News Analysis: Recipe for happiness
The latest World Happiness Index did not get serious attention here. But the index offers food for thought for the policymakers.
According to the index released on Monday, people of the countries with effective democratic institutions and good governance are much happier than those having deficiency in those areas.
Norway, Denmark, Iceland, Switzerland and Finland rounded out the top five countries in the index. Democratic institutions and governance system are strong in these five countries. This contributes to improving the quality of their people's lives, resulting in an increase in their happiness.
In contrast, sub-Saharan African countries and those hit by conflict scored low and were at the bottom of the index due to their fragile state of democracy, rule of law, and pervasive corruption.
Rwanda, Syria, Tanzania, Burundi and Central African Republic are at the bottom.
Where does Bangladesh stand in terms of the quality of life of its citizens? Bangladesh ranked 110th among 155 countries surveyed for the index by the Sustainable Development Solutions Network. This exposes, once again, poor governance and the deficient democratic structure in the country.
How do good governance and strong democratic institutions contribute to increase people's happiness?
The World Happiness Report measures "subjective well-being" -- how happy the people are, and why. It also takes into account GDP per capita, healthy life expectancy, freedom, generosity, social support and absence of corruption in government or business.
A global initiative launched by UN in 2012, the SDSN in its new report said their previous reports considered evidence that good governance has enabled countries to sustain or improve happiness, even during an economic crisis.
"Results presented there suggested not just that people are more satisfied with their lives in countries with better governance, but also that actual changes in governance quality since 2005 have led to significant changes in the quality of life," it asserted.
Some other latest global indexes on corruption, freedom of the press, economic freedom and rule of law support the findings of the Happiness Index.
In the previous global corruption indexes by Transparency International, Norway, Denmark, Switzerland and Finland were always top scorers.
Their positions also looked bright in the press freedom indexes released by Reporters Without Border, economic freedom indexes by the Heritage Foundation and global rule of law index by World Justice Project.
On the other hand, those countries scored poor in happiness index remained at the bottom of the indexes released by TI, Reporters Without Border, Heritage Foundation and World Justice Project.
Bangladesh could not score well in any of the indexes. The country ranked as 15th most corrupt country or 145 among 176 countries in TI index; it ranked 103 out of 113 countries in the rule of law index by World Justice Project.
Bangladesh could not perform well in economic and press freedom indexes released a few months ago. It ranked 128 among 180 countries in economic index while it's position was 144th in press freedom index.
The underlying massages of those indexes are the same: democracy, good governance and rule of law can reduce corruption, improve quality of people's lives, and increase their happiness.
For our poor ranking in economic freedom index, Heritage Foundation says: "The fragile rule of law continues to undermine economic development in Bangladesh." It also blamed corruption and repeated political crises for constraining economic dynamism.
And according to the World Justice Project, effective rule of law reduces corruption, improves public health, enhances education, alleviates poverty, and protects people from injustices and dangers large and small.
There are numerous studies suggesting that corruption increased poverty, deprived people of basic needs and proper nutrition. Thus it reduces people's life expectancy too.
The countries with little tolerance for corruption and government and strongly sustaining rule of law performed well in the index. People of those countries are happier than other countries.
So, happiness index should not be considered in isolation. The happiness index is linked to other global indexes. Our poor ranking in the Happiness Index once again expose the poor governance, weak rule of law and deficiency in democracy.
Policymakers of our government need to know the causes of happiness and misery of people. They should work more to improve governance and quality of rule of law.
If they do so, people will be benefited and the country's ranking in all global indexes including the Happiness Index will look better.
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