Human Capital and Development: Introduction

Abstract

Given the contemporary socio-economic reality in terms of disparities in standard of living, inequity in access to resources, policy asymmetries across countries and coexistence of higher growth with poverty in developing countries, it is widely believed that there is a need for enhancement and appropriate utilisation of human skills to foster development. India and other large emerging economies have great potential for achieving high-economic growth if only they could use their demographic dividend much more judiciously. There has been a great deal of theoretical understanding and rich empirical evidence on the link between human capital and development. However, the gross enrolment ratio in both school and higher education has been a cause for concern in several developing countries. The needs of the changing pattern of industrialisation, which demands more and more skilled manpower, are also going unmatched by the supply. What are the paradigms available in the context of modern development? How appropriate could they be specifically for India? How can one evaluate the suitability of different paradigms? What are the interlinkages between skill content of the workforce and competitiveness of industries? These are some of the questions that we have addressed in this volume.