Concepts of Human Development (Edexcel A Level Geography)

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Relationship Between Economic & Social Development

  • Development is the process of growth, or changing from one condition to another (hopefully for the better)

  • Since the 1980s, countries across the world have made progress in health, family size and life expectancy

  • However, there remains great inequality between countries e.g. Malawi and South Korea

Comparison of health indicators

Health Indicator

South Korea

UK

Malawi

 

1980

2014

1980

2014

1980

2014

Life expectancy (years)

66

82

74

81

45

63

Infant mortality per 1000 live births

12

3

12

4

152

43

Maternal mortality per 100,000 births

21 (1990)

11

10 (1990)

9

957 (1990)

460

A traditional economic development indicator

  • Traditionally, the growth of Gross Domestic Product(GDP) is used to measure progress:

    • GDP per capita is the monetary value of all goods and services produced by a country every year, divided by the population

    •  A high GDP per capita suggests a high-earning population and productive workforce, which aids advances in health and life expectancy

    • However, it is a crude average and masks the income gap between the rich and the poor

    • It doesn’t consider the informal economy e.g. 94% of Uganda’s population work in untaxed jobs

Using social development indicators

  •  There is more to development than economic growth

  •  Development should consider:

    • The advancement of human well-being

    • The sustainability of the planet

  •  Social development considers social measures, including:

    • Health (life expectancy, death rate, infant mortality)

    •  Education (literacy rate, number of schooling years)

  •  Measuring human development is complex, requiring more composite measures (using more than one indicator)

The Happy Planet Index

  •  Happy Planet Index (HPI) – a composite measure of sustainable well-being

  •   It doesn’t include economic development indicators / wealth

  •  Scored between 0-100. The higher the number, the better the level of sustainable human development

                          HPI =    fraction numerator space experienced space well minus being space straight x space life space expectancy over denominator Ecological space footprint space per space capita end fraction

  •  Experienced well-being – how satisfied people are with their lives (Gallup World Poll)

  •  Life expectancy - how long people on average live for (UN)

  • Ecological footprint per capita – the amount of land needed to sustain the country’s resource consumption (World Wildlife Fund)

A sample of national HPI values (2019)

High

HPI

Upper middle

HPI

Lower Middle

HPI

Low

HPI

Costa Rica

62.1

UK

56.0

Haiti

38.2

Zimbabwe

28.6

Vanuatu

60.4

Peru

55.9

Guinea

38.1

Lesotho

27.3

Colombia

60.2

Nicaragua

55.2

Burundi

37.7

Central African Republic

25.2

Switzerland

60.1

Tajikistan

55.2

USA

37.4

Mongolia

24.5

Ecuador

58.8

Netherlands

 54.9

Togo

37.3

Qatar

24.3

Data: New Economics Foundation

  • Costa Rica has frequently placed in 1st position, outdoing countries considered to be more developed

  • USA placed 122nd in the overall list, below many poverty-stricken countries eg. Haiti

  • The countries with the lowest HPI score are also considered amongst the least developed countries globally

  •  Criticisms of the HPI:

    • Well-being is highly subjective

    • Ecological footprints of the least developed countries could be lower as its citizens can’t afford to buy lots of material objects

Contesting the more traditional western approaches to measuring development

  • There are some governments who do not wish to adopt Western approaches to measuring development

  • They adopt alternative approaches

  • Sharia Law focuses on the importance of human welfare

  • This is a legal system which controls aspects of life within Muslim countries, such as Qatar, the UEA and Yemen

Diagram of sharia law for A level Geography
Sharia Law and development
  • Bolivia shows the importance of intervention by the national government 

bolivia
Impacts of intervention by national government
  • Despite significant improvements Bolivia remains one of the poorest countries in Latin America and over  6% of the population live on less than US$3.20 a day (2020)

Importance of Social Goals of Development

  • A prevailing view of development is there’s more to it than just economic indicators

  • Hans Rosling (co-founder of Gapminder) felt that future goals must improve on: 

    • Environmental quality e.g. air and water quality

    • The health and life expectancy of the poorest

    • Human rights (ie. rights for women)

  • He believed these goals could be achieved through economic growth, with a good and stable government

  • Through economic growth, governments can invest in healthcare and education

  •  Rosling also stressed that achieving the three goals empowers people to become more economically successful, driving economic growth forward

  • Improvements in environmental quality are seen as being vital to the well-being of both the physical world and its inhabitants

  • However, economic growth is frequently based on the exploitation of natural resources, which can cause detrimental impacts on the environment 

Importance of Education

Education aids development

  • Investing in education creates a literate and skilled workforce, which is crucial for countries wanting to economically develop

  • If countries invest in education and health:

    •  It increases the value of human capital (the economic, political, cultural and social skills within a country)

    •  Enables more people to participate effectively in society

  • This facilitates more economic and social development: 

    • better job 

    • higher wages 

    • more disposable income

    • increased quality of life

Education on human rights

  •  Human rights are the rights people are entitled to simply for being human

    • These basic rights (protected by law) are based on shared values and include:

      • Dignity

      • Fairness

      • Equality

      • Respect

      • Independence

  •  Education is the key to knowing and asserting your human rights

  •  Education enables a longer life as it enlightens people about:

    • Personal health

    • Hygiene

    • Diet

  • Part of the UN’s International Bill of Human Rights, signed by 163 countries, recognises the right to free primary education

    • The number of children attending school worldwide has improved

    • UNESCO estimates education is inaccessible to 60 million primary aged children

    • This mainly impacts children in Sub-Saharan Africa 

africa
Enrolment ratio for Africa in primary education (2016)

(Note - Total enrolment in primary education as a percentage of the population of official primary education age. The gross enrolment ratio may be greater than 100% due to early and late school entrance)

  • Barriers to education include:

    • Gender discrimination - there are 129 million girls worldwide without access to education; possible reasons are early marriage, pregnancy, religion

    • Extremism - Extreme religious groups often prevent children, especially females, from accessing education, such as the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan

    • Cultural identity - some cultures state that the sexes should be separated where possible, so a lack of female teachers means less education for girls

    • Poverty - some families prevent their children from attending school, instead sending them to work from an early age

  • The case of Nobel Prize laureate, Malala Yousafzai, illustrates the ignorance and violence that prevents females from exercising their right to education in Pakistan

  • Malala Yousafzai was shot in the head by a Taliban gunman in an assassination attempt to stop her campaign over the right of girls to be educated

  • In much of Africa and South Asia, the female literacy rate is more than a quarter below that for males

Worked Example

The total number of children aged 6-17 in Madagascar was 8.9 million.
The number of children who were enrolled in school was 5.8 million.

Calculate the percentage of children who were enrolled in school to one decimal place.

You must show your working.

[2 Marks]

  • Calculating and having an understanding of % of a whole and % growth and decline are fundamental to geography, as well as working out simple % figures as seen in this exam question

  • The best answers will show the working out, as well as the answer. The answer given will be to one decimal place

Answer:

(1) for working and (1) for correct answer (to one decimal place) 

5.8 ÷ 8.9 x100 (1) 
= 65.2% (1) 


No working, correct answer (1) 
Accept other working that leads to a correct answer (1,1) 
Correct working but wrong numbers (1) 
Answer must be correct to one decimal place. 

Examiner Tips and Tricks

Before the exam, check you can do basic calculations e.g. mean, mode, range, percentages, ratios, fractions
If you find these tricky, have a look at the question as you may be able to score 1 mark by setting out the working

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