposite, the form in which it is has been developed, particularly since the 1980s when mineral exports began to dominate its political economy. PNG’s surface area is over 460,000 square kilometres while Fiji’s is only 18, 270. The size of PNG’s economy is more than four times that of Fiji, and many more times that of every other South Pacific country. Its population is now over 8 million, when it was `only’ one and a half to two million at Independence in 1975. Fiji has about one tenth of PNG’s population.
In 2015-16, PNG’s national debt per capita was one third that of Fiji, USD 819 to USD 2,485. Not in the official indicators, but in PNG wealth is probably far more unevenly distributed than in any other South Pacific country. First Independence Prime Minister (Chief) (Sir) Michael Somare was a business associate, investing in the USA, with Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara. During the 1990s, former Prime Minister and Highlands businessman Paias Wingti was claimed to be the South Pacific’s first billionaire in US dollars. The current Prime Minister is currently much more wealthy than any Fiji businessman. PNG, like Fiji, are both internationalised political economies with characteristics which would be recognisable in the USA, UK, Australia and any other so-called developed country with vast differences in wealth and equally obvious poverty.
On the other side of the wealth explosion, what is now called tribal fighting bears no resemblance to its name sake. Almost eliminated under colonial rule’s development policies and superior arms, it re-emerged in the late 1960s and 1970s as that rule was being removed and land shortages became prevalent. These shortages were in substantial measure a product of the success of colonial agricultural policy to stimulate export crop and domestic food production: in the Highlands people fought over land close to roads etc to grow cash crops on. More recently, tribal fighting, including the revolt on Bougainville have been incited by mineral development and the rapid fluctuations in international agricultural prices. Poverty too, plays its part in further stimulating fighting carried out with AK47s and other guns, with spears, bows and arrows light weaponry. Now witchcraft has made a foul re-emergence on the back of capitalism’s disorders.
I could go on but this should be enough to begin with. In short, please compare like with like and ignores these facile descriptions of PNG taken from official, often dated publications.
Best wishes,
Scott MacWilliam
Thanks Scott. I don't agree with your comments on the Social Progress Index
but welcome your PNG comments. Croz
i
In 2018 Tier 1.had Norway first. NZ came 10th, followed by Sweden, Ireland, the UK and Canada 14th.
Tier 2 was headed by Australia 15th, with Singapore 22nd, the USA 25th, Israel 30th.
Tier 3 included the UAE 45th, Russia 60th, and Cuba 63rd.
Tier 4, had South Africa at 77th, Fiji 84th, China 87th and India 100th.
Tier 5 included the Solomon Islands, and Tier 6 had PNG at 138th.
In 2018 NZ was underperforming, relative to expectations (SPI 1oth of 146; GDPpc 25th of 146), on child mortality, gender parity in secondary schools, equality of political power by social group, greenhouse gas emissions and biome protection. It overperformed on most basic human needs, access to information and communications, personal freedom and choice, and inclusiveness (acceptance of gays and lesbians, discrimination and violence against minorities, and equality of political power by gender. https://www.socialprogress.org/?tab=2&code=NZL
Fiji was underperforming on maternal mortality, gender parity in secondary schools, freedom of expression, property rights for women, access to online governance, access to independent media, life expectancy at 60, premature deaths from non-communicable diseases, equality of political power by gender, and by socio-economic position, biome protection.
It overperformed on low child stunting (impaired growth and development due to poor nutrition, repeated infection, and inadequate psychosocial stimulation), access to quality education, personal safety, and few deaths from air pollution. https://www.socialprogress.org/?tab=2&code=FJI
Solomon Islands underperformed on access to essential health services, premature death from non-communicable diseases, life expectancy at 60, rural sanitation, deaths from household air pollutants, freedom of religion, equality of political power by gender, biome protection. It overperformed on nutrition and basic medical care, maternal and child mortality and child stunting, deaths from infectious diseases, and oudoor pollutants, average women's age at school, and access to advanced education,
PNG is a vast country with considerable natural resources but most parts only became part of the world economy in the 1930s, and many areas are still basically remote and tribal. Understandably, it is the least developed country in the South Pacific. Its social progress indicators showed it underperformed on nutrition and basic medical care, maternal and child mortality and child stunting. Secondary school enrolments, especially for girls, was low, and access to
quality education limited. It had poor access to safe and piped water and basic sanitation. Most dwellings lacked electricity and deaths from household air pollution was higher than expected. Also poorer than expected were life expectancy at 60, deaths from non-communicable diseases, and access to essential health services. For environmental quality there was poor wastewater treatment and biome protection and high levels of greenhouse gas emissions. Personal rights and freedoms were much as expected except for poor access to justice and poor political equality by gender.
