A Review of the Literature on Well-Being in Italy: A Human Development Perspective

Abstract

In recent years, a large literature on indicators of well-being and quality of life has emerged. While all these indicators are an important step toward the recognition of well-being as a multidimensional phenomenon, they are often rooted in very different approaches—when we can identify a relevant “theoretical” framework—such as basic needs, happiness, or capability approach, and vary significantly in terms of statistical quality. This paper has a twofold objective: (1) to analyze the state of the art of the literature on well-being in Italy; (2) to examine this literature from a human development perspective. Thus, we investigate the pros and cons of the existing approaches/indicators and assess whether they are rooted in the human development approach. This is deemed necessary for the final goal of constructing a context-based indicator of human development for Italy and its territorial units.

Keywords:

• well-being
• human development
• indicators
• territorial disparities
• Italy

JEL classifications:

• O150
• R580
• D630
• C430

Acknowledgements

The authors thank the participants in the PRIN Workshop and in the EAPE conference, held in October 2012 in Modena and Krakow, respectively.

Notes

¹ Multidimensional phenomena such as poverty and well-being can be measured with a set of dimensional indicators and/or with “composite” indicators, where the different dimensional indicators are finally aggregated. In this paper, we do not engage in the debate on whether it is better to have one single number or multiple numbers as this choice depends on the specific objectives of the researchers/institutions.

² The questionnaire can be found at http://www.misuredelbenessere.it/fileadmin/upload/docPdf/Questionario_per_il_sondaggio_on_line_sul_sito_del_BES.pdf (consulted: 14 July 2014).

³ The full list is available at http://www.misuredelbenessere.it/fileadmin/upload/docPdf/LISTA_INDICATORI_ENG.pdf (consulted: 14 July 2014).

⁴ The report is available (only in Italian) at http://www.istat.it/it/files/2013/03/bes_2013.pdf (consulted: 14 July, 2014).

⁵ A detailed description of this indicator can be found at http://www.who.int/whosis/indicators/2007HALE0/en/.

⁶ The authors of this paper do not follow a traditional “statistical” perspective on the basis of which two or more highly correlated variables can never be inserted in a multidimensional indicator. When these variables reflect different dimensions or aspects of people's lives, their simultaneous presence is not problematical. It can cause substantial bias in cases—like the one presented here—when the two variables indicate more or less the same (economic) dimension. The employment rate, in fact, is a variable traditionally used in standard economic analysis.

⁷ The gross enrollment ratio is the share of children of any age that are enrolled in, say, primary school, while the net enrollment ratio is the share of children of official primary school age that are enrolled in primary school. Where there are frequent grade repetitions, the gross enrolment can exceed 100%.

⁸ This is also referred to as livelihood approach in the context of developing countries.

⁹ In particular, the fact that in a given region there are more people producing biological food does not mean that there are more people consuming it.

¹⁰ We could use the famous expression “measuring without theory” (Koopman, 1947).

¹¹ The dimensions in which these phenomena are studied reflect only to a minimal degree of the whole phenomena. While this could be due to data constraints, the authors of the index do not explain it. Moreover, for example, equal opportunities could be analyzed with regard to education as gender-differentiated data on this domain are available.

¹² In the existing literature, there is no agreement on whether well-being and quality of life measures should include subjective indicators in addition to objective ones. For example, the Stiglitz report (Stiglitz et al., 2009) suggests to use both. However, the report does not provide an answer on how to integrate one with the other and considers subjective measures important mostly as predictors of people's behavior. How a person perceives her/his health status, for example, affects where she/he will use more or less the health services, whether she/he will take more or less medicines, and in turn this can affect current and future health status. Therefore, in our view, to measure—more than to assess—well-being dimensions such as health, nutrition, or education, we should rely mostly on objective measures, and use subjective ones only when the former are missing. Different considerations are made with regard to potential dimensions such as personal security or life satisfaction, where subjective indicators are clearly indispensable.

¹³ For a comparison of well-being levels in Italian regions calculated on the basis of BES dimensions and an alternative approach to select dimensions (the “Constitutional Approach”), see Burchi, De Muro, and Kollar (2014).

¹⁴ For a comprehensive review of this approach to quality of life, see Stiglitz et al. (2009).

Additional information

Funding

This paper is an outcome of the National Research Project (PRIN) “Measuring Human Development and Capabilities in Italy: methodological and empirical issues” co-funded by the Italian Ministry of Education, University, and Research (MIUR).