The Importance of the Geographic Level of Analysis in the Assessment of the Quality of Life: The Case of Spain

There is a growing literature on the assessment of quality of life conditions in geographically and/or politically divided regions. Sometimes these territories are countries within a specified supranational structure, such as the European Union, for instance, and sometimes they are regions within countries. There is also some research that focuses on the municipal level of analysis, measuring the quality of life in cities. In the end what the researcher obtains is, at best, an average of the living conditions in the specified territory. However, if results are intended to have policy implications, attention should be paid to the variance in living conditions within regions. In this paper we attempt to quantify the relative importance of three different geographic levels of analysis in assessing the quality of life of the Spanish population. The geo-political division in Spain consists firstly of regions called Comunidades Autónomas, which are then divided into provinces which in turn are divided into municipalities. We are interested in evaluating the extent to which the quality of life conditions of an average person living in a given municipality are explained by the province and region in which the municipality is located. To do so, we first construct a composite indicator of quality of life (QoL) for the 643 largest municipalities of Spain using 19 variables which are weighted using Value Efficiency Analysis (VEA). VEA is a refinement of Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) that imposes some consistency on the weights of the indicators used to construct the aggregate index. The indicators cover aspects related to consumption, social services, housing, transport, environment, labour market, health, culture and leisure, education and security. We then make a variance decomposition of the VEA scores to assess the importance of the three levels of geo-political administration. The results show that the municipal level is the most important of these, accounting for 52% of the variance in QoL. Regions explain 38% while provinces only account for a moderate 10%. Therefore, political action at the regional and municipal level would seem to have a larger impact on QoL indicators.     

On the Output Orientation of the Benefit-of-the-Doubt-Model

While Benefit-of-the-Doubt (BoD) models, as used in the context of composite indicator construction, seek to aggregate outputs only, they are formally equivalent to an input-oriented Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) model in multiplier form. Strictly read, this introduces conceptually ambiguous results, as input adjustments have no real significance in the context at hand. At heart of this ambiguity lies a double interpretation of what is essentially a binding constraint in BoD’s underlying linear-fractional program. Moreover, there is a direct, reciprocal relation between the BoD-model and an earlier output-oriented DEA model introduced by Lovell et al. (Eur J Oper Res 87:507–518, 1995) for similar purposes. Although these models are essentially similar, I also show that there are instances (i.e. when adding additional weight restrictions) in which the results of one alternative are easier to communicate. The models surveyed in this paper are complemented with a short application on human development data for females living in Brussels municipalities.     

A Composite Indicator for University Quality Assesment: The Case of Spanish Higher Education System

This study presents a synthetic indicator for quality assessment in the Spanish public university system. The indicator is based on a series of components and simple indicators that were obtained from the public universities’ financial planning estimates. The paper takes a quantitative, wide-ranging approach to analyse the quality of university institutions and is intended to be complimentary to other qualitative approaches. Data Envelopment Analysis was used in order to facilitate the aggregation and weighting of the data used to construct the synthetic indicator. This technique allows the analyst to endogenously determine the weighting of the partial indicators while respecting the peculiarities intrinsic to each university. The results reveal that there are significant differences among Spanish public universities. In addition to how relatively well each of the institutions performs, other factors would seem to be influencing the results; essentially these are related to socio-economic factors and to the application of university policy in Spain over recent decades.

Considering the Extremely Poor: Multidimensional Poverty Measurement for Germany

This paper applies the Alkire and Foster (J Public Econ 95:476–487, 2011) index of multidimensional poverty to German data. This is done with respect to the politically most important dimensions of poverty mentioned in the German Federal Government’s report on poverty and wealth. Additionally, a modification of the identification step of the Alkire–Foster index is proposed to guarantee that individuals, who are extremely poor in only few dimensions, are not omitted by the index.     

Analyzing Disability in Socially Responsible Companies

The incorporation of People with Disability (PWD) in organizations is a subject taken up by international organizations, such as the European Union and the United Nations, which has had subsequent consequences in Spain with the development of legislation and specific initiatives. In this paper we have considered the concept of disability as part of diversity and, above all, as a fundamental subject of human rights and justice, which has allowed us to include the collective of PWD among the stakeholders of companies. The research on the incorporation of disability as an integral part of the policies of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in companies is very recent, although the term Corporate Social Responsibility and Disability is already used. The main objective of this paper is to analyze the commitment with PWD of Spanish companies considered socially responsible by the sustainability indices used. We have included in four large dimensions (Stakeholders, Visibility, Human Resources and Accessibility) the indicators that have allowed us to analyze the information on PWD published by these companies in their sustainability reports or similar documents accessible through their websites. The results suggest that the companies are more concerned about improving their image towards the exterior than for the commitment with their own employees, which is consistent with the dimension Visibility being where the companies carry out more actions in favor of PWD.     

