Flavio Comim

The capability approach : concepts, measures and applications

List of figures List of tables Introduction 1. Using the capability approach: prospective and evaluative analyses Sabina Alkire Part I. Concepts: 2. Amartya Sens capability view: insightful sketch or distorted picture? Mozaffar Qizilbash 3. Sens capability approach and feminist concerns Ingrid Robeyns 4. Beyond individual freedom and agency: structures of living together in the capability approach to development Severine Deneulin 5. Does identity matter? On the relevance of identity and interaction for capabilities Miriam Teschl and Laurent Derobert 6. Measuring Capabilities Flavio Comim Part II. Measures: 7. Do concepts matter? An empirical investigation of the differences between a capability and a monetary assessment of poverty Caterina Ruggeri Laderchi 8. Social exclusion in the EU: a capability-based approach Fotis Papadopoulos and Panos Tsakloglou 9. Complexity and vagueness in the capability approach: strengths or weaknesses? Enrica Chiappero Martinetti 10. Operationalising Sens capability approach: the influence of the selected technique Sara Lelli 11. Operationalizing capabilities in a segmented society: the role of institutions Kanchan Chopra and Anantha Kumar Duraiappah Part III. Applications: 12. Democracy, decentralisation and access to basic services: an elaboration on Sens capability approach Santosh Mehrotra 13. Reinforcing households capabilities as a way to reduce vulnerability and prevent poverty in equitable terms Jean-Luc Dubois and Sophie Rousseau 14. Capabilities over the lifecourse: at what age does poverty damage most? Shahin Yaqub 15. Social policy and the ability to appear in public without shame: some lessons from a food relief programme in Kinshasa Tom De Herdt 16. The capability approach and gendered education:some issues of operationalisation in the context of the HIV/AIDs epidemic in South Africa Elaine Unterhalter 17. Women and poverty In Mozambique: is there a gender bias In capabilities, employment conditions and living standards? Pier Giogio Ardeni and Antonio Andracchio 18. From the quantity to the quality of employment: an application of the capability approach to the Chilean labour market Kirsten Sehnbruch Index.

Adaptive Preferences and Capabilities: Some Preliminary Conceptual Explorations

The Capability Approach (CA) as developed by Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum, has in part been a response to the problem of adaptive preferences. Their argument says that people might adapt to certain unfavorable circumstances and any self-evaluation in terms of satisfaction or happiness will in this case necessarily be distorted. To evaluate peoples well-being in terms of functionings and capabilities guarantees a more objective picture of peoples life. Next to this strong criticism on subjective measurements of well-being, we observe an increasing interest in Subjective Well-Being (SWB) or Happiness studies that are included in the broader field of Hedonic Psychology. In this paper, we thus revise the original critique of adaptive preferences and compare it with a more detailed analysis of adaptation as it is presented in hedonic psychology. It becomes clear that adaptation can be a positive as well as a negative phenomenon and that the adaptive preference critique had a particular narrow view on adaptation. However, this does not mean SWB-research is not any longer susceptible to this critique. An alternative way to assess peoples subjective well-being, but which could be considered to be more in line with the CA, is proposed by Daniel Kahnemans Objective Happiness. These are all relatively new considerations, especially in economics. Therefore much more research needs to be done on the positive and negative aspects of adaptation to understand its consequences on well-being – especially when evaluated within the capability-space.

Capabilities and Happiness: Potential Synergies

The paper compares two prominent approaches to assessing Human Well-Being, the Capability Approach and the Subjective Well-Being Approach. It investigates the differences and the similarities between these approaches. An argument is made for exploring the potential synergies between them. Finally, the papers of this special edition are briefly introduced.

Children’s Agency and the Capability Approach: A Conceptual Framework

The aim of this chapter is to explore the possibilities for fruitfully using the capability approach (CA) as a theoretical foundation for understanding children as subjects of human development. This means considering children not simply as recipients of freedoms, but as active social actors and agents in their communities with their own priorities, strategies and aspirations. By doing so, we hope to contribute to the current theoretical debate on the assessment of children’s well-being with a simple and useful framework. Our overarching goal is to improve policies towards children’s well-being.

The Capability Approach and Research on Children: Capability Approach and Children’s Issues

The objective of this chapter is to show that the Capability Approach can serve as an appropriate conceptual framework and a normative tool to analyse children’s well-being and other relevant children’s issues. To meet this objective, the second section reviews the literature on children and the Capability Approach with a special focus on empirical analyses. The third section concentrates on the capability framework and on how “new” concepts need to be introduced within it to improve the analysis of children’s issues. The fourth section reinforces our observations by recalling some of our main initial empirical findings and the conclusions reiterate some of the core results.

