Tourism and Socio-cultural Development Issues - Tourism and Development: Concepts and Issues - page 212

development', 'the human welfare approach' or 'the basic needs approach'.
These approaches focus on processes of development, or on humans as either
an input for development or as beneficiaries of development. In contrast, the
UN HDI measures the end result of development; it argues that individuals
must be the centre of the development process and that they must be par-
ticipants of the development of their choice (UNDP, 2013). Sharpe (1999)
called the HDI a 'cross-national index of well-being' but Harris and Burns
(2004) considered this index not well-suited to the comparison of regions
within a nation.
The HDI is not free from criticism. American Economist Bryan Caplan
(2009) questions the calculation of three dimensions, especially the dimen-
sion of education. He also points out that the HDI overlooks the potential of
the rich nations to improve because these countries are already near the
maximum score of the Gross National Income indicator. The European Local
Inclusion and Social Action Network (ELISAN) (2012) added that the HDI
is nothing new; it failed to include any ecological concerns and it lacks com-
parability due to assessing development differently among different groups
of countries. Basu (2005) argues that human development and deprivation
cannot be discussed simply as three dimensions of HDI; some aspects of
development, such as spiritual development, cannot be measured quantita-
tively. Basu cautions that the 'problem arises when the “eradication of human
deprivations” becomes synonymous with “human development”' (Basu,
2005: 5). Finally, Porter et al. (2013) point out that the HDI only addresses
basic needs and lacks a broader set of measurements that will help to provide
a more concrete guide for further development.
The HDI may be a better alternative measure of the level of development
of a nation when compared to an orthodox economy-based indicator, and the
2013 HDI report emphasises that nations from the South show significant
improvement in 2012, especially in comparison with 1990 levels. Nevertheless,
at the international level, those nations that rank very high are still 'devel-
oped' nations (Norway holds first place, followed by Australia, the United
States and the Netherlands in 2013) and southern countries, even China and
India, score low on the index. Even if a nation demonstrated great HDI
improvement within a given region like Asia, so long as the gap between this
nation and the rest of the developed nations was not diminished, persons in
the low HDI nations could still be expected to face considerable inequality
and conflict. An example is the case of international tourism; conflicts arise
when tourists from developed nations demonstrate superiority over the local
population in terms of economy, education and standard of living.
Better Life Index
In 2011, the OECD launched an interactive Better Life Initiative after
measuring the development of member countries, mainly by GDP, for