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The Human Development Index (HDI) is a comparative measure of life expectancy, literacy, education, and standard of living for countries worldwide. It is a standard means of measuring well-being, especially child welfare. It is used to determine and indicate whether a country is a developed, developing, or underdeveloped country and also to measure the impact of economic policies on quality of life. The index was developed in 1990 by Indian Nobel prize winner Amartya Sen, Pakistani economist Mahbub ul Haq, with help from Gustav Ranis of Yale University and Lord Meghnad Desai of the London School of Economics and has been used since then by the United Nations Development Programme in its annual Human Development Report.
Source: Wikipedia
Samuel Phillips Huntington is a controversial US political scientist known for his analysis of the relationship between the military and the civil government, his investigation of coups d'etat, his thesis (inspired by Polish scientist Feliks Koneczny) that the central political actors of the 21st century will be civilizations rather than nation-states and, most recently, for his views on US immigration. Huntington came to prominence as a scholar in the 1960s with the publication of Political Order in Changing Societies, a work that challenged the conventional view of modernization theorists that economic and social progress would bring about stable democracies in recently decolonized countries.
Source: Wikipedia
Beyond Borders (2003): directed by Martin Campbell and starring Angelina Jolie and Clive Owen. Tagline: Where hope survives. Plot summary: An epic tale of the turbulent romance between two star-crossed lovers set against the backdrop of the world's most dangerous hot spots. Angelina Jolie stars as Sarah Jordan, an American living in London in 1984. She is married to Henry Bauford (Linus Roache) son of a wealthy British industrialist, when she encounters Nick Callahan (Clive Owen) a renegade doctor, whose impassioned plea for help to support his relief efforts in war-torn Africa moves her deeply. As a result, Sarah embarks upon a journey of discovery that leads to danger, heartbreak and romance in the far corners of the world.
Critics said the fictional storyline, in which the doctor's NGO gets involved in weapons dealing for the US Central Intelligence Agency, could encourage extremist attacks on aid workers in hotspots such as Baghdad.
Source: IMDb
The top 10 countries in the 2006 report on the Human Development Index were:
1. Norway: 0.965
2. Iceland: 0.960
3. Australia: 0.957
4. Ireland: 0.956
5. Sweden: 0.951
6. Canada: 0.950
7. Japan: 0.949
8. United States: 0.948
9. Switzerland: 0.947
10. Netherlands: 0.947
Source: Wikipedia
The Rostovian take-off model (also called "Rostow's Stages of Growth") is one of the major historical models of economic growth. It was developed by W. W. Rostow. The model postulates that economic modernization occurs in five basic stages, of varying length.
1. Traditional society
2. Preconditions for take-off
3. Take-off
4. Drive to maturity
5. Age of High mass consumption
Rostow asserts that countries go through each of these stages fairly linearly, and set out a number of conditions that were likely to occur in investment, consumption and social trends at each state. Not all of the conditions were certain to occur at each stage, however, and the stages and transitions periods may occur at varying lengths from country to country, and even from region to region.
Source: Wikipedia
Tales from the Third World by Hocico
See lyrics
Dirt poor, filthy rich is an anagram (a word or phrase made by using the letters of another word or phrase in a different order) of Horrid thrift policy.
Department for International Development is an anagram of Plan to feed Poor - natter, lament it - never mind.
Source: Anagram Genius
The Marshall Plan (from its enactment, officially the European Recovery Program [ERP]) was the primary plan of the United States for rebuilding and creating a stronger foundation for the allied countries of Europe, and repelling communism after World War II. The initiative was named for Secretary of State George Marshall and was largely the creation of State Department officials, especially William L. Clayton and George F. Kennan. The reconstruction plan was developed at a meeting of the participating European states on July 12, 1947.
Source: Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_plan
In a society of little economic development, universal inactivity accompanies universal poverty. You survive not by struggling against nature, or by relentless labour; instead you survive by expending as little energy as possible. (Ryszard Kapuscinski)
Nations, like plants and human beings, grow. And if the development is thwarted they are dwarfed and overshadowed. (Claude McKay)
The high stage of world-industrial development in capitalistic production finds expression in the extraordinary technical development and destructiveness of the instruments of war. (Rosa Luxemburg)
The true law of the race is progress and development. Whenever civilization pauses in the march of conquest, it is overthrown by the barbarian. (William Gilmore Simms)
Source: Creative Quotations
The Luddites were a social movement of British textile artisans in the early nineteenth century who protested — often by destroying textile machines — against the changes produced by the Industrial Revolution, which they felt threatened their livelihood. The Luddite movement, which began in Nottingham in 1811, was named after a mythical leader, Ned Ludd. For a short time the movement was so strong that it clashed in battles with the British Army.
Source: Wikipedia
People think that the poor are not as wise as the rich, for if a man be wise, why is he poor? (African)
When a rich man wants children, he gets dollars, when a poor man wants dollars, he gets children. (Arabian)
If a rich man dies, all the world is moved; if a poor man dies, nobody knows it. (Armenian)
Never promise a poor person, and never owe a rich one. (Brazilian)
He who has a lot of money and no children is not rich; he who has many children and no money is not a pauper. (Chinese)
It's as difficult to be rich without bragging as it is to be poor without complaining. (Chinese)
Rich men accumulate money; the poor accumulate years. (Chinese)
The poor can only guess at what wealth is; the rich don't know what poverty means. (Chinese)
The rich man plans for tomorrow, the poor man for today. (Chinese)
When death comes, the rich man has no money and the poor man no debt. (Estonian)
Economy is the wealth of the poor and the wisdom of the rich. (French)
Source: Creative Proverbs
Since the Human Development Index first appeared, Canada has been the top ranked country ten times, Norway six times, Japan two times and Switzerland once.
Source: Wikipedia
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