Changes in quality of life perceptions in Saskatoon,Saskatchewan: comparing survey results from 2001 and 2004

There is a growing interest in quality of life (QoL) as an integrated approach to addressing key social, environmental and economic determinants of health. The University of Saskatchewan’s Community-University Institute for Social Research (CUISR) has examined the process and results of a multi-stakeholder approach to the ongoing sustainability of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan as a healthy city with an improving and a more equitably distributed QoL. Using quantitative and qualitative analysis, this research has examined QoL across three locales in Saskatoon—representing Low, Middle and High socio-economic status neighbourhoods. Two large telephone surveys were conducted with residents of the city in 2001 and 2004. This paper presents the major findings from these two surveys according to four overarching research questions posed by the CUISR QoL team. The questions relate to a number of QoL issues including the socio-demographic characteristics of respondents, place related measures, aspects influencing excellent or very good QoL in Saskatoon and feelings of a strong sense of place. The paper also assesses the changes in the results of the four questions between 2001 and 2004.

Measuring Youth Development: A Nonparametric Cross-Country ‘Youth Welfare Index’

This paper develops an empirical methodology for the construction of a synthetic multi-dimensional cross-country comparison of the performance of governments around the world in improving the livelihood of their younger population. The devised ‘Youth Welfare Index’ is based on the nonparametric Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) methodology and allows for cross-country benchmarking and comparison over time. The value added of the youth index is to produce country-specific rankings and trace performance evolution with respect to indicators solely centered on youth, unlike other development indicators like the Human Development Index (HDI) which bundles many social and development indicators.

A Comprehensive Action Plan Information System: A Tool for Tracking and Mapping Quality of Life Action Implementation and Planning

Since its inception, the Community-University Institute for Social Research (CUISR) has been involved in a participatory process aimed at understanding the quality of life in Saskatoon. Informed by the results of Quality of Life (QoL) survey in 2001 and by a list of QoL action priorities from a community forum, the CUISR QoL module set out to survey community work on QoL action planning and implementation. In collaboration with a steering committee of community-based professionals, CUISR developed a methodology for managing and analyzing QoL initiatives related to community action implementation and planning. The Community Action Plan Information System (CAPIS) is the result of this process. CAPIS is a compendium, an analysis, and a purposive contextualization of QoL actions and recommendations from collaborative action plan documents, focused on the Saskatoon community. This paper provides a detailed examination of the concept and components of the Comprehensive Action Plan Information System (CAPIS), as well as the process and outcomes of a sampling of the QoL statement analysis and mapping project. The paper concludes by projecting how the CAPIS could evolve into a fully operational QoL strategic action plan and gap indicator, providing the foundation for a knowledge based, informed, reporting mechanism on the state and evolution of QoL action and policy.

Employment and Earnings Expectations of Jobless Young Skilled: Evidence from Italy

Quality of Life (QoL) is a multi-dimensional idea that includes various distinctive dimensions and its estimation is considered as an essential factor for policy assessment. The study estimates the inter-district variation in QoL in Pakistan by using a data set of Household Integrated Economic Survey of 2010–2011. Objective and subjective indices are constructed to measure QoL with 7 domains and 31 indicators within 89 districts of Pakistan by employing the principal component analysis. The leading result of the study reveals that top ranked district is Jhelum in term of QoL and Tharparkar is at the bottom. The analysis also reveals that the most of the top ranked districts are located in Punjab province. This reflects the better performance of the province in term objective and QoL indices. Whereas, the districts of Balochistan emerge at the lower end in terms of objective and QoL indices. Majority districts of Punjab shows a modest level of satisfaction regarding the facilities provided by the government and the least satisfied districts belong to KPK and Sindh. It is interesting to identify that disparity in the objective index and subjective perceptions are representing QoL differences.

