Question

Frank purchased a professional road bike recently and dreams of becoming a professional cyclist and compete in the Tour de France someday. Unfortunately, Frankl ives in a country that does not have infrastructure appropriate for this type of sport. According to Amartya Sen’s capability approach explain the difference in this situation between the functioning that Frank desires and the capability/freedom of becoming a professional cyclist. What is the link between Frank’s situation and the development of the country he lives in?

Answer 1

Amartya Sen’s capability approach is a moral framework. It proposes that social arrangements should be primarily evaluated according to the extent of freedom people have to promote or achieve functionings they value.

Its the choice of focus upon the moral significance of an individual's capability of achieving the kind of lives they have reason to value.

Here functioning is riding a professional road bike. His achievement will be of being a professional cyclist and compete in Tour de France. In this case, the capability will be the unavailability of infrastructure in his current residing country for this kind of sport.

Development ought to be holistic — it should create an enabling environment for people to live long, healthy, and fulfilling lives. In franks case enabling environment will be infrastructure for this type of sport which is link between Franks desire and the developement of the country. This is possible in the capability approach because it puts people in the center of the debate. All factors that can potentially affect people’s capabilities are relevant for consideration.