Paper short abstract:

In this paper, I develop a research agenda grounded on the notion of ‘everyday economies of welfare’. This agenda aims to provide a compass for connecting people's embedded knowledge with social policy interventions that go beyond the imperative of economic growth.

Paper long abstract:

The historical use of measurement frameworks and global indicators as tools of state governance and knowledge production in defining human welfare and welfare policy has been marked by the emergence of statistics and the rise of the GDP indicator as the primary policy compass guiding economic growth and societal well-being. However, this historical reliance on measurement frameworks has not met the expectations of ordinary people for greater well-being, human needs satisfaction, and livelihood sustainability. Instead, it has been associated with increasing inequality, crises in social reproduction, the erosion of intergenerational social mobility, the scaling back of welfare state safety nets, growing food insecurity, and the recent "cost of living crisis." A core contradiction of the current conjuncture is the disconnection between the ongoing hegemony of economic growth and the sustainability of human welfare. In this paper, I develop a research agenda grounded on the notion of ‘everyday economies of welfare’, which aims to provide a compass for connecting people's embedded knowledge and social policy interventions that go beyond the imperative of economic growth. I first offer context on the evolution of quantitative indicators, illustrating how they have transformed from simple representations of reality into influential models of reality and human well-being, using GDP as a key example. Next, I introduce the concept of "everyday economies of welfare." After that, I explore three central anthropological questions that emphasise a shift in perspective in understanding human welfare calculus and livelihood sustainability towards a bottom-up approach to choice, agency, and provisioning decision-making processes.