Upstream - Gross National Happiness with Dr. Tho Ha Vinh

Episode Date: February 8, 2016

In this interview, we hear from Dr. Ha Vinh Tho, the Program Development Coordinator of the Gross National Happiness Centre in Bhutan. Tho is also the founder and chairman of Eurasia Foundation, a humanitarian NGO, a visiting fellow at several universities and a Buddhist teacher in the Tradition of Vietnamese Zen Buddhism, who was ordained by Thich Nhat Hanh. We speak about the history and meaning of the Gross National Happiness Index and how it can be a better index for measuring happiness, health, and wellbeing in a country. For more information, visit Dr. Tho's blog and Bhutan's Gross National Happiness website. This episode of Upstream was made possible with support from listeners like you. Upstream is a labor of love — we couldn't keep this project going without the generosity of our listeners and fans. Please consider chipping in a one-time or recurring donation at www.upstreampodcast.org/support If your organization wants to sponsor one of our upcoming documentaries, we have a number of sponsorship packages available. Find out more at upstreampodcast.org/sponsorship For more from Upstream, visit www.upstreampodcast.org and follow us on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and Bluesky. You can also subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts.

Hello and welcome. You are listening to an Upstream interview, which is part of the Economics for Transition project. Today I'll be speaking with Dr. Ha-Vin Toh, the Program Director of the Gross National Happiness Center in Bhutan, and a co-facilitator of the Right Livelihood Program at Schumacher College. Toh is also the founder and chairman of the Eurasia Foundation, a humanitarian non-governmental organization, a visiting fellow at several international universities, and a Buddhist teacher in the tradition of Vietnamese Zen Buddhism. Welcome, Dr. Tho. Thank you. Dr. Tho, can you describe a little bit more about your background and particularly how you came to work at the Gross National Happiness Center in Bhutan? Maybe I'll just speak about the work I was doing just before going to Bhutan, because obviously I've done quite a lot of different things, so that would take too long.

obviously I've done quite a lot of different things so that would take too long but for several years before going to Bhutan I was working with the International Committee of the Red Cross which is the part of the Red Cross Red Crescent movement that works in the economic system has an inherent violence it is profoundly unjust inequitable, and the other root cause is connected with climate change and environmental destruction.

religious or political or ideological reasons are put in the foreground. They are not really the main reasons. The main reasons are much deeper. So if I give you an example, I was in Darfur several times. And Darfur is West Sudan. There's been a very violent conflict. Over two million people died in Darfur is West Sudan. There's been a very violent conflict. Over two million people died in Darfur. And Darfur was actually a conflict originally over water resource.

Because of climate change, the water resource had diminished. And you had two populations. You had farmers and herders, nomads. And both of them needed water, and there was not enough water for both. Then, of course, came political and, you know, all kind of other things then were built on it, like big powers fighting over proxy war and so on.

But originally it was basically a war to war. And I really had the experience that now, if you look at the conflicts now, most of the conflicts are oil wars. Look at the conflict map and the oil maps, they are almost identical. From Syria to Iraq to... It's all oil wars. Whatever you put over it as ideological, religious, whatever. But in reality, it's oil wars. But with the climate change

challenge, we might see more and more water wars coming up. And they will be much more violent because living without oil is sort of difficult for a Western lifestyle. But you can live without oil. But without water, you can only survive maybe a few days. So I really felt that if we didn't address these root causes, it didn't really make much sense to continue just trying to mitigate the effects.

So with these two things in mind, economic system and climate and environment, so I tried to see whether there were alternatives. And the one alternative that I found that was the only one that was implemented at a country-wide level was Gross National Happiness in Bhutan. So that's how I got interested in Gross National Happiness and then there were some circumstances that made that at that time

the then Prime Minister of Bhutan was wanting to create a G&H center and was looking for someone to be the program director and I got hired. So that's how I come to Bhutan. Thank you. You mentioned the root causes in terms of the environmental climate change.

What are some of the root problems or issues about our current economic system? problems or issues about our current economic system? One aspect is the way we measure development and what the goal of development is supposed to be. So currently, the goal of development is the economic growth, by and large. goal of development is the economic growth by and large. And the theory is that if you enhance economic growth, all the rest will somehow naturally or magically or somehow come along and there will be the so-called trickle-down effect and people will become richer. A rising tide lifts all boats. Exactly.

