Wellbeing : alternative policy perspectives / Timothy Besley, Irene Bucelli (eds.)

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Besley, Timothy, editor.

Bucelli, Irene, editor.

Series:

LSE public policy review series ; 2

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Well-being.

Physical Description:

1 electronic resource (xi, 184 pages)

Other Title:

Well-being

Place of Publication:

London LSE Press 2022

London : LSE Press, 2022.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Governments in liberal democracies pursue social welfare, but in many different ways. The wellbeing approach instead asks: Why not focus directly on increasing measured human happiness? Why not try to improve people’s overall quality of life, as it is subjectively seen by citizens themselves?The radical implications of this stance include shifting attention to previously neglected areas (such as mental health and ‘social infrastructure’ services) and developing defensible measures of overall wellbeing or quality of life indicators. Can one ‘master’ concept of wellbeing work to create more holism in policy-making? Or should we stick with multiple metrics? These debates have been live in relation to an alternative ‘capacities’ approaches, and they are well-developed in health policymaking. Most recently, the connections between wellbeing and political participation have come into sharper focus.Wellbeing remains a contested concept, one that can be interpreted and used differently, with consequences for how it is incorporated into policy decisions. By bringing together scholars from economics, psychology and behavioural science, philosophy and political science, the authors explore how different disciplinary approaches can contribute to the study of wellbeing and how this can shape policy priorities.

Notes:

This book is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution + Noncommercial + NoDerivatives 4.0 license. Copyright is retained by the author(s).

ISBN:

9781909890817

Access Restriction:

Unrestricted online access