For years government involvement in citizen’s happiness has been largely limited to the extent it correlates with wealth: increasing GDP is often seen as the main factor determining contentment.

 

But while national prosperity is certainly a key metric in estimating our quality of life, it is not the only one. According the 2018 World Happiness Report, a healthy life expectancy, social support, freedom, trust and the generosity of the population are also crucial. Happiness itself may fall to the individual, but it is government policies that shape these contributory factors.

 

And although many countries are only just opening their eyes to the need to address happiness as an issue in its own right, others are already leading the way in trying to cheer their populations up,

 

Happiness in the UAE

 

In 2016, the United Arab Emirates appointed its first happiness minister.

 

Her Excellency Ohood bint Khalfan Al Roumi launched an ambitious national happiness agenda.

 

She told the 2018 World Government Summit in Dubai that every UAE government project from now on will have the improvement of citizens’ happiness and wellbeing among its objectives.

 

“Do we always ask ourselves if our policies have real impact on the happiness and wellbeing of a community?” she asked.

“When any official has happiness as an objective, he or she will contribute to the happiness of thousands of people.”

 

Global happiness

 

The UAE is not alone in trying to make happiness a central plank of government policy.

 

The Dubai summit also heard how Indonesia had shaped the UN “happiness pyramid”, which turned the organization’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals into a policy-making tool.

 

The SDGs are global objectives to eliminate poverty, improve education and health outcomes, create better jobs and tackle environmental challenges everywhere by 2030.

 

The pyramid links three key pillars of happiness – “people harmony”, “ecological harmony” and “spiritual harmony” – to individual goals.

 

A philosophical outlook

 

His Excellency Bambang Brodjonegoro, Indonesia's minister for national development planning, said these harmonies align perfectly to Tri Hita Karana, the traditional philosophy on the island of Bali.

 

These say we can only be truly happy after we have achieved unity between people, have a spiritual dimension in our daily lives and care for our planet.

 

The harmonies also fit well with Indonesia’s state philosophy “Pancasila'.

 

People harmony was perhaps one of Indonesia’s biggest challenges, H E Brodjonegoro said, because the archipelago is multi-faith: “We have to ensure the unity of diverse cultures and faiths to create happiness.”

 

As a lower-middle income country, much of the nation’s future contentment depends on development, and poverty is still a big problem, he said.

 

Happiness can only be achieved by uniting government, public and civil society, H E Brodjonegoro added.

 

Don’t worry, be happy?

 

Despite the challenges facing our planet, the UAE Government aims to make the federation one of the top-five happiest places in the world by 2021.

 

“We are not idealistic in our own theories,” said H E Al Roumi. “We realise that the world is facing difficult times, and that challenges are increasing and accelerating their pace.”

 

This is why happiness leadership has to come from the fore, she argues, even though happiness may prove difficult to instil as we face up to life in the digital era.

 

“We realise that the road to adopt happiness as a government approach is not clear yet, but we decided to embark on the journey,” she said.

 

“The very essence of human nature is now being called into question, with the borders between digital, physical and biological starting to disappear thanks to the developments of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

 

“We have to be aware of the repercussions on human beings.”