Indicators as proxy of commodities
In CFM indicators must represent the commodities necessary to achieve functionings. The
selected indicators ought to be determinants of well-being, i.e. they must represent «goods and
services which are inputs in the production of well-being» (Dasgupta, 1999:11), since their
purpose is to measure the means by which social outcomes are achieved, and not social
outcomes themselves. In fact, relying on the outputs of well-being (i.e. choosing constituent
indicators), would provide “performance” measures, while, in a sense, we should measure social
performances in the space of achieved functionings, not in the one of commodities (indicators).
Furthermore, in our simplified dynamic context the commodity indicators are the locus of
change: their (positive or negative) growth rate is in fact the only lever that can move the system
toward new equilibriums over time.
Indicators as proxy of conversion factors
These indicators aren’t directly related to well-being, they just convert (translate)
commodities into functionings. They are sources of variation between the commodities basis and
«the advantages - the well-being and freedom - we get out of them» (Sen, 1999:70). According
to Sen’s paradigm (1999:70, 71) these indicators could be framed in families of diversities: i)
personal heterogeneities, ii) environmental diversities, iii) variations in social climate10:
I. personal heterogeneities imply that people with different physical characteristics have
different needs and thus require different level of income/resources to obtain the same
level of well-being: «For example an ill person may need more income to fight her
illness - income that a person without such an illness would not need;» (Sen,
1999:70);
II. different environmental conditions (pollution, environmental hazards, climatic
circumstances) affect the quality of life of dwellers of a given region;
III. «The conversion of personal incomes and resources into the quality of life is
influenced also by social conditions, including public educational arrangements, and
the prevalence or absence of crime and violence in the particular location» (Sen,
1999:70-71).
1.4 The importance of personal and social conversion factors
Personal and social conversion factors play a pivotal role in Sen’s capability approach: «One
of the major strengths of the capability approach is that it can account for interpersonal
variations in conversion of the characteristics of the commodities into functionings» (Robeyns,
2000: 6). For this unique “conversion power” they are the cornerstone of CFM. Personal and
social conversion factors are in fact the catalysts that determine the degree of conversion of
resources into capabilities (or in Sen’s vocabulary, of commodities into functionings). Their
converting role entails that individuals cannot be considered only in terms of the resources they
have. They have to be weighed also in terms of their ability and opportunity to convert these
resources into valuable beings and doings: «Even if it is accepted (as Rawls, 1971, has argued)
that everyone may need the very same resources of primary goods to pursue their diverse ends
(no matter what this ends are) there still remains the “conversion problem”, to wit, interpersonal
variations in the functional relation between resources and achievements.» (Sen, 1994:335).
The essentiality of the conversion issue lies in the fact that it allows the capability approach
to account explicitly for diversity: in fact if we assume that everybody can convert income
and/or commodities into functionings and capabilities at the same rate, there would be no point
10 Sen points out other two sources of diversity: the differences in relational perspectives, and the distribution within
the family. In CFM we do not consider the former since it does not have great explicative power in a developed
society like the Italian one, in which conventions and customs are quite homogeneous. Nor do we consider the
latter, since CFM works at a more aggregate level.