poverty measurement: the choice of dimensions and indicators · public consensus: a list can be the...

Poverty Measurement: The choice of

Dimensions and Indicators

Francesco Burchi

German Development Institute (DIE)

Measuring Poverty

• Poverty is increasingly viewed as a multidimensional phenomenon

• To measure it in a multidimensional setting, a researcher needs to address a series of questions (Alkire, 2008; Burchi and De Muro, 2015):

1. Identification of the conceptual framework

© German Development Institute / Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik (DIE) 2

1. Identification of the conceptual framework

2. Selection of relevant dimensions

3. Weighting of the dimensions

4. Selection of the indicators

5. Definition of poverty lines

6. Aggregation (?) of the dimensions into an index.

Selection of relevant dimensions


Objective and outline of the paper

• Too often poverty assessment (and policy) lacks theoretical rigor and/or political legitimacy: this concerns especially the choice of dimensions

• …this caused delays in the implementation of a MD approach to poverty measurement & assessment

• Example: UNDP – Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI)

© German Development Institute / Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik (DIE)

• Example: UNDP – Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI)

– “It includes an array of dimensions from participatory exercises among

poor communities and an emerging international consensus” (Alkire and

Santos, 2010) ----- not justified

– “The MPI is grounded in the capability approach” ----- standard of

living is not a capability, rather a means to achieve them

– Some standard of living indicators could be proxy for other relevant

capabilities: e.g. access to drinkable water and sanitation

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Dimensions and indicators in the MPI


Source: Alkire and Santos (2010)

The CA, poverty and well-being

Using the CA has three implications:

1. The concept of WB has a clear and precise meaning: “‘Well-

being’ is concerned with a person’s achievement: how ‘well’

is his or her ‘being’?” (Sen, 1985: 5); more precisely, a

person’s well-being can be seen as an evaluation of the

vector of his or her functionings (p.12), where ‘a functioning


vector of his or her functionings (p.12), where ‘a functioning

is an achievement of a person: what he or she manages to

do or to be’ (p.10). We will use this definition of WB.

(Subjective WB may be easily included)

2. Poverty = lack of a minimum level of well-being / deprivation

of basic capabilities

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How can we select dimensions? –1

• Alkire (2008) classified methods employed:

1. Existing data: data availability is the only guiding principle

problem: lack of ethical justification

2. Normative assumptions: derive the list from a particular ethical

view of the human good, e.g. Maslow’s (1948) pyramid of needs.

Nussbaum’s (2000) list based on the Aristotelian idea of a “good life”


Nussbaum’s (2000) list based on the Aristotelian idea of a “good life”

problem: justifiability in a pluralist context

3. Public consensus: A list can be the outcome of “some

arguably legitimate consensus building process at one point in

time, and are relatively stable, thus not expected to be iterative

or subject to ongoing participatory evaluation” (Alkire, 2008: 10).

E.g. MDGs; UDHR

problem: status quo bias

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How can we select dimensions? –2

4. Ongoing deliberative participation: deliberative participatory

practices, focus groups, citizens’ jury, other techniques yield

the list

problem: the normative validity of the outcome

assumes ideal conditions of deliberation difficult to

approximate in practice


5. Empirical analyses: e.g. World Values Survey

problem: what people actually value vs. what they have

reason to value upon reflection

2 steps approach: 1) ideal list; 2) feasible list based on

data and resource availability (Robeyns, 2003)

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Constitutional Approach –1


http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17496535.2014.932415#.U_7x92flr5o


Proposal: a “Constitutional Approach” to extract in an ethically

sound way publicly justifiable dimensions of poverty and W-B

Political constructivism (Rawls, 1993)

Core: in pluralistic societies, political principles should be justified

by reference to norms embedded in a public political culture.

� principles worked out from within the political practice.


� principles worked out from within the political practice.

• Starting point: public political culture - long standing,

crystallized and institutionally embodied ideals and norms.

�Relevant source: Constitution + interpretative practice

This method is yet unexplored in reasoning about poverty dimensions.

