TY - JOUR
T1 - Psychologizing indexes of societal progress: Accounting for cultural diversity in preferred developmental pathways
AU - Krys, Kuba
AU - Capaldi, Colin A.
AU - Lun, Vivian M.C.
AU - Vauclair, Christin-Melanie
AU - Bond, Michael Harris
AU - Espinosa, Alejandra Domínguez-
AU - Uchida, Yukiko
N1 - Funding Information:
We thank Janusz Reykowski, John W. Berry, and Kasia Cantarero for offering feedback on the presented idea.
Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2019.
PY - 2020/9/1
Y1 - 2020/9/1
N2 - Since the Second World War, the dominating paradigm of societal development has focused on economic growth. While economic growth has improved the quality of human life in a variety of ways, we posit that the identification of economic growth as the primary societal goal is culture-blind because preferences for developmental pathways likely vary between societies. We argue that the cultural diversity of developmental goals and the pathways leading to these goals could be reflected in a culturally sensitive approach to assessing societal development. For the vast majority of post-materialistic societies, it is an urgent necessity to prepare culturally sensitive compasses on how to develop next, and to start conceptualizing growth in a more nuanced and culturally responsive way. Furthermore, we propose that cultural sensitivity in measuring societal growth could also be applied to existing development indicators (e.g. the Human Development Index). We call for cultural researchers, in cooperation with development economists and other social scientists, to prepare a new cultural map of developmental goals, and to create and adapt development indexes that are more culturally sensitive. This innovation could ultimately help social planners understand the diverse pathways of development and assess the degree to which societies are progressing in a self-determined and indigenously valued manner.
AB - Since the Second World War, the dominating paradigm of societal development has focused on economic growth. While economic growth has improved the quality of human life in a variety of ways, we posit that the identification of economic growth as the primary societal goal is culture-blind because preferences for developmental pathways likely vary between societies. We argue that the cultural diversity of developmental goals and the pathways leading to these goals could be reflected in a culturally sensitive approach to assessing societal development. For the vast majority of post-materialistic societies, it is an urgent necessity to prepare culturally sensitive compasses on how to develop next, and to start conceptualizing growth in a more nuanced and culturally responsive way. Furthermore, we propose that cultural sensitivity in measuring societal growth could also be applied to existing development indicators (e.g. the Human Development Index). We call for cultural researchers, in cooperation with development economists and other social scientists, to prepare a new cultural map of developmental goals, and to create and adapt development indexes that are more culturally sensitive. This innovation could ultimately help social planners understand the diverse pathways of development and assess the degree to which societies are progressing in a self-determined and indigenously valued manner.
KW - Societal development
KW - cultural diversity
KW - cultural sensitivity
KW - economic development
KW - societal change
KW - societal growth
KW - socio-economics
KW - values
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85071463949&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1354067X19868146
DO - https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1354067X19868146
M3 - Journal article
SN - 1354-067X
VL - 26
SP - 303
EP - 319
JO - Culture and Psychology
JF - Culture and Psychology
IS - 3
ER -