Introduction
A few of us are actively engaged in assisting people across
national boundaries. Some of us see this
as a justice issue – it is simply unfair that a few of us have most of the
world’s resources and wealth. Our nation as a whole feels some need to help
other countries attain democracy and free markets. We think of it as a defensive measure, to
eliminate areas where terrorism might be fostered. My personal interest
combines these two approaches. As the
great Canadian sage Red Green has it, “We are all in this together”. Every evil
or limitation that restricts the opportunities for growth and development of
anyone on the planet, ultimately affects my well being. Every crime perpetrated
on another person eventually damages my freedom and growth. To my mind, the
impact is worst where the problem is greatest. Some child, growing up now in
poorest Africa, has the potential to create some amazing thing in human
history, and they may never even survive – let alone go to school, and learn to
read and write. Poverty and political instability create a whole new generation
of rebels and terrorists in the poorest and worst managed countries on the
globe. I would dedicate considerable more resources to leveling this playing
field – to make the rest of the planet at least as well off as those of us in
the developed countries.
We are all in this together
Consider an example from garment manufacturing. Nicaragua and
many other countries have free trade zones to attract businesses. Companies
located there are tax and duty free. The hope is that they will create jobs and
benefit the local economy. These companies tend to pay modest wages, but
thousands of people line up for the jobs. Levi Strauss built a brand new factory
in Nicaragua, but before it opened, they discovered a less expensive
alternative in a different country. That factory building is standing there vacant.
Virtually all manufacturing is a race to the bottom. The garment workers of Los
Angeles organized and sued the primary retailer that purchased their products, to
make them demand that their contract suppliers pay the legal minimum wage. It took them over 3 years, and a legal
appeal, but they eventually won their case. What happened next? Many of the manufacturers
in town moved their operations elsewhere. In China, companies are moving
manufacturing from the coastal areas further inland, where the salary and
working condition expectations are still modest.
This is not a static industry. It is just a matter of time until someone figures
out how to automate this process entirely, so that a bunch of cotton or a roll
of cloth can be turned into any type of garment with minimal or no human
intervention. And that will be a good thing, even though it means there will be
a great reduction in the available jobs for unskilled labor. It will be a good
thing, because it will actually generate wealth, although the short term impact
on garment manufacturing will be devastating.
I don’t believe there is much of a market for buggy whips these days.
I am persuaded, if left to only free market conditions,
workers will not be paid a living wage anywhere until the last cheap laborer in
China, India and Africa has a living wage. We are all in this together.
Support the Developing World
So, I support those who would help the developing world – it
will benefit all of us in the long run.
But it is a disturbing fact that most of these efforts do not succeed. The
world has literally spent trillions of dollars to end poverty, to encourage
democracy and free markets – all things which enhance human growth and
development – with very little benefit. It is like a large black hole – we pour
money in, and very little comes out. I am persuaded that there are some
fundamental human forces at work which we do not yet understand.
I have had the opportunity to visit some developing
countries – a few of them on several occasions.
I discovered that the basic world view in these places is very different
than my own. A few researchers have found a new insight into these problems.
They have discovered that our culture, our basic view of the world, greatly influences
behavior and thus opportunities for human development – for democracy and free
markets in particular. The problem is, as it is with most human things, this is
a very complicated business. The more I read in this area, the more confused I
get. I am convinced that this is a major breakthrough, but it is very hard for
most of us to grasp it. We need a simplified, short hand way to think about it.
Humans can only retain about 6 things at a time. It’s called “the rule of 6”. (George
Miller, Information and Memory, 1956) It is essential to group and categorize
complex topics so they can be readily shared. This is my attempt at that.
Here is a short hand description of the way different cultures
around the world regard the human role:
1.
We are in
charge of the planet. Typically the West, Northern Europe, and most
especially the US.
2.
No one is
in charge – things just happen. I found this in Africa.
3.
Someone
else is in charge – those in the North, those with money, the government,
the boss, the priest, the church, the deity. My simplistic view of Latin
America.
4.
A grand
conspiracy is in charge, not us – a group of powerful people, a group of
nations, a religious group, or evil itself. People tell me that this is typical
of Arab nations.
(There’s room here for
2 more!)
It is important to understand that this “culture” thing is not
a collection of customs and clothing differences, but a “world view”. It would
be easier to just talk about “world view”, but most of the literature refers to
it as “culture”. It colors everything, and this world view is communicated from
one generation to the next almost unconsciously. We learn how the world works
from every interaction with parents, teachers and peers. The key finding in
recent years is that cultures are not all equal when it comes to human
development. Some elements of a culture are more positive – others negative. This
is not to cast aspersion on an entire culture – just certain elements of it. Again,
stating this as simplistically as possible:
1.
