Manfred Max Neef: Biography and Contributions

Manfred Max Neef is a Chilean economist with a German family. He began his career in the 1960s teaching at the prestigious University of California at Berkeley, United States. Among its most important actions is the classification of basic human needs and the development of the human scale.

He has also worked as an environmentalist and participated as a candidate in the 1993 Chilean elections. He has spent most of his professional career as a professor of economy in several universities in Chile. His professional contributions have gone beyond the economic and has stood out for developing humanistic texts.

He carried out different projects for private organizations and also worked on his own, independently. Max Neef has always favored the care of nature and worked closely with the Chilean environmentalist party.

Biography

Artur Manfred Max Neef was born in Valparaíso, Chile, on October 26, 1932. His parents were Germans who had emigrated from his country after the consequences of the First World War .

His mother was a woman dedicated to humanistic studies and Max Neef decided to follow in the footsteps of his father, who was an economist.

Studies

As a child, Max Neef studied at the Liceo de Aplicacion, a prestigious Chilean school for boys, recognized as one of the best Chilean schools thanks to the political and social contributions he has given to the country.

After graduating from high school he studied at the University of Chile, where he graduated as a Bachelor of Economics.

He spent much of his time traveling throughout South America, where he worked with developing and third world countries. In his travels he developed theories working on the problem of development in the third world, where he described how inappropriate the current methods and structures are and how they harm the poorer classes.

At the beginning of the 70s Max Neef studied poverty in Ecuador, where he shared closely with peasants from the most rural areas of the country. He also worked in Brazil, and the experiences gained in these trips inspired him to write several texts that would later become his book Watching from outside .

In 1983 he won the Right Livelihood Award, awarded for his collaboration in the study of developing countries. That same year he ran for the presidency of Chile as an independent candidate, although he had support from the Chilean ecological party. He obtained less than 6% of the votes and remained in fourth place.

Differences and life in Argentina

When Augusto Pinochet came to power in Chile, Max Neef had to go to live in Argentina, because the dictator did not agree with the humanitarian actions of the economist in the third world countries. In addition, Max Neef was openly democratic and was against the dictatorial military regime of Pinochet.

During his exile he dedicated himself to work in the development of mathematics, science and music in Argentina. He created a study based on the issues he addressed during his stay in that country, but above all, emphasizing the environmental issues that concern the world.

His exile did not last long, and by 1985 he was back in his homeland. That same year he returned to politics to oppose the Pinochet dictatorship; He enrolled in a democratic political party until he founded his own in 1988, this being also democratic beliefs and calling for elections in Chile.

Academic life

After the Pinochet dictatorship finally fell in 1990, a year later he was offered the post of rector at the Bolivarian University of Chile. Max Neef accepted the position and remained in it until 1994, the year in which he became rector of the Austral University and kept working in that institution for more than a decade.

In 2002 he left the rectory of the Austral University and became the most prominent professor of Economic Sciences of the university, while also directed the entire area of ​​Economics of the same institution.

Currently Max Neef works as a member of the World Future Council, and also has affiliations with the European Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Club of Rome, the Academy of Sciences of New York and the Academy of Salzburg by Leopold Kohr.

Acknowledgments

His social works made him obtain a series of awards throughout his career. Among the most important awards include:

- Maximum Honor Award, granted by the Soka University in Japan.

- Doctor Honoris Causa, awarded by the University of Jordan.

- Chilean National Award for the promotion and defense of human rights.

- He obtained the highest honor of the International Society of Ecology.

Contributions

Max Neef made several contributions to the fields of economics and ecology. He also highlights his participation in the studies of poor countries and rural populations, determining the importance of a change in the economies that are harmful to the people affected.

The economist created a scale to measure how much energy consumption is necessary before it can be classified as excessive, known as the indicator ecological person . He also developed a theory that explains how necessary purchasing power is in the quality of life .

However, his most recognized work is the creation of the scale of basic human needs.

Basic human needs

Max Neef developed this theory together with two other economists, and it is an ontological measurement (that is to say, that every human being possesses) of the few and finite, classifiable human needs. These are constant throughout all human cultures and no matter which period of history is taken into account.

This theory is basically a taxonomy of basic needs and the process by which the wealth and poverty of the communities can be identified according to the basic needs they have on the scale.

Max Neef classified the basic human needs into 9 categories, from which transcendence was excluded (with which it would be 10, originally). These are:

- Subsistence.

- Protection.

- Affected.

- Understanding.

- Participation.

- Leisure.

- Creation.

- Identity

- Freedom.

References

1. Talk-talk with Professor M. A. Max-Neef, Jesús Astigarraga and Javier Usoz, December 11, 2008. PDF taken from unizar.es
2. The development of the human scale, Manfred Max Neef, (n.d.). Taken from archive.org
3. Theory of the development of the human scale, (n.d.). Taken from hsdnetwork.org
4. Manfred Max Neef, World Citizenship, February 21, 2007. Taken from world-citizenship.org
5. Manfred Max Neef, (n.d.), January 12, 2018. Taken from Wikipedia.org