But frankly speaking, we haven't seen that happening. We have seen huge, enormous economic growth, but we haven't seen poverty being really alleviated. We've seen, even within rich societies, inequality on the rise. And we know from research that inequality is one of the main factors of social problems. So the more unequal a country and the more social problems you will have, including depression, teen pregnancy, crime rate, things that seem to be totally unrelated. But the fact is that they do rise as inequality rises. So that's one very important aspect. The second one is that the way we measure development, so the GDP as a measurement tool, that really doesn't make the difference between whether what fuels the growth has a positive or a negative impact on society.

to include drug trafficking and prostitution in their GDP measurement, which is logical from a GDP point of view because it's financial transactions. So you saw that the GDP was rising when you included prostitution and drug trafficking because it's big business. And that's a typical symptom that, you know, even if what creates growth is something that is completely destructive for people, or for environment, or for society, from a GQP point of view, it doesn't make any difference. And that's definitely one of the reasons why we have so many wars, is that arms industry is one of the big contributors to GDP in many of the developed countries. And weapons are a fantastic product, They're self-destroyed. You pay a missile, I don't know,

like hundreds of thousands of dollars, maybe a million dollars, and then you shoot it and then it's destroyed or you have to replace it. So it's a perfect product from a GDP point of view. So to put it a bit more pointedly, imagine that the parents are very nice parents and take good care of their children and feed them well and give them a lot of support and educate them properly and there's a wonderful atmosphere in the family so their children grow up to be happy and well and healthy. This will never appear in GDP because none of that has been paid for. While if you're bad parents and you feed them junk food and don't educate them properly, and the kids get

ill and stressed and have to go to the doctors and the psychologists, well, you will have to pay, or someone will have to pay for all these services. So it will increase GDP. So that's the absurd situation, that being good parents is not as good for GDP as being bad parents. It's a bit extreme, but just to make my point. And likewise, many, many of the things that we know from our personal experience are really important in our life, like friendship and love and nature, but we don't pay for that. So it doesn't appear in GDP. Therefore, there's no focus on these things, because what you count counts. What you measure is what you're attentive to, and public policies are driven by what is measured.

what is measured. And the last point is that the understanding of the human being that underlies the current economic system, the so-called homo economicus, is actually kind of a sort of a monster, like a

purely selfish, purely rational being. Competitive. Competitive, just trying to maximize its own profit at any cost and minimize so-called disutilities like work. And so I think that's, in a way, you could say the current economic system is a self-fulfilling prophecy. You say, okay, that's the way human beings are.

So let's create a system that fits to these people. And then that's a system that you get, a system that is heartless, soulless, compassionless, competitive, winner-takes-it-all kind of approach to economics. And yeah, so we could go on and on. But these are the kind of the root, some of the root problems of the current economic system. And the results are, we see them everywhere around us, destruction of nature, destruction of community, destruction of cultures, destruction of social fabric. And even those who are so-called successful in this system pay a high price. in this system pay a high price you know we have the we've seen the the depression and stress related illnesses becoming the number one cause of illness and morbidity in the developed countries

so that's really system related yes so the way that we measure development is important. So let's go to something different than gross domestic product, gross national happiness index. So can you describe that index, how it came to be, the story behind it? So there's a long-term story and a short-term story. So there's a long-term story and a short-term story. So the long story started in the 17th century, really, when Shabdrung, who was the person who united Bhutan as a nation, first created Bhutan. And he was a Buddhist monk.

And so he created Bhutan based on Buddhist values. And Buddhist values are very intimately related to loving kindness and compassion. And loving kindness is the intention to bring happiness and well-being and compassion is the intention to alleviate suffering. So they're the two sides of the same coin. On one hand you try to bring happiness and well-being, on the other hand you try to mitigate, alleviate suffering, wherever you can. So this kind of idea that that was the role of the leaders of the state,

was to bring happiness and well-being and to alleviate suffering, has been enshrined in the history of Bhutan since the beginning. So that's a long historic story. The short-term story started in the 1970s. historic story. The short-term story started in the 1970s. In 1972, the third king of Bhutan died at a relatively young age. He was 42, I think, something like that. And his son, who was at that time only 17 years old, Chigme Singyewontruk, the fourth king of Bhutan, ascended the throne. He was a very young man, a teenager, and he was wise enough to understand that at this young age he didn't know what he actually should do as a king. He had not had time to be trained by his father long enough because he was so young.

So what he did, and I think that's quite a unique feature, he walked around the country from village to village. And Bhutan is small enough that you can do that. So he really walked all over the country, went from village to village, and sat down with the people and asked them, so I will be your king, what do you expect of me? So it was quite a unique sort of spontaneous participatory process

of listening to the people. So he met with farmers and with monks and with women and with men and with young people and with old people and with all kinds of North and the West and the Center and the South. So he heard many, many stories, what were the people's stories and what they hoped and so on. And then when he came back, he said, well, you know, I heard so many different stories and each one is quite different. But really what all people have in common is they would like to be happy.