Culture or a world view is a powerful force that
greatly influences how humans think and act.
2.
We understand our culture by the age of 7, and
that world view rarely changes.
3.
A culture develops over centuries, from a wide
variety of sources – geography, climate, religion, leaders, and philosophies. It
does not change easily or quickly.
4.
Some cultural traits are not supportive of human
development in the economic and political realms. These traits must change
before those cultures will be able to support their citizens to reach their
full potential.
5.
And that change is very, very difficult, but not
impossible.
6.
Even cultures that appear to be highly
successful in one realm or other, still harbor serious negative traits that restrict
their continued growth and development. The U.S. is a prime example.
Caveats
That’s a Latin word that means “watch out”. Here are the
problems.
·
Negatives.
This approach says bad things about your culture, and other cultures. In the
multi-ethnic world of the United States, that is considered bad form. We
tolerate and even celebrate all manner of cultural diversity in terms of dress
and speech and belief. But when it comes to fundamental views of how things
work, it is a simple fact that not every feature of a given culture is positive
for human development. Slavery and the subjugation of women were once supported
by major parts of our cultural heritage – religious, economic, and political. We
are still working out all of the implications of that. But they were clearly
not positive elements of our culture.
There are many others that should also be changed.
·
Broad
Brush. Every nation, every culture has individuals within it that are
exceptional, that do not conform to the culture. We call those people
criminals, or reactionaries, or revolutionaries, or visionaries, depending on
their departure from the norm. But some of them are the source of change and
progress. That is normal. This paper takes a broad brush stroke to an entire
region, or people, or nation. That is simplistic, but unavoidable. It is
obvious that there is not one culture even within a single country. And there
are not 6 or even 50 cultural traits. There are thousands. But some
simplification is required to convey the idea that culture has a powerful
impact on development. Every culture has multiple strains, multiple factors. Every
nation has multiple cultures within it. That does not deny the truth of the
impact of culture – it just makes it more complicated, which is part of the
human condition. There is no black and white here, despite our strong biological
desire to simplify things that threaten us.
·
Not
Complete.
None of the ideas in this paper were created by the author. They are all the
results of the work of other people. And nothing about this paper is complete. You
can contribute to it and help improve it. Please take the initiative to do so.
What is Development?
In this context, development includes economic, social,
political structures of our society. My goal would be that every human be able
to achieve the fullest development of their potential. We would all benefit
from that. Human creative capacity is the true engine of development. Where
social and legal structures and values foster creativity, development
flourishes. In the past 300 years we have moved from the belief that wealth is
something you dig from the ground, to the understanding that wealth is created
by ideas. When our nation was founded, most of us grew crops for ourselves and our
neighbors. Now, less than 1% of us can feed our nation, and a major part of the
world. The rest of us create wealth and enhance human freedom through ideas
that we literally create.
It was a revelation to me that development is a really
recent phenomenon. I have always regarded human progress as a kind of evolutionary
path that is inevitable. I thought that, given enough time, all intelligent
societies will “develop”. Not necessarily so! Biological evolution hits dead
ends on a regular basis, and our civilized progress could easily have been one
of those. The basic idea of agriculture was a revolution that spread from the first
area that discovered it. We walked around as intelligent humans for hundreds of
thousands of years without adopting this revolutionary way to obtain food. Writing
was a similar revolution. Prior to the industrial revolution, wealth was always
regarded as something dug from the ground – or that grows in the ground. The
basic idea that humans could create wealth or value with ideas, inventions, was
another revolution. Now we have a world where Apple can create an idea, a
phone, which costs $500 to purchase, is assembled in China with $10 worth of
labor, and Apple’s share for profit and development and support is $250. That
is wealth creation!
Negative Force of Culture
The major finding of recent research is that some parts of a
culture support this creativity, and other cultural traits destroy it. Some
cultural components are negative forces for human development, some are
positive.
Think about this as an evolutionary path for society, or the
path from childhood to maturity. Some social norms support human development better
than others. Those of us who were raised in a multi-cultural environment are
biased to see cultural differences as of equal value. But all cultural traits are
not equally supportive of human
development. Democracy works better than unrestrained dictatorship. Religion is
important, but it should not be a part of government. An unrestrained press is
essential to development. A free market is a better approach to economics than
top down control of an economy. Slavery is not supportive of human development
and innovation. Rigorous control of beliefs and ideas suppresses innovation and
initiative. We all benefit when women have equal opportunities and rights. These
are all cultural factors that affect economic and social development. Those of
us in the developed world have overcome many cultural restraints – not all, for
sure, but many. We have a distance to go. We also have a lot more work to do. It
is important to accept the evidence that some cultural traits simply are not
friendly to development.
