Human Wellbeing in the Age of AI

2023 COMMEMORATIVE EDITION

HUMAN WELLBEING IN THE AGE OF AI HOW MEANINGFUL AI WILL ENABLE HUMAN FLOURISHING

MASTHEAD CEO & PUBLISHER ANA C. ROLD EDITOR-IN-CHIEF SHANE SZARKOWSKI ART DIRECTOR MARC GARFIELD MULTIMEDIA MANAGER WHITNEY DEVRIES BOOK REVIEWER JOSHUA HUMINSKI

EDITORS JEREMY FUGLEBERG MELISSA METOS SPECIAL SERIES EDITOR KELLY R. BAILEY CORRESPONDENTS ELIA PRETO MARTINI NIKOLA MIKOVIC OPERATIONS COORDINATOR BEKI ADAMS

EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD ANDREW M. BEATO FUMBI CHIMA DANTE A. DISPARTE KERSTIN EWELT

SIR IAN FORBES LISA GABLE GREG LEBEDEV ANITA MCBRIDE

CONTRIBUTING AUTHORS NIKOS ACUÑA BINIAM BEDASSO JON CLIFTON STEPHEN COURTRIGHT SUSANNAH HARES JIM HARTER PAUL LAMBERT AMELLE LIAZOGHLI

KIANNA MAHONY ULRICH MARSEILLE JAMIE METZL YVONNE OCHIENG SHWETA RAWAT DOMINIC REGESTER MOITREYEE SINHA MARK TOMLINSON

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ARTWORK. Cover photo by Matthew Thanuj via Unsplash. Artwork and design by Marc Garfield for Diplomatic Courier.

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enabling human flourishing through physical, mental, spiritual, social, and intellectual health.

9 October 2023 | 10:00 am — 6:00 pm GMT The Shard, 32 London Bridge St, London SE1 9SG, UK

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Welcome We have big anxieties.

Ana C. Rold CEO & Founder

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ike many of our readers and experts, I’ve been fascinated by artificial intelligence (AI) for a long time. My favorite genre in movies and books is SciFi and it’s likely an influence in my founding of World in 2050 over a decade ago— our futuristic think tank that aims to “help the future arrive well.” When we first started asking the big questions about AI and exponential tech—the first of our five megatrends, which we study at Diplomatic Courier and World in 2050—they had little to do with the tech itself and everything to do with the type of society we are building and the choices we are making as a human race.

Despite the vast barrage of commentary we’re all consuming the past year about AI, the debates we’re having are not about AI at all. The AI debate is a proxy for all the anxieties humanity is facing at this critical juncture in our civilization.

In the past year alone, existential threats have soared.

The threat of nuclear war is back on the table with geopolitical tensions at an all-time high; we’ve lived through an increasing number of extreme weather events with July 2023 being the hottest month ever recorded on Earth; and, the experts tell us, the chance that AI could destroy humanity is not zero.

We have “smaller” anxieties too.

We have economic systems and governance institutions that are being questioned and challenged to a breaking point. We are nowhere near achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals to ensure basic human needs are met (such as education for all, no poverty, decent jobs, better health, etc.). COVID-19 continues to ravage health systems. Automation has reached fever pitch, and we disagree whether it’s better to work from home or from the office. Our kids are regressing in basic numeracy and literacy skills. The list goes on.

All AI has done is force us to make urgent choices about which world do we want and confront “business as usual.”

Where does the concept of wellbeing fit into all of this?

With the help of our partners

at the Gallup World Poll, we have looked at wellbeing as a key megatrend for several years. As a theme, it tends to fall low on big policy agendas; but that is changing. The loneliness epidemic has become a key issue for our host country for this year’s Wellbeing Forum. Health and wellbeing now top policy agendas for world leadership summits like the G20 and even NATO. On an organizational level, measuring how your employees are feeling matters for companies’ bottom line—whether you have five employees or five thousand. And at the individual level, we are learning to practice selfcare and strategize with our employers and health care providers to achieve our wellbeing goals.

Will AI be an enabler for better health outcomes?

Or will it contribute to more anxieties? AI is going to be a big part in how we meet these challenges.

What we know now is that AI is powerful, but not perfect (yet). It is up to us to shape it into something good and in service of humanity. The Wellbeing Forum is a where principals are doing just that. We look forward to the dialogue that begins in London and will continue to other key cities around the world in 2024 and beyond.

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Contents W EL L B EI N G F ORU M I OC TOBER 2023

08 I How Meaningful AI Will Enable Human Flourishing By: Nikos Acuña

12 I Human Success in the AI Age By: Jamie Metzl

16 I A More Holistic Lens to Transform Mental Health and Wellbeing By: Moitreyee Sinha

20 I Leaders: Ignore Employee Wellbeing at Your Own Risk By: Jim Harter

24 I Business Should Care About Faith By: Paul Lambert and Stephen Courtright

28 I Taking Responsibility for the World By: Dominic Regester

32 I Health and Wellbeing as a Fundamental Right By: Ulrich Marseille

36 I What Makes a Great Life?

By: Jon Clifton

40 I Reimagining Mental Health

by Empowering Marginalized Youth By: Yvonne Ochieng

44 I Confronting The Crisis of Meaning By: Kianna Mahony

48 I Pioneering Patient Wellbeing through AI and Self-Care By: Amelle Liazoghli

52 I The Future of Funding to Support Mental Health and Wellbeing By: Shweta Rawat

56 I Imagining a City Built for the Wellbeing of Young People By: Mark Tomlinson

60 I A Wellbeing Agenda for Poor Students By: Biniam Bedasso and Susannah Hares

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Image via Adobe Stock.

How Meaningful AI Will Enable Human Flourishing

By Nikos Acuña

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n an era dominated by algorithms that often compromise both personalization and privacy, the advent of meaningful AI promises to redefine our digital experiences. This next-gen AI doesn’t just gather data; it understands deeper context, adapts in real-time, and focuses on what is meaningful for every user at the highest possible resolution.

Beyond personal utility, meaningful AI has the potential to transform economic systems, drive equitable wealth distribution and optimized resource allocation through hyper-efficient automation.

AI NEEDS MUCH BETTER RESOLUTION IN ORDER TO POWER OUR AUTONOMOUS FUTURE, AND PERHAPS TO FULFILL THE UTOPIAN VISION OF HAVING A PERSONAL EXPERT IN YOUR POCKET.

With the explosion of generative AI causing massive ripple effects across industries, alarm bells are ringing around building systems responsibly for humans to flourish in this new age. Challenges in AI safety and alignment are important derivatives of problems deeply rooted in how the web, media, and data ecosystems are built.

What’s needed for this vision for human flourishing is a radical re-envisioning of the entire web and data ecosystem at the foundational level—evolving it from a data extraction monolith to a universal platform powered by human-centric AI expression.

This will not only unlock exponential value for every user, it will harmonize market economies by providing AI with the highest resolution that will lead to the emergence of a societal creative class, and a more prosperous future for humanity.

Big tech companies primarily profit f rom collecting user data to deliver targeted ads, often without explicit consent, fair compensation or data practice transparency. This model prioritizes profit over privacy, undermines personal data integrity, and is worsened by AI algorithms that amplify content that contributes to societal polarization. In a digital age rife with deep fakes and misinformation campaigns, the role of human validation is indispensable. Machine algorithms, while increasingly sophisticated, still fall short of discerning fact f rom fiction, requiring human oversight for maintaining information integrity. Digital platforms and media utilities like search are all binary by design and cannot reflect the full spectrum of human expression and experience—obfuscating attributes and preferences into targeting mechanisms designed for behavior modification. AI needs much better resolution in order to power our autonomous future, and perhaps to fulfill the utopian vision of having a personal expert in your pocket that can, along with countless other personal AI nodes, collectively solve the world’s biggest problems.

What exactly is meaningful AI and how is it a departure from the current model?

Meaningful AI is a functional data object that can render a user’s subjective interpretation of keywords and content. Think of how users place hashtags on posts, but instead of just posting a tag on a photo, a point of expression across a spectrum is created. (0-5-star ratings is just one of countless examples). These are not merely new data points but rich layers of information resolution that enable AI systems to grasp the user’s unique preferences, situational context, emotions, and any attributes of intent and interest. This multi-layered understanding propels personalization to new heights, allowing the AI to adapt in real-time as user behaviors and preferences evolve. It also maps subjective experiences with objective insights in real-time rather than the traditional input-process-output computation model. It can do this at an infinite capacity across multiple dimensions.

What sets this apart from existing techniWELLBEING FORUM | 9

THE REACH OF MEANINGFUL AI WILL BE TRANSFORMATIVE AND UNIVERSAL, SERVING AS COLLABORATORS FOR SCIENTISTS, FONTS OF CREATIVITY FOR ARTISTS AND CREATORS, AND ADVISORS FOR SOCIETAL LEADERS, BOOSTING THE WELLBEING OF THE COMMUNITIES THEY LEAD. cal and personalization models is the shift from a platform-centric to human-centric data experience and architecture with ethical considerations. Usually, personalization compromises privacy, but the encryption embedded in these semantic data objects allows for nuanced customization without jeopardizing user data.