     

Using fractionalization indexes: deriving methodological principles for growth studies from time series evidence

Recent cross-country growth studies have found that ethnolinguistic fractionalization is an important explanatory variable of long-run growth performance. This paper highlights some limitations of cross-country studies by focusing on the time series evidence for South Africa. In presenting variation over time in a number of social dimensions, this paper adds longitudinal evidence on a range of dimensions that have been linked to long run economic development. Given South Africa’s history of ethnic and racial politics, it constitutes a useful case study to explore the dynamics of the possible effects of ethnolinguistic fractionalization on growth. We introduce several new sets of fractionalization indicators for South Africa: ethnolinguistic, religious and cultural fractionalization, and a polarization measure. The results of this study provide important nuance to the existing body of evidence, for the use of fractionalization indices in growth studies.

Measuring Active Citizenship through the Development of a Composite Indicator

This article defines Active Citizenship within a European context as a broad range of value based participation. It develops a framework for measuring this phenomenon which combines the four dimensions of Protest and Social Change, Community Life, Representative Democracy and Democratic values. The European Social Survey 2002 is used to populate the framework as this survey provided the best data coverage available and covered 19 European Countries. In total 61 indicators were selected. A composite indicator (CI), The Active Citizenship Composite Indicator (ACCI), is built using the framework provided and using experts’ weights. In addition, the robustness of the results is tested using sensitivity analysis. The limitations to the ACCI are explained in terms of the limitation of the data availability in particular concerning the new forms of participation and less organised forms of participation. Nevertheless, ACCI proved to be statistically robust and reliable and proved to be a useful tool for monitoring levels of citizenship in Europe. The results of ACCI exhibit interesting and quite distinct regional patterns. The results showed that the Nordic countries, and in particular Sweden, have the highest rate of Active Citizenship, followed by Central Europe and Anglo-Saxon countries. Mediterranean countries are next followed by Eastern European countries that close the ranking.

An Economic Wellbeing Index for the Spanish Provinces: A Data Envelopment Analysis Approach

 This article presents the estimation of a synthetic economic wellbeing index using Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA). The DEA is a multidimensional technique that has its origins in efficiency analysis, but its usage within the social indicators context is particularly appropriate. It allows the researcher to take advantage of the inherent flexibility of DEA when assigning weights to the factors. The model itself carries out the aggregation and weighting of 8 partial indicators, which attempt to describe the four components of economic wellbeing suggested by Osberg (Royal Commision on the Economic Union and Development Prospects for Canada (University of Toronto Press, 1985)), in order to assess the economic wellbeing of the 50 Spanish provinces. By using the index obtained in the analysis a “ranking” of the provinces is obtained. This ranking proves to be relatively similar to the one that corresponds to per capita income, although there are significant differences.     

The French Regions and Their Social Health

In this article, a new indicator designed to capture the multidimensionality of the social health of the French regions is put to the test. Drawing on regional data for 2004, this indicator of social health (ISH) sheds new light on the social performance of the French regions. The worst performers are the highly urbanised regions, whereas others, such as Limousin, turn out to perform well in social terms. Two or three regions remain stuck at the bottom of the table regardless of the indicator used. Nord-Pas-de-Calais and Languedoc-Roussillon, which bring up the rear in terms of gross disposable income (GDI) and gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, also record very mediocre scores for social health as measured by our ISH.

Socioeconomic Indicators for Analyzing Convergence: The Case of Greece: 1960–2004

The purpose of this paper is to use socioeconomic indicators for analyzing convergence within Greece at regional (NUTS II) and prefecture levels (NUTS III) since 1960. We use two alternative approaches. The first one is based on the coefficient of variation and the second one on quality of life rankings. We confirm the decline of regional inequalities in Greece, with the exclusion of the 1980s. Regions with increased tourist and trade activity are also regions with high quality of life. Border regions are usually the laggards of social and economic development.

Labour mobility and regional disparities: the role of female labour participation

Unemployment rates, as well as income per capita, differ vastly across the regions of Europe. Labour mobility can play a role in resolving regional disparities. This paper focuses on the questions of why labour mobility is low in the EU and how it is possible that it remains low. We explore whether changes in male and female labour participation act as an important alternative adjustment mechanism. We answer this question in the affirmative. We argue that female labour participation is very important in adjusting to regional disparities.