Traits of Culture that Impact Development
As stated more than once, this is a simplistic
categorization to enable us to put our brain around this complex idea. There
are thousands of cultural traits. The literature has lists that number 20 and
up. This list is purely an arbitrary grouping, and follows the “rule of six”. Please
feel free to criticize and enhance. These categories are based on those
suggested by the chapter of Culture
Matters written by Daniel Etounga-Manguelle (Chapter 6, p. 65 ff). He is
trying to describe a generic culture that might be found in all parts of sub
Sahara Africa, a formidable task. These categories are not identical to his, but
the idea is similar – how can one simply describe a continent or a world with
hundreds of languages and cultures. These are ordered by importance in terms of
my guess as to their influence on development.
1. Hierarchical world view.
A
hierarchical world view, where all power rests on the top, the strong man, the
leader, the deity, tends to inhibit initiative and creates dependency. Power in
this world view leads to arrogance and corruption, to suppression of dissent,
and control. A stratified society results with no ability to move up or to create
wealth from the bottom.
2. Trust.
Trust
here means interdependence, a sense of the common good, ethics and legal system
founded on this premise. A limited range of trust, or little sense of belonging
to the whole, severely limits development. A trust circle that is limited to
the family does not foster cooperation, or sharing of resources, or the
creation of new resources. Goods are seen as limited – I can only get more if
you have less. Competition is always win / lose. Win / win is not possible.
3. Control over Reality.
Humans
need some sense of a measure of control over uncertainty in order to prosper. A
world view that just accepts things, that sees things as driven by a deity or
fate or magic, will not prosper. To prosper, we need to have a sense that we
can conquer life, not just accept it. Religion, philosophy, or the prevailing
world view all influence this.
4. Sense of time as progress.
A
world view that lives only in the present, or some distant future in another
realm, does not support initiative and the planning necessary for development. The
past tends to dominate, and change is seen as problematic.
5. Community vs. Individual.
A clear understanding that we depend on each other, that “we
are all in this together” supports development. But this sense of community
cannot be such that it suppresses the initiative of the individual. This is not
a hierarchical view of community, where individuals are subservient to the
needs of the group. That is a difficult balance to maintain. It is what we
normally call “the common good”.
6. Hard Work.
Hard work as a cultural value clearly supports development. A
poor regard for hard work, the attitude that it is something to be avoided if
at all possible, tends to retard development. Some cultures see hard work as a
necessary evil that is to be completed as quickly as possible, so that the real
parts of life can continue. A culture open to development sees work as
productive, rewarding, an end in itself.
Historic Causes of Cultural Traits
This is a
fascinating area – why did these traits develop in some parts of the world and
not in others? There is no general consensus on this. Jared Diamond thinks it
has to do with geography, the availability of domesticable animals, and small
grains that fostered the invention of agriculture. Jeffry Sachs agrees with
these, and also adds political and social ideas and philosophies. For my money,
ideas are all the results of the culture, not the causes. There are likely
multiple causes for our cultural diversity – but, again, I dare to simplify to
make a point. These are presented in the order of plausibility, not importance
to development.
1. Climate.
It seems fairly obvious that climate has had a major impact
on the culture of a people. Prosperity generally declines as one moves closer
to the equator. Hard work, planning ahead, and other long term values tend to
thrive better in colder climates. There are two exceptions always cited to
this: Hong Kong and Singapore. But both
of these city states had the benefit of a profound British occupation for many
years prior to their emergence as developed societies. There is no question
that the Chinese culture has many traits supportive of development, if they can
temper some of the overwhelming hierarchical characteristics.
2. Religion / Philosophy.
Virtually all religions began as animistic – an attempt to
explain how things work. Virtually all deliver immense authority and power to
the deity. The prevailing leaders normally utilize this belief system to ensure
themselves authority and stability. It is only after the fracture of this
controlling mindset that real development begins – after the Reformation and
Enlightenment in Europe. Some religious trends, such as Confucianism and
Buddhism do not have this deity problem to contend with, but still support an
authoritarian view of society to maintain order.
3. Strong Man / Hierarchical Genetics.
It is fairly well established that humans have a genetic
propensity to favor a strong leader form of government. Historically, a strong
leader has generally been much more successful. The theory is that this
developed as a result of wars, where those with highly centralized, military
style of leadership tended to prevail. Those individuals who might favor a less
structured view of life simply did not survive. Edmund Wilson is one author who
favors this theory. So we are all prone to a hierarchical view of reality,
although it tends to limit development. Development occurs best when some other
force counters this propensity.
