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The Human Development Index revisited

  • Development Indicators
  • Published:
Intereconomics

Abstract

The emergence of the Human Development Index has stimulated wide-ranging debate about its usefulness and ability to measure human development adequately1 This article discusses whether the HDI should be rejected in view of the criticism it has attracted, or improved, refined and more widely used.

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  16. See for example H.-R. Hemmer: Wirtschaftsprobleme der Entwicklungsländer, Munich 1988, pp. 8–21; D. Nohlen and F. Nuscheler: Indikatoren von Unterentwicklung und Entwicklung. Probleme der Messung und quantifizierende Analyse, in: D. Nohlen and F. Nuscheler (eds.): Handbuch der Dritten Welt, Vol. 1, Hamburg 1992, p. 82; N. Hicks and P. Streeten: Indicators of Development: The Search for a Basic Yardstick, in: World Development, Vol. 7, 1979, pp. 567–580.

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  21. UNDP, op. cit. Human Development Report 1990, p. iii.

  22. D. Nohlen and F. Nuscheler, op. cit. Indikatoren von Unterentwicklung und Entwicklung Probleme der Messung und quantifizierende Analyse, in: D. Nohlen and F. Nuscheler (eds.): Handbuch der Dritten Welt, Vol. 1, Hamburg 1992, p. 456.

  23. J. Drenowski, loc. cit. Social Indicators and Welfare Measurement: Remarks on Methodology, in: N. Baster (ed.), op. cit., Measuring Development, London 1972, p. 77.

  24. G. K. Helleiner: From Adjustment to Development in Sub-Saharan Africa, in: UNCTAD Review 1994, New York and Geneva 1994, p. 148.

  25. UNDP, op. cit. Human Development Report 1990, p. iii.

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  1. Free University, Berlin, Germany

    Irmgard Nübler

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  1. Irmgard Nübler
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Nübler, I. The Human Development Index revisited. Intereconomics 30, 171–176 (1995). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02928088

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