PNG did not overperform on any indicator but most were "neutral" or as expected.
https://www.socialprogress.org/?tab=2&code=PNG
--ACW
Comment too big to put in comments
Dear Croz,
I don’t know where these sentences came from in your latest posting but it is nonsense to say that ` PNG is a vast country with considerable natural resources but most parts only became part of the world economy in the 1930s, and many areas are still basically remote and tribal. Understandably, it is the least developed country in the South Pacific’.
It would take too long to say how and why this is inaccurate in nearly all respects but it really is a replica of late colonial imagery `the land that time forgot’ and other clichés, including the country of hundreds of languages, riven by tribal fighting. If this is the sort of conclusion the Social Progress Initiative comes up with, your readers would be advised to spend their time doing serious reading about the subject and ignore such drivel. The amalgam of Amartya Sen, Douglas North and Joseph Stiglitz is not just a quaint one, given their vast political ideological differences but one over-burdened with economists, practitioners of the dismal science. Please keep in mind what another economist J K Galbraith said about economic forecasting, that its only function is to make astrology look respectable. Social progress indicators for explaining and predicting are a bit like tarot cards.
A few current details about PNG. The cash economy includes over 90% of the country’s population, and shells are now used, if at all, for display and tourist souvenirs. In the 1960s in the Highlands, shells with little commercial value were ground up for chicken feed.The use of mobile phones, tablets etc, for a country many times larger and more difficult to cover than any other in the South Pacific, is widespread. Much of the poverty is not due to the fact it is least developed but precisely the opposite, the form in which it is has been developed, particularly since the 1980s when mineral exports began to dominate its political economy. PNG’s surface area is over 460,000 square kilometres while Fiji’s is only 18, 270. The size of PNG’s economy is more than four times that of Fiji, and many more times that of every other South Pacific country. Its population is now over 8 million, when it was `only’ one and a half to two million at Independence in 1975. Fiji has about one tenth of PNG’s population.
In 2015-16, PNG’s national debt per capita was one third that of Fiji, USD 819 to USD 2,485. Not in the official indicators, but in PNG wealth is probably far more unevenly distributed than in any other South Pacific country. First Independence Prime Minister (Chief) (Sir) Michael Somare was a business associate, investing in the USA, with Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara. During the 1990s, former Prime Minister and Highlands businessman Paias Wingti was claimed to be the South Pacific’s first billionaire in US dollars. The current Prime Minister is currently much more wealthy than any Fiji businessman. PNG, like Fiji, are both internationalised political economies with characteristics which would be recognisable in the USA, UK, Australia and any other so-called developed country with vast differences in wealth and equally obvious poverty.
On the other side of the wealth explosion, what is now called tribal fighting bears no resemblance to its name sake. Almost eliminated under colonial rule’s development policies and superior arms, it re-emerged in the late 1960s and 1970s as that rule was being removed and land shortages became prevalent. These shortages were in substantial measure a product of the success of colonial agricultural policy to stimulate export crop and domestic food production: in the Highlands people fought over land close to roads etc to grow cash crops on. More recently, tribal fighting, including the revolt on Bougainville have been incited by mineral development and the rapid fluctuations in international agricultural prices. Poverty too, plays its part in further stimulating fighting carried out with AK47s and other guns, with spears, bows and arrows light weaponry. Now witchcraft has made a foul re-emergence on the back of capitalism’s disorders.
I could go on but this should be enough to begin with. In short, please compare like with like and ignores these facile descriptions of PNG taken from official, often dated publications.
Best wishes,
Scott MacWilliam
Thanks Scott. I don't agree with your comments on the Social Progress Index
but welcome your PNG comments. Croz
i
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