That's really what's the common thread. They would like to be happy. That's really what's a common thread. So how can I take that as the main goal of my government, of my mission as a king, to bring happiness and well-being to the country? So that was a very early kind of, very general kind of vision that said, well, the goal of development is happiness and well-being. And economic growth is one of the many factors that we need in order to bring happiness and well-being. But it's not the goal,

it's just a tool, one of the many tools that we have to bring happiness and well-being. It's just a tool, one of the many tools that we have to bring happiness and well-being. And then a bit later, the same fourth king of Bhutan was in Mumbai airport, and a journalist asked him in a sort of sarcastic way, you know, but, you know, what's the GNP of Bhutan anyway? I mean, in the 70s, you know, GDP, GNP, in these days one tended to say GNP, Gross National Product, rather than Gross Domestic Product. It was like very, very small peanuts, really.

And so it was sort of, you know, a bit sarcastic. And the king answered, I believe that gross national happiness is more important than gross national product. And that was the first time ever that the word gross national happiness was put out there. So that was a long time ago. That was like mid-70s. But it was just a very general kind of vision, a very idea. Like, you know, okay, we have to try to bring happiness and well-being. But then how do we actually do that?

It took them many, many years to try to come up with, like, a strategy, with tools, with indicators. And actually, the G&H as an index came much, much later, and it was something that came from outside. It came because Bhutan, being a member of the international community, member of the UN, and so on, donor countries or donor institutions said, well, if you want to replace gross domestic product or gross national product with gross national happiness, well, gross domestic product is a measurement tool. It's a system of, it's an indicator, it's a statistic tool. So you could not replace a statistic measurement tool with a general idea. You have to have another tool that will have a

similar function to monitor the development. So that's how the idea of Gross National Happiness Index came. It's relatively recent, it was only after the year 2000 that the research started, and the survey was in the second part of the first decade of the 21st century. So basically what it is, it's a system, it's an indicator system, it's a measurement tool that is based on four pillars. The four pillars being preservation and resilience of the environment, good governance, resilience and diversity of culture,

and sustainable and equitable social and economic development. So there is economic development, but only as one of the four pillars, and the three other pillars have to be in balance. So that's the overall architecture. And then there are the various domains that go much more in-depth, and within the domains there are indicators. So some of the domains take these four pillars.

Some of the domains are quite classic. You'll find them in many other indicators like health and education and things like that. But some of the domains are quite unique to G&H, like, for instance, time use. That's a very interesting indicator that is not measured usually, but I believe that time use is a very important indicator. And I spoke before of stress-related illnesses. Stress-related illnesses are very much connected

with how we experience our time. So people in Western countries mostly will tell you, I don't have any time. I have too much to do, not enough time, and so on and so forth. So this feeling that there's not enough time, so the time use is very unbalanced. People work too much. You have the people who don't have a job, so they have too much time, they don't know what to do with it,

and you have people who have a job, they have too much to do and not enough time. So there's this kind of unbalance and a time that has completely disconnected from natural cycles. In all traditional societies, time was related to natural cycles, because time is not like an abstract, sort of linear kind of beat. It's the cycles of life. It's night and day, it's the seasons, it's, you know... And in all traditional societies, the cycle of life and the cycle of seasons and the way people lead their life are connected so a farmer

there are moments where he has a lot of work at the farm and then there are moments that are very quiet because nature is sort of resting and farmers are resting and sometimes the days are very long and sometimes the days are quite short and things like that but since industrial age we don't have rhythm anymore. We have machine kind of time measurement, you know, like Charlie

Chaplin's film Modern Times. So that's a perfect example of what time has become for modern people. They have to adjust to the rhythm of the machine. But our own rhythm has not changed. So our heartbeat and our breathing and our sleeping and waking and our need to take food and to rest and all that is the same than our ancestors. But our life has completely disconnected from our own rhythms. So our bodily rhythm, biological rhythm, and the biological rhythm of the earth are connected, but now they've

been disconnected. So that's one of the reasons of stress-related illnesses. So that's just one example. As you can see, one could speak for a very long time from each one of these indicators. Another one that is very interesting is community vitality. So we know that from research that across cultures and countries the feeling of being integrated in a community plays a very important role in our sense of well-being. And one of the consequences of modern urban life has been the sort of destruction of social fabric and community. Most of the functions that were community-based are now outsourced to professionals, like taking care of children, taking care of the sick, taking care of the elderly, listening to one another, you name it. All that is now professional work, paid professional