But the implications of AI for enhanced expression extend beyond individual experiences and better recommendation engines. They serve as conduits for peerto-peer transactions, enabling direct, nuanced exchanges between users and businesses, thereby creating a more balanced market dynamic. This could even replace the current, ad-based revenue models with a democratic data marketplace. In this new paradigm, these expressive nondual objects determine the value of publicly-owned data, offering a more equitable distribution of digital wealth to the users that allow third-parties to partake in leveraging their data.

Resource allocation, too, gains f rom the inherent intelligence of these semantically-driven AI expressions. They possess the potential to harmonize global and local economies. Imagine a way for an AI to express the value of a 10 | D I PLOM AT I C COURIE R

local artisanal craft, connecting it with a global market that cherishes its uniqueness and cultural richness.

In the realm of professions, the reach of meaningful AI will be transformative and universal, serving as collaborators for scientists, fonts of creativity for artists and creators, and advisors for societal leaders, boosting the wellbeing of the communities they lead.

This isn’t just an upgrade in processing power; it’s a renaissance of the human spirit.

With proper human-centric expressions reinforcing integrity and enriched feedback loops at the same rate at which content and data are created every day, the AI of the future will be able to understand complex concepts like emotion–or even spirituality, enabling people to express themselves creatively, regardless of technical skill, while fostering empathy and resilience.

AI informed by augmented semantic resolution offers a dual promise: First, it elevates AI personalization, deepening its understanding and adaptability in real-time. Second, it has the potential to democratize and harmonize economic systems by infusing transactions and data ownership with layers of meaningful interconnected values into a global scale neural network that serves the collective whole while optimizing individual nodes.

Through these groundbreaking capabilities, we may be on the brink of entering an era of human-centered AI abundance and equitable digital economies. ***** About the author: Nikos Acuña is a tech entrepreneur, researcher, angel investor, and award-winning author. He is the co-founder of Lyrical AI and DialIN, and leads AI commercialization at Domo. With vast experience in AI products and technology, he explores AI’s impact on humanity, how to govern data responsibly, while fostering growth and abundance for all.

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Human Success in the AI Age

By Jamie Metzl

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Image via Adobe Stock.

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verywhere we look nowadays, we find warnings that artificialintelligence algorithms are coming for our jobs. While Goldman Sachs estimates that two-thirds of all current jobs in the United States and Europe could be “exposed to some degree of AI automation” in the coming years, a report from Pew Research Center puts the figure at closer to onefifth—with a special emphasis on jobs requiring a college education.

There is a strong consensus that AI algorithms are becoming increasingly capable of performing more tasks far better than humans can, and that this trend will continue indefinitely. Though the future is always uncertain, we are clearly entering a new phase of human development in which AI will play an increasingly central role in our lives, work, and world. Its algorithms will not just offer better versions of existing services like internet search; instead, like written language, electricity, and computing, they will be woven into most every aspect of how we interact with each other and the world around us.

The dawn of a new AI age does not mean that dusk is approaching for humans. We humans have always co-evolved with our technologies, and this time will be no exception. Learning to cook with fire helped us reallocate energy f rom digestion to our brains—which in turn allowed us to evolve stronger forms of social organization.

Domesticating plants and animals helped us stay put, so that more people could do things other than hunting, gathering, and farming—which in turn allowed our technologies, cultures, and civilizations to grow. Industrialization gave us the tools to expand our population, build modern megacities, and make our way into space.

Like these earlier technologies, AI will change us. Complex functions we once valued as uniquely human will suddenly be performed better by AI algorithms.

That will include computer programming, deciphering patterns from massive data

THE DAWN OF A NEW AI AGE DOES NOT MEAN THAT DUSK IS APPROACHING FOR HUMANS. WE HUMANS HAVE ALWAYS CO-EVOLVED WITH OUR TECHNOLOGIES, AND THIS TIME WILL BE NO EXCEPTION. sets, generating art, and a whole slew of other capabilities whose susceptibility to AI we are only just beginning to explore and understand. AI technologies stand to improve our health, make our economies more productive and efficient, and potentially build a safer and more sustainable future for all.

Of course, the same capabilities also bring considerable risks, from the emergence of autonomous weapons and rapid job displacement to the more fundamental problem of misalignment between our own goals and those of the AI systems we are creating. While people like Elon Musk have called for a voluntary moratorium on AI development in light of the associated risks, that simply will not work. The potential benefits of AI are too great, and our societies are too competitive—both internally and with each other.

Our time and energy would be better spent preparing for what is inevitably coming. We need not only stronger rules of the road but also the institutions (local, national, and international) to support and enforce them. Our goal must be to maximize the benefits and minimize the potential harms.

Even if details of the coming labor-market disruption remain uncertain, there is no doubt that many job categories will be effectively eliminated, as happened previously in agriculture, telephony, and WELLBEING FORUM | 13

other sectors. But some jobs, we will find, are uniquely human. Jobs that we do not much value (economically) today—like home health attendants and poets—may come to be considered precious human jobs in the future. And as has always happened in the past, new jobs that we scarcely could have imagined will be created.

Almost all existing jobs will be hybridized.

If an AI algorithm does not displace you, someone who has figured out how to work alongside AI better than you might.

That means we will all need our own hybridization strategies.

Since every job can be broken down into a list of core functions, every person and organization will need to look at these tasks to determine which are better done by humans, which by AI, and which by some combination of the two. The key to success will be to let AIs and humans each do what they do best, and to figure out how AIs and humans can best work together on everything else. Those who find the optimal mix will be the champions of the new economy.

The future does not belong to AI, but nor does it belong to humans alone. As has been the case since the stone age, we will co-evolve with our technology—just faster. Everyone should be scrambling to figure out how best to do that. ***** About the author: Jamie Metzl, Founder and Chair of OneShared.

World, served on the U.S. National Security Council and in the U.S. State Department during the Clinton administration. He is the author of the forthcoming “Superconvergence: How the Genetics, Biotech, and AI Revolutions Will Transform Our Lives, Work, and World” (Timber/Hachette, 2023).

Copyright: Project Syndicate, 2023.

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Photo by Kevin Schmid via Unsplash.

A More Holistic Lens to Transform Mental Health and Wellbeing

By Moitreyee Sinha

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ur world is increasingly complex and difficult. From pandemics to the effects of climate change to the rise of technology, we are all under immense stress, but younger people are often more vulnerable than most. If we are to adapt to the complex challenges of our modern world, we must adequately support the mental health and wellbeing of young people. And yet, current mental health interventions and systems fall drastically short of meeting young people’s needs.

To meaningfully support young people’s mental health and wellbeing, we must shift away from a narrow focus on addressing symptoms toward a more holistic approach, including core dimensions such as meaning, purpose, belonging, hopefulness, and relationship to nature.

Supporting young people to find wholeness within themselves and nurturing connections with others and the broader world can have transformative impacts on mental health and wellbeing. Further, these efforts would have ripple effects, stewarding a more loving, just, and sustainable future for all.

There is no one single group of actors equipped to lead such efforts alone.

To collectively drive the paradigm shift younger and future generations need, we will need to harness diverse sources of creativity and wisdom by collaborating across disciplinary, generational, geographic, and other boundaries.

Transdisciplinary, Intergenerational, Cross-Cultural Collaborations Mental health and wellbeing are subjects as old as humanity, yet the science is very new. While we have made significant progress in recent decades, fundamental questions such as “what does it mean to be human” and “how can we support human flourishing” remain excluded from mainstream research agendas and funding. We need experts f rom across disciplines to come together and not only contribute from their respective areas of

WE NEED EXPERTS FROM ACROSS DISCIPLINES TO COME TOGETHER AND NOT ONLY CONTRIBUTE FROM THEIR RESPECTIVE AREAS OF EXPERTISE, BUT ALSO TO TRANSCEND USUAL DISCIPLINARY BOUNDARIES. expertise, but also to transcend usual disciplinary boundaries. The complexity of challenges in mental health and wellbeing science requires bringing together and extending discipline-specif ic theories and methods to create new ways of working. Further, the bounds of science need to be expanded to include sources such as ancient wisdom and lived experience. This approach to science challenges current ways of working, but is a necessary challenge.

Young people’s own creativity, wisdom, passion, and lived experience expertise are necessary ingredients for driving change. Meaningful youth engagement is on the rise and becoming a hot topic in the mental health and wellbeing field, particularly given how young people have been historically treated as passive beneficiaries. However, youth engagement is still often approached as a checkbox activity and young people are still often confined to a single role advising on mental health and wellbeing initiatives.

There are countless different roles that young people can play–as researchers, implementers, advocates, facilitators, and participants to name a few. Transformative change can happen when we meaningfully support young people to play roles in leading, driving, and supporting initiatives that are distinct to their unique perspectives and capabilities, and provide spaces where they can meaningfully partner with older adults.

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While youth mental health and wellbeing efforts are under-resourced in every country globally, efforts in low-middle income countries have been particularly underresourced historically. Furthermore, even as more attention has been paid to mental health over the past decade, a lot of the support in low-middle income countries has largely been in the form of spreading Western-based approaches.

