The financial crisis unleashed in September 2008 demands deep reflection and a change of attitude from everyone. It contains a deeper crisis affecting our model for civilization. What is desired: a world of consumers or a world of citizens? Governments took action when faced with the fluctuations in the market. The invisible hand was amputated by facts. The chaotic uncontrolled economy required the regulatory action of governments. The market, left on its own, went into a spin, losing sight of ethical values and merely considering monetary values. It was the victim of its own excessive ambition. The crisis today demands paradigms to be changed. What does the strength of the banks mean to us when we are faced with the squalid figure of one billion chronically hungry persons? Why did the G8 governments, early on, designate almost US$1.5 trillion (which have now reached US$18 trillion), towards avoiding the collapse of the capitalist financial system, merely promising (in L’Aquila, but not delivering) US$20 billion to diminish world hunger?
What is required: to save the financial system or to save humanity?
An economy centred on ethical values has the objective, first and foremostl, of reducing social inequality and of caring about the well being of all people. We know that today more than three billion people – almost half of humanity – live below the poverty line and 1.3 billion below the line of abject poverty. The lack of sufficient food kills 23,000 every day. 80% of the world’s wealth is to be found concentrated in the hands of only 20% of the population on the planet.
If this outlook does not alter, humanity walks towards barbarity. Governments should be more concerned with the growth of the HDI (Human Development Index) than with the increase of the GNP (Gross National Product). What is important today is the GNH (Gross National Happiness). Most people do not want to be rich, they want to be happy.
The crisis makes us ponder: what plan for society will we bequeath to future generations? What is the use of so many scientific and technological advances if the population is lacking in accessible and efficient health services, free quality education, good public transport, basic sanitation, decent housing and the right to leisure.
A system which places personal profit before community rights, speculation before production and access to credit without the backing of savings is neither ethical nor human. A system which creates islands of opulence surrounded by poverty on all sides is not ethical.
Ethics for a post-crisis world are based on the common good above individual ambition, on the right of the State to regulate the economy and assure basic services to the whole population and on the pursuit of enduring, spiritual gains above the consumption of transitory, material goods.
Ethics for a new project for civilisation include preserving the environment through sustainable development, encouraging networks of solidary economy and fair trade, strengthening organised civil society and regulating the actions within the public administration.
Old Aristotle used to teach that the greatest good we all seek – even when practising evil – is not to be found for sale in the market: happiness itself. Now, since the market is not capable of transforming this good into a saleable product, it tries to convince us that happiness can be obtained through a variety of pleasures. This is an illusion which provokes frustration and enlarges the contingent of spiritual failures who are hostages to anti depressive medicines and drugs offered by the narcotics trade.
The worst thing about a crisis is not to learn any lessons from it and, in an effort to alleviate its effects, not to bother to eliminate its causes. Perhaps religions have no solutions which will help us find new values for the post-crisis world. But certainly the spiritual tradition of humanity has much to offer, for it is spirituality that helps people look at themselves and measure themselves but those who lack it become blind and bogged down. Human beings thirst for the Absolute.
I often warn shopkeepers who approach wanting me to enter their shops: “I am simply taking a Socratic walk”. When they look surprised I explain: “Socrates, the Greek philosopher, also liked to rest his mind by walking around the commercial centre of Athens. When a salesman like you approached him he would say: ‘I am only observing the large number of things that are available which I do not need in order to be happy’”.
PS: This text was written responding to a request by the 2010 World Economic Forum in Davos.
*Frei Betto is a writer, author of “A arte de semear estrelas” (The Art of Sowing Stars) (Rocco).
Copyright 2010 by Frei Betto - Without prior authorization, the reproduction of this article is forbidden by either electronic or printed means. Contact: MHP – Literary Agents (E-mail: mhpal@terra.com.br )
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
He is a Brazilian Dominican with an international reputation as a liberation theologian.
Within Brazil he is equally famous as a writer, with over 52 books to his name. In 1985 he won Brazil’s most important literary prize, the Jabuti, and was elected Intellectual of the Year by the members of the Brazilian Writers’ Union.
Frei Betto has always been active in Brazilian social movements, and has been an adviser to the Church’s ministry to workers in São Paulo’s industrial belt, to the Church base communities, and to the Landless Rural Workers’ Movement (MST).
In 2003-2004, he was Special Adviser to President Lula and Coordinator of Social Mobilisation for the Brazilian Government’s Zero Hunger programme.
Helen Hughes (translator)
E-mail: helen@loanda.plus.com