Mapping Well-Being and Opportunity for Resilient Communities Around the World

What are the conditions that make a place ‘livable’? Measuring that is difficult, but data and analysis on a person’s daily experience are more meaningful than national averages or GDP. A full picture of the economy and society must embrace what people value about their immediate living conditions, how they behave when their expectations are unmet, and how local services contribute to improved job opportunities and healthier lives. Improving people’s lives requires making where they live better: place matters.

Although access to education, health, and to a clean environment continue to improve worldwide, socio-economic divisions within and across countries are growing. Measuring people’s well-being helps capture whether increases in overall prosperity are translating into better lives for all. Income and jobs are certainly important factors for well-being, but so too are other dimensions such as health, housing, environment, and civic engagement.

National and international efforts to measure quality of life and social progress in cities and regions can help policy makers identify where interventions may be effective in ensuring synergies and coherence among them, and to engage all the needed stakeholders.

Participants include:
•Ana Marie Argilagos - Senior Advisor to the Ford Foundation
•Matthew Boms, Communitas Coalition, Communications Manager
•Genie Birch - Co-director of the Penn Institute for Urban Research and Chair, World Urban Campaign
•Monica Brezzi, Head Regional Analysis and Statistics, OECD, How’s Life in your Region?
•Sarah Burd-Sharps – Co-director, Measure of America of the Social Science Research Council
•Emilio Dorcely - President, Bridge Street Development Corporation:
•Andrew Rudd, UN-Habitat

Please join this discussion with a diverse group of experts, policy makers, corporate and philanthropic foundations, and non-governmental organizations working on designing policies in regions and cities that improve their livability, their sustainability and the quality of life of the people who live and work within them. Space is limited. Kindly RSVP by 26 September 2014 to csmith@mas.org.