4. Education / literacy.
World views can be strongly affected by ideas, by
philosophies, by literature – but only if a society has the basic education infrastructure.
This is a relatively recent development in Western society. Development could
only jump forward once the philosophical underpinnings for democracy and
capitalism were widely spread among those with education. The skills required
for technological innovation came from the universities of Europe. As education
spread to the common man, the pace of development continued to grow.
5. Resource Constraints.
Parts of the world are less endowed than others with
natural elements such as arable land, rain, types of crops, animals, etc. This
is the primary thesis of Jared Diamond. A culture built around rice growing is
very different than one which pursues cattle on open ranges, or constructs
dikes to hold back the sea.
Traits and Causes - How Does This Work?
This section
is an attempt to apply these “causes” to the “traits” above. It helps me to hold them together in my
mind. If you don’t find it helpful, skip
ahead.
1.
Sense of Time.
A cold
climate tends to produce a different sense of time.
Cold and
inhospitable environments tend to develop cultural traits that are more
supportive of human development in the long run. I look at the Scandinavian
countries as extreme models of a sense of community, or togetherness, and long
range planning. These nations, Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Norway are some of
the coldest, most inhospitable places. The standing joke in Minnesota for why
these folks tended to migrate here, is that they walked across the US until
they found a place almost as rocky and cold as home, and said, “This looks
good”.
In climates
like this, your survival depends on planning ahead, on taking the initiative to
prepare for the cold. In a warmer
climate, the need to anticipate is not as great. Food can generally be obtained
without a great deal of foresight. It may require some cooperation, but on a
pretty limited scale.
2.
Hard Work.
A cold
climate tends to give high value to hard work.
This seems
patently obvious. If you don’t plan ahead, if you don’t dig and build and
construct, you simply do not survive until spring. There may be some physical
or psychological propensity to these things in the people who survived in these
climates, but it is clear that hard work is valued. In a warmer climate, some
food is readily available without a lot of effort. There are still some hunter
/ gatherer tribes in Africa and South America who are doing just fine without
agriculture and the social organization that it demands.
For resource
limitations, in “peasant cultures”, hard work is not valued because it does not
generate wealth. Farming is the only source of wealth, and land is in limited
supply. The point of diminishing returns for farming is reached very rapidly. This
is even more true in societies dependent on crops like rice, where large scale
operations are virtually impossible, even with technology.
3.
Control
Over Reality.
A cold
climate tends to produce a different sense of control over reality.
Of
necessity, you must construct shelters against the cold, and find ways to grow
crops and tend animals that are more creative in colder climates. If you allow
things to just happen to you, you are not around very long. In a warmer
climate, the laid back approach, it will come tomorrow or not, is very
workable. Things happen. I don’t
anticipate them, I don’t prepare for them, I don’t try to thwart them – I just put
up with them and survive.
Religious
beliefs that presume that an all powerful deity manages all affairs tend to
reduce one’s sense of control over reality, and initiative. A strong
hierarchical sense has the same kind of impact until something happens that
breaks that history of control.
4.
Trust /
Ethics.
The
productive culture tends to have a larger circle of trust. It starts with
family, extends to tribe, and then can be extended to any business relationship
– given a supportive ethical and legal environment. The Scandinavian cultures
seem to support a much higher standard of ethics than the rest of us. I would
like to think it came from survival together, but I am unaware of any studies
in that regard.
As to the
role of scarce resources, the typical peasant culture sees others as
competitors for the scarce goods that exist – primarily arable land. The
concept of community welfare is of little benefit. (Who
Prospers, p. 20.)
5.
Community
vs. Individual.
Similarly,
the Scandinavians seem to have a high level of commitment to the common good,
but not one that suppresses individual initiative. They focus individual
efforts on supporting the common good. Where did this come from? Authors point
to the world of Max Weber, The Protestant
Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, as the primary explanation. Somehow,
the early Puritan settlers in America viewed hard work and prosperity as a
moral imperative. Weber pretty much saw these pioneers as turning against the
religious doctrine that all things are somehow provided by a benign deity. He
credits the Reformation with destroying the prior dominant world view of the
Catholic Church, leading to significantly more individual initiative. It could
also be that this happened to coincide with the discovery of the new world, and
the emigration of a whole crowd of risk taking entrepreneurs.
6. Hierarchical World View.
A
hierarchical world view is more dependent on genetics or religion and
philosophy. It is a more efficient way to organize for common defense against
enemies. Those people with this tendency, or who adopted this culture, tended
to survive better than their loosely organized neighbors. There is clearly a
genetic tendency within us to want a hierarchical social structure.