This one-way flow ignores the unique insights and strengths that every community, in every culture and geography, has to offer. Further, this one-way flow ignores the transformative potential of practitioners across cultures and geographies coming together to collaborate and merge the best of what they have to offer.

My own life journey has taught me the value of listening to and connecting a diverse range of perspectives. From a childhood in India listening to the stories of refugees from Bangladesh to leveraging physics to bring multiple disciplines to bear on wicked problems in the private sector to now working with partners spanning many countries with citiesRISE, I have seen that transformative change happens when we challenge usual boundaries. This holistic, cross-boundary approach to collaboration works, as illustrated by a program adapting innovations—developed for marginalized young people in informal settlements in Nairobi—for use by LGBTQ+, immigrant, and refugee communities in Seattle.

We each have unique opportunities in our everyday work and lives to collaborate across boundaries. The more that we can support these types of collaborations, the stronger the global movement for young people’s mental health and wellbeing will be. ***** About the author: Moitreyee Sinha is a humanitarian, scientist, and social entrepreneur. As CEO and Founder of citiesRISE, she brings her unique vision for collective action to mental health and wellbeing.

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Photo by Israel Andrade via Unsplash.

Leaders: Ignore Employee Wellbeing at Your Own Risk

By Jim Harter

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hy would anyone put in extra effort if they feel like you don’t care about them?

Only about one in four U.S. employees feel strongly that their organization cares about their wellbeing. This percentage has been trending down since it peaked at the start of the pandemic. Gallup has found similarly low numbers in Germany, France and the UK This finding has significant implications now that work and life are more blended than ever before. According to Gallup research, those who prefer remote work cite reduced commute times, flexibility for their family and their wellbeing as some of the key reasons.

In 2011, long before the pandemic, about the same percentage of U.S. employees strongly agreed that their employer cared about their overall wellbeing (21%).

Then at the onset of the pandemic in 2020, employers responded quickly with plans, communication and what many employees believed was genuine concern for them. And the percentage who felt their organization cared about them nearly doubled, reaching a high of 49% in May of that year. But since 2020, the percentage has plummeted to the previous low levels.

Why It Matters Employees who strongly agree that their employer cares about their overall wellbeing, compared with those who don’t, are: • • • • • •

3x more likely to be engaged at work.

69% less likely to actively search for a new job.

71% less likely to report experiencing a lot of burnout.

5x more likely to strongly advocate for their company as a place to work.

5x more likely to strongly agree that they trust the leadership of their organization.

36% more likely to be thriving in their overall lives.

Gallup has also found that teams most likely to feel like their organization cares about their wellbeing have higher customer engagement, profitability and productivity; lower turnover; and fewer safety incidents.

Employees’ expectations have fundamentally changed since 2020. Many employees now have new and more serious factors to consider when they think about their job, including if their employer cares about their wellbeing. The intersection between work and life has new meaning—upping the bar for employers.

TEAMS MOST LIKELY TO FEEL LIKE THEIR ORGANIZATION CARES ABOUT THEIR WELLBEING HAVE HIGHER CUSTOMER ENGAGEMENT, PROFITABILITY AND PRODUCTIVITY; LOWER TURNOVER; AND FEWER SAFETY INCIDENTS. WELLBEING FORUM | 21

ONLY ONE IN FIVE EMPLOYEES STRONGLY AGREE THAT THE LEADERSHIP OF THEIR ORGANIZATION MAKES DECISIONS THAT ARE IN THE CUSTOMERS’ BEST INTEREST. Increasing Employee-Employer Disconnect Complicating matters for organizations, declining levels of employee engagement and feeling like their employer cares about their wellbeing—and increasing levels of dissatisfaction—are signs of a growing disconnect between employees and employers. The expectations of the post-pandemic workforce don’t match the actual experience employees have at work.

Ultimately, this disconnect has serious implications for customer retention. There has been a recent decline in the American Customer Satisfaction Index, which measures customers’ satisfaction with company products and services—how close they are to ideal and the extent to which they meet or exceed expectations.

From 2020 to 2022, among exclusively remote employees of all ages, Gallup saw a significant drop in the percentage who say that they are extremely proud of the quality of the products and services their organization offers. This is especially true for workers below age 35, regardless of whether they work remotely, on-site or hybrid and for workers 35 and older who are exclusively remote. Younger employees are also less likely to feel great responsibility for the quality of their organization’s products and services.

Only one in five employees strongly agree that the leadership of their organization

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makes decisions that are in the customers’ best interest. This perception is highly correlated with delivering on promises to customers. Why would employees care if their leaders don’t care?

Consider this: Engaged employees are 4x as likely to feel extremely proud of the products and services their organization offers.

Employees who experience frequent or constant burnout are 50% less likely to feel that their organization always delivers on its promise to customers.

Among U.S. workers, approval of labor unions is at its highest point since 1965 (71%) —and the younger the worker, the more interested they are in joining a union.

These facts indicate that employees are becoming dangerously alienated from their employers. And the consequences of employee-employer detachment—and employees feeling their employer doesn’t care about their wellbeing—include less commitment and effort from employees to go the extra mile for customers, less loyalty to the organization, and higher turnover. ***** About the author: Jim Harter, PhD, is Chief Scientist, Workplace for Gallup and bestselling author of Culture Shock, Wellbeing at Work, It’s the Manager, 12: The Elements of Great Managing and Wellbeing: The Five Essential Elements.

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The new genius is a collaborative genius

At Northwestern University’s Roberta Buffett Institute for Global Affairs, we believe that relationships among individuals and institutions—globally and locally—are what generate new knowledge that sparks solutions to global challenges.

Learn more at buffett.northwestern.edu.

Business Should Care About Faith

By Paul Lambert and Stephen Courtright

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Photo by Aaron Burden via Unsplash.

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n today’s competitive global marketplace, businesses are in a “war” for attracting talent—a war that has only intensified in the wake of the global COVID-19 pandemic. However, companies such as Accenture, Dell Technologies, and Google have discovered a key best practice to attracting and retaining top talent: recognizing faith and belief within their diversity–equity–inclusion (DEI) and employee wellness programs.

Companies that are serious about successfully competing in the war for talent should take note and follow suit.

Many companies already recognize the critical importance of DEI and employee wellness to attracting and retaining the best talent. The growth in these initiatives is backed by hundreds of studies demonstrating the positive benefits of diversitysupportive and wellness-focused climates, including more engaged and better performing workforces. And since people are the most important asset of any company, it follows that when employees perform better, companies perform better.

With that in mind, businesses have typically designed DEI efforts around recognizing individual identities related to race, gender, and sexual orientation. Although these are essential components of any DEI strategy, a comprehensive strategy must also include faith and belief. One reason is that 84% of the world’s population identifies as religious, and all but one of the 10 fastest growing economies since 2017 are countries with large majority religious populations. Furthermore, even in regions where religiosity is declining, religious diversity is increasing. Thus, to attract top global talent as well as reach diverse global customers, businesses must understand the role faith plays in individual identity. Like gender, race, and sexual orientation, faith is an aspect of identity that employees bring with them to work, and studies show that employees in faithfriendly organizations have higher job satisfaction, better productivity, and lower burnout. What’s more, research has shown that companies with a commitment to

EVEN IN REGIONS WHERE RELIGIOSITY IS DECLINING, RELIGIOUS DIVERSITY IS INCREASING. TO ATTRACT TOP GLOBAL TALENT AS WELL AS REACH DIVERSE GLOBAL CUSTOMERS, BUSINESSES MUST UNDERSTAND THE ROLE FAITH PLAYS IN INDIVIDUAL IDENTITY. religious inclusion have higher levels of inclusion in other identity areas, including race, gender, and sexual orientation.

One approach to fostering religious inclusion is creating faith-based employee resource groups (ERGs). For example, Walmart’s Faith and Vocation ERG has a mission to “connect, collaborate and celebrate associates of all faiths to make a difference for our company, our customer, and our communities.” Similarly, Google’s Inter Belief Network aims to “create a culture of inclusion, tolerance, and mutual understanding at Google for a diversity of beliefs.” Such efforts have been very successful for companies that have implemented them. At Salesforce, for example, the Faithforce ERG quickly became one of the fastest growing ERGs in the company’s history after its launch in 2017. As one Salesforce employee stated, “I am here at Salesforce because of Faithforce. I was at [another company] and I didn’t feel allowed to pray. I heard about Faithforce and I quit, and now I’m here.”

Besides including faith and belief in DEI efforts, companies should also recognize faith and belief as critical components of wellness. This approach is backed by decades of research, including a recent study by McKinsey in which thousands of respondents listed spiritual health as one WELLBEING FORUM | 25

BESIDES INCLUDING FAITH AND BELIEF IN DEI EFFORTS, COMPANIES SHOULD ALSO RECOGNIZE FAITH AND BELIEF AS CRITICAL COMPONENTS OF WELLNESS. THIS APPROACH IS BACKED BY DECADES OF RESEARCH.

is doing so, gathering insights from research and corporate best practice to develop playbooks for leaders who want to learn to address faith and belief at work.

of four “extremely” or “very important” aspects of their overall health. Further, a Gallup study—to be published on World Mental Health Day this year—showed people with a greater commitment to spirituality or religion reported greater well-being in terms of experiencing more positive emotions, better social connections, and higher community engagement. Studies have also found links between religious involvement and lower rates of depression, suicide, addiction, and isolation.

