By Neville S. Roche, ContributorTHE CELEBRATED Pakistan Economist Mahbub Ul Haq died July 16, 1998. He is widely regarded as the outstanding visionary of development economics. While attending Ivy League Universities (Yale, Cambridge and Harvard) in the 1950s, Mr. Ul Haq was exposed to the "prevailing wisdom" of measuring development by looking solely at economic growth, i.e. growth in gross domestic product (GDP).
Many economists expressed disquiet about this emphasis on economic growth, which led to conventional usage development becoming a synonym for economic growth. Dudley Seers, Dennis Goulet and Donald Warwick all had profound misgivings.
Seers (1972) asked poignantly "Why do we confuse development with economic growth?" The enterprising Mahbub set about devising a more accurate and meaningful measure of development.
PIONEERING WORK
Several decades later, his pioneering work refined and honed by rigorous analysis found tangible expression in the human development report founded by him in 1990 under the auspices of the United Nations Development Programme.
The Human Development Report as devised by the ingenious Mr. Haq is an index for human development which measures national well being: life expectancy, education, welfare and of course wealth. This comprehensive view of development is really about expanding the choices people have and creating at the same time an environment in which they can develop their full potential and lead productive creative lives.
Development is much more than economic growth, which is a means albeit very important one of enlarging peoples choices.
Early in his career he worked at the World Bank but it proved too small and limiting a stage for the flamboyant irrepressible intellectual. His own country, Pakistan appointed him Minister of Finance under General Zia Ul Haq's government 1985-1988.
The outspoken economist with a concern for the poor tried to tax the 22 families that controlled Pakistan's economy. Predictably he was unsuccessful. Undaunted, he started the human development two years later.
PROFOUND AND ENGAGING
A persuasive and compelling speaker, Mr. Ul Haq was pragmatic yet profound and engaging in the promotion of his thesis.
Richard Jolly, a colleague, remembers him thus: 'He would hold audiences spellbound, weaving together his proposals and vision in a subtle mixture of technical analysis, political cunning and with the uncompromising tones of the true preacher".
So pervasive has been his influence that many countries now have Human Development Centres producing annual reports.
Is there any hope for poor developing countries? Yes would be his answer. He loved to cite example of Costa Rica as a country that had virtually abolished its army and was spending a third of its national income on education and health. It is one of the most prosperous democracies in Central America.
Noble in vision, worthy in motive, penetrating in intellect and gracious in spirit, Mahbub Ul Haq would be the first to find resonance with Aristotle's "wealth is evidently not the good we are seeking, for it is merely useful for the sake of something else".