work. All these were things that were happening within the community. So there's been a loss of sense of community replaced by money. So I don't have friends that can listen to me or help me with my kids or my parents, but I have money so I can pay professionals who will do it for a fee. So this outsourcing of human relationship to professionals has created an incredible sense of disconnect. So loneliness has become a huge problem. More than 50% of people in big western cities live alone. When you look at cars passing by in a highway, usually it's one person sitting in the car. So this kind of boxed loneliness, alone in your car, alone in your flat, and then you go to work, and you're in front of your screen, and so on and so forth. So community vitality is a very important indicator of happiness

and well-being. And one of the questions that is asked is, if you face a serious challenge, how many people can you count on? And other way around, for how many people are you willing to go out of your way to help them if they're facing challenge? I remember one of the farmers that was interviewed in Bhutan said, he was thinking, thinking, he said, I can't say the number, it's just the whole village. So he had this feeling, if something happens, the whole village will be there for me. But in modern Western cities,

you have regularly old people dying in their flat and then people only discover it because it starts smelling. That's the level of loneliness we've come from. I've just seen in a website, a lady has set up a business in the US where you can pay her to get hugged and cuddled. It's not like adult service. It's just to get hugged. And people will come and pay to get hugged and cuddled because they have no one that will hug them and cuddle them if they don't pay for it. So that's the level of solitude that we've come to.

So anyway, to come back to your question, so that's the idea that you measure a variety of dimensions that are important for human happiness and well-being. And another interesting feature about the GNH index is that there is, for each one of these domains, what is called a sufficiency level. Because the GDP model, the underlying idea is the more the better. There's no threshold.

It's the richer, the better. The higher, the better. There's no threshold. It's the richer the better, the higher the better, infinite growth, which is obviously nonsense on a finite planet, but anyway that's the idea. While with GNH the idea is not the more the better. If you have a certain sufficiency level that's good enough, there's no point adding to it. And in all the different domains, not only for money, but in all the different domains, not only for money, but in all the domains, if you have a certain level, then it's good enough. Then you should focus your attention somewhere else.

It's no point to have more and more and more and more because actually happiness and well-being is about balance. It's not about maximizing. So it's a very different approach. So are the sufficiency levels related to people getting their basic needs met? Or is it about the planetary boundaries of their needs? There are different things. The whole of the GNH is within planetary boundaries.

So that's not even that the sufficiency level. I mean, the whole of the GNH idea is that whatever we do, we have to grow within planetary boundaries. And I don't know if you've seen, but now there was a... I think... I don't remember if it was the Guardian or another, just published the Bhutan, the pledges that Bhutan did in COP21 in Paris. And it was the highest pledges from all the countries in the world. It was just two, three countries who were on top, like Bhutan and Costa Rica and I don't know, anyway. So for Bhutan, it's obvious that growth and development is within planetary boundaries.

So that's not the sufficiency level. No, the sufficiency level says two things. One is within each one of the domains, you try to figure out how much is enough. So it can be materially how much is enough, how much is enough for your basic needs to be met and so on like that. But even in things like health, let's say, it's not, you know, like health services should be the absolute maximum possible whatever, you know, which then will only always be accessible for a few people, because they're much too expensive. But how much is enough that all the population has decent health service, not the latest discovery in neurosurgery or something like that, but that

the whole population and has a free access to it. So in Bhutan, health is totally free for absolutely everyone, including foreigners. If you live there, or even if you come as a tourist, you get ill, you go to hospital, you will get treated, and you will get the medicine, you won't pay anything. Because health is considered as a basic need. So it shouldn't be paid for. Education is a basic need. It shouldn't be paid for.

Education is totally free, absolutely free. So that's the idea, you know. But it doesn't mean that everybody has to have a PhD. It means just basic education should be accessible and free for everyone. Basic health should be accessible and free for everyone. So that's the idea, that you have within each one of the domains, what is enough that you say, that's the responsibility of the society

to provide these services. And it's not the more and more and more and more and more, which is unattainable, but it's, you know, what is enough. And then the other idea of sufficiency is that you don't have to be really good at each one of the nine domains. But if you have six out of nine that are good enough, then it's good enough for your well-being and happiness. Because depending on your life situation, certain things will be higher or lower. Let's say you live in a farm, your income will be lower. But your nature will be stronger,

