Antecedentes nacionales

Capability approach came to light in the 1980s and it largely influenced the evolution of the Human Development Report series of the UN. The approach recreated the concept of poverty by linking it to the human development discourse in a broader sense. According to the pioneer of this approach, Amartya Sen, whose proposition revolve around conceptualizing poverty in terms of capabilities emphasizes that development should not be viewed as the maximisation of utility or money income, which is its proxy but rather as the expansion of human capabilities (Sen, 1985; 1999). This approach defines poverty as the ―failure to achieve certain minimal or basic capabilities‖ (Ruggeri, Laderchi, and Stewart, 2006, pp. 9-10). Over time, the term basic

capabilities has changed in the literature thereby causing some confusion. The first mention of

this term by Amartya Sen was in his 1980 Tanner Lecture on Human Value titled ―Equality of what?‖ In this lecture, Sen explains basic capabilities to refer to ―a person being able to do certain basic things. The ability to move about is the relevant one here, but one can consider others, e.g., the ability to meet one‘s nutritional requirements, the wherewithal to be clothed and sheltered, and the power to participate in the social life of the community.‖ This term is used differently by Nussbaum (2000, p. 84) who sees it as ―the innate equipment of individuals that is necessary for developing the more advanced capabilities‖ which in practical sense involves such capability as that of speech and language which a newly born child has with him/her from birth but which only needs to be nurtured. As a result of such confusion, Sen replaces the term basic capabilities with capabilities in his subsequent works where basic capabilities is defined from an

angle of seeing it as a threshold level for the relevant capabilities. This new conceptualization of the term is an indication that it is ―not so much in ranking living standards, but in deciding on a cut-off point for the purpose of assessing poverty and deprivation‖ (Sen, 1987, p. 109). In a subsequent work, Sen refers to basic capabilities as ―the ability to satisfy certain elementary and crucially important functionings up to certain levels‖ (Sen, 1992, p. 45). In another, he refers to it as ―the ability to satisfy certain crucially important functionings up to certain minimally adequate levels‖ (Sen, 1993, p. 41). These basic capabilities are not static, they vary ―from such elementary physical ones as being well nourished, being adequately clothed and sheltered, avoiding preventable morbidity, and so forth, to more complex social achievements such as taking part in the life of the community, being able to appear in public without shame, and so on‖

(Sen, 1995, p. 15).

Capability approach ―rejects monetary income as its measure of well-being, and instead focuses on indicators of the freedom to live a valued life‖ (Ruggeri, Laderchi and Stewart, 2006, pp. 9-10. While the monetary approach recognizes increased income as instrumental to the attainment of valued functionings, the capability approach is about the ―actual opportunities a person has,‖ that is, his/her capabilities (possibly achievable) and functionings (achieved values) (Sen, 2009, p. 253; Oosterlaken, 2009; Robeyns, 2005 ). This does not mean that Sen does not see a relationship between lack or lowness of income and a high level of poverty. According to him, a ―lack of income can be a principal reason for a person‘s capability deprivation‖ and ―a strong predisposing condition for an impoverished life‖ (Sen, 1999, p. 87). Also, Sen‘s capability approach deviates from the basic needs approach because its philosophical foundation is based on an assertion that ―people should have equal freedom to choose their valued ways of life rather than achieving minimum subsistence; because it defines poverty as a ―deprivations of opportunities‖ rather than that of consumptions; and because poverty can be reduced via ―equal opportunity to make choices‖ rather than ensuring ―adequate access to consumptions‖ Wong (2012, p. 10).

