Beyond the richness of the economies in which the people are living, human development is a concept about thriving of the human life. Human development is an approach focusing on the people themselves and the opportunities they have.
With the finding that the economic growth does not bring automatic growth in wealth for everyone, human development focuses on the role of the people themselves in bringing human life to a better condition. Growth in income is only a tool rather than a final goal.
Human development is about providing more freedom and opportunity to the people for living their lives as they wish. For this, people should be able to improve and use their capabilities.
Human development is a multidimensional concept. The three variables used by UN in Human Development Index (HDI) constitutes the key dimensions of human development. These key dimensions are: a long and healthy life, being knowledgeable and have a decent standard of living. When these key dimensions are provided at first, the progress and improvement opportunities in other areas of human life will also grow.
Mainly, human development means having more alternatives and more opportunities and this must be the key reference in human development. Nobody can guarantee the happiness of the human being and the choices which people would make in their lives concern only themselves. However, human development at least aims to provide the necessary conditions to all the people individually or collectively for improving their potentials and spending a productive and creative live.
Where does Turkey rank in the world?
The measurement of the human development is one of the top agendas of national and international institutions, academia and the related civil initiatives. Although there are many indexes and measurement techniques in this area; The Human Development Index (HDI) which was created and owned by United Nations Development Program (UNDP) distinguishes itself with its comprehensiveness and integrated perspective. Although the measurement of the human development is a detailed and comprehensive work, HDI is taken as the most common and main reference.
Human Development Index is a measurement done through life expectancy, literacy rate and the standard of living and education. This index shows whether a country is a developed, developing or non-developed country and also it shows in which level the effect in its economy affects the standard of living in that country. The Human Development Index was first developed by Pakistani economist Mahbub ul Haq in 1990 and is being presented by United Nations Development Program in annual Human Development Report since 1993.
Human Development Index considers the below three key dimensions in the countries:
Long and Healthy Life: the measurement is done with the average life expectancy.
Knowledge: the measurement is done with the literacy rate (2/3) and the percentage of the registrations to primary and high schools and universities.
Decent Standard of Living: the measurement is done with per capita income and the calculation of the purchasing power in US Dollar.
Human Development in Our Country
Turkey has been listed in the reports and indexes since the beginning of the publishing in 1990. According to this; although Turkey has been listed among the countries with high level of human development by going up 15 lines especially between 2008-2013, the regression in last three years is remarkable.
187 countries were listed in Human Development Index 2015. The country with highest HDI score is Norway and the lowest HDI score belongs to Niger. Turkey has been listed as 72th in the Index and placed at the human development level. However, there is still much to do for Turkey in human development. For this, contribution to the human development falls first to the public enterprises and also to all enterprises and sectors.
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