Introduction
The Multidimensional Inequality Framework covers the important dimensions of life, which overall determine the capability for people to enjoy a good quality of life. People’s health, education, family life, personal safety and security, and their ability to participate in decision-making are some of the important dimensions that allow individuals to flourish. Like income and wealth, inequalities are present in all these dimensions with some individuals subject to discrimination, state violence, made to work in poor and unsafe conditions, denied the right to a voice in local affairs, while others enjoy advantage and privilege through strong political influence, elite education, greater access to the top jobs and enhanced legal security. Here you can learn more about the theoretical foundation to the Framework, a brief introduction to the structure and advice on how to adapt the Framework to suit your context and meet your needs.
Guide
A guide to the structure of the framework
Adapt
Adapting the Framework to fit your country context and suit your needs
Guide
A guide to the structure of the Framework
The Multidimensional Inequality Framework is organised around seven key life domains which have been identified as those that are critical to enjoying a good quality of life.
The seven life domains are:
Domain 1: Life and health
Domain 2: Physical and legal security
Domain 3: Education and learning
Domain 4: Financial security and dignified work
Domain 5: Comfortable, independent and secure living conditions
Domain 6: Participation, influence and voice
Domain 7: Individual, family and social life
Within each of the domains are a series of sub-domains, inequality indicators and inequality measures which are identified using a simple coding system: Domains are identified by a single numeric code, sub-domains by an alpha-numeric code, inequality indicators by a ‘two digit’ numeric code and inequality measures by a ‘three-digit’ numeric code.
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Here we examine one of the domains to illustrate the structure of the Framework. Domain 3: Education and learning: Inequality in the capability to be knowledgeable, to understand and reason, and to have the skills to participate in society is structured around five sub-domains picking up key aspects of well-being within education and learning:
For the titles of sub-domains which focus on top end inequalities we systematically start these with 'Evidence of…'. For example, the title of sub-domain 3.B is Evidence of financial constraints limiting attainment and unequal access to elite education opportunities.
Within each of the sub-domains, we have identified a number of inequality indicators which identify particular aspects of inequality. You can expand out the Framework by clicking on the subdomain buttons to show the inequality indicators. For example, there are three indicators in sub-domain 3.A:
You can then expand out each of the inequality indicators to reveal that inequality measures. For example, within indicator 3.2 there are four inequality measures which suggest ways in which inequality in educational attainment and schooling can be evaluated:
It is these measures of inequality that we suggest you estimate using data for your country, to provide a comprehensive assessment of inequality. In the next section we provide more information on the types of measures included in the Framework, how to find data of sufficient quality and detail to allow you to estimate these inequality measures. We also provide guidance on what you can do if you identify data gaps.
Many of the measures in the Framework are already used by governments and international organisations like the United Nations, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, and the World Bank, and other agencies who monitor poverty and inequality.
By selecting measures which have already been tried and tested, which are already used by other agencies, we have some assurance that data sources are likely to be available.
In many cases you can expand out the Framework further by clicking on inequality measures showing a ‘+’ sign to find a mapping our inequality measures and UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) indicators and measures. This information can be used to understand how these two frameworks are related to each other, and as a potential guide to existing knowledge and potential data sources for estimating inequality measures included in the Framework. For example indicator 3.2.4 is closely related to the UN SDG indicator 8.6.1
Adapt
Adapting the Framework to fit your country context and suit your needs
Applying the complete Framework is a large task and we recognise that this is not something that everyone can undertake and so you may decide to focus on one of the Framework’s seven life Domains or a selection of these Domains. For example, you may conclude that in your country a lot is already known about the economic inequalities covered by Domain 4 Financial independence and security but much less is known about inequalities in Domain 2 Physical and legal security and therefore decide to start by focusing on this Domain. Alternatively you may develop a plan to systematically work through the Framework covering all of the Domains over the course of a number of months or years.
In addition to deciding whether to focus on a selection of Domains or apply the complete Framework, you should feel free to adapt the Domains in terms of the selection of sub-domains, inequality indicators and inequality measures, to suit the circumstances in your own country or to meet your needs. We call this process "countrification".
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The Framework has been developed so that it can be applied in countries around the world but we fully recognise that important differences exist between countries. You can use the Framework as a guide to the key life domains and the types of inequality that you should measure but you are free to adapt it. This may involve adding additional inequality measures or excluding some of the measures within the Framework.
There are a number of reasons why you might want to include new inequality measures:
- You have identified an important aspect of inequality in your country that is not currently included in the Framework
- Due to limited data availability you find it is not possible to operationalise some of the measures but similar measures are available
Similarly there may be a number of reasons why you may choose to exclude some of the inequality measures in the Framework:
- You do not have the capacity to apply the complete Framework, or all of the measures included in one of the Domains
- A particular aspect of inequality captured by some of the measures are not relevant in your country
When adapting the Framework it is important to be aware that the selection of sub-domains, inequality indicators and inequality measures capture key aspects of capability inequality that have been identified by experts and practitioners. In choosing new inequality measures you should keep these aspects in mind. They include measures that help to identify:
- where choice has been constrained
- autonomy
- treatment by others
- the notion that it is possible to have too much as well as too little.
In choosing new measures you should keep these aspects in mind.
Further adaptions might be necessary as your project progresses and you become more familiar with any data limitations. Note though that identifying data gaps is a valuable exercise that you can use for data advocacy purposes to help try and improve both the quantity and quality of data sources in your country. We deal with this issue later in the Toolkit. You may choose to put together an expert group or taskforce to help you complete this process as important decisions will need to be made that will have implications for the output that you can produce and what policy action is possible.
We are keen to hear from you if you have adapted the Framework so that we can share experience and findings to help develop a community of users.
Learn
Learn more about the theoretical foundation
The Multidimensional Inequality Framework has been designed to provide a systematic approach to measuring and analysing inequality, and for identifying causes and potential solutions. It is theoretically grounded, drawing on Amartya Sen’s capability approach to assessing the quality of people’s lives. The capability approach marks an important advancement from either an exclusive focus on economic outcomes (such as income) or subjective measures of well-being (such as happiness).
Theoretically grounding the MIF provides a clear methodology to how we should assess well-being and inequality in the quality of people’s lives. It allows us to examine differences in people’s capabilities to live the kind of life they have reason to want and to value.
The Multidimensional Inequality Framework is innovative, marking a departure from the majority of previous instantiations of Sen’s capability approach that have tended to focus on capability-deprivation, measuring differences in rates of deprivation between groups, rather than capability-inequality which encompasses advantage as well as disadvantage.
If you want to learn more about the theoretical basis of the Framework click here.
Click here for a video of Dr Tania Burchardt introducing the capability approach.