The Human Development Index (HDI) has long been criticized for not taking account of ecological sustainability. This limitation is becoming increasingly problematic given a growing crisis of climate change and ecological breakdown in the 21st century. All of the HDI top performers are notable for dangerously high levels of ecological impact, which is driving a global crisis. We can see this relationship by plotting the HDI series against the per-capita CO2 emissions and material footprint for each nation. The plots below use data from 2015:

There are two problems to consider here. First, HDI celebrates the very nations that are contributing most to climate change and other forms of ecological breakdown, in terms of their per capita emissions and material footprint. In doing so, it promotes a model of development that is empirically incompatible with ecology. The average material footprint of nations with “very high” HDI scores is 26t per capita (four times over the sustainable boundary), while their average CO2 emissions is 11t per capita (six times over the boundary). It is not ecologically possible for all nations to consume at this level. In other words, the pursuit of development according to HDI requires that the world “develops” to the point of ecological collapse. This is not a tenable approach for the 21st century.

The second problem is related to the first. The countries of the global South suffer disproportionately from the negative impacts of climate change and ecological breakdown, with significant costs to human economies and living systems; indeed, climate change is now beginning to reverse key development indicators in some regions, as agricultural yields decline and hunger rates rise. In this sense, HDI embodies a contradiction whereby the process of generating high levels of development in some nations constrains development – and even drives de-development – in other nations. For a development indicator that purports to be universal, such a contradiction is indefensible.

Any ecologically rational vision for human development needs to respect the principle of planetary boundaries. In other words, resources should be mobilized to improve human development, but without violating the parameters of ecological sustainability. The objective is to accomplish both human development and ecological sustainability at the same time. This aim is now widely accepted, and is officially enshrined in the Sustainable Development Goals. It is time to update the human development index accordingly.

The Sustainable Development Index (SDI) addresses these concerns by focusing on the ecological efficiency of nations in delivering human development. It starts with the base components of the HDI (life expectancy index, education index, and income index modified with a sufficiency threshold) and divides it by ecological overshoot: the extent to which consumption-based CO2 emissions and material footprint exceed per-capita shares of planetary boundaries). For the details of the methodology, see here. Countries that have high human development with low ecological impact rise to the top of the SDI. Countries with low human development, and countries with high human development but high ecological impact, fall to the bottom of the SDI.

In this way, the SDI promotes a new vision for progress in the 21st century - one compatible with the ecology of our planet. To succeed in terms of SDI, poor nations must significantly improve human development while keeping their ecological impact within planetary boundaries, while rich nations must maintain or enhance human development while significantly reducing their ecological impact down to sustainable levels.

Citation and attribution

Hickel, Jason. 2020. “The Sustainable Development Index: Measuring the Ecological Efficiency of Human Development in the Anthropocene,” Ecological Economics vol 167 [PDF]. Data management, data visualization and program coding is by Huzaifa Zoomkawala.

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