*****

Despite well-documented successes from incorporating faith good for company culture” for employees to be open about their faith, and that “discussions into DEI and wellness efforts, a recent Deseret News/HarrisX poll found that nearly 40% of employees report keeping their religion secret from peers and supervisors for fear of repercussions. At the same time, the poll found that over 75% of business leaders express the opinion that “it’s about religious beliefs make workers happier.” Why the conundrum? Why do business leaders recognize the need for faith and belief at work but feel unable to address it? Often, business leaders are unsure of how to address faith and belief at work.

To this end, stakeholders should work to cultivate a more personal, positive place for faith within modern society. Radiant Foundation’s Coalition for Faith & Media 26 | D I PLOM AT I C COU RIE R

In the end, every business is built by its people, and if companies want to fully engage their people in building the business, they must engage with their employees fully. To do this, successful companies will not only continue making DEI and wellness efforts central to their talent management strategy, but they will extend the scope of those efforts to include faith and belief. A failure to do so is a failure to recognize and empower a core aspect of individual identity and wellness.

About the authors: Paul Lambert is the Director of the Wheatley Institute’s Religion Initiative at Brigham Young University and a faculty member at BYU’s Marriott School of Business.

Stephen Courtright is the Henry B. Tippie Research Professor of Management and Entrepreneurship at University of Iowa’s Tippie College of Business.

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Photo by Charlein Garcia via Unsplash.

Taking Responsibility for the World

By Dominic Regester

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he German philosopher Hannah Arendt described education “as the point at which you love the world enough to take responsibility for it.” Taking responsibility for the health and wellbeing of students and teachers is a key component of this.

Many education systems, networks and institutions are now beginning to attach greater importance to supporting student wellbeing.

This is in many ways long overdue. There is a lot of literature detailing the mental health crisis facing Generation Z (those born between 1997–2012), attributable to the rapid spread of digital technology and the complexities that can bring, to the COVID-19 pandemic, to climate change, and to complex social issues such as addressing long standing inequalities.

In September 2022 the United Nations hosted the Transforming Education Summit, “convened in response to a global crisis in education—one of equity and inclusion, quality and relevance.” It was the largest global education convening in 40 years. As part of the preparation for it, countries were to hold national consultations and then prepare a Statement of commitment for the summit. 106 countries submitted statements. In the immediate aftermath of TES the Center for Global Development published a brilliant analysis of what topics countries were prioritizing. Depressingly they found the ‘issues relating to child wellbeing had low prominence’ in the Statements.

Coming so soon after all the coverage of the ways in which COVID-19 had a particularly acute impact on the mental health and wellbeing of young people, this felt like a missed opportunity. The impact of COVID-19 should not be underestimated, OECD research has shown that in some countries the number of children experiencing anxiety, depression, loneliness and withdrawal is more than twice as high as before the pandemic.

It feels self-evident that there should be a clear correlation between wellbeing and

IT FEELS SELF-EVIDENT THAT THERE SHOULD BE A CLEAR CORRELATION BETWEEN WELLBEING AND SUCCESS AT SCHOOL. IF YOU FEEL GOOD ABOUT YOURSELF THEN YOU WILL BE BETTER ABLE TO CONCENTRATE AND TO LEARN. success at school. If you feel good about yourself then you will be better able to concentrate and to learn. To a fair degree, albeit with certain caveats (such as results vary significantly depending on age of students) the academic literature supports this. In the last few years there have been some significant education initiatives that actively support well-being.

For example there has been a global increase in social and emotional programs in part because “research shows that social and emotional learning (SEL) leads to increased positive attitudes, prosocial behavior, and improved wellbeing and academic learning.”

Programs as diverse as Yale’s RULER approach or Delhi’s Happiness Curriculum provide compelling evidence that interventions that prioritize student wellbeing have a direct impact on academic attainment . The benefits clearly go beyond academic attainment in terms of wider health and societal benefits. In August 2023 the World Health Organization published an article showing suicide is the fourth leading cause of death among 15–29-year-olds globally. In an era of growing polarization initiatives such as the Happiness Curriculum, which “believes that the purpose of education is to create confident, mindful, responsible, and happy individuals who collectively build a happy and harmonious society” are surely to be welcomed.

WELLBEING FORUM | 29

ONE OF THE WAYS IN WHICH STUDENT WELLBEING CAN BE SUPPORTED IS THROUGH PROGRAMS THAT HELP DEVELOP A SENSE OF AGENCY LEADING TO CHANGE. THERE IS GOOD EVIDENCE THAT CONNECTS AGENCY WITH WELLBEING AND PROGRAMS.

being in recent years. The Wellbeing Project and the World Innovation Summit for Education co-host an initiative called the Teacher Wellbeing Group, “a collaborative initiative that advances the inner wellbeing of teachers and educators worldwide.”

They put out a fascinating report in 2021 with a global literature review and case studies from Cambodia, Kenya and Qatar showing the importance of paying attention to educator wellbeing.

In July 2023 the G20 Interfaith Forum Education Working Group published a policy brief on ‘Developing Well-Being Focused Education Ecosystems’ The policy brief includes a series of recommendations for practical actions schools and systems can take. These include creating intentional spaces for whole-person learning in the curriculum, moving towards a more collaborative approach to evaluation, embedding a relational approach to teaching and learning, supporting teacher wellbeing and professional development, and developing multi-sectoral educational ecosystems. Whilst some of these recommendations can sound quite jargony each of them is supported by evidencebased case studies that show how they can be implemented.

*****

One of the ways in which student wellbeing can be supported is through programs that help develop a sense of agency leading to change. There is good evidence that connects agency with wellbeing and programs like the Medellin Challenge in Colombia that let students apply what they are learning in school to address real world problems.

As well as student wellbeing there has been a positive increase in educator well30 | D I PLOM AT I C CO URIE R

There are fantastic evidence-led examples from many different parts of the world showing how prioritizing student and educator wellbeing makes a real difference to students’ learning outcomes and personal wellbeing, which can only be good for the long-term future of the planet. Hopefully Hannah Arendt would approve.

About the author: Dominic Regester is the Director of the Salzburg Global Center for Education Transformation and a senior contributing editor at Diplomatic Courier.

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Health and Wellbeing as a Fundamental Right Desert in Sudan. Photo by Yiannis Mantas via Adobe Stock.

By Ulrich Marseille

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he World Health Organization (WHO) has concluded that half of the world’s population lacks access to essential health services.

One particularly revealing metric by the WHO is that several dozen countries don’t even meet the basic, minimum requirements for per-capita hospital density, a leading indicator of healthcare limitations. The COVID-19 crisis worsened the situation, as almost all of the 105 countries surveyed by the WHO in 2020 had health services disrupted, and elective and routine treatment were completely suspended.

Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, the WHO, Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), and the World Bank found that poor quality healthcare and lack of access to care increased the burden of illness and healthcare costs globally. Research by the McKinsey Global Institute concluded that poor health reduces global GDP by 15% each year, and that prudent investments in health could generate $12 trillion in economic opportunity, save hundreds of millions of lives, and establish better health across the world. While all countries bear this burden, the WHO found in April 2023 that health care delivery in areas of conflict and crisis is the second most urgent global health challenge. Only addressing the global impact of climate change is considered more urgent.

The WHO Constitution of 1946 conceptualizes healthcare as a human right, stating “the highest attainable standard of health as a fundamental right of every human being.” This confers states with an international legal obligation to its citizens. A final but important key metric is the UN’s 2030 Sustainable Development Goals, which includes SDG3 to “ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages.”

If states are already struggling to meet the healthcare needs of their citizens, they are less able to address crisis situations, such as natural and man-made disasters and the humanitarian effects of conflict and war.

IF STATES ARE ALREADY STRUGGLING TO MEET THE HEALTHCARE NEEDS OF THEIR CITIZENS, THEY ARE LESS ABLE TO ADDRESS CRISIS SITUATIONS, SUCH AS NATURAL AND MAN-MADE DISASTERS AND THE HUMANITARIAN EFFECTS OF CONFLICT AND WAR. The Case of Sudan Sudan is a case in point. Sudanese officials barely averted a complete collapse of its health system earlier this year. And while nations can never be fully prepared for the impact of conflict, particularly attacks on health facilities, the question remains—would more robust investments in Sudan’s health system have made Sudan better prepared to address the healthcare crisis that it now faces?

In the weeks after the crisis in Sudan, only 16% of the medical institutes in its capital city of Khartoum were working at full capacity and 70% of hospitals in conflict zones were shut down. Hospitals were targeted throughout the fighting, causing medical staff to flee or take shelter, disrupting the provision of care. The conflict in Sudan will also generate long-term health challenges including disease outbreaks, threats to healthy pregnancies and child mortality rates, increases in disabilities, treatment of chronic diseases, health access, and health infrastructure.

