9781422283943

To understand how social progress differs from one country to another, the Social Progress Imperative scored 133 countries around the world in three main areas: Basic Human Needs: Does a country provide for its people’s most essential needs? Foundations of Well-being: Are the building blocks in place for individuals and communities to enhance and sustain well-being? Opportunity: Is there opportunity for all individuals to reach their full potential? Based on dozens of scores in these three areas, the Social Progress Imperative calculated an overall Social Progress Index (SPI) score for each country. Scores were then classified into six groups, from very low social progress to very high. As shown below, 11 of the 12 South American countries fell into the middle and high categories. (Note: Suriname was not included because some data were not available.) Actual scores for each country can be found in Chapter 4. High Social Progress: Uruguay and Chile Upper Middle Social Progress: Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Paraguay Lower Middle Social Progress: Venezuela, Bolivia, and Guyana Countries in South America and around theworld are using SPI scores and rankings to identify areas for improvement and to help guide social investment. Even cities will soon be able to evaluate and compare their levels of social progress as the Social Progress Initiative releases more city-level scores like those recently published for 10 cities in Colombia (socialprogressimperative. org/data/spi/countries/COL).

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