MAN’S WELL-BEING: A NEED FOR METAFRAMEWORK

Abstract

Man’s well-being, with a wide array of concepts, has emerged as one of the most debated topics in the contemporary research, particularly in social sciences. In the post renaissance emphasis on humanism and reduction of ecclesiastical precepts to personal private affairs, the hedonistic concept of well-being, aimed at ‘pleasureseeking’, became the prime objective of all human endeavours. However, neither utilitarian ‘welfarism’1 nor United Nations’ sponsored Human Development Index (HDI) could help ameliorate the well-being of humanity at large. Taking lead from Dr Mahbub ul Haq and Dr Amartya Sen’s contribution towards enlarging the choices of people and bringing about more discernible equity in the world,2 it is now being realized all around the globe that there is a need for a wider framework of well-being, which should be universal in nature, besides encompassing life of an individual as a whole. This paper argues that existing frameworks of happiness/well-being studies deal with the human life in piecemeal, whereas, man’s life needs to be taken as a whole. The paper in hand attempts to present, in the light of Holy Quran, a ‘Metaframework of Well-being’, which is capable of transcending time and space.