Metodo

International Studies in Phenomenology and Philosophy

Series | Book | Chapter

202230

Structure of well-being

an exploratory study of the distinction between individual well-being and community well-being and the importance of intersubjective community well-being

Seung Jong LeeYunji Kim

pp. 13-37

Abstract

Despite the popularity of well-being in public policy discourses, the meaning of well-being and how to use it in a public policy context is still unclear. In this chapter, we present a comprehensive framework of well-being that clarifies its meaning by distinguishing different types and aspects of well-being. First, we distinguish individual well-being and community well-being. Since public policy concerns public resources, we further explore the aspects of community well-being. Previous works only identified objective and subjective aspects of community well-being, leading to confusion in the measurement process regarding aggregation from individuals to the community. To address this issue, we identify a third aspect called intersubjective community well-being measured by evaluative questions. Using survey data from six districts in Seoul, South Korea, we show that individual well-being and community well-being can be distinguished empirically and that the relationship between intersubjective and objective community well-being is stronger than the relationship between subjective and objective community well-being. This suggests that policymakers can gain better insight for policymaking by paying more attention to intersubjective community well-being, which effectively bridges relevant objective measures to collective evaluation of citizens.

Publication details

Published in:

Kee Youngwha, Jong Lee Seung, Phillips Rhonda (2016) Social factors and community well-being. Dordrecht, Springer.

Pages: 13-37

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-29942-6_2

Full citation:

Jong Lee Seung, Kim Yunji (2016) „Structure of well-being: an exploratory study of the distinction between individual well-being and community well-being and the importance of intersubjective community well-being“, In: Y. Kee, S. Jong lee & R. Phillips (eds.), Social factors and community well-being, Dordrecht, Springer, 13–37.