Happiness Explained ─ What Human Flourishing is and What We Can Do To Promote It

What is human happiness and how can we promote it?

These questions are central to human existence and Happiness Explained draws on scientific research from economics, psychology, and philosophy, as well as a range of other disciplines, to outline a new paradigm in which human flourishing plays a central role in the assessment of national and global progress. It shows why the traditional national income approach is limited as a measure of human wellbeing and demonstrates how the contributors to happiness, wellbeing, and quality of life can be measured and understood across the human life course. Discussing wide-ranging aspects, from parenting, decent employment, friendship, education, and health in old age, through to money, autonomy, and fairness, as well as personal strategies and governmental polices used in the pursuit of happiness, it offers a science-based understanding of human flourishing.

Written by an economist involved in helping governmental organisations move 'beyond GDP',Happiness Explained shows how a wide range of factors that contribute to better and happier lives and how, together, they provide a new blueprint for the assessment of progress in terms of personal wellbeing.

Paul Anand, Professor of Economics at the Open University and Research Associate at Oxford University

Paul Anand is an economist involved in helping governmental organizations move beyond GDP. He has held posts at Oxford University where he obtained his doctorate on the foundations of rational choice. He has written extensively on quality of life issues through research funded by the Leverhulme Trust and the Arts and Humanities Research Board. He has contributed to a number of journal boards including the Journal of Economic Psychology and been a member of research commissioning panels for the ESRC and NHS. He also has long standing interests in the utilization of research having worked closely for a number of years with the Statistics Directorate of the OECD and the UK Office of National Statistics Task force. He is a professor of Economics Decision Sciences and Philosophy at the Open University and a research associate in Oxford University and the LSE. He has been a founder of the Oxford Foundation for Knowledge Exchange and is a Fellow of the Human Capability and Development Association.