Dear PERN community,
In continuation of the discussion on the definition of the concept of habitability started yesterday with the sharing of the work initiated by David Wrathall (Oregon State University), we share with you today the statement of David O'Byrne (Lund University, Sweden): "Habitability as a capacity: a proposing normative definition of the concept".
David Wrathall et al. end their essay by writing "Habitability is a choice". David O'Byrne says: "Habitability is a freedom" and should be understood in terms of the freedoms available to the inhabitants of a given area. David proposes to define habitability along the lines of Amartya Sen's approach, which defines freedom in terms of capabilities.
There could be places "where it is barely possible for people to access basic capabilities, such as being fed with food and water and having shelter, to places that are much more livable, where freedoms such as education, belonging to a community and access to safe spaces for recreation, for example, are available".
Thinking of habitability in terms of capability reflects the intrinsic normativity of the concept. We can only agree with David that 'habitability is something we want to see maintained and improved' and that, therefore, discussing habitability involves considering inequality in capabilities, power relations and political processes.
This normative view of habitability provides an excellent perspective on the link between habitability and migration, and David explains at the outset of his essay that a simple inverse relationship between habitability and migration does not seem to stand up to the evidence.
This point complements a point in yesterday's first statement by David Wrathall who argued that migration is a signal of changing habitability. If I interpret David O’Byrne's essay correctly, one could be argued that what might be a signal of habitability change is an increase or decrease in forced migration and involuntary immobility.
Please have a look at this excellent statement and let us know your thoughts, comments or questions!
Yours sincerely,
Marion
--
The Population-Environment Research Network (PERN) Cyberseminar Discussion List
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "PERNSeminars - List" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to pernseminars...@ciesin.columbia.edu.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/a/ciesin.columbia.edu/d/msgid/pernseminars/a0e829bd-41e3-4ed0-a093-acc644059753n%40ciesin.columbia.edu.
--
The Population-Environment Research Network (PERN) Cyberseminar Discussion List
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "PERNSeminars - List" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to pernseminars...@ciesin.columbia.edu.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/a/ciesin.columbia.edu/d/msgid/pernseminars/79d9de1b-6550-4067-b81d-124b4393f3e2n%40ciesin.columbia.edu.
Hi Harald,
Thanks for these questions and comments.
I am less familiar with Nussbaum’s work than Sen’s, though I am aware of some differences. I believe she does see a certain group of capabilities as being universally valuable and more important, but as you say she does not choose a hierarchy between them.
Sen in principle leaves it up to the people who are affected by, and therefore participating in, the decision to determine for themselves which capabilities they will prioritise in their chosen course of action. I did not develop much on it in the above piece, but his idea of social choice is that through discussion and deliberation people will produce an evaluative framework constituted by a weighted list of evaluative factors (which are related to different capabilities). They then use this list to assess different courses of action. As such the approach is not really meant to define something abstractly, like habitability, but to select between alternative courses of action, in which, of course, an implicit idea of habitability will be entailed. So I agree, I think, that it could be a good link between concept and practical decision-making.
This is a really interesting point that you raise about comparability and international assistance. So, while the form of decision-making I describe above is the deepest form of social choice that Sen advocates, this is something that is very difficult to achieve in practice. Not only is it costly and involved, as Sen acknowledges, but accepting the decisions that emerge from such radically democratic procedures will likely require redistribution of resources from private capital to the less well-off in society (something Sen acknowledges sometimes but does not incorporate to his theory). For whichever of these reasons, Sen himself saw the need for a much quicker and more objective/universal way of assessing capability to direct investment. This is why he was so instrumental in the formulation of the Human Development Index and in advocating for it with the World Bank.
But I think it is probably necessary to go beyond Sen on this point. He has focused very much on metrics and measures of development. And I think with capability he provides us with very good, even the best, metrics. But he has paid less attention to institutional and structural conditions that would allow these metrics to become the basis of decision-making. Perhaps when we are thinking about prioritising assistance we should think not just in terms of indicators and metrics of development/habitability, but what kinds of institutional and structural barriers exist to habitability/development/well-being etc. Where are they most severe, where can they be most fruitfully tackled, where do we have greatest chance of success, and so on?
All the best,
David
--
The Population-Environment Research Network (PERN) Cyberseminar Discussion List
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "PERNSeminars - List" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to
pernseminars...@ciesin.columbia.edu.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/a/ciesin.columbia.edu/d/msgid/pernseminars/a0e829bd-41e3-4ed0-a093-acc644059753n%40ciesin.columbia.edu.
Hi Oliver,
I agree with you whole heartedly. And I think that the capability approach can provide a good framework for conceptualising these different types of habitability in a common language. But more than a common language it provides a common point of reference for people. They can relate all these qualitatively very different types of habitability to their own well-being and freedom. At the same time, it avoids making all of these different factors in an individual’s well-being equivalent, i.e., reducing them to monetary values.
David
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/a/ciesin.columbia.edu/d/msgid/pernseminars/CAJBK7AccG01PEbN50%2BPD9eW0fSTvqRVZievzF20oEsVm-spMPA%40mail.gmail.com.
Hi Maria,
Thanks for your comment. You raise a very good point and a good example of it. Indeed, I think you also point to one of the difficulties with conceptualizing habitability. On the one hand, for the reasons I point out in the piece I think it is wrong to associate habitability only with migration, but then, on the other hand, when opening up that definition to include all the things that affect whether people find it desirable to live in place, the number of factors and phenomena that we start to include becomes almost endless. If habitability becomes such a comprehensive term, then what distinguishes it from well-being, adaptation, development, etc. In short, I wonder how we keep habitability as a focused and discrete terms at the same time as we avoid it just being an inverse concept for migration. Perhaps a question that we need to answer at the same time as define a new concept is what added value/new insights does this concept bring?
David
Från: 'Maria Franco Gavonel' via PERNSeminars - List <pernse...@ciesin.columbia.edu>
Skickat: den 15 mars 2023 18:53
Till: PERNSeminars - List <pernse...@ciesin.columbia.edu>
Kopia: Oliver Ujah <olive...@gmail.com>; PERNSeminars - List <pernse...@ciesin.columbia.edu>; Marion Borderon <marion....@gmail.com>
Ämne: Re: [PERN Cyberseminar] Habitability as capability: proposing a normative definition of the concept – D. O’Byrne | Cyberseminar on the Habitability concept
Dear David,
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/a/ciesin.columbia.edu/d/msgid/pernseminars/54e81406-fbfc-458e-b40d-35dd23eef979n%40ciesin.columbia.edu.