Introduction — Theoretical Foundations and the Book’s Roadmap

Childhood and adolescence are periods in life that are distinct for a variety of reasons. It is during the early years of life that individuals experience the most important cognitive and emotional developments that subsequently shape their identity and world-views. The capabilities of children and adolescents are formed through social interaction and receptiveness within the household and broader environments, and constitute to a large extent the foundation of a human being’s development. This means that understanding and assessing children’s and adolescents’ well-being cannot successfully be pursued by viewing them as miniature adults. Moreover, understanding adults’ well-being might not be possible without reference to these early stages in life. As a result, what might appear to be a simple technical question — namely, what is the most appropriate way of assessing children’s well-being? — may turn out to be a real challenge. To help address this challenge, this book develops the capability approach (CA) as a conceptual framework for understanding children’s well-being.

Poverty Reduction through Microfinance: A Capability Perspective

The importance of assessing the impact of microfinance schemes on poverty reduction cannot be overestimated. Poverty reduction is the raison-d’etre of microfinance. It is because other forms of finance are not usually accessible to the poor (due to high transaction costs, the poor’s lack of collateral, etc) that microfinance has been explored as a possible solution to poverty reduction. But it is more than that. The assumption underlying this argument is that poverty is partly explained by lack of economic opportunities and that microfinance can provide a sustainable path towards viable surviving economic strategies. Therefore, microfinance can be important not only because it can lead to poverty reduction but mainly because it promotes, in a non-patronizing and decentralized way, economic alternatives to the poor that are in principle more sustainable (permanent) in the long-run. Microfinance can be compared with other poverty reduction initiatives based on paternalistic concessions (e.g., basic income programmes) that are a priori unsustainable in the long-run because they are dependent on a continuous inflow of resources.

The Santa Fe approach to complexity: a Marshallian evaluation

The paper examines the characteristics of the ‘Santa Fe approach’ (hereafter SFA) to complexity and attempts its evaluation in terms of the Marshallian intellectual tradition. The paper is organised into three parts. The first part outlines the main features of the SFA The second describes Marshall’s views on complexity and his appeal to common sense as a way to apply economic reasoning (on complex systems) in practice. The last part argues that Marshall’s views on complexity, rather than just being a historical precedent for the SFA, consist in an original illustration of the role of judgement in the use of economic theory.

Capabilities, Gender, Equality: Towards Fundamental Entitlements

Preface Introduction: capabilities, challenges, and the omnipresence of political liberalism Martha C. Nussbaum Part I. The Capabilities Approach: 1. Perfectionist liberalism and political liberalism Martha C. Nussbaum 2. Rawlsian social-contract theory and the severely disabled Henry S. Richardson 3. Logos, pathos and ethos in Martha C. Nussbaums capabilities approach to human development Des Gasper 4. Building capabilities: a new paradigm for human development Flavio Comim 5. Capabilities or functionings? Anatomy of a debate Marc Fleurbaey 6. From humans to all of life: Nussbaums transformation of dignity Jeremy Bendik-Keymer Part II. Gender: 7. Questioning the gender-based division of labour: the contribution of the capabilities approach to feminist economics Ulrike Knoblock 8. Primary goods, capabilities, and the millennium development target for gender equity in education Elaine Unterhalter and Harry Brighouse 9. The weight of institutions on womens capabilities: how far can microfinance help? Muriel Gilardone, Isabelle Guerin and Jane Palier 10. The capabilities of women: towards an alternative framework for development Santosh Mehrotra 11. Applying the capabilities approach to disability, poverty, and gender Patricia Welch Saleeby 12. Educational transformation, gender justice and Nussbaums capabilities Melanie Walker 13. The social contract, unpaid child care and womens income capability Hilde Bojer Part III. Equality: 14. Lists and thresholds: comparing the Doyal-Gough theory of human need with Nussbaums capabilities approach Ian Gough 15. Nussbaum, Rawls, and the ecological limits of justice: using capability ceilings to resolve capability conflicts Breena Holland 16. Social justice and Nussbaums concept of the person John M. Alexander 17. God and Martha C. Nussbaum: towards a Reformed Christian view of capabilities Jonathan Warner Index.

Final Remarks and Conclusions: The Promotion of Children’s Active Participation

This book tries to show that a new conceptual framework and shift in policy design is required to help promote children’s well-being and enhance their “evolving capabilities”. The arguments in this book have been developed and refined following workshops, seminars and conferences held over a number of years and are likely to be the subject of future debate. The chapters in this book represent a wide range of perspectives and have been written by people from various countries with different disciplinary backgrounds, methodologies and life experiences. However, all are committed to working towards a more just world in which children can be respected as active agents in their own right. For this reason we would like to end this book with some thoughts that put our commitment to changing the world through a “child-centred CA” into perspective. We also reflect on the goals that need to be achieved to make this a reality.