International comparisons and alternative measures of well-being

Detail

1. What international comparisons show

• Human Development Index (HDI): a UNDP score from 0 to 1. It combines three things:
• health, measured by life expectancy at birth
• education, measured by mean years of schooling and expected years of schooling

• standard of living, measured by Gross National Income per person

• NCERT's main point: a country's size of territory and its per capita income (average income per person) do not decide its human development.

• Smaller and relatively poorer countries can rank above larger, richer ones.
• They do this by spending well on health and education (the "social sectors").

• Some high-income countries with weak social sectors rank lower than their income would suggest.

• Why some countries score high and others score low:

Feature	High-HDI countries	Low-HDI countries
Social spending	Large and steady investment in health and education	Low investment
Governance	Stable government	Political turmoil, civil war
Shocks	Few	Famine and disease outbreaks are common
Result	Long lives, more schooling, higher incomes	Short lives, low schooling, poverty

• The two run in a cycle:
• Stable government → steady spending on schools and hospitals → healthier, better-educated people → higher HDI.
• Conflict or famine → money goes to survival and war → schools and clinics collapse → HDI stays low.

2. The world map of human development

• Very high HDI:
• Europe, North America (USA, Canada), Australia
• Japan and South Korea in East Asia

• The Gulf states of West Asia, such as the UAE, Qatar and Saudi Arabia. Their oil income pays for social services.

• Low HDI:

• These countries are mostly in sub-Saharan Africa (Africa south of the Sahara Desert).
• The lowest-ranked are South Sudan, Somalia, the Central African Republic, Niger and Chad.

• Most of them have had civil war, drought or famine, which fits NCERT's explanation.

• South Asia is mostly in the medium group.

• Sri Lanka is in the high group and ranks above India. It has long spent on free health care and education.

• India in HDR 2025:

• Title of the report: "A Matter of Choice: People and Possibilities in the Age of AI" [2]
• India ranks 130 out of 193 countries. Its rank was 133 for 2022 and 130 for 2023 [2].
• India's HDI value rose from 0.676 (2022) to 0.685 (2023). This keeps India in the medium group [2].
• A country needs an HDI of 0.700 or more to count as "high". India is now close to that line [2].
• India's rank went up mainly because mean years of schooling and national income per person improved [2].
• India's life expectancy is the highest it has been since the index began, which shows recovery after the COVID-19 pandemic [2].

3. NCERT activity: corruption and HDI

• NCERT asks students to compare a country's corruption ranking with its HDI score.

• The usual corruption ranking is Transparency International's Corruption Perceptions Index, which scores how corrupt each country's public sector is believed to be.

• What students usually find:

• Countries seen as less corrupt, like the Nordic states, tend to have very high HDI.

• Countries seen as highly corrupt are often in the low-HDI group.

• Why the two are linked:

• Corruption → money meant for schools and hospitals is lost → poor public services → lower HDI.

4. Gross National Happiness (Bhutan)

• Gross National Happiness (GNH): a way of judging progress by how happy and well people are, not only by how much the economy produces.
• Origin:
• The idea came from Bhutan's fourth king, Jigme Singye Wangchuck, in the 1970s.
• His famous line: "GNH is more important than GNP". GNP (Gross National Product) is the total value of goods and services a country's people produce.

• Bhutan has valued national happiness above national income since the early 1970s. It chose GNH, not GNP, as its policy goal [3].

• Four pillars of GNH:

Pillar	Meaning
Well-being (fair, sustainable socio-economic development)	Growth that reaches everyone and can last
Cultural preservation	Protecting Bhutanese traditions, language and values
Good governance	Honest, fair and responsive government
Environmental conservation	Protecting forests, rivers and wildlife

• The GNH Index came into use from 2008. It has nine domains (areas it measures):

• psychological well-being, health, education, time use, cultural diversity and resilience, good governance, community vitality, ecological diversity and resilience, and living standards.

• GNH is written into Bhutan's Constitution of 2008. Article 9 tells the state to work for conditions that allow GNH.