The
Scandinavian nations avoided many of the influences of the Roman and Holy Roman
Empires which gave a divine imperative to the political leadership. They were loosely
organized tribes, who banded together for mutual protection. They have a king,
because they decided they needed one – not because the deity forced it upon
them. This hierarchical perspective from Roman and Catholic culture seems to
have penetrated Italy and Spain, and through Spain, the whole of Latin America.
Background Information
Well, if you have survived this far, I highly recommend that
you continue reading. Hopefully this section will give you more information on
each of the above topics to help with understanding.
The Power of Culture - Stories
Culture or “world view” is much more powerful than a simple
collection of customs or social norms. It is deeper than that. It governs how
we think, how we approach everything. It is enduring, and very difficult to
change. It was formed through centuries
of experience, and it is conveyed from generation to generation in every word,
every act. Our children have a firm grasp of it before the age of 7 or 8, and
that will be their guide for life.
In 2000 my son Tom and I traveled to Tanzania. He was in his
last year of residency, and the hospital wanted him to experience a different
environment prior to his graduation. I happen to have a friend in Tanzania who
runs a flying medical service, and who does things around a hospital in Arusha.
My son thought this would be a very different experience of medicine. It was
different all right. We learned a lot – about medicine, and a whole lot of
other things. We spent a month visiting hospitals, and sitting and talking with
missionaries, and meeting Africans.
The key thing I came away with is: These people are
different! Yes their skin is different, but the way they think about the world
is also different. Americans, people who grew up in the US, tend to think that
humans are in charge of the world. If there’s a problem, we fix it. The
Africans we met did not work that way. They are definitely not in charge of
their world. In their world, things just happen. A couple of simple examples
here might help.
AIDS
They all have had extensive education on AIDS – how
it is transmitted, and its terrible consequences. We would drive by a small
group of people under a tree, with a teacher demonstrating how condoms work,
and why they are important. But, armed with this knowledge, they do NOTHING to
avoid getting AIDS. If it happens, it happens, is how they seem to treat it. About
40% of the people who present themselves to the hospital have AIDS. Their
culture seems to say that things just happen – there is nothing you can do or
should do about it.
No Water
On a more pedestrian scale, we were out in the bush near
Endulen, on the edge of the Serengeti. The town has about 300 people. The sole
water supply comes via a pipe from a hospital about a mile away. The Austrians built
the hospital in the 70s. They put in a generator and a well. They graciously
provide water during the day to the village. One day, the water stopped. It
just stopped. There appeared to be no response to this crisis. We asked the
head of the village, if the water has stopped, what do you do for water? He
says, we walk down to the river – about half a mile – and carry water up. They
have no vehicle, and they carry the containers on their head for that distance.
We asked several other questions, but it was very clear to us that no one was
going to get about fixing the water problem. The water came, it was here, and
now it is not – things happen. All over this part of Africa, you can see
abandoned water works that were put in by the Germans or the British that no
longer work. They appeared; they stopped working – that is how life is.
No Swing
In another anecdote, a Canadian volunteer put up a rope
swing for the students of this small school. They loved it – used it all the time.
One day, someone pushed it hard and it got stuck up in the tree. Each day, they
would come and look at the spot where the swing used to be, and lament, “No
swing”. It was up there 4 months. They all knew where the ladder was, they had
seen the Canadian put it up. they were
perfectly capable of climbing the tree. But it was not theirs, it just happened,
and now it is gone.
They are not in charge of life – life happens to them. As a
western person, it is hard for me to even believe that this is true. I cannot
stop myself from fixing a toilet anywhere on the planet that is leaking! My
head says this is what we do – we fix things.
No King
When I returned from my second trip to Tanzania, I found a
book which helped me understand this a little bit: Culture and Organizations by Geert Hofstede. It is a sociological
study of IBM employees around the world. It describes five major cultural
variances, and ranks them by country. As noted above, cultures are very
complex, but the book explores these five in some detail.
Each chapter includes an anecdote to help illustrate the fundamental
power of this world view perspective. Hoffstede ranked the nations of his study
by the degree of separation that they experience from the top to the bottom of their
society. He calls it the “Power Distance”. When I talk about this with people,
I ask the audience where they think the US falls on this hierarchy. Do we have
a large gap from top to bottom, or a small one? Invariably, they will say that
we have a relatively small one, as compared to places like Africa or India or
most of Asia. We have some sense that we are all equal.
Then I tell them the story in the book which illustrates
this cultural value. This article appeared in the Dutch newspaper NRCC/Handelsblad,
December 23, 1988. (Hoffstede, p. 47)
Stockholm, December 23. The Swedish King Carl Gustav this week
experienced considerable delay while shopping for Christmas presents for his
children, when he wanted to pay by cheque but could not show his cheque card. The
salesperson refused to accept the cheque without legitimation. Only when
helpful bystanders dug in their pockets for one-crown pieces showing the face
of the King, the salesperson decided to accept this for legitimation, not
,however, without testing the cheque thoroughly for authenticity and noting the
name and address of the holder.
