Constructing Well-Being and Poverty Dimensions on Political Grounds

Area of Science:

• Social Sciences
• Political Philosophy
• Economics

Background:

• Establishing ethically sound dimensions for multidimensional poverty and well-being frameworks is challenging.
• Existing methods may lack a robust ethical foundation for diverse societies.

Purpose of the Study:

• To propose and illustrate a novel Constitutional Approach for selecting ethically sound well-being dimensions.
• To provide an improved ethical basis for well-being conceptions in pluralist societies.
• To explore the practical implications for data-driven well-being measurement.

Main Methods:

• Combining Amartya Sen's capability approach with John Rawls' political constructivism.
• Analyzing the Italian Constitution to derive well-being dimensions.
• Applying the derived dimensions to rank Italian regions based on well-being data.

Main Results:

• The Constitutional Approach offers an ethically superior method for dimension selection compared to existing literature.
• The approach provides a strong foundation for well-being conceptions in public affairs.
• Ranking Italian regions revealed differences based on varying measurement methods.

Conclusions:

• The Constitutional Approach effectively justifies ethically sound dimensions for multidimensional well-being frameworks.
• This method enhances the ethical basis for well-being measurement in pluralist societies.
• Constitutional analysis offers a practical tool for informing public policy and regional well-being assessments.