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Reasons in favor of the Constitutional Approach:

1. Moral: Respect citizens by offering them justification they have reason to accept based on shared starting points.

2. Pragmatic: the resulting dimensions may serve as a


2. Pragmatic: the resulting dimensions may serve as a

common standard of WB/poverty in a pluralistic setting where people disagree about the fundamental values

3. Avoid status quo bias: starts from institutionally embedded norms, which are not taken at face value, but they are reinterpreted and re-elaborated through moral guidance � qualified public consensus view

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The Italian Constitution –1

• Written between 1946 and 1947 by the “Constituent Assembly”, elected in 1946 by 89.1% of voters

• Result of broad and rich debate among the many diverse political cultures

• Our focus is on the first two sections: Fundamental


• Our focus is on the first two sections: Fundamental Principles; Rights and Duties of Citizens

• Clear and significant references to dimensions (“rights”, “freedoms”)

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The Italian Constitution –2

• “Decent work” is the most valued dimension (art.1, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40)

• “Participation”

– Political (art. 3, 48, 49, 50, 51)

– Civil (art. 3, 17, 18, 21)


– Civil (art. 3, 17, 18, 21)

– Economic (art. 3, 41, 45, 46)

• “Education”, (art. 33, 34)

• “Health” and “medical care” (art.32)

• “Culture, arts and science” (art. 9, 33)

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Sources of Interpretation and Integration

• Sources of interpretation: Constitutional Court �

– Two additional dimensions:

1. right to decent housing (Sentence 217, 1988)

2. right to healthy environment (Sentence 641, 1987)

• Some possible sources of integration


• Some possible sources of integration

– European Treaties

– International Treaties, Conventions, Agreements

– Universal Declaration of Human Rights

• Italian Const. as a core, minimum, open-ended list, to be interpreted and integrated

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Does it matter that we do not agree on the list of well-being dimensions?

• Empirical survey vs. Constitutional Approach

• Equitable and Sustainable Well-being (BES) Initiative by Istat and Cnel:

1. Proposal of 12 domains

2. Short online questionnaire submitted to a (non-


2. Short online questionnaire submitted to a (non-representative) sample of Italian citizens between October 2011 and February 2012: “How important is for you this dimension?”

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List of dimensions

Enlarged Constitutional Approach

Ranking Dimension Dimension Ranking Dimension

1 Decent work Decent work 1 Health

2 Education Education 2 Environment

3 Political participation Political participation 3 Education and training

4 Economic participation Economic participation 4 Quality of services

5 Health and medical care Health and medical care 5 Work and l ife-work balance

6 Culture, arts and science Culture, arts and science 6 Research and innovation

Full BES (12 dimensions)Constitutional Approach


7 Decent housing 7 Landscape and cultural heritage

8 Environment 8 Social relations

9 Safety

10 Political participation/trust in inst.

11 Life satisfaction

12 Economic well-being

Figure 1. Parallel plot with the BES-type Index and the Constitution-based Index


Source: Burchi et al. 2014

Figure 2. Parallel plot with BES-type Index and the Enlarged Constitution-based Index



Figure 3. Parallel plot with BES-type Index, Constitution-based Index and the Enlarged Const. based Index (alternative weights)



Empirical exercise: conclusions

• The choice of dimensions is not only relevant

because a list of dimensions can be more or

less legitimate. It also matters because

depending on the method we use we obtain

different values of well-being indicators and


different values of well-being indicators and

even different rankings among the geographical

units analyzed.

• This has direct implications for the identification

of geographical and horizontal inequalities and

for the targeting of policy interventions.

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Summing up

Pros Cons

Moral justification (accounts for pluralism) More suitable for democratic countries that

meet specific requirements

Legitimacy Which (procedural and substantive) criteria

to decide whether a Const. is adequate?

Feasibility Questions about international application:

-What are the embedded norms in


international public culture: HR?; MDG?

- How contested are they?

Clear conceptual framework

Satisfies Robeyns’ (2003) 4 criteria:

1. Explicit formulation;

2. Methodological justification;

3. Different levels of generality;

4. Exhaustion and non reduction criteria:

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Selection of indicators


Selecting indicators for country poverty profiles

1. Prioritizing outcome indicators (or eventually output)

� Distinction between input, output and outcome indicators coincides with the dichotomy means-ends of poverty (or well-being)

� Not mixing up different categories of indicators (Adelman and Morris 1972, McGranahan, 1972; OECD-JRC, 2008,


and Morris 1972, McGranahan, 1972; OECD-JRC, 2008, Burchi and De Muro, 2015) because:

a) difficult to interpret

b) assumes a straightforward relationship between the means and the outcomes (sometimes not observed)

c) violates the principle of ownership, i.e., the possibility that policy-makers choose the policies to implement

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Selecting indicators –2

2. Adaptation to the development context (link with post-2015 agenda)

- health: being able to avoid death from preventable diseases or being in a good health status?

- education: having basic education/being literate or


having higher levels of cognitive skills?

Other issues to consider

� Flows vs. stock variables

� Objective vs. subjective indicators

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Thank you for your attention!

German Development Institute / Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik (DIE)


Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik (DIE)

Tulpenfeld 6

D-53113 Bonn

Telephone: +48 (0)228-94927-185

E-Mail: [email protected]

www.die-gdi.de

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poverty measurement: the choice of dimensions and indicators · public consensus: a list can be the...

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