Basically, the capability approach has two fundamental elements which are functionings and freedom. Sen (1999, p. 75) refers to functionings as ―the various things a person may value doing or being,‖ meaning that human living can be said to involve a set of interrelated functionings. Sen (1992) emphasizes that functionings are central to a proper comprehension of the capability approach because capability ―represents the various combinations of functionings (beings and doings) that the person can achieve‖ (p. 40); and as a result, capability is analyzed as an idea that involves the liberty of achieving valuable functionings. According to Robeyns (2011), examples of functionings that capture various things a person may value being include

―being well-nourished, being undernourished, being housed in a pleasantly warm but not excessively hot house, being educated, being illiterate, being part of a supportive social network, being part of a criminal network, and being depressed;‖ and examples of functionings that capture various things a person may value doing include ―travelling, caring for a child, voting in an election, taking part in a debate, taking drugs, killing animals, eating animals, consuming lots of fuel in order to heat one's house, and donating money to charity.‖ Wells (2012) throws more light on functionings by using Sen‘s example of a standard bicycle as a source of explanation. He states that the bicycle ―has the characteristics of transportation but whether it will actually provide transportation will depend on the characteristics of those who try to use it‖ and that it

―might be considered a generally useful tool for most people to extend their mobility, but it obviously will not do that for a person without legs.‖ He states further that even if this person without legs, by some delusion, sees the bicycle as charming, this person still lacks transportation, and this person‘s mental reaction does not prove that if transportation by this bicycle was available to him/her, it would not be appreciated. Therefore, functionings ―should be distinguished from the commodities employed to achieve them (as bicycling is distinguishable from possessing a bike),‖ Wells concludes. As for the freedom element of the capability approach, Sen (1999, p. 92) discusses poverty with reference to ―the lives people can actually lead and the freedoms they do actually have.‖ Freedom, according to him is ―a principle determinant of individual initiative and social effectiveness; it is good primarily because it enhances the ability of individuals to help themselves‖ (Sen, 1999, p. 19). In the analysis of Sen (1999), the idea of freedom is exemplified by a rich man who chooses to fast against a man whose hunger situation is as a result of lack of resources. Truly, these two men have been able to achieve same functioning, but what makes the difference is that the former has not got the same

capabilities set as the latter, which indicates that in terms of realization of freedom, these two men may not be seen to be at par. According to Sen (1999, p.76), ―fasting is not the same thing as starving,‖ and having the option of eating makes fasting what it is, to wit, choosing not to eat when one could have eaten.‖ Sen (1999) lists five fundamental freedoms that are instrumental to leading the kind of life a person values and which by extension make positive freedom possible to include political freedom which refers to ―the opportunities that people have to determine who should govern and on what principles, and also includes the possibility to scrutinize and criticize authorities, to have freedom of political expression and an uncensored press, to enjoy the freedom to choose between different political parties, and so on‖ (p. 38); economic facilities which refers to ―the opportunity to enjoy and utilize resources for consumption, production and exchange (p. 39); social opportunities which refers to ―the right to enjoy healthier, more educated, and more fulfilled lives‖ (p. 39); transparency guarantees which refers to ―the ability to live under the assurance that disclosure and lucidity are normative elements of society‖ (p. 39);

and protective security which refers to ―the chance to exist in a society dedicated to preventing its citizens from experiencing hopelessness‖ (p. 40).

Sen‘s capability approach does not develop any list of capabilities. (Sen, 1992; 1999) emphasize that having a basic list of capabilities as a focal point is a value judgement that is to be clearly made through a process of public debate in most cases. In support of this, Sen (1993, p. 47; 1999, p. 283) emphasize that the use of the capability approach does not require taking a single route as ―the deliberate incompleteness of the capability approach permits other routes to be taken which also have some plausibility and also that ―there is no substitute for individual responsibility.‖ Connected to this is an argument that ―the capability approach considers people one by one, not as parts of an organic unit; it is very interested in seeing how a supposed organic

unit such as the family has constructed unequal capabilities for various types of functionings‖

