Starting from the voice of populations, the article aims to define the social gap in terms of existing wellbeing at local level. To do that, the distinguishing features of which are the distribution of rights, opportunities, goods and expectations among the inhabitants rather than the social, economic and interactive measures to reduce them. Without criteria and indicators that are functional to this aim we cannot define the concept of progress, knowing that associating it with the idea of an unlimited Gross domestic product no longer makes sense in the present age. Where progress may be unlimited is in the immaterial field of the social, environmental and institutional ties that are indispensable for ensuring that everyone’s contribution has been recognized and competences and resources made best use of. Making this field explicit and the specific object of progress requires the wellbeing of all being defined with methods and measures that encourage citizen interaction. The article also summarizes the participatory methodology promoted by the Council of Europe for defining the wellbeing of all.only subscribers can see the full article

The article analyses the causes of the apparent paradox between the strongly positive response in public debate to the criticism of Gdp as inadequate in measuring progress, and the continuing centrality of economic growth in the political aims that are actually pursued. Economic growth requires the constant enlargement of markets, without which there would be the risk of economic collapse, and in this situation it continues to be the premise of security quite apart from its value in terms of wellbeing, progress and sustainability. To be able to pursue these aims without it will require more than measurements going «beyond Gdp» further than they already do, as an overall reconsideration is necessary that will make it possible to translate increased productivity into shorter working hours rather than greater production, and shift decision-making as to what, how much, for whom, where and how we produce from the market to society.only subscribers can see the full article

How adequate Gdp is as a measure of development has always been a matter of debate, but attempts to define a more holistic concept of development have so far failed. As well as considering national and international policy initiatives aimed at defining agreed paradigms of sustainable development, this article offers to identify a series of theoretical and cultural elements on which a measurement of wellbeing compatible with the idea of sustainability can be based. The possibility of translating these elements into a concrete example is demonstrated in the analysis of the Feem Si (Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei Sustainability index), a flexible tool that can simulate the impact of various policies, thus making a new paradigm of sustainable development operative. only subscribers can see the full article

The measurement of wellbeing has become one of the challenges that national statistics institutes are called on to face. To do that, there are at least two big challenges. First, statistical production needs to be able to cover all the significant dimensions of progress. Secondly, the selection of key indicators needs to derive from a democratic process that guarantees the legitimacy of the tool. The statistical production of Istat (Italian national institute of statistics) seems able to provide enough solid information to measure economic performance, the different dimensions that make up wellbeing, and environmental sustainability. The definition of the set of indicators to be used to measure progress is assigned to an initiative recently launched by Istat and the Cnel, which aims to include all the most representative stakeholders in a shared deliberation. only subscribers can see the full article

In recent decades wellbeing, in the sense of the combined capacities of individuals in a given historical and social context, has been proposed by Amartya Sen as the centre of a new analytic paradigm. As part of this approach, a debate has been opened on the list of capabilities that define wellbeing. In this discussion we also place the question at the centre of the essay: what is the role of public policies in developing these dimensions and what is the impact of gender differences? In the article, which is based on long experience studying these themes, the authors set out the methods followed in experimenting gender balance in wellbeing approaches, introduced for the first time in Emilia-Romagna, and later adopted in Italy at various levels of local government, in the regions, the provinces and the municipalities. only subscribers can see the full article