I can just see this clerk in the store. “I don’t care if
he’s the king, if he doesn’t have a cheque card he can’t pay with a check.” When
they show her his picture on the coin, I can just hear her say, “Fine. But he has
to write down his phone number!” I doubt that the US President will ever find him or
herself in this predicament. The Scandinavians, as a whole, have a very low
Power Distance. They rank 47th or 48th on a list of 53
countries studied. The US ranks 38th on that list. At the top of the
list, we find Malaysia, Guatemala, Panama, Philippines and Mexico. The point
is, no one taught the citizens of Sweden that the king was not that big a deal.
It is how they all see the world, and how they all react. The king is a servant
of the people. He is one of us, and he does our bidding. I have some theories
as to why they see the king so differently, but the difference is profound. That
view will not change if they emigrate to another country. Their children may change, but they will not.
It is simply part of how they see the world.
Culture matters, and almost nothing else does! That is the
major conclusion of the book cited above.
Culture is formed over centuries. The Scandinavians endured bitter
winters, survived by forming close knit tribes, and all understand that they
depend on each other. When they thought they needed a king, they created one. Those
of us whose culture formed within the Roman Empire, and then the Holy Roman
Empire, somehow got the impression that God or some higher power installed our
fearless leader. Our power distance is much greater.
The Latin American Problem
In the past 10 years, I have visited Nicaragua 10 times. I
have toured the country, learned its history, studied its language, and spent a
few days living in the homes of some friends. My parish has had a relationship
with a community there for 30 years. We have been trying to assist them, without
just doing charity works. We have been facilitating education and community
building, and giving them room to expand and grow. In all those years, we have
been puzzled and confused by some aspects of their culture. I have been looking
for a way to understand what is blocking their potential. They are marvelous
people – I care for them greatly. I
would like to help.
Who Prospers
The book, Who Prospers,
by Lawrence E. Harrison, gives some insight into the problems. It explains how
cultural values shape economic and political success. The author lived for 13
years in Latin America, working as USAID director. His prior work, Underdevelopment is a State of Mind,
examined how the cultures of Latin America had a negative effect on their development.
In the first chapter of Who Prospers,
he has a summary which explains the basic thesis. He cites the work of Mariano
Grondona, an Argentine who studied Argentina’s fall from grace after 1930. He
identified a set of cultural factors that operate very differently in
development-prone and development-resistant societies. This is a quote from p.
18 of those factors. Grondona expanded
this list to 20 in the book Culture
Matters.
·
Religion
explains and justifies success in a development-prone culture. In a
development-resistant culture, religion relieves or explains suffering.
·
Wealth
is created as the product of human
initiative and effort in the favorable culture. Wealth is the natural or
physical resource that exists in the resistant culture, and life is a struggle
to acquire (or redistribute) it.
·
Competition
is viewed in a progress-prone culture as a positive force that promotes excellence
and enriches the society. The resistant culture discourages competition as a
form of aggression that threatens the stability and solidarity of the society,
in part because it nurtures envy.
·
Economic
justice demands saving and investment for the benefit of future generations
in the progressive culture. In the resistant culture, economic justice demands
equitable distribution to the current generation. Obviously relevant is the
time focus of a society (see time focus).
·
Labor is
a moral, social duty and a central form of self-expression and satisfaction in
a favorable culture. In a resistant culture, it is a burden, a necessary evil;
real pleasure and satisfaction are attainable only outside the workplace.
·
Heresy
or dissent, is crucial to progress, reform, and the search for truth in the
favorable culture, which encourages innovation. The heretic is a criminal who
threatens stability and solidarity in the resistant culture.
·
Education nurtures
inquisitiveness and creativity in a favorable culture. In a resistant,
traditional culture, it transmits orthodoxy.
·
Pragmatism,
rationalism, empiricism, and utilitarianism are central values in a
favorable culture, threats to stability, solidarity, and continuity in a
resistant culture. Tradition, emotion, and chance substitute for rationality,
with stagnating consequences.
·
Time Focus
is the manipulable future in the favorable culture. The resistant culture
focuses on the past, and the concept of future is one of destiny, reflecting a
fatalistic world view.
·
The world is
a setting for action and achievement in a favorable culture; one approaches it
with optimism. In the resistant culture, the world is controlled by
irresistible forces (“God or the Devil, multinational companies, or the
international Marxist conspiracy,” Grondona elaborates), one approaches it with
pessimism, if not fear.
