SOCIAL INCLUSION

 
This criterion measures the extent to which social policy prevents poverty and limits socioeconomic exclusion. While the achievement of these two goals may coincide, the objectives do differ from one other, and may require rather different policies.

Poverty prevention and the provision of roughly equal opportunities for success within a society are substantial elements in policy aiming at minimizing exclusion. A country that shows high levels of gender inequity or a large population of youth that is neither employed nor in education is using its human assets inefficiently, and risks political disaffection as well.

Although membership in unions or political parties is on the decline in a number of OECD countries, this indicator reflects an aspect of a population’s social or community engagement that remains important.