Could you please say briefly the differences in the two reports. Which data show decrease or increase in certain key areas? I have just downloaded the 2005 report.
Miguel
The 2008 report builds on the 2005 one. The 2005 report established that the relatively low human development in the DR is not the result of the lack of resources, but rather the lack of commitment of the leadership (business, political, social and religious) to long term development and the scarce empowerment of the most influential sectors of society to push for a social pact that would guarantee human development. Basically, there has been economic growth, but this had not trickled down to the people, with the indifference of the powers that be.
The 2008 report takes it a step forward. It criticizes the local style of economic growth and institutions that create wealth reproducing the misery of the people. The most dramatic finding is that the province that has generated the most wealth in recent years, La Altagracia (where the tourism development has concentrated in Punta Cana) has dramatically low human development indexes.
And then it establishes that empowerment of the people is necessary if people are to have opportunities. It sends out a challenge for empowerment, and for this citizens have to become better citizens (including business, social groups, religious groups, even politicians) need to demand the rule of the law for the common good. It brings it down to politics, this time around. By establishing that it has found that human development is a matter of power, and thus, of politics, understanding that politics is the space where power relations are dealt with. And it concludes that historically, given the degree of social, economic and institutional inequity in the DR today, the power structures have failed to build a society that provides access to opportunities except to those that are in power. It criticizes governments, indicating that these have upheld a logic of perverse loyalties: the logic of power for power and to themselves. There is no loyalty with the population nor with state policies nor with development.
It concludes that for a regime of rule of the law to be achieved, where the people can have fair access to opportunities, there needs to be consequences for actions. That is a system of justice that penalizes violations of the law, and an empowered population that exercises its rights. It criticizes that the system of political parties has served to weaken the consequences.
To end, the report states:
"Finally, if up to now the structures and power relations have not generated human development as would be expected given the resources available, have not reduced the inequities nor strengthened the country's institutions, there are no reasons to suppose that they will do so spontaneously in the future. If the society does not organize itself, empower itself and restructure its power relations, there will not be human development. Human development is a matter of power."
Those interested in reading a summary of the report in English, see See
http://www.pnud.org.do/sites/pnud.onu.org.do/files/Resumen_Ingles.pdf