·
Life is
“something I will do” in the favorable culture. In the resistant culture, life
is “something that happens to me.”
·
Optimism is
nurtured in the favorable culture. In the resistant culture, survival is the
goal and pessimism the mood.
My sense is that all of these apply in the negative for
Nicaragua, and most Latin countries.
Universal Peasant Culture
Others point to a kind of
“universal peasant culture” that is typical of undeveloped nations, which is
very similar to the typology described by Gondona. It is a zero-sum world view.
Everything of value, resources, money, honor, etc. is in short supply, and can
only be gained at the expense of others. Life is a continual struggle to obtain
these things in competition with others. Anyone who advances is seen as a threat to all.
People avoid leadership roles lest they be held suspect. In this world view,
mutual suspicion limits any attempts at cooperation. (Who
Prospers, p. 19.)
Lawrence E. Harrison after
his 13 years working in Latin America, came up with four key factors of culture
that are essential to foster development:
1. Trust creates a sense of community and
empathy for others. When this trait is strong, human creativity is supported. When
it is lacking, people have a difficult time working together.
2. A rigorous ethical system supports
justice and fairness, allowing people to profit from their creative ventures. A
corrupt system inhibits development.
3. Authority that is exercised
responsibly, and not as a license to steal. An authoritarian culture supports a
hierarchical view of the world, where power and prestige rest only at the top
of the society.
4. Work, innovation, saving and profit –
he lists these traits as a single factor which supports development or hinders
it, depending on how these values are expressed. These are the basic habits
required to generate wealth.
Simplistic Ideal: Cultural Values that Foster Development
As this thing developed, I kept thinking, this is way too
complicated. What we need is something simpler, that people can grasp and keep
in their head, as we try to change our cultures. So here is a proposed set of
“ideal” cultural components that fit within the limitations of our physiology
and emotional baggage, and yet open the doors to development.
- We are
all in this together. Our reality is interdependent. The poverty or hunger
of one affects us all, deprives us of contributions and wealth. Helping our weakest
thrive benefits all of us. We are each other’s insurance for life.
- We are in
charge of this. Things just don’t happen, god is not running the show, the
“others” are not in charge of our reality. We can make a difference, and we can
change the way the world works. We get the government we deserve, and it is our
government – they are not to blame and all goods do not come from them.
- The goal
can be achieved, near term, not in the next life. Poverty is not a blessing
of God, but a curse we are working to eliminate, and here and now, not in
paradise. Liberation Theology got this right.
- Ideas are
our wealth and energy. Wealth does not come from the favor of the powerful,
or from the ground, or crops – it comes from creative ideas that benefit all of
us. We must support and defend dissent, differences of opinion, arguments,
because we derive our wealth from the ideas that they generate. Competition in
products and ideas generates wealth, at the price of some failures that we must
bear.
- Hard work
is rewarded. It is not God’s will, not luck, not a conspiracy, not the
authorities. We can work hard, make a difference, and prosper.
- High ethical
standards are essential. We must be able to trust our institutions and each
other. If that trust is degraded, we all pay an enormous price. This is a
corollary of #1.
- Power
resides in the law, not the people and not the leaders.
A path to the future
Given this pile of problems, what do we do to change it? This
is really the key insight of all of this. All cultural elements are not positive
– some need to change. How does one go about that?
Practical suggestions
Change that affects an entire society actually starts at the
bottom. This is a set of suggestions on how we can initiate that change in the
small groups where we live and work. For example, my parish has been working
with a small community in Nicaragua for 30 years. We are not about projects. The
community in Nicaragua has projects, and that is fine and good. But we are
focused on changing the people, by means of supporting their projects. We want
them to become fully empowered human beings, in charge of their destiny, able
to modify their cultural norms enough to take charge of their lives and move
forward. This is not charity, and it is not justice, if justice means
distributive justice or sharing our wealth with them. This is about empowering
them to change their world. Incidentally, their view of life also changes us. They
have a lot more perspective on some things than most of us.
- Education.Every text talks about education as the
solution. The primary problem here is that the educators also have the
prevailing world view, and find it difficult to step outside of that. How are
they going to educate young people to adopt a different culture?
We could import teachers from developed countries, and have them teach
“culture” to elementary students, not science and math to secondary students. Develop
a curriculum around world views, and expose the students to the many different
ones that exist on the planet. We don’t need to foster one or another – help
them experience them all, and have a more critical eye in that respect.
- International
Exposure.Pick up a generation of young people, and send them elsewhere –
to Scandinavia, to Germany, to Holland, to North America. The problem here is
that they have to be really young to be malleable – 7 or 8 years of age. That
age group cannot normally travel unattended. Secondary students are already
fairly well formed in their world view. It doesn’t hurt them to travel and
experience other cultures – but the benefit is smaller.
