"Sustainable development is the holy Grail of governments and leaders but has remained elusive and undefined. Wellbeing of Nations provides the diagnostics to turn sustainability into reality. This is the ultimate travel guide to a sustainable future." Jose Maria Figueres Former President of Costa Rica World Economic Forum

"At long last, a real metric for measuring sustainability and wellbeing. It provides a way to chart a better future. The cornerstone of any working library on environment, development, and quality of life. A volume without peer." Thomas E. Lovejoy Chief Biodiversity Advisor The World Bank

The use of indicators to gauge human progress is common and well understood; Gross Domestic Product and the Index of Leading Economic Indicators are two well-known examples. Yet most of the widely cited indicators focus exclusively on economic activity, and even the most progressive of indicators fail to account for key issues of sustainability. The Wellbeing of Nations addresses that shortcoming by combining indicators of human well-being with those of environmental stability to generate a more comprehensive picture of the state of our world.

The author combines 39 indicators of health, population, wealth, education, communication, freedom, peace, crime, and equity in to a Human Wellbeing Index, and 39 indicators of land health, protected areas, water quality, water supply, global atmosphere, air quality, species diversity, energy use, and resource pressures into an Ecosystem Wellbeing Index. The two indexes are then combined into a Wellbeing/Stress Index that measures how much human wellbeing each country obtains for the amount of stress it places on the environment. Seventy color-coded geopolitical maps vividly portray the performance of each of the 180 nations for all indexes, and the main indicators that go into them. In addition, all data are given in 160 pages of tables, and the highly accessible methodology is described in appendices so that readers can undertake their own assessments.

Produced in collaboration with the leading international organizations involved with sustainable development, The Wellbeing of Nations is a one-of-a-kind reference for development and environmental policy professionals, as well as for students and scholars in environmental studies, international studies, and international development.