a community of activity will be stronger and things like that. But then income will be lower. And that's okay because it balances out i would i read about the survey on the the website which is www.grossnationalhappiness.com and uh yeah it was very thorough survey 148 questions and yeah really really large breath and uh and one one one thing that came up that i thought was really interesting was was um spirituality was also a part of it how often do you meditate was asked and also a question do you agree that nature is the domain of spirits and deities yeah i found that really interesting and also also, I read that some of the data that had been

gathered, some of the things that were found from, I guess, the two surveys ago and then this last one, because they're done about every four years, is that men were happier than women, people living in urban areas were happier than rural residents, and farmers were less happy than other occupational groups. So I'm wondering, with the government and even the center where you work, knowing these types of things, are there then policies or campaigns or different things to try to address that? Or knowing what the Gross National Happiness Index is, what comes next? Yes, that's exactly the goal of the survey. The goal of the survey is to direct public policy. So the results of the survey are shared with the government and with the public. It's available, it's transparent, it's available. Its function is to help the government set priorities. That's the general dimension,

that the government should know where are the priorities and which are either the areas or the groups within society where they should put more attention. That's one thing. The second thing is there's the Gross National Happiness Commission. The Gross National Happiness Commission is a planning commission of the government and its function is to screen every project that the government wants to implement in the light of gross national happiness. So on one hand does it respond to the problems that were identified through the survey? That's one

question. The other question is what will be the impact of this project or this law or this whatever it is on all nine domains? So that you don't take decisions that are driven only, for instance, by economic consideration that, let's say, mining. If you increase mining, it will definitely bring a lot of income, but it will have also negative consequences on environment, and maybe there will be population displacement and things like that. So if you only look at the GDP kind of model,

then you will definitely want to develop mining. If you look at it from a, like South Africa did for instance, right? Or Australia. Huge mining things and a lot of money came in. But at what cost? Other costs than financial costs. And then when you look at a project with the lens of the

nine domains, then you will balance out and see, okay, there will be positive results financially, economically, and maybe, I don't know, maybe that will allow to finance more healthcare and education, but it will have a heavy price on nature and communities. And then you have to, and of course, in the end, the decision is a political one.

You cannot expect a screening tool to take a decision, right? It just gives you data. But the data is just broad enough that you then take a balanced decision that takes into consideration all the different factors and not only one factor. The way it is when we look at development from a GDP lens. And there isn't an effort to try to quantify these nine domains. There's qualitative data because i know sometimes when we think about oh you know should we build a bridge or not there's there's can be an effort of trying to um trying to find like numbers to go with how things will impact but you're saying

it stays in the qualitative realm yes yes and one of the reason is what is uh connected with what you said the example that you gave when you read one of the reasons is connected with what you said, the example that you gave when you read one of the questions, do you believe that nature is the realm of deities? So if you consider nature to be just matter, resources, then you can quantify matter and say, okay, how much is the rainforest worth in terms of natural services? It's a trillion dollars or two trillion dollars or whatever you want. Just try to quantify it.

And then you might say from one point of view it's a good thing because then you will take it into consideration because you know it's worth something. On the other hand, it's a very negative thing because it monetizes things that are not monetary. And that's one of the huge problems of our system, that everything's being monetized. But if you say, well, you know, the river is the home of Nagas, of like water deities and so you're not going to pollute it, so it's not about how much does it cost to clean it or how much

is the river worth in terms of if I transform it into hydroelectric power I don't know what, it's just it's the home of a being you know so then the point is not to monetize it. It's just to respect it because it's someone.

So otherwise you would say, okay, how much is my friend worth? Okay, so if I speak with her, it saves me like counselor's fees and she might drive me to the supermarket when I need to. So I save on the bus ticket. Do we want to do that? We want to quantify relationship. And the very idea of, I think, true ecology is that we rebuild a relationship with nature that is a relationship between beings.

So we don't respect it because it's worth a bunch of money and we shouldn't waste our money by destroying it but we respect it because this is the home of beings that are as real within the Bhutanese culture as human beings and animals so no, long answer to a short question. It's not being quantified. It's really qualitative data. Mostly.

There are also quantitative data, of course. Yeah. What about... So it sounds like values are important. Extrinsic and intrinsic values and the difference. Because whether I see the extrinsic value of something,

such as the rainforest, or the intrinsic value, and then also with commodifying relationships and friendships, that looks like an extrinsic and intrinsic value system too. Is that correct? I'm not sure whether it has to do so much with intrinsic or extrinsic value. I think it has more to do with a different kind of relationship with reality. So, because we use the same term of value when we speak of material values like money and when we speak of moral values like compassion and altruism.

