What is Capabilty approach to development?

Oxford Conversations with Sabina Alkire

I think there’s a nobel Laureate Amartya Sen who in 1979 observed that when we think about
equality we’re always trying to measure quality in some space and all of the disagreements are
about what space measured in whether it’s in resources whether it’s in Liberty or something else
and theories of justice we disagree about the space in which we should assess equality and he
proposed that we considered in a space of capabilities which is people’s freedom from their real
freedom not a paper freedom but their real freedom to pursue and achieve activities and states of
life that they deeply valued and also that they have reason to value that are valuable from a wider
perspective and so that’s a mouthful. It’s a lot of phrases, it’s a lot of ideas but he developed
those ideas very powerful both in philosophy and in economics and so that has been a way of
widening the focus of economic, thinking away from just looking at people’s preferences or
utility to really looking at their activities and their state of being and also doing so while leaving
respect for their freedom so that they can act as agent so that they can create in an on-going way
and they’re not putting the box in trying to simply give them basic needs as in the prison so that
idea which I had read in night when I was studying theology reading group continued to inspire
me. It was the basis of my doctoral work and it’s been a continual thing since then.