This dire situation is occurring in a country that faced significant health and healthcare challenges well before conflict started. Sudan’s health system had been chronically underfunded for decades, and WELLBEING FORUM | 33

SUDAN’S HEALTH SYSTEM HAD BEEN CHRONICALLY UNDERFUNDED FOR DECADES, AND MORE RECENTLY, BOTH AN ECONOMIC CRISIS AND THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC DRAINED THE COUNTRY OF ITS RESOURCES. more recently, both an economic crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic drained the country of its resources. Sudan’s percentage of doctors per inhabitant in 2017 was almost six times below the global average at 0.3 per 1000 residents, and 70% of all healthcare workers were in Khartoum. Citizens in several regions have few to no health consultations, access to skilled health workers, and less than a third of needed medications are available at public and private facilities.

It is difficult for any society to be prepared for a health crisis of the magnitude unfolding in Sudan. However, making long-term investments in healthcare before conflict occurs is essential, as is the commitment to support the health rights of all citizens. Sudan’s healthcare needs were well documented before Sudan’s current crisis, including better legal enforcement of healthcare policies, stronger communications between all levels of policy making, closer monitoring of health implementation and outcomes, and improvements in data quality and systems. In short, Sudan needed more accountability, more coordination, and better technology.

For countries like Sudan must seek to accelerate investments in medical personnel and infrastructure. These investments would increase doctor-to-patient ratios; create resilient, mobile, and flexible medical facilities that can better serve populations; and support access to routine care 34 | D I PLOM AT I C CO URIE R

to help stymie disease. Simply providing more doctors, beds, and hospitals would go a long way towards improving Sudan’s health system and would better prepare any healthcare system for crisis.

To be sure, there are limits to what can be done to lessen the tragedies caused by conflict. At the same time, there are necessary and prudent steps all societies can take to become more resilient and better prepared for crisis situations. The international community must support countries like Sudan to ensure the basic human right to healthcare to support citizens during crises and in times of peace. This is the right of all people. ***** About the author: Ulrich Marseille is CEO of Worldwide Hospitals, a mobile health care company, and established one of Germany’s leading health care networks, starting in 1984, prior to German reunification.

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Agency & Opportunity for All

What Makes a Great Life?

By Jon Clifton

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Photo by Mohamed Nohassi via Unsplash.

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hile many things contribute to a great life, Gallup finds five aspects that all people have in common: their work, finances, physical health, communities, and relationships with family and friends. If you are excelling in each of these elements of wellbeing, you are highly likely to be thriving in life.

RESEARCH CONDUCTED ONLY IN THE WEST COMES UNDER A GREAT DEAL OF SCRUTINY— FOR GOOD REASON. THESE STUDIES OFTEN INCLUDE PEOPLE WHO DO NOT REPRESENT THE ENTIRE WORLD. For example, the people who are recruited to participate in U.S. academic research are usually college students. This is problematic because U.S. college students are not representative of the world.

In fact, they are not even representative of young people across the U.S.

To discover these five elements, Gallup began by reviewing much of the vast literature on happiness and wellbeing. Search “wellbeing” on Google Scholar, and you will find over 1.9 million academic articles; “happiness” yields over 2.7 million articles.

One person could not read every article in a lifetime, so we focused on meta-analyses— which combine the results of multiple studies—and the studies that had the greatest impact on the field of wellbeing research.

Then, we conducted surveys. Lots of them.

To date, we have conducted about 5 million surveys in almost 170 countries—roughly 2 million interviews in the U.S. and 3 million globally. We also conducted panel studies, which allow us to track the same people over time so we can better understand what causes changes in wellbeing, such as an economic collapse, a job loss, or the death of a spouse.

The global nature of this work is crucial. Research conducted only in the West comes under a great deal of scrutiny—for good reason. These studies often include people who do not represent the entire world.

This kind of research is called “WEIRD,” which is an acronym for Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic.

Many U.S. academic studies rely solely on participants who fit these characteristics—but often claim that the conclusions from the research apply to all people. The authors of this concept—Joe Henrich, Steven Heine, and Ara Norenzayan—caution, “We need to be less cavalier in addressing questions of human nature on the basis of data drawn from this particularly thin, and rather unusual, slice of humanity.”

Gallup’s wellbeing research is truly global, covering over 98% of the world’s adult population. It includes almost every ethnic group, religion, and income level and virtually every kind of human experience worldwide.

In every survey, we ask people how they see and live their lives. Their answers become the outcomes of interest in our analysis—meaning, we look at other variables to see what would help us explain how their lives are going. When someone says, “My life is a 10” or “I laughed and smiled a lot all day yesterday,” what else do they tell us? Are they physically active? Do WELLBEING FORUM | 37

they love their job? Do they have a lot of friends? Or some combination of all three?

Gallup’s research as well as research by the global community of wellbeing practitioners has produced hundreds, if not thousands, of discoveries.

One of the most famous discoveries is the U-curve of happiness, which shows how age is associated with wellbeing. Young people rate their lives high, and so do older people. But middle-aged people rate their lives the lowest. This trend holds every year in almost every country in the world. It is nicknamed the “U-curve” of happiness because when you look at the graph, it looks like a “U.” Some jokingly say that the chart is smiling.

Some discoveries are astonishing; others feel like they reveal a “blandly sophomoric secret,” as George Gallup referred to some of his longevity findings. For example, you could argue that the U-curve of happiness simply quantifies conventional wisdom— that people have midlife crises.

Here are a few of the discoveries that are truly compelling: •

People who love their jobs do not hate Mondays.

•

Education-related debt can cause

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YOUNG PEOPLE RATE THEIR LIVES HIGH, AND SO DO OLDER PEOPLE. BUT MIDDLE-AGED PEOPLE RATE THEIR LIVES THE LOWEST. THIS TREND HOLDS EVERY YEAR IN ALMOST EVERY COUNTRY IN THE WORLD. an emotional scar that remains even after you pay off the debt.

•

Volunteering is not just good for the people you are helping; it is also good for you.

•

Exercising is better at eliminating fatigue than prescription drugs.

•

Loneliness can double your risk of dying from heart disease.

We could list every insight ever produced from this research and encourage leaders to work on all of them. Instead, we took another approach. Using all these insights from across the industry combined with our surveys and analysis, we created the five elements of wellbeing. And our ongoing global research confirms that the five elements of wellbeing are significant drivers of a great life everywhere. ***** About the author: Jon Clifton is the CEO of Gallup and author of “Blind Spot: The Global Rise of Unhappiness and How Leaders Missed It.”

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Reimagining Mental Health

by Empowering Marginalized Youth

By Yvonne Ochieng

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magine a world where every young person, no matter their background, has access to the support they need for their mental and emotional wellbeing. This would be a world where meaningful assistance is accessible to all, especially those who today often go unnoticed or face challenging circumstances.

Growing up in Huruma, an informal settlement in Nairobi, Kenya, I experienced firsthand the struggles of marginalized communities. In such places, young individuals often slip through the cracks of inadequate mental health and social systems. My own turbulent childhood was marked by violence, parental alcoholism, the loss of my mother, neglect, and the threat of assault. These traumas led me to miss out on much of my adolescence due to severe depression. I attempted suicide at 16, feeling robbed of a crucial life stage that could have been salvaged.

This narrative isn’t unique—it resonates across communities like Huruma. Picture a curious young person living in underserved communities like Huruma and experiencing mental health challenges- their potential stifled by the limitations of existing mental health approaches. How can we change this story for these youth?

The issue is stark: even with abundant resources, the current mental health framework leaves these young people with insufficient support. Kenya’s population is mostly young, with almost three-quarters under 30. Around 46% of urban dwellers live in informal settlements, a number even higher in Nairobi, where over 60% reside informally on just 6% of the city’s land. Congested living conditions and associated challenges create complex sociocultural and economic environments.

Those experiencing forced displacement, migration, unstable families, violence, and mental health problems face even greater hardships. Poverty and gender inequalities compound these issues, impacting adolescent health and wellbeing.

The existing mental health systems’ challenges are multi-faceted. Often focused

THOSE EXPERIENCING FORCED DISPLACEMENT, MIGRATION, UNSTABLE FAMILIES, VIOLENCE, AND MENTAL HEALTH PROBLEMS FACE EVEN GREATER HARDSHIPS. POVERTY AND GENDER INEQUALITIES COMPOUND THESE ISSUES, IMPACTING ADOLESCENT HEALTH AND WELLBEING. narrowly on treating symptoms rather than causes, these clinical approaches fall short in addressing the broader contexts of marginalized youth. Solutions offered are often inaccessible, failing to resonate with these individuals.

A Reimagined Support System However, within such communities, there is more than adversity—there is resilience. I found solace in my early adulthood through Nzumari Af rica, a youthled community center that became my sanctuary. Partnering with citiesRISE, a global platform reimagining mental health care, this space transformed into a “gathering space” for local youth. Here, young individuals express themselves through art, guided by mental health professionals, fostering emotional resilience and life skills.

This transformation has broader effects.

In this reimagined mental health support landscape, these gathering spaces evolve into havens of belonging. As young people participate, they initiate projects that not only clean up their environment but also instill responsibility. The community center becomes an innovation hub, exchanging ideas and building skills.