But I don't think that it's right to use the same term for both, because I don't think that they belong at all in the same qualitative system. Because one is really the field of the material world, and the body, and its needs, and the material. And the other one is really the field of the mind, and the heart, and the other one is really the field of the mind and the heart and the soul. So I think it's more to acknowledge that we live on different planes simultaneously and that we definitely need to meet our material needs, our physical needs. We need to eat, we need to have a house, we need to have clothes, and so on and so forth.

you know, have clothes and so on and so forth. But there's no immediate relationship between the meeting of the material needs and the meeting of the inner needs, the needs of the mind, of the heart, of the soul. And, you know, like there are many systems that see the needs like a kind of a pyramid that starts with basic needs and then you when you have met these you can go to the next one next one and then you at the end like a cherry on the cake and have like self-realization and

things like that and i don't quite agree with that. I think that spiritual needs, for instance, are as basic as material needs. That's the reason why, like in Bhutan, you have a lot of, for instance, hermits who spend a life long in caves or in huts where really their material needs are not really met at all. You know, they just survive. But their inner needs are met in such a strong way that for them it's much more valuable. So it's not that once they have a comfortable house and then they have material security, then they can go over and start meditating and so on.

It's not like that. You know, it's not that it builds in a sort of a rational and mechanical way one on the other. It's rather that they are on different levels and you can start anywhere. And that's something that I've also observed when I was in war zones. For instance, you would say, okay, let's things like art. That's a luxury, right? So if you have met the basic needs, then you can start doing music and theater and dancing or painting, whatever. But it's not true. You know, when you go in refugee camps, in war zones, you find that people who are really barely surviving, but they're singing, they're dancing,

they need to do that to survive. They need it as much as they need food and shelter. See what I'm trying to say? So I think it's not so... It's just taking into consideration the fullness of human reality, which includes physical needs, material needs, definitely, emotional needs and so on, but also a spiritual dimension that cannot be reduced to material.

So how does the Gross National Happiness Index relate to Buddhist economics, particularly Buddhism, because spirituality encompasses many different religions. the Gross National Happiness Index relate to Buddhist economics, particularly Buddhism? Because spirituality encompasses many different religions. So what's the direct connection there? And could this work in a context where Buddhism isn't the predominantly practiced spirituality? I mean, GNH as such, of course, was born in Bhutan, which is a Buddhist country, predominantly, not 100%, but predominantly Buddhist country, and where spirituality is very alive. And so there is a connection. But as such, GNH is a secular thing.

So I don't think that... And actually, at the GNH Center we had a conference about two years ago where we invited spiritual leaders from all different traditions, also people who were not spiritual, like activists or civil society people, to discuss

what would GNH look like in a non-Buddhist country or in a different cultural setting. And I think it's really... it's not limited to Buddhism, because it's really about universal human values. So, for instance, let's say, again, loving kindness and compassion are very central to Buddhist values, but compassion and love are universal. You don't have to be Buddhist to be compassionate

or to love. There's a strong emphasis in the doctrine in Buddhism on that, but it's not a Buddhist thing to be compassionate or to be generous or to be altruistic. So I don't think that it's limited to Buddhism. In the case of Bhutan, of course, it's been influenced by the Buddhist context. For instance, the idea of sufficiency threshold, you can connect it to the idea of contentment, which is a very strong Buddhist value that actually greed is a source of suffering. While our current economic system is based on the idea that greed is good because that's what helps the economy to grow so each time we are facing a problem

we are encouraged to consume more, go out and shop. That's the answer to the problem. While from a Buddhist perspective, contentment is more important, but contentment is not good for GDP, because if you are happy with little, then you will buy much less. So that's a very Buddhist idea, you know, and also the notion of altruistic behavior, like the bodhisattva ideal of

serving others, is very strong in Buddhist countries. But again, I think that the idea that you know, there's a deeper happiness that arises from serving.

It's something we even have now scientific evidence of it. For instance, Tanya Singer in Germany, a neuroscientist, did all this research on compassion. And she was able to show scientifically that altruistic behavior and compassion and altruism actually they trigger from the point of view of brain the same circuits that are activated when we experience pleasure so there isn't it's not only like kind of an more imperative given by monks and and priests you know be generous and then you'll be happy. It's like,

that's the way we're wired, actually. So I think there's something very fundamental about it. So JNH is born in a Buddhist country, but I think is applicable in non-Buddhist contexts. But what I believe is that if you would want to apply something like JNH, let's say here in this country or in the US, what would be necessary would be to create a participatory process to find out what is important to the people. You cannot just copy paste the nine domains, because that was born out of the Whitney's reality. You might end up finding they're very similar but you cannot take it for granted that

they're the same. I think it would be really important to have a participatory process so that people have a voice because that's the whole idea, you know, that people can tell you because the idea is not the government will decide what makes you happy. It's the people who should say what they want and then the government will decide what makes you happy. It's the people who should say what they want.