• Bhutan is a landlocked Himalayan country between India and China (Tibet). This helps explain the pillars:
• Its small population and Buddhist traditions shape the focus on culture.
• Its forests and mountains shape the focus on conservation.

5. From GNH to the United Nations

• 2011: the UN General Assembly passed a resolution called "Happiness: towards a holistic approach to development". It asked member states to measure happiness and well-being, not only income.
• 2012: Resolution 66/281, adopted on 12 July 2012, created the International Day of Happiness, held every year on 20 March [3].
• Bhutan proposed this resolution [3].
• The day was first observed in 2013 [3].
• It calls happiness "a fundamental human goal". It asks for "a more inclusive, equitable and balanced approach to economic growth" [3].

6. World Happiness Report (WHR)

• World Happiness Report: a yearly ranking of countries by how people rate their own lives.

• It is based on subjective life evaluations: in the Gallup World Poll, people score their life on a ladder from 0 (worst possible life) to 10 (best possible life).

• The report started in 2012, following the 2011 UN General Assembly resolution.

• Results in the 2025 report:
• Finland came first for the eighth year in a row.

• India ranked 118th.

• How WHR differs from HDI:

Feature	HDI (UNDP)	World Happiness Report
Started	1990	2012
Data	Objective figures: life expectancy, schooling, income	People's own rating of their lives (Gallup)
Measures	What people are able to be and do (their capabilities)	How satisfied people feel
India's position	130/193 (HDR 2025) [2]	118th (2025)

7. Global Gender Gap Index

• Global Gender Gap Index: a score from the World Economic Forum (WEF), published since 2006. It shows how close women are to men in four areas, where 1 (or 100%) means full parity (equality).
• Economic participation and opportunity: jobs, pay and senior roles
• Educational attainment: literacy and enrolment
• Health and survival: sex ratio at birth and healthy life expectancy

• Political empowerment: women in Parliament and ministries, and years with a woman head of state

• Iceland leads the index.

• India in 2025:
• India ranked 131 of 148 countries.
• Its weakest area is economic participation, because few women are in paid work and women earn less than men.

Prelims Hooks

• India's rank in HDR 2025 is 130 of 193, with an HDI of 0.685. It is in the medium group, and the line for "high" is 0.700 [2].
• The title of HDR 2025 is "A Matter of Choice: People and Possibilities in the Age of AI" [2].
• The International Day of Happiness is on 20 March. It was set up by UNGA Resolution 66/281 (2012), which Bhutan proposed, and first observed in 2013 [3].
• GNH was proposed by the fourth king, Jigme Singye Wangchuck, in the 1970s. It has 4 pillars, its index has 9 domains, and it is in the 2008 Constitution.
• The World Happiness Report started in 2012 and uses Gallup World Poll life ratings. In the 2025 report, Finland was 1st for the 8th year in a row and India was 118th.
• The Global Gender Gap Index is published by the WEF, not by UNDP or UN Women, and started in 2006. Iceland is 1st. India was 131/148 in 2025 and weakest on economic participation.
• Trap: country size and per capita income do not decide HDI. Sri Lanka (high HDI) ranks above India (medium HDI).
• Low-HDI countries at the bottom are all in sub-Saharan Africa: South Sudan, Somalia, Central African Republic, Niger and Chad.

Mains Points

• Spending matters more than income. Sri Lanka and Kerala (in India) reached good health and education results at modest income levels. Some oil-rich or high-income countries rank lower than their income would suggest. India's improvement in HDR 2025 came from more schooling and higher income [2]. Its main gaps are in learning quality and in women's work.
• The low-HDI belt in sub-Saharan Africa is linked to civil war, famine and disease. In those countries, governance and peace come before any social programme can work.
• New measures (GNH, WHR, the Gender Gap Index) look beyond GDP to happiness, culture, the environment and equality between men and women. India's low ranks in WHR (118th in 2025) and the Gender Gap Index (131/148 in 2025) show that rising income has not yet brought matching gains in well-being and gender equality.
• Corruption is a reason for low HDI. Money that should go to health and education is lost. Clean, stable government is a basic condition for human development.