Gross National Happiness Part 2

I feel so happy, read on…

GNH as Goal

Happiness is a subjectively felt public good. Happiness is a public good, as all human beings value it. Hence, the government of Bhutan takes the view that it cannot be left exclusively to private individual devices and strivings. If a governments policy framework, and thus a nations macro-conditions, is adverse to happiness, happiness will fail as a collective goal. Any government concerned with happiness must create conducive conditions for happiness in which individual strivings can succeed.

In this context, public policies are needed to educate citizens about collective happiness. People can make wrong choices that lead them away from happiness. Right policy frameworks can address and reduce such problems from recurring on a large scale.

There are many entities, such as the corporations and other organizations, above the individual level that make choices and decisions that impact collective happiness. Individuals are relatively less powerful to redress decisions of big organizations if they are contrary to the goal of collective happiness.

During the consumption of goods and services, the measure of what gives the people happiness will be relative, either to what others are consuming or to what one had the year before. This fact implies that there are negative externalities to happiness associated with consumption that needs to be curbed. Public policy instruments have to correct externalities when they are present in a large scale. At the same time, to cultivate a positive psychology which does not work always on invidious comparison is important for personal development.

Our understanding of how the mind achieves happiness affects our experience of happiness by influencing the means we choose in striving towards it. In some branches of the behavioral sciences, the mind is conceived of as an input-output device responding to external stimuli. One consequence of this model is that happy and pleasurable feelings are seen as dependent solely upon external stimuli. Happiness is perceived as a direct consequence of sensory pleasures. With such an overemphasis on external stimuli as the source for happiness, it isnt surprising that individuals are led to believe that being materialistic will increase their happiness.

But there is a contrary tradition to the external stimuli based happiness that point to a different source of happiness, showing that pleasurable feelings will be generated by shutting down sensory inputs and the related mental chatter. This involves secular meditation whereby the individual experiences the subject itself, as opposed to the subject perceiving external stimuli. There is much less external input to happiness through contemplative method. Long enough meditation may lead the brain structure (neural pathways) to be changed such that calmness and contentment will be a personality trait. In other words, the mental faculties can be trained towards happiness. From a contemplative perspective, extreme reliance on externally derived pleasure distracts the individual from inner sources of happiness, elevating the latter.

When this cultural view is applied, stable and sustainable economies can be termed successful. An economy that is continually growing at an unsustainable rate may be seen as a failure due to its inability to promote detachment from the proliferation of wants. Sustainable and stationary economy may signal that stability in wants and psychological stability have been achieved among the consumers.

GNH encourages individuals to see all things as interdependent with all other things. In order to achieve collective happiness, the principle of interdependence needs to be taken on by everyone. Members of a GNH society would cultivate a third eye, which can elevate our vision beyond individual self-interest to address the happiness of all, as a collective goal. The third eye metaphorically represents our potential to see all things as interdependent across time and space. Equity is central to GNH. The perception of happiness that doesnt take into account the needs of others happiness is irresponsible and egocentric, and the pursuit of such happiness is likely to be unethical. Happiness blossoms through enhanced relationships, arising unbidden when relationships improve. In this sense, the whole of development is a progress in relationships, not of individuals.

The GNH indicators have been designed to include nine core dimensions that are regarded as components of happiness and well-being in Bhutan , and are constructed of indicators which are robust and informative with respect to each of the dimensions. The nine dimensions were selected on normative grounds, and are equally weighted, because each dimension is considered to be relatively equal in terms of equal intrinsic importance as a component of gross national happiness. Within each dimension, several indicators were selected that seemed likely to remain informative across time, had high response rates, and were relatively uncorrelated. The nine dimensions are:

1. Psychological Well-being
2. Time Use
3. Community Vitality
4. Culture
5. Health
6. Education
7. Environmental Diversity
8. Living Standard
9. Governance

In this perspective happiness comprises having sufficient achievements in each of the nine dimensions.

Makes me happy just thinking about it. Yippee, I’ll vote for it.