WELLBEING FORUM | 41

THE VERY STRUCTURES THAT CURRENTLY HINDER YOUNG PEOPLE FROM RECEIVING HOLISTIC MENTAL HEALTH SUPPORT MUST BE DISMANTLED. THIS NECESSITATES POLICY CHANGES, INCREASED INVESTMENT, AND A CONCERTED EFFORT TO RESHAPE PERCEPTIONS AROUND MENTAL HEALTH. Imagine a world where every young person, irrespective of their upbringing, accesses evidence-based support where they already spend time. These spaces shift from access points to nurturing environments where purpose and contribution flourish.

Change ripples through communities, one person and one relationship at a time.

Creating Change Together To bring this vision to life, we must acknowledge that the transformation begins with us. It starts with community organizations already entrenched in meaningful work with young people. These organizations can be supported to mainstream a mental health lens, infusing their efforts with a deeper understanding of the psychological well-being of those they serve.

Moreover, there’s a pressing need to develop new spaces where none currently exist.

These spaces can serve as entry points, allowing young individuals to access the support they require without barriers. Imagine a community center within Huruma where a young person, along with her peers, can engage in activities that empower them mentally, emotionally, and socially.

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Transitioning from the clinic-centric approach to one grounded in community mental health professionals is essential.

These professionals can bridge the gap between clinical expertise and community dynamics. By embedding themselves within the community, they gain a comprehensive understanding of its unique challenges, facilitating tailored and impactful interventions.

However, such a paradigm shift requires systemic change on a larger scale. The very structures that currently hinder young people from receiving holistic mental health support must be dismantled. This necessitates policy changes, increased investment, and a concerted effort to reshape perceptions around mental health.

Reimagining Mental Health, Today Reimagining mental health for marginalized youth isn’t a distant dream; it’s a call to action. It urges us to challenge existing systems, advocate for community-based initiatives, support organizations uplifting youth, and champion policy changes prioritizing mental health in marginalized communities. Together, we can transform spaces like Huruma into thriving ecosystems of growth and resilience.

Be part of this movement. Illuminate the path to change through collective effort and commitment. By embracing this vision, we transcend clinical limitations and band-aid solutions, creating spaces where every young person can thrive, contribute, and shape a brighter future—one community, one relationship at a time. ***** About the author: Yvonne Ochieng is Co-Founder and former Executive Director of Nzumari Africa, a community organization supporting youth well-being in informal settlements in Nairobi, Kenya. She is currently doing her PhD in clinical psychology at Duke University.

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Photo by Gavin Allanwood via Unsplash.

Confronting The Crisis of Meaning

By Kianna Mahony

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eptember is National Suicide Prevention Month, and although public awareness heightens this time of the year, preventative measures must be a lifelong endeavor.

Showcasing stories that enliven individuals’ day-to-day lives through movies is an accessible resource that can address the current mental health crisis of meaning.

Winner of 2023’s Academy Award for Best Picture, Everything Everywhere All at Once, draws attention to the crisis of meaning—defined as a growing existential state where people are “judg[ing] their lives as frustratingly empty and pointless” by clinical psychologist Dr. Bernadette Vötter. The physical manifestation of despair is evident: the most recent U.S. statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) identifies over 140,000 deaths from excessive alcohol use in 2019, 91,799 deaths from drug overdoses in 2020, and 48,183 deaths from suicide in 2021. Together, the CDC refers to these three causes of mortality as “deaths of despair,” and their rates are increasing.

The despair tightening its grip on society needs to be addressed by tackling the crisis of meaning problem. The movie Everything Everywhere All at Once confronts this crisis in two significant ways.

Firstly, the movie provides an example of characters making peace with the crisis of meaning and, secondly, it invites viewers to reflect on their own engagement with spirituality and religion as a means of resisting despair.

In the film, Evelyn Wang, a Chinese American immigrant, experiences what her life could have been if she had decided to stay in China instead of moving to America.

Evelyn’s despair is revealed in flashbacks of marital problems and fights with her daughter Joy, exacerbated by her mundane reality of doing laundry and taxes.

Evelyn’s journey into the multiverse is filled with explorations on the nature of life and the universe in the infinite possibilities she can access. The more time that Evelyn spends in the multiverse, the more

CDC IDENTIFIES OVER 140,000 DEATHS FROM EXCESSIVE ALCOHOL USE IN 2019, 91,799 DEATHS FROM DRUG OVERDOSES IN 2020, AND 48,183 DEATHS FROM SUICIDE IN 2021. TOGETHER, THESE THREE CAUSES OF MORTALITY AS “DEATHS OF DESPAIR.” she realizes that if everything is possible then no underlying meaning of life and the universe exists. Though nihilistic, this deduction is an example of spiritual and religious engagement because Evelyn is thinking deeply about her place in life and the universe. But rather than succumbing to the despair that typically comes with nihilism, Evelyn chooses to “cherish these few specks of time” that do make sense within a life and universe that decidedly does not make sense. By doing so, her struggles, triumphs, and transcendence of existential questions shift Evelyn’s mindset from despair to joy. Evelyn’s mental growth was due to making peace with her crisis of meaning problem which gives the audience hope that despair is avoidable.

Everything Everywhere All at Once also offers the audience a call to action in the form of motivating introspection regarding how spirituality and religion are embedded in everyday life. Through the identification of spiritual and religious forms, the audience can recognize that these forms may resist despair by animating individuals’ lives without necessarily being part of religious institutions.

In the beginning, a “lucky cat” figurine, derived from Japanese religious folklore, invites us into Evelyn’s spiritual world.

WELLBEING FORUM | 45

STORIES, PROVERBIAL WISDOM, TRANSCENDENT SANCTUARIES, AND BELIEFS DEMONSTRATE THAT SPIRITUAL AND RELIGIOUS ENGAGEMENT IN DAILY LIFE CAN BE THEISTIC, NONTHEISTIC, AND EVERYTHING IN BETWEEN. Legends from the Edo Period (1603-1868) hold that the cat of a local abbot, Maneki Neko, saved a regional ruler f rom a lightning bolt. The ruler made Maneki Neko a patron of the empire, and people have been praying to lucky cat figurines for good fortune ever since. Additionally, the analogy between her mind and the leaking clay pot in Evelyn’s multiverse journey references wisdom f rom the Hindu Scripture Srimad Bhagavatam that illustrates the importance of taking care of your mind. Also representing Hinduism (and Buddhism), the ‘third eye’ placement on Evelyn’s forehead is a nod to transcendence after much deliberation. Later in the film, Evelyn is dragged into the eerie matte-white Bagel Sanctuary wearing a Persepolis-inspired brown veil and chador typically worn by Muslim women—representing a location where existential questions can be examined. The rest of the characters in this scene appear in white clerical robes that look like Jewish kittels. Throughout the film, the dichotomous symbolism between the googly eyes and “everything bagel” is an homage to the Yin and is a philosophical concept closely associated with the spiritual and religious traditions of Taoism, Confucianism, and Ch’an (Zen) Buddhism. Looking at the movie with Yin and Yang in mind, the dark can be found in the light of the googly eyes, and the light can be found in the dark of the bagel.

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These instantiations of origin stories, proverbial wisdom, transcendent sanctuaries, and beliefs demonstrate that spiritual and religious engagement in daily life can be theistic, nontheistic, and everything in between. They attest to the ways that people have made and understood meaning in their lives. By identifying spiritual and religious forms present in Everything Everywhere All at Once, viewers can recognize that spirituality and religion are “everywhere all at once” even if we are not looking for them—suggesting that there is a correlation between a person’s degree of spiritual and religious engagement and their mental health.

Arguably, more engagement with existential questions equates to better mental health, while less engagement implies the opposite. This National Suicide Prevention Month, individuals can attempt to resist despair by utilizing movies, and thus opportunities for spiritual and religious engagement, to reflect upon their wellbeing. ***** About the author: Kianna Mahony is a writer for DeeperDive.org, an initiative of KC Social Impact Lab that explores the impact of religion’s presence in entertainment media.

She is a Master of Divinity candidate at Harvard Divinity School, where she is a member of the Religious Literacy and the Professions Initiative.

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Pioneering Patient Wellbeing through AI and Self-Care

Illustration via Adobe Stock.

By Amelle Liazoghli

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remember my busy mornings as a doctor—seeing 30 patients, each with their own health problems. Some had fevers, coughs, and sneezes, while others needed advice about diabetes or recovering after surgery. I felt like an acrobat juggling too many balls, rarely having enough time for detailed explanations. Sometimes, my patients returned to the clinic due to complications that could have been avoided with more time for proper education. But nowadays, with the merging of medical technology, AI, and a growing focus on self-care, the prospect of elevating patient wellbeing is more attainable than ever.

At the core of this transformation is the interdependence of wellbeing and selfcare. Beyond theory, actively managing one’s health leads to better outcomes.

Engaging in self-care—through exercise, diet, stress management, and treatment adherence—not only improves health but also lightens the burden on healthcare systems. This symbiotic relationship underscores self-care’s pivotal role in shaping health outcomes. Ultimately, prioritizing self-care empowers individuals to enhance their wellbeing while positively impacting the broader healthcare landscape.