And then the government's responsibility is to create a conducive environment for that to happen. So what has been the international reception of gross national happiness? Have there been other places that have adopted it? I know on some city levels there's been some initiatives. So what have you seen from where you are? And also what have been some of the challenges? Maybe it hasn't worked so well. In so maybe critiques or challenges um well the situation has evolved and and is still evolving very very strongly like about uh you know 10 years ago it was not really taken seriously

happiness didn't seem to be serious business. Funnily enough, because in the end, as persons, we all know that we really strive for it, but somehow it was not considered serious. Anyway, but it has changed. So one of the factors was that the royal government of Bhutan presented a motion at the UN in July 2011 around happiness and well-being as a goal of development, and it was adopted by the General Assembly, and it was corresponded by 68 countries. in New York at the UN where about 900 people from government leaders and prime ministers and ministers

but also academics and civil society people came together and around the happiness and well-being and new development paradigm was the title of this. And then Bhutan has written a report for the sustainableable Development Goal

called Happiness and Wellbeing Towards a New Development Paradigm, which you can find online and download for free. So the awareness has been growing. There has been a lot of interest in happiness and well-being

studies. This has two fields that have really grown exponentially in the last decade is happiness and well-being studies. This has, you know, two fields that have really grown exponentially in the last decade is research on mindfulness and meditation and research on happiness and well-being. These two have been really growing exponentially. If you look it up on the internet, there's thousands and thousands of studies

in both these fields. So now we have quite serious data and scientific evidence to ground it. The other thing is that the economic crisis and the ecological crisis is becoming more and more perceivable, evident. More and more people are waking up to the fact that the current system is sort of in a dead end. And therefore there's more and more interest

in alternative measurement. So there are interesting examples. OECD for instance has the so-called Better Life Index, a very interesting website that they have created where they have a number of indicators and you and and you can give them different weighting and millions of people have already done that and that's

feeding into the OECD to know what is important to the citizens of the OECD so it's a kind of online process to to perceive what people want and when you you do that, you see that certain, if you change the weight you put on the indicators, certain countries will go up and down, so you can see which countries are the ones that are more aligned with your own values or your own intentions. So that's one interesting example. Here in the UK, now there is a well-being commission

that has been established, and Lord Layard from London School commission that has been established, and Lord Layard from London School of Economics has been doing extensive research, and he's one of the editors of the World Happiness Report. Nicolas Sarkozy, the former president of France, had created this commission on alternative measurement for France. So you have many... Chancellor Merkel has created a... It's called a citizen's dialogue on happiness and well-being with German population.

So there's a lot of science that there's an awareness raising and interestingly enough, it has nothing to do with right-left politics. You see some leftist politicians, right-wing politicians doing it. It goes beyond the traditional kind of separation right-left.

It's another dimension. So this is growing, but in no other developed country has it been established as a national policy yet. In Latin America, there are similar initiatives, like the Buen Vivir initiative and the Pura Vida in Costa Rica.

I would say Pura Vida in Costa Rica is probably the closest to GNA. It's a bit different, but it is similar. And actually, in 2012, when there was the high-level meeting in the UN, the president of Costa Rica was the co-sponsor, together with the prime minister of Bhutan. Then we had, for instance, the governor of Oregon coming to one of our

conferences, then governor, because he's not governor anymore. And he implemented in his state not exactly GNH, but GPI, Genuine Progress Indicator. And also in Canada, there's a number of regions that are using GPI, Genuine Progress Indicators. So what I observe is that some years ago, we were not really taken very seriously. And now it has completely changed.

There's a growing interest and a lot of efforts. But if you take G&H seriously it really challenges the current economic model and there's a lot of pushback. A lot of pushback. One of the best ways to put people's minds away from happiness and well-being is to find a common enemy and declare war on something, war on terror, war on

Islam, war on whatever. And so that's happening right now. Everywhere now the Western world is in like, we're going to war. It's really not clear what the war is going to be against, because most of the, if you take the Paris incident, they were all French. So why are you going to bomb Syria for something that has been done in French, by French people? But anyway, so I would say that I see it in a very contrasted way on one hand i see a big movement of awakening that we need a different system there's a lot of grassroots initiatives from transition towns to economy of the common good to gnh to genuine progress educators a lot of really inspiring initiatives.