Determinants of Work-life Balance: Shortcomings in the Contemporary Measurement of WLB in Large-scale Surveys

Research on work-life balance (WLB) has presented important insights into the problems of combining family aspirations with paid work in relation to policy relevant agendas. Using the ESS II (2004/2005), we examine work-related and household/family-related causes of WLB. We can corroborate other research findings that show that work-related aspects explain by far the largest part of the variation in WLB. However, we illustrate that the measurement of WLB is partly problematic. Because WLB scales conceptualize the work component more specifically than the life component, what ‘life’ means remains rather intangible apart from general references to the ‘home’, ‘housework’ and ‘family responsibilities’. This largely neglects different emic dimensions to WLB common to specific subgroups and renders the measurement rather abstract. Second, the wordings of WLB indicators already include their most probable explanations. There is the danger of a circular argument here and many explanations seem tautological. This makes it difficult to conclude on the effects of other than work-related aspects on WLB, which are, arguably, also important aspects of WLB. Finally, WLB scales hardly correlate with relevant external criteria, for instance subjective well-being. Following from these findings, we discuss what these WLB scales could really measure and propose to broaden quantitative empirical approaches to it.

Does Municipal Socioeconomic Development Affect Public Perceptions of Crime? A Multilevel Logistic Regression Analysis

Chile is considered as one of the safest countries in Latin America, with a below-the-average world crime rate. However, during the last few decades, the country has experienced a deterioration in public perceptions of safety. This paper investigates public perceptions of crime in the 52 municipalities of the metropolitan area of Santiago, by employing an index of socioeconomic development for each municipality. Multilevel logistic regression analysis is used in order to assess the impact of individual and municipal-level variables on perceptions of crime in these municipalities. The results show that women exhibit higher perceptions of crime, while people living in rural areas, inactive people, and people with higher education and income have generally lower perceptions. Multidimensional poverty is positively associated with high perceptions of crime, while municipal spending on health and/or education does not show a relationship with perceptions of crime. Regarding socioeconomic development level of municipalities, the results show that people living in municipalities of high development show the lowest perceptions of crime, despite the fact that these municipalities do actually exhibit the highest crime rates, a fact confirming the ‘perception gap’ and the ‘neighbourhood favouritism’ theories. The results and conclusions of this study can be used not only by local policy-makers but also by officials in other cities that—like Santiago—are characterised by high urban segregation.     

Displacement Dynamics in Southern Louisiana After Hurricanes Katrina and Rita

We describe displacement dynamics in Louisiana approximately 1 year after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Policy-makers and service-providers require a more detailed understanding of displacement in order to provide for geographically dispersed populations. Census estimates of net change are often insufficient because they fail to capture the broad range of movement of people. Therefore, we draw upon original data to more fully describe patterns of movement across and within parish lines in southern Louisiana. The 2006 Louisiana Health and Population Survey (LHPS) was commissioned by the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals and the Louisiana Recovery Authority to provide information on population dispersion and related health characteristics in and around hurricane-affected regions. Our paper utilizes this unique dataset to describe three distinct dimensions of displacement dynamics: in-migration, out-migration, and intra-parish movement. These displacement dynamics add important correctives to the broader “net effects” commonly cited in media reports of population changes, which vastly understate the extent of displacement in the region.

Community Interests and Indicator System Success

Testing the validity of indicator systems is a task almost always left to the scientific community, in standard practice and in keeping with the quest for objectivity prevalent in politics and in society as a whole. This paper calls for a reinvigorated agenda within indicators research to question this practice and develop alternative methodologies to test the validity, legitimacy and impacts of indicator systems. The assumptions of objectivity are not realistic in contemporary policy contexts. As a result, the scientific community is not the only community with a stake in assessing an indicator system; it is perhaps not even the most important one. Four other community types with distinct interests in the design, use and impacts of indicator systems are identified. First is the community of elected officials, whose positions of power make their perspective important and unique; second is the community of engaged publics, whose stake is made clear by the principles of participatory and deliberative democracy; third are communities of cultural difference; and fourth are professional communities. The unique relationship each of these communities has with indicator systems, and thus the tests and challenges offered by each to the practice of indicators, is discussed through a case study of a public participation process for the development of a new set of regional sustainability indicators in Vancouver, Canada. The evidence suggests new research questions for scholars in policy and indicators studies who seek to better understand paths and barriers to implementation and impact in indicators practice, as well as lessons for other local indicators practices.