(Nussbaum, 1999, p. 34). This suggests that from one country to another, the list of capabilities needed by an individual to escape poverty is not the same. Alkire (2002) commends Sen‘s deliberate incompleteness, arguing that a list of capabilities ―may be tremendously overspecified;‖ and that theoretically, it is ―consistent and combinable with several different substantive theories‖ which may on a balance of probabilities make it a subject of public debate (p. 29). Sen‘s approach has been criticized for a number of reasons. According to Wells (2012), Sen‘s approach has been criticized based on its focus which revolves around people‘s ability to achieve the kind of lives they have reason to value, arguing that this appears as an imposition of an external valuation of the good life, whatever people may actually value, which makes it problematic. Wells further says that Sen‘s approach has been criticized based on the premise that the approach‘s content and structure are under-theorised which does not make it suitable as a theory of justice, and on the premise that Sen fails to make clarifications as to the level of importance of capabilities and the manner by which they are to be distributed. Another criticism is based on the ground that the individualism aspect of Sen‘s approach is too individualistic as it shows no interest in communal values which people‘s ways of life are characterized by (Wells, 2012). The emphasis of Sen‘s approach on individual freedom looks so vague as it fails to put into consideration the relationship between freedoms of individuals, and fails to point out freedoms that are either good or bad, or that are either important or trivial (Nussbaum, 2003).

Another proponent of the capability approach, Martha Nussbaum is in agreement with Sen on his propositions such as the role of freedom in development process and the measurement of the successes of development programmes with the individual being the main unit but defers in the aspect of the definition of capabilities threshold in form of a list to be met to attain a level of

human dignity to be secured by individuals. Nussbaum (2000) argues that the absence of a list of capabilities in Sen‘s approach does not make it as relevant as it should be and not as useful for interpersonal comparisons as it should be; and does not constitute an objective normative framework. Corroborating Nussbaum‘s position, Qizilbash (1996, p. 1212) states that ―Sen fails to give a list of capabilities, or functionings, associated with human flourishing, a complete account of interpersonal comparison‖ which makes his approach incommensurable. In order to define the capabilities threshold which Sen‘s approach fails to do, Nussbaum (2000) composes a list of universal capabilities which is ―a basis for determining a decent social minimum in a variety of areas‖ (p. 75). According to her, the list represents a ―freestanding moral core of a political conception‖ and is not committed to accepting ―any particular metaphysical view of the world, any particular comprehensive ethical or religious view, or even any particular view of the person or of human nature‖ (p. 76). Nussbaum‘s list include life (not dying prematurely); bodily health (having good health, including reproductive health, being adequately nourished, and having shelter); bodily integrity (having freedom of movement, protection from assault, having opportunities for sexual gratification, and choice in reproductive matters); senses, imagination, and thought (having the ability to use the senses to think and reason, cultivated by an adequate education which is protected by basic freedoms); emotions (having freedom to love, grieve, experience longing, gratitude, and justified anger, and having freedom one's emotional developing blighted by fear or anxiety); practical reason (having freedom to form a personal conception of the good and to critically engage in planning of one's own life); affiliation (being able to live for and in relation to others, engage in various personally determined social interactions, and having freedom from humiliation and all forms of discrimination); other species (being able to live with and interact freely with the world of nature); play (being able to laugh,

play, and enjoy recreational activities); and control over one‘s environment (having fundamental political and economic rights which guarantees political participation, ownership of property, and equal opportunity of employment) (Nussbaum, 1999, pp. 41-42). In a nutshell, Nussbaum is particular about getting those who are in poverty out of it to a minimum threshold level. in support of this, she asserts that ―we may reasonably defer questions about what we shall do when all citizens are above the threshold, given that this already imposes a taxing and nowhere-realized standard‖ (Nussbaum 2000, p. 12). Nussbaum‘s approach has not been free from criticism just as Sen‘s. Okin (2003) criticizes her approach on the ground that there are basically no changes in her list despite her long years of cross-cultural discourse which has made it remain her same original list which is the Aristotelian one, this puts the epistemological basis of Nussbaum‘s approach into question. one other criticism of her approach comes from Alkire (2005) who argues that in her list, some vital capabilities are missed out which does not make it useful in a number of aspects such as the quality of life measurement or development fieldwork, this questions the legal-moral-philosophical orientation of her approach.