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October 25, 2005

Dr. Sabina Alkire speaks on ethical economics and its link to human development

With a forceful yet contained passion, Dr. Sabina Alkire introduced an audience of about 50 Fletcher students to a new way to look at economics and its relationship human development.

“Contrary to its public persona, economics is a passionately ethical subject. And the great economists are passionately ethical thinkers,” Alkire said.

Alkire, who received her doctorate in Economics at Oxford and is currently a research associate at Harvard’s Global Initiatives Studies Program, gave a talk on “Dimensions for Human Development: Ethics and Economics.” The October 18 event was arranged by Professor John Hammock in conjunction with Fletcher’s International Development Club.

Alkire pointed to John Maynard Keynes, father of Keynesian economics, who was influenced by the unstable peace after World War I and the Great Depression, as an example of the many economists who have wanted to use economics to promote peace and development.

Alkire told students that the roots of economics deal with the question of “how one should live” and “how to achieve the human good” – the first defines human fulfillment and the second is the link to human development.

“Human development represents a shift in the objectives of economic activity from economic growth to human fulfillment,” Alkire said.

An example of this approach is Noble Laureate Amartya Sen’s capability approach, Alkire said. She said Sen defines human development through three main ideas. First, people are the ends of economic development and not the means. Second, there is a need to increase people’s freedom by providing choices that matter to them, and finally people should be the agents of their own development and not passive bystanders.

“The same choices that Brazilians value may not be valued in China; women may have different values than men . . . So given this human diversity, people themselves need the freedom to make something of development that they personally value,” Alkire said.

According to Alkire, human development includes all changes that people have a reason to value and the key is to determine what it is that people want - what she calls the “dimensions of human development.”

Alkire has found many commonalities in surveys of “lists” of basic human needs, aspects of well-being, and universal values compiled by practioners and researchers. The composite lists make a good starting point for further work, she said. She also referred to Sen’s grassroots methodology of asking people why they chose to value certain things.

When asked how to respond to people who chose to value things that are cruel, Alkire admitted that there were no clear answers, but suggested use of Sen’s constructive value participation method which encourages dialogue about value choices.

Alkire said the next step is to determine how economics can fulfill human development.

“I have tried to argue ethics and economics have always been united. I have pointed out there is a demand in economics for what are the dimensions of human development.”

She is setting up a research center that will assimilate human development work and research using this approach and build appropriate economic strategies.

Alkire is also currently working with Professor Hammock to implement a program on ethics, economics and development at Fletcher. Alkire helped found the Human Development and Capabilities Association and serves as its secretary. She is the author of a series of articles on economic development, poverty reduction and the ethics of development and is the author of Valuing Freedom and most recently, What One Person Can Do: Faith to Heal a Broken World.

Article by Aisha Husain, MALD '07

Posted by jessica at October 25, 2005 11:37 AM