The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare is a game-changer for bringing together self-care and improving wellbeing by changing how patients get information and look after their health. Health apps that use AI give real-time advice on managing symptoms, taking medications correctly, and making personalized lifestyle changes. This new ability empowers people to keep a close eye on their health, spot potential issues early, and take action to prevent them—all without leaving their homes. AI’s ability to provide information in an easy-to-understand format helps people comprehend their conditions and treatment plans better.

Self-care is about preventing problems, and AI can help a lot with that. AI can use predictive analytics to identify people at risk and help them before chronic condi-

THE RISE OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (AI) IN HEALTHCARE IS A GAMECHANGER FOR BRINGING TOGETHER SELF-CARE AND IMPROVING WELLBEING BY CHANGING HOW PATIENTS GET INFORMATION AND LOOK AFTER THEIR HEALTH. tions develop. By looking at people’s data and behaviors, AI can suggest exercise routines, changes in diet, and ways to manage stress that are tailored to everyone. This approach not only takes some of the load off healthcare facilities but also improves people’s quality of life. It encourages a culture where people take an active role in their health and wellbeing.

A worldwide effort under the umbrella of the “United for Self-Care Coalition” started in 2022, bringing together different groups like academia, NGOs, private sector, and health experts. They all agree that self-care is essential in healthcare planning. This global movement wants self-care to be a part of every health strategy, supported by a resolution from the World Health Organization (WHO).

Indeed, the WHO acknowledges the importance of self-care, yet its full value is often fragmented across policies, lacking systematic and comprehensive integration across all areas. The United for Self-Care Coalition is working towards the systematic incorporation of self-care into policies across the healthcare spectrum, simultaneously covering more than 190 countries.

As efforts move forward, it’s important to also address concerns about AI. Worries about privacy and data security need careful attention, and strong measures like encryption and strict privacy rules can help WELLBEING FORUM | 49

ease these worries. We should remember that AI doesn’t replace human expertise; it adds to it. AI is a tool that helps healthcare professionals make better diagnoses, handle administrative tasks more efficiently, and give personalized advice based on lots of data.

Policymakers, as the ones who shape the future of healthcare, need to understand the value of self-care and how technology can help. AI has the power to make healthcare resources work better and keep health systems strong and sustainable. Thus, healthcare professionals need to know how to use AI effectively. Having access to these technological tools during my time as a doctor could have really helped patients take better care of themselves.

In short, the combination of promoting self-care, using AI, and changing healthcare policies is a unique chance to redefine patient health. The strong link between self-care and better health results is incredibly important, and the growing push to include self-care in healthcare strategies shows how vital it is. With the rise of AI, there’s a real opportunity to boost self-care efforts, empowering patients and preventing health problems.

By clearing up misunderstandings and using AI well, policymakers can guide the transformation of healthcare systems, putting patient health at the center in our increasingly technology-driven world. ***** About the author: Dr. Amelle Liazoghli, a physician with years of practice in primary health and over two decades in the pharmaceutical industry, is the Director of Public Affairs, Science, and Sustainability at Bayer Consumer Health.

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Chennai, India. Photo by Matthew Thanuj via Unsplash.

The Future of Funding to Support Mental Health and Wellbeing

By Shweta Rawat

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W EL L B EI N G F O RU M I OC TOBER 2023

he global funding community is at an inflection point when it comes to supporting mental health and wellbeing. Efforts to reduce the stigma around mental health issues have gained traction, shifting society’s views on mental health and what wellbeing should mean to everyone, universally. The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated this change, as mental health and wellbeing came further into focus. These shifts have encouraged more funders to enter the space, which has boosted funding as we seek to address one of the defining challenges of our generation.

While these are welcome developments, they are not enough—even with the recent influx of resources, deeply rooted inequities and injustices persist within and between countries. At the same time, philanthropy is often criticized for being top-down, undemocratic, and out-of-touch with the voices and needs of communities. Over more than a decade of work on health focused initiatives in India, the Rural India Supporting Trust has learned key lessons about how funders can meaningfully and ethically support our partners toward transformative change.

It is crucial for funding organizations to understand the impact that either their financial support or direct program implementation is having. In order to be effective at this, we must also be open to examining the processes we undertake to ensure maximum positive impact with minimum intrusion and discomfort to the communities we aim to assist.

Grantee, Community Leadership The most impactful mental health and wellbeing programs are the ones that listen to community members as they express their priorities and needs. Organizations that support such programs need to align themselves with partner organizations (grantees) who understand the local context and can advise on what is desired at

OVER MORE THAN A DECADE OF WORK ON HEALTH FOCUSED INITIATIVES IN INDIA, THE RURAL INDIA SUPPORTING TRUST HAS LEARNED KEY LESSONS ABOUT HOW FUNDERS CAN MEANINGFULLY AND ETHICALLY SUPPORT OUR PARTNERS TOWARD TRANSFORMATIVE CHANGE. the grassroots level, not dictate interventions from the top down. Clear goals with objectives aimed at achieving them are imperative. Understanding theories of change are an important part of creating long lasting and fruitful programming, so finding partners with the capacity to engage and include all facets at the local level is a must.

Iterative Capacity Development It is the responsibility of funding entities to avail resources to their grantees for proper monitoring, evaluation and learning (MEL), not just at the program level but for the organization as a whole. If “we” want sustainable programs that progress in their effectiveness over time, we must also build the capacity of local and partner organizations to understand what works (what doesn’t) and why. With this knowledge, programs can be altered and evolve for consistent improvement. Grantees have different levels of ability when it comes to MEL, so it is in a funder’s best interest to allow for this within their MEL requirements. One size does not fit all in this case. When evaluation is approached as a collaborative, evolving exercise that is key to driving impact, rather than an arduous funder requirement, transformative change can happen.

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AN INITIATIVE IN CHENNAI, SUPPORTED BY A NETWORK OF RESEARCH HUBS, BRINGS TOGETHER THE STRENGTHS OF SCHOOLBASED INTERVENTIONS IN CANADA, IRELAND, KENYA, AND INDIA TOGETHER WITH LOCAL COMMUNITIES’ INSIGHTS. Diversify Metrics Mental health and wellbeing are a very intersectional issue area. Programming can cut across health, education, disability, gender, environment, systemic justice, and other areas. Mental health and wellbeing initiatives can range from more “traditional” psychology-based clinical programs targeting anxiety and depression, to youth-driven initiatives that integrate clinical mental health resources with ancient Indigenous wisdom on spirituality and relationship to the land.

Rather than picking a few quantitative metrics and forcing every grantee to adhere to them, funders have an opportunity to partner with grantees who consider a diverse portfolio of metrics. This may create a situation where there is the development of new metrics that mix quantitative and qualitative data where appropriate.

Collective Impact It is important for funders to think of impact not just at the level of a single standalone project, but also collectively. Too often, we miss opportunities to connect and weave together amazing community-led or -driven work done by separate grantees. I have seen impactful mental health 54 | D IPLOM AT I C CO URIE R

and wellbeing work in India influenced by innovations and approaches from many different countries in the Global South and North, and vice versa. One example is an initiative in Chennai that, supported by a network of research hubs, brings together the strengths of school-based interventions in places including Canada, Ireland, Kenya, and India together with local communities’ insights. We have an opportunity to learn from networks of impact, where the efforts of multiple locally-led and driven groups across different cultures and contexts can add up to a whole greater than the sum of its parts. By taking a collective impact lens, funders can support significant impacts in the short-term while also contributing to a stronger and better-connected mental health and wellbeing ecosystem.

Taking a more progressive approach to conceptualizing and evaluating impact, and supporting grantees in this domain, is just one change area of many that are necessary for a more effective and just funding system. Funders open to learning, adapting and innovating are key to ushering in the future of funding to support mental health and wellbeing initiatives. ***** About the author: Shweta Rawat has led the development of Rural India Supporting Trust (RIST) to provide over $150 million of funding in support of people’s wellbeing in 19 states across India.

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Imagining a City Built for the Wellbeing of Young People

Street Scene in Cairo, Egypt. Photo by Simon Berger via Adobe Stock.

By Mark Tomlinson

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W EL L B EI N G F O RU M I OC TOBER 2023

n the popular imagination, population growth and urbanization go hand in hand. As populations increase, people move into cities. To a marked degree this has been true. The global urban population in 1950 was a mere 0.75 billion, rising to 4.22 billion in 2018. The scale of urbanization has shaped landscapes and lives, making it the “seminal demographic shift” of our times, and unprecedented in human history. Current projections are that close to 70% of the world’s population will live in urban areas by 2050.

In countries in Asia and particularly Africa much of the rapid urbanization taking place is unplanned, resulting in informal settlements, or slums, in popular nomenclature. From now until 2050, one million new people will be added to our cities.

Every week. South Asia is ahead of Africa in terms of urbanization, with more than half the population now living in urban areas, but even in Africa 43% already live in towns and cities. By 2050, African cities are expected to be home to an additional 950 million people. This urbanization will inevitably lead to young people experiencing increased exposure to toxic water, air and noise pollution, overcrowding, increased water scarcity, lack of clean and protected play and sporting venues, alongside linked changes in social services and political economies. And in the background, looming over all of us, is climate breakdown, and the inevitability of large-scale disruption exacerbating many of these urban risks.

