By the winner of the 1988 Nobel Prize in Economics, an essential and paradigm-altering framework for understanding economic development–for both rich and poor–in the twenty-first century.
Freedom, Sen argues, is both the end and most efficient means of sustaining economic life and the key to securing the general welfare of the world’s entire population. Releasing the idea of individual freedom from association with any particular historical, intellectual, political, or religious tradition, Sen clearly demonstrates its current applicability and possibilities. In the new global economy, where, despite unprecedented increases in overall opulence, the contemporary world denies elementary freedoms to vast numbers–perhaps even the majority of people–he concludes, it is still possible to practically and optimistically restain a sense of social accountability. Development as Freedom is essential reading.
Customer Reviews
Do you have trouble sleeping at night? If yes buy this book!:
Great concepts and ideas, just not very interesting to read. I could only read a page at a time before my mind began to wander off.
Development as rhetoric:
This is Amartya Sen’s, Nobel Prize winner in Economics and collaborator of Martha Nussbaum, most famous work. In “Development as Freedom” he gives a broad and general overview of his views on development economics, and in particular on the priorities that must be made in creating social and economic policy in the developing world. The general thesis of the book is that many economic advisors have far too much relied on measurements of real income alone, and ignored the fact that income and wealth are a means to an end, and that this end is freedom (broadly defined as capacity); and that for this reason any policy which increases income but decreases freedom must be rejected. This thesis of itself is strong and well-made, and a deserved rebuttal to the ideas of many Asian development economists and politicians who see a right-wing dictatorship à la Lee Kwan Yew as the most effective way to create economic growth, and therefore desirable.
But that is, unfortunately, the only point of the book. Sen’s actual discussion of which economic policies would lead to the results of increasing freedom is so general as to be practically unusable. He has a completely unwarranted faith in the capacity of markets (albeit interventionist ones) to create these increases in freedom, and incorrectly claims that the proof is overwhelmingly in favor of markets leading to growth on their own, when the evidence is in reality wildly conflicting and the strongest proofs are against markets. What makes this even worse is his ignorant conflating of markets as such with capitalism, which leads to such silly canards as dismissing criticisms of capitalism as not understanding freedom, since after all, what can be more free than freedom of exchange? In this way, his defense of mainstream development policy is worse than undergraduate level.
Moreover, the very greatest part of the book is filled with meaningless and saccharine rhetoric of the most astonishingly unintelligent kind. In each short chapter addressing some major aspect of development economics and its problematic, he will, after much talk, come to such stunning conclusions as “take the middle road” and “there are arguments for and against interventionism and we must consider both”, as well as the whopping conclusion that we need to take the whole spectrum of effects on people into account when suggesting policies. One hardly needs to have a Nobel Prize to come to these ‘insights’.
To add insult to injury, his discussion of past economic policies and economists in general is incompetent and historically dubious. He claims that no democratic state has experienced famines, but then qualifies this by excluding colonies of such states, without however giving any reason for this - creating a wholly ad hoc argument for an unproven link between ‘democracy’ (which apparently includes pre-Reform Bill Britain) and well-being. Similarly, he constantly cherry-picks quotes from Adam Smith to cast him as a concerned and judicious proponent of development, while a more objective look at the entirety of Smith’s oeuvre would quickly reveal the degree to which he appeared as a propagandist for the Glasgow mercantile and industrial interests. It must be said in Sen’s favor though that he does recognize that famines can easily occur where free markets are present, which at least puts him at a level above most apologetics for economic orthodoxy.
On the whole this book is a major disappointment. Sen’s vague and hand-waving rhetoric is useless for any kind of policy purpose and yet fills most of the book, even obscuring the one point he does have about freedom as end and means. With the idea he originally had, he could have done a lot better, but his unwarranted support for mainstream economics and its equivocations has made this impossible.
a wonderful work:
This is a must read for all people, the work is not just on economics but how we live our lives. One of the top economists in the world, shows how there is more to economics then just markets. Freedom is more then just free speech, and is critical in human development.
Connecting economic and political development:
What is economic development? This book argues that economic development is the expansion of human choice; i.e. freedom and capability to do what we want. The emphasis of this books is the duality: freedom and capability. Hence a society can give freedom to its citizens, but if they are not equipped with the mental and/or physical capabilities to use these freedoms, then the freedoms can be meaningless. Therefore, investing in education, providing health care, equal rights and other social programs that improve the capabilities of individuals are often as important to economic progress as building roads, airports and starting up businesses.
The Indian, Nobel-prize winning author of this book backs up this argument with empirical evidence from multiple countries and time periods across the world, with special emphasis on China, India, and other locales in Asia that one might not normally consider as textbook examples of economic development. By comparing specific actions taken by specific governments, the author shows how personal development, in terms of increasing literacy, providing family planning services, and spreading basic health care are often the prerequisite for economic development for a society as a whole. The book backs this up with examples of Japan, Korea, and the US itself; three countries where industrialization and economic growth came after social reform, the spread of basic education, and equalization of rights between genders.
Overall this is a great book. It connects economic policy to human actions, and shows how government policies connect the two. Great reading and highly recommended for all those interested in the social sciences.
Freedom as a better goal than GDP:
Freedom as a better goal than GDP.
This book describes new concepts and presents important, controversial, conclusions. The concepts are relevant for developed and developing countries. The foundation is Sen’s view of well-being formulated as follows: “We all want the capability to live long (without being cut off in our prime) have a good life (rather than a life of misery and unfreedom)” and “We would all like to lead a kind of life that we have reason to value”. To achieve that goal requires the removal of unfreedoms like poverty, lack of ability to be accepted for a job, lack of economic opportunities, health problems, discrimination, repression and arbitrary justice.
Freedom is an end in itself a means to be able to lead a satisfactory life. Individual freedom is also a condition for being able to act responsibly. Without opportunities because of a lack of capability, no responsibility. Increasing freedom as a goal is more complete than increasing the GDP per person. People have good reason to want income and wealth precisely because it “produces” freedom. GDP/person and freedom are related. When people can act responsibly because they have capabilities and can a find job, the GDP will increase automatically. .
The book is very rich in “surprising” conclusions all convincingly documented and presented. Only a few will be referred to here.
(1) An important cause of poverty in Sub Saharan Africa and South Asia is explosive population growth. If women have the freedom to decide the number of children to have the explosive population growth stops. There is no justification for using violent means to reduce family size. (2) All poor countries can afford basic healthcare and basic education as these are labour intensive and therefore low cost. (3) The opinion that democracy with free speech and elections is not suitable for Asians because of different Asian values has no factual basis.
(4) One of the fundamental freedoms people cherish is to buy what they want from whom they want and sell what they can to whom the want, that is the”free market”. The idea that the free market can be left alone and will function perfectly as it is based on self-interest and greed is false. It requires effective legal structures that support the rights ensuing from contracts, that people can trust each and behave decently. Sen warns on the danger of “high minded sentimentality, assuming that all people are peculiarly virtuous and keen to be just” or the equally unrealistic “Low-minded sentimentality, which some economists appear to prefer, that we are only influenced by crude consideration of personal advantage”. The free market” to function requires freedom, regulations and ethical values beyond greed and self-interest.
The book is brilliant but requires effort to read. Read at least chapter 1 The perspective on freedom, 6 The importance of democracy, 9 Population, food and freedom, 10 Culture and human rights and 11 Social choice and individual behaviour (100 pages).