And on the other hand, the current system is pushing back very violently. A lot of warmongering and big corporations continue to spread their GMOs. So it's a tense situation right now. And what's the role of the Gross National Happiness Center where you work? The Gross National Happiness... Well, you know, like, GNH is four different things. First of all, it's an overall development strategy and vision.

So putting happiness and well-being in the center. So that's the first thing. The second thing, it's an indicator system and a measurement tool. So that's the survey. Then it's a policy screening tool. It's how do you align public policies with the results of a survey once you know where the priority should be. And lastly, it's a shift in consciousness.

Because systems are not something that have a life outside of us. I mean, they do in a way, but they were created by human minds. So if we don't change the way we think, if we don't have a shift in consciousness, whatever system we will build will be similar to the existing system. Because the existing system is a result of our way of thinking, interacting, relating, behaving. So it's a product of our consciousness. It's not a God-given thing.

We created them. So the good news is because we created them, we can also change them. Because we created them, so we can create something else. The bad news, or not the bad news, but the necessity is we need to change our consciousness. Otherwise, if we just change the system without changing the consciousness, whatever system we will build, it would have the same results. So our effort at the GNI

Center is to bring about a change in consciousness. So it's an educational center. It's a learning center, transformative learning center. Pretty much like Schumacher College is, in a way. Trying to help people go through a learning process is just not an intellectual information gathering, but really an inner transformation process. So that's

what we're trying to do, is to align with the values, so that people align, not with our values, or with the G&H values, but with their own values. Because G&H is not about a fixed set of values that we try to promote, impose. It's not a religion.

It's not even Buddhism. But that if people really find their own inner deepest values, deepest aspiration, their highest potential, then I believe naturally what they will do will have this kind of positive impact. Because my view on the human being is the opposite of a homo economicus. I believe there's a fundamental goodness in human beings,

fundamental wisdom. We all have the capacity and the wish to love and be loved. But so it's being covered by a veil or by, you know, so it's not about imposing something else, but helping people to uncover or unearth what is there already. So that's what we're trying to help. Do you have any activities or maybe a journaling prompt that you could offer the listeners to start to explore these issues on their own?

Sorry, I didn't get the question. that you could offer the listeners to start to explore these issues on their own? Sorry, I didn't get the question. Do you have any kind of an activity or maybe a question for the listeners so they can start to think about these on their own? Maybe something you would ask them to think about so that they can kind of think about this stuff in a personal way? Well, I think the starting point is slowing down and taking moments to reflect. So one of the big problems in our time is we live in a very distracted society.

So when you, you know, for instance, our devices, you know, iPhones and smartphones and tablets and all that. So we see that our attention is completely drawn out, always outside. So we need to take moments to stop and slow down and just for a while put our devices and technologies aside and take a moment to reflect. And just to be really present. Because I think we need three things. The first thing is we need to reconnect to ourselves.

And these are moments of silence and presence and moments of peace where we really reflect, what's truly important for me? So, for instance, if you ask yourself, if I knew I only had, let's say, one month to live, I was diagnosed with a sickness that is uncurable, and I know for sure I have only one month to live, what would I do? And then ask yourself, so if that's what I really want to do, why don't I do it?

Because maybe I have only one month to live. How do I know? So, you know, how do I's what I really want to do, why don't I do it? Because maybe I have only one month to live. How do I know? So how do I align what I do with what's really important? So what really matters to me? That's one question. So what gives me energy? What do I love doing? And what drains my energy?

And what could I do less of so that's the first connection reconnection with oneself the second one is reconnection with others connecting with others because of this kind of distracted society we live in we mentioned that you know like loneliness

but actually the most important thing in life is human relationship so do we invest enough time and attention in friendship, love, relationship? Are we so busy making money and running around and checking our emails and our Facebook and our whatever that we don't really have time for others? So really taking time and investing in relationship. Because reconnecting with others is what will change the economic system. Because economic system is nothing else than relationships.

So if we heal our relationships, we will heal the system. And the third one is connection with nature. To have enough time to really be in nature. And to connect with nature, to experience the rhythms of nature to to feel how we are nurtured by being in nature and with nature so i think these are three kind of good starting point to think of our own happiness and well-being thank you you've been listening to an upstream

interview with dr havin toe thank you so much again for sharing your wisdom with us today. Thank you. You've been listening to an Upstream Interview, which is part of the Economics for Transition project. To listen to more interviews and episodes, please visit economicsfortransition.org.