Growth, Change And Development
Growth: Growth is used in an economic sense, synonymous with ‘economic growth’. It means generally speaking an increase in the amount of economic goods (commodities and services) that are produced in a society and a concomitant increase in the inhabitants’ ability to acquire economic goods.
Development is a broader and more diverse concept denoting improvements in the quality of life of the people existing much beyond direct gains from increased production of commodities and services. The dominant view has been that economic growth in a society if sustained over sufficient long period would ensure gradual improvement in the quality of life of the people. This would occur through:
- Transfer of growth from some core production unit and economic sectors to other units and sectors.
- Transformation of economic surplus from increased production into increased income for the people who incorporated into the growth process.
- Transformation of the increased income into broader economic and social welfare.
Social change, growth and development are interrelated concept and frequently they have been treated as inter-changeable terms. Social change is capable of value free objective description of certain societal process; the social development is a value laden term which refers to a subjective statement of the desired direction of social change and also the constituent element of the end products.