Life, Liberty and the pursuit of (Gross National) Happiness

The Buddhist government of Bhutan has been set on pursuing the goal of "gross national happiness" instead of pure GNP (gross national product). This goal was announced by the king of Bhutan when he took the throne in 1972, and in the last 20 years the government has been incorporating the philosophy in development and economic policy.

Naturally, I think they are right on track and completely in line with the Calvert-Henderson Quality of Life Indicators which I wrote about in an earlier post

http://sustainablewealth.blogspot.com/2006/08/what-is-quality-of-life.html

http://www.calvert-henderson.com/

"The Calvert-Henderson Quality of Life Indicators are a contribution to the worldwide effort to develop comprehensive statistics of national well-being that go beyond traditional macroeconomic indicators. A systems approach is used to illustrate the dynamic state of our social, economic and environmental quality of life. The dimensions of life examined include: education, employment, energy, environment, health, human rights, income, infrastructure, national security, public safety, re-creation and shelter."

The term Gross National Happiness was first expressed by the King of Bhutan His Majesty Jigme Singye Wangchuck.

Bhutan’s minister Dasho Meghraj Gurung put the Bhutanese philosophy succinctly: “The ideology of GNH connects Bhutan’s development goals with the pursuit of happiness. This means that the ideology reflects Bhutan’s vision on the purpose of human life, a vision that puts the individual’s self-cultivation at the center of the nation’s developmental goals, a primary priority for Bhutanese society as a whole as well as for the individual concerned”.

Now, one can argue this is not a case of separation of "church and state" since Bhutan is a Buddhist monarch- but if you think about the Founding Father's vision of "pursuit of happiness" as a cornerstone of our society, the Bhutanese view is not far off, and we can gain from it.

This all underscores how much our modern economic system of measures and definition of "progress" has taken a big detour from the basic well being of individual citizens in our country.

Since we base the measure of quality of life based on what material goods we produce and consume, the oversights and ills of this country are a natural result, you get what you focus on...

I suggest further reading on any of these sites:
http://www.globalideasbank.org/site/bank/idea.php?ideaId=3257

Gross International Happiness - a website of an organization wanting to take this philosophy global: http://www.grossinternationalhappiness.org/gnh.html

http://travelbhutan.tripod.com/druk.html