Confronting Biases About Cities It would not be hyperbolic to claim that for most people, when they think of cities, they see them as toxic. It is rare to read about a ‘crime ridden’ rural village.

Even more rare to hear about the uptick in children suffering from pollution induced asthma in a remote desert oasis.

There is little question of course, that rapid and unplanned urbanization (exponential expansion of informal settlements) exacerbates risks. But is this the whole story?

Of course, there are problems. But for so many, our views about cities often appear

ONE OF THE IRONIES OF LIVING IN A CITY IS THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE WHO DESCRIBE FEELINGS OF ALIENATION AND LONELINESS. IS IT THAT FEELING ALONE AMONGST SO MANY OTHER PEOPLE THAT MAKES LONELINESS WORSE? to be tainted by a nostalgic (occasionally archetypal) memory of idealized village and country life. What might happen if we looked at cities in new ways? Can we imagine a different type of city?

Adopting an alternative forces us to concede the extent to which throughout history cities have been the foremost site of innovation and engine of wealth creation.

In 2017 the theoretical physicist Geoffrey West published “Scale: The Universal Laws of Growth, Innovation, Sustainability, and the Pace of Life in Organisms, Cities, Economies, and Companies.” In this monumental work he took the well-known fact from biology that when organisms scale (mouse to elephant) they do so with remarkable consistency—an increase in size requires a proportional increase in the energy needed to survive. But the most important part here is that size increase relative to the energy need is not proportional. A quadrupling in size only requires a tripling in energy use. The larger an organism becomes the less energy they need—in other words, they enjoy an economy of scale. Remarkably, the same holds true for cities as they double and quadruple in size. From a sustainability perspective, cities use less energy, per capita, than small towns.

According to West “cities create problems as they grow, but they create solutions to those problems even faster.”

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IF WE ARE TO SUCCEED IN THIS, CITIES ARE GOING TO BE CENTRAL—AND BUILDING A CITY DESIGNED FOR THE WELLBEING OF YOUNG PEOPLE WOULD BE A REVOLUTIONARY ACHIEVEMENT FOR US ALL. One of the ironies of living in a city is the number of people who describe feelings of alienation and loneliness. Is it that feeling alone amongst so many other people that makes loneliness worse? How could it be, that in a place with so many potential social connections, people feel disconnected, and increasingly feel that they know no one that they could turn to in a crisis. Without a feeling of connection, we are likely to feel that we do not belong and perhaps that we do not matter. A sense of belonging is foundational to our wellbeing and to thriving. Might it be possible to imagine cities as possible places of heightened social connectedness, where a deep sense of community has the potential to provide an even deeper sense of belonging?

In October 2019, a group of young people in Nairobi with lived experience, together with young mental health advocates, marched through Nairobi advocating for accessible, affordable and youth friendly mental health care. They also insisted on the importance of creating safe spaces at the community level for youth to gather.

The march drew the attention of the County Government as well as other mental health stakeholders. As a direct consequence, the national government set up a taskforce. The youth leaders made key contributions to the task force, resulting in a National Mental Health Action Plan 2021-2025. This is connectedness, collective 58 | D IPLOM AT I C COU RIE R

action, and the active creation of a sense of belonging and mattering that cities can play a role in manifesting.

We are in the midst of what many have described as a polycrisis—“an interconnected web of near simultaneous adversities manifesting interdependently in a globalized world”. Might cities, with their economies of scale, offer a model for a different way of engaging with one another and for organizing ourselves, one based on care, and a deep acknowledgement of our interconnectedness, and how our individual wellbeing is intimately linked to the wellbeing of all other people? If we are to succeed in this, cities are going to be central—and building a city designed for the wellbeing of young people would be a revolutionary achievement for us all. ***** About the author: Mark Tomlinson is Co-Director of the Institute for Life Course Health Research at Stellenbosch University and Professor of Maternal and Child Health at Queens University, Belfast. He is on the Editorial Board of PLOS Medicine, and an Associate Editor of Adversity and Resilience Science as well as the Infant Mental Health Journal.

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A Wellbeing Agenda for Poor Students

Photo by Charu Chaturvedi via Unsplash.

By Biniam Bedasso and Susannah Hares

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here is growing concern that children in developing countries are not learning enough in school. Even before pandemicrelated school closures, 57% of ten-year-olds in low- and middle-income countries were unable to read and understand a simple text—the definition of “learning poverty.” The COVID-19 crisis has only exacerbated the situation, leading large donors and global institutions to launch a program aimed at improving foundational skills.

But if well-intentioned efforts to tackle learning poverty do not account for the complex and interrelated challenges that prevent children in poor countries from achieving academic success, they risk reproducing existing inequalities in educational outcomes.

For the more than one billion children worldwide who live in multidimensional poverty—lacking access to adequate nutrition, health care, safety, and sanitation—the barriers to learning extend far beyond the school gates. They may suffer from the psychological stresses of poverty or be hungry at school, both of which impede learning. Perhaps violence threatens them inside or outside the classroom, or they are at risk of being married off young and dropping out of school. Over reliance on technical solutions designed to address the proximate causes of learning poverty from the supply side could leave many of these children behind.

Policymakers in low- and middle-income countries and aid organizations tend to decouple education policy from the underlying issues of poverty and social vulnerability. This can partly be attributed to the fact that the Washington Consensus advocated small government in developing countries, limiting their ability to implement broad-based social policies in conjunction with expanding schooling.

The advent of New Public Management reforms, which emphasized quantifiable performance based on narrowly defined organizational objectives, also likely dis-

FOR THE MORE THAN ONE BILLION CHILDREN WORLDWIDE WHO LIVE IN MULTIDIMENSIONAL POVERTY— LACKING ACCESS TO ADEQUATE NUTRITION, HEALTH CARE, SAFETY, AND SANITATION—THE BARRIERS TO LEARNING EXTEND FAR BEYOND THE SCHOOL GATES. couraged education ministries from addressing well-being more broadly or encouraging intersectoral collaboration.

As for donors, their laser focus on chan neling resources to cost-effective projects with specif ic and measurable outcomes has seemingly diverted attention f rom more complex problems that extend beyond the classroom. An overview of the education strategies of major multilateral and bilateral aid organizations shows that their inclusion and well-being agendas are too often limited to girls’ education and children in f ragile states or marginalized regions, leaving other forms of deprivation unaddressed.

Consider, for example, school meals, an area where education policies and antipoverty measures intersect. Since the start of the pandemic, lower-middleincome countries have expanded their school-meal programs by an average of 12%—three times higher than their wealthier counterparts. This contrasts sharply with the 4% contraction, on average, in school-meal coverage in low-income countries, which usually have the neediest children but lack the fiscal space to expand meal programs.

WELLBEING FORUM | 61

THE PREVAILING VIEW IN UGANDA, A LOWINCOME COUNTRY WHERE THE PROVISION OF SCHOOL MEALS IS PATCHY, IS THAT THE GOVERNMENT HAS ONLY A NARROW ROLE TO PLAY IN EDUCATION—A VIEW ENSHRINED IN THE COUNTRY’S LEGISLATION. The prevailing view in Uganda, a lowincome country where the provision of school meals is patchy, is that the government has only a narrow role to play in education—a view enshrined in the country’s legislation. As Joyce Moriku Kaducu, the minister of state for primary education, puts it, “Education is a shared responsibility.

The government and parents have different roles to play. The government ensures that there is a conducive environment for learning by providing infrastructure, teachers, and learning materials. Parents have the core responsibility of sending learners to school, ensuring the learner is appropriately dressed, and that the learner is well fed, even at school.”

This narrow view of the state’s role in education prevails among donors and policymakers and has been ingrained by the neoliberal notion of minimal government intervention.

The tendency to draw an artificial boundary between a child’s education and overall well-being is also evident in the “smart buys” report. Produced by a panel of high-profile international experts and sponsored by many of the largest donors in global education, the report classifies school meals as an “effective, but…rela62 | D I PLOM AT I C COU RIE R

tively expensive” way to deliver learning outcomes. In the panel’s view, “education systems face budget constraints, and they need to allocate scarce resources toward whatever interventions will deliver the most learning gains for the most children and youth on a given budget.”

In fact, providing school meals—a form of transfer to households—is less of an economic cost to society than a direct fiscal cost to governments. Moreover, spending on programs with multi-sectoral benefits does not necessarily have to be constrained by the education budget.

By the same token, some donors are fixated on the false dichotomy between intervention in early childhood and during school attendance. The United Kingdom’s Foreign, Commonwealth, and Development Office, for example, notes that feeding children before the age of two is more effective than feeding school-age children.

Apart from the moral issue at stake, it is unclear how allowing school-age children to go hungry can be cost-effective from an educational perspective. When examining the evidence, it makes little sense to separate the educational, nutritional, and safety-net benefits of school meals for children and their families.

Breaking through such conceptual silos in governments and donor bureaucracies could be the first step toward adopting a much more holistic approach to education policy and resource allocation. More fundamentally, better learning outcomes require greater comprehension of the realities of school life for poor children. Like all children, they will learn best when they are free from hunger, illness, and violence. ***** About the author: Biniam Bedasso is a senior research associate at the Center for Global Development.

Susannah Hares is Director of the global-education program at the Center for Global Development.

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