ABSTRACT
This chapter presents Amartya Sen's capability approach (CA) and highlight how it creates a role for practical reason in the social sciences, and specifically in economics. It presents the CA, specially focusing on one of its contributions, which is to explain development and the removal of poverty in a more qualitative manner than is usually the case in economics. The CA is a broad framework for the evaluation or assessment of individual well-being – as well as the development of entire countries, socio-economic circumstances and social arrangements – for the purpose of implementing social and economic policies. Following Isaiah Berlin, Sen distinguishes between negative freedom and positive freedom, and claims the necessity of both. In 1995, David Crocker compared Nussbaum's list of capabilities with the capabilities that Sen has considered as basic or necessary. In Development as Freedom Sen includes, nourishment, health, surviving from mortality, tradition and culture, employment, political participation, and literacy.
