The paper explores the conditions making for success in Human Development (HD) in developing countries. For this purpose it defines success in HD in a materialistic and reductionist way as being measured by progress in improving life expectancy and reducing infant mortality rates. Drawing on...

The well-known Human Development Index (HDI) encompasses only three rather basic aspects of human welfare. This paper aims to go beyond this, by identifying 11 categories of human development. We next propose plausible candidates as indicators of these categories. We then estimate correlations...

Current thinking about development places individuals firmly at the centre of concern for analysis and policy. This paper explores why groups are important for individual welfare and social stability, and argues that horizontal inequalities (ie inequalities between culturally formed groups) is a...

Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSPs) have been introduced by the World Bank and the IMF as a necessary aspect of securing HIPC debt relief and access to other funds. They are intended to increase national 'ownership' of programmes, through extensive participation. This paper assesses...

The paper adopts a more expansive definition of Human Development than that encompassed by the Human Development Index and explores alternative patterns of country behavior in terms of this broader definition. We categorize countries according to their behavior on basic human development, and...

Income distribution is extremely important for development, since it influences the cohesion of society, determines the extent of poverty for any given average per capita income and the poverty-reducing effects of growth, and even affects people's health. The paper reviews the connections...

This paper explores the links between economic growth and human development, identifying two chains, one from economic growth to human development, and the other, conversely, from human development to economic growth. The various links in each chain are explored, together with a review of some...

This paper analyses the 'root' causes of complex humanitarian emergencies (CHEs) on the basis of studies conducted in a UNU/WIDER project on social and economic causes of CHEs; and identifies policies that appear relevant to the prevention of conflict. The paper regards horizontal inequality...

While there is worldwide agreement on poverty reduction as an overriding goal of development policy, there is little agreement on the definition of poverty. The paper reviews four approaches to the definition and measurement of poverty - the monetary, capability, social exclusion and...

This paper analyses major global economic influences on violent self-determination movements, distinguishing between those influences which affect the basic causes of violent SDMs from those that help sustain and finance such movements. While globalisation has been associated with economic...