Ut Prosim: Gross National Happiness

Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Gross National Happiness

Bhutan held its first ever elections yesterday. The tiny (2.3 million people) Tibetan Buddhist kingdom nestled between India and China is making the transition from monarchy to constitutional monarchy. The kingdom has a gross domestic product per capita of 1,400 USD (the US GDP/capita is 46,000 USD), however the winning party used the former king's policy of "gross national happiness" as its motto. The term refers to a balanced policy of economic development and preservation of culture and protection of the environment. Best of luck Bhutan!

More about Bhutan:
http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritories/bhutan/index.html

News on the elections:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/25/world/asia/25bhutan.html?ex=1364184000&en=66a4918cda1eb5e1&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

If

If you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

But make allowance for their doubting too:

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,

Or being hated don’t give way to hating,

And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;

If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim,

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same:

If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

And never breathe a word about your loss:

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,

Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

If all men count with you, but none too much:

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,

Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,

And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

-Rudyard Kipling