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DEVELOPMENT-URUGUAY: Slowly but Surely

Raúl Pierri

MONTEVIDEO, Dec 11 2008 (IPS) - While Uruguay’s human development levels are improving, the country has lagged behind the faster progress made by some of its neighbours due to fluctuations in its economic performance, according to a local study sponsored by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

The UNDP’s Human Development Index (HDI) is highly sensitive to variations in GDP, while the other elements used to estimate a country’s HDI ranking – access to education and life expectancy – change at a slower pace.

For that reason, although Uruguay has strong social indicators, it is outranked on the HDI by Argentina and Chile, because of the higher rates of economic growth achieved by those two countries, political scientist Constanza Moreira, lead author of the nearly 400-page report "Politics, Policies and Human Development," presented officially Thursday, told IPS.

The HDI is a yearly assessment produced by the UNDP on the progress made by nations worldwide in improving living standards, and was created to look beyond GDP to a broader definition of well-being, making people and their capabilities the ultimate criteria for assessing the development of a country, rather than economic growth.

Uruguay ranks among the countries classified as having "high human development" (0.8 or higher), and at 0.840, its HDI is above the average for Latin America. However, a clear deterioration has been observed in the last few years.

"From the early 1990s on, Uruguay’s achievements in education and health, which are very high in relation to its GDP per capita, have placed the country among the nations with high human development. But seen in perspective, since the first measurement in the year 1990, Uruguay has dropped in the ranking and its human development growth has practically stagnated," the report indicates.

"Other countries that had similar values in 1990 have made significant progress, which explains why the country has been falling steadily in the world human development ranking. Uruguay has not been able to move forward in its achievements at the same pace as countries that started out with similar values," the report adds.

Uruguay is currently ranked 46 in the world HDI and occupies third place in Latin America, after Argentina and Chile.

The study, which was commissioned to independent researchers, shows that these problems began to arise in the 1960s, becoming more acute over the following two decades, during the 1973-1985 military dictatorship.

Moreira said the drop in the country’s ranking is due to a lack of continuity in economic performance, dating back to the "regressive" policies which were first implemented in the mid-1960s, continued through the end of the dictatorship, past the 1982 crisis, the period of "de-industrialisation" that characterised the 1990s, when growth did not translate into equitable redistribution of income, and up to the financial and economic crisis of 2002.

According to the report, the development seen in the 1990s did not represent a rupture with past policies, and the problems peaked with the 2002 economic crisis, one of the most severe in the history of Uruguay.

"The Uruguayan economy has not been marked by stagnation and immobility. On the contrary, it has had short periods of very fast growth, but was unable to maintain the pace, alternating with severe crises that led to the breakdown of companies, individuals and institutions, and which drove many Uruguayans and foreign nationals to despair over the future of the country," the study indicates.

The researchers also point out that this small nation of 3.2 million people has undergone constant changes in its model of development, "generally forced by international constraints and circumstances, and rarely as a result of a thought-out plan for the country’s future."

Uruguay’s high levels of human development are explained by the combination of welfare state policies and a strong system of political parties and trade unions, two aspects that were advanced in the early 20th century during the presidential terms of José Batlle y Ordóñez (1903-1907 and 1911-1915) and which have succeeded in "buffering" to a certain extent the devastating effects of the dictatorship and the ensuing years, Moreira said.

Uruguayans today are still keenly aware of social inequality issues and maintain a significant level of trust in the State and the political system, an attitude that has even improved since 2002, as compared to the other countries of Latin America, the political scientist said.

The researchers also valued as positive the package of policies adopted by the current left-wing government of President Tabaré Vázquez – which includes measures to mitigate poverty, social assistance programmes for low-income families, and collective re-negotiation of wages between management, workers and the State.

"We’re headed in the right direction, provided the parties agree on actions and plans that will go beyond simple emergency measures to tackle structural poverty. Because no economic boom will by itself be able to incorporate this segment of the population into society and pull them out of poverty," Moreira said.

The UNDP-sponsored study, which was based on official data and two opinion polls – one targeting the general public and the other the country’s business and political elites – recognises that progress has been made in education, health and access to wealth.

Political scientist Agustín Canzani – who conducted the first of these surveys, which gauged the respondents’ political culture – said Uruguayans’ traditional pessimistic attitude with regard to the economy has been tempered.

During the Vázquez administration, citizen concern has shifted from the economy to other issues, such as insecurity or inequity.

"Over the past two decades Uruguayans had a negative view of the economy, but now they are looking at it in a more favourable light," Canzani told IPS.

Based on the results of the surveys conducted in 2007, the political scientist described Uruguay as a "democratic society, which trusts and accepts the democratic system of government, a society for which politics are still important, and very much so, and are still viewed as an instrument of change."

"This, in Latin America, is remarkable, if we consider that in other countries, such as Argentina and Chile, trust in the political system has fallen drastically," Canzani said.

He also pointed out that a traditional characteristic of Uruguayans is their faith in political parties, over and above personalities, who do not tend to draw strong followings, in contrast to the tendency in other countries of the region.

The report underlines that "with respect to adult literacy, Uruguay has made great strides, surpassed only by Cuba, a country that has implemented very active policies in this area. In terms of school enrolment, the aggregate gross rate is the highest in the region, with only one country – Argentina – at the same level."

The study also recognises that in the past 15 years the preschool attendance rate has gone up as a result of the expansion of public preschools as of 1998.

The report highlights the gradual but steady drop in the infant mortality rate. The 2006 rate of 12 out of 1,000 babies dying before their first birthday represented a more than 30 percent improvement since 1986. However, Uruguay is still outranked in the region by Chile and Cuba.