Again, this is expensive and problematic. What if we bring these world views to
them, via TV and Sesame Street and similar programs? I am confident that the
Children’s Television Workshop could readily create content that would “teach”
world views, if they once understood its importance. Learning another language
is good – learning another world view is even better.
- Scientific
Criteria. Build a body of research on those cultural qualities that foster
or hinder development. This science has begun, but it is just at the beginning.
If we are going to teach the younger generation, then we need to understand
what to teach them. Otherwise we run the risk of introducing elements that may
hinder rather than foster development.
More?
This section is really slim.
If you have some thoughts along these lines – let me know. We could all use your help and ideas.
Hope For The Future
There is a little gem of a book available online for $3.00, that
talks about what our economic engine might become. Instead of focusing business
making and acquiring things, what if we focused on human well being? We might start
measuring it, we might start funding its growth. Instead of those enterprises which
generate cash, what if we invested in those that generated human well being? The
book is called
Betterness:
Economics for Humans, by Umair Hague. I think the author is a bit optimistic
– but check it out. It’s good to have a bit of hope in this realm.
Book List
These are not alphabetic, but in the order of suggested
reading. They build on one another.
- Hofstede, Geert, Cultures and Organizations. The earliest editions of this work are
better for the purpose of this paper. The later ones add a lot of material, but
the key thing is to understand the power and permanence of culture, or the
“software of the mind”.
- Harrison, Lawrence E , Underdevelopment is a State of Mind, 1985. This is the original work by Harrison
that generated all of the controversy and interest.
- Harrison, Lawrence E., Who Prospers, How Cultural Values Shape Economic and Political Success,
1992 paperback, first published in 1992. This is a book long argument that
culture is the major force in the different development rates of nations around
the world.
- Harrison, Lawrence E., and Huntington, Samuel
P. CULTURE MATTERS: HOW VALUES SHAPEHUMAN PROGRESS – 2000. This is a collection of talks given at a symposium
on the topic. Two of the authors disagree, so it gives an interesting
perspective.
- Harrison, Lawrence E., The Central Liberal Truth: How Politics Can Change a Culture and Save
It from Itself, 2006. This one contains some key ideas for changing
cultures.
- Sen, Amartya, Development as Freedom. This is an excellent evaluation of
developing nations by a Nobel Prize winning Economist. His basic thesis is that
development occurs naturally wherever 5 basic human freedoms are supported by
the society. He does not discuss the cultural perspective – he is focused on
the presence or absence of these freedoms – which, I believe, spring from the
culture.
- Haque, Umair, Betterness: Economics for Humans. A perfect gem of a little book. If
you think Capitalism is broken, and that we need a better approach – this is it.
The author is optimistic that this will become the future path for real profit and
gain – increasing human potential, not just the number of things we have. I hope
he is right.
References
COMMENTS:
I tried posting this as a comment - could not get it to work. SO . . . it is a footnote of sorts.
If you read this far, may the fates bless you, you might be interested in this piece from the BBC.
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20170118-how-east-and-west-think-in-profoundly-different-ways
It has to do with some research on the CAUSE of these mental models. Weather, agriculture, you name it. This has profound effects on all parts of our society, not just our economic development. The GOOD is that we are beginning to understand this. The BAD is that we have no idea what to do with it. It appears, for example, that collective world view is more supportive of basic rights, while individualistic is more creative, entrepreneurial. We need both, clearly. But, because of our "tribal" leanings, we are all generally persuaded by the society around us.
WHAT IF we managed to persuade people to distinguish themselves from the mass and maintain their individual contribution, but still live in a holistic society? Is that even possible? How would one do that? For example, it appears that we are about 10% psychopaths - and that is a GOOD thing. That particular brand of human is very important in certain situations that affect all of human kind. That's why they remain in our gene pool. When they are BAD, they are horrendous. But when they are raised wisely they are an enormous resource.
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/the-neuroscientist-who-discovered-he-was-a-psychopath-180947814/
I am beginning to think that if we could persuade ourselves to teach grade school kids to practice mindfulness for 10 minutes a day, we might be able to get a handle on people choosing one path or the other, instead of just following the crowd.
https://www.amazon.com/Mindful-Nation-Practice-Performance-Recapture/dp/1401939309/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1484851388&sr=8-1&keywords=a+mindful+nation
A More Pessimistic Tone
I am now of the tentative opinion that the culture that gave rise to capitalism, development and democracy was in the works for hundreds of years, and it is NOT common on the planet. I would love to have someone dissuade me of this belief. We may be just spinning our wheels here!
Your thoughts?
