|
GLOBAL
DISPARITIES
(Published in The Statesman in
two parts, March 1 & 2, 2002, Kolkata)
Fr. Felix Raj, SJ
“The earth is one, but the world is divided”
History is moving fast and we are in the third millennium. Man,
in his quest for progress, wants to change the past and become
master of the future. The world is going through a rapid and
significant socio-economic, political, cultural and
technological transformation. The IT revolution has unleashed
waves of change. The process of transformation does not occur
simultaneously or at a uniform pace and pattern in all countries
and regions of the world. While it opens up immense
opportunities, it also poses new threats to human life, freedom
and security. There are discrepancies, which have differentiated
the countries and created an unequal situation.
The world has become a
global village with instant and efficient communication
facilities. This has made the socio-economic realities and
cultural backgrounds of one nation or one people transparent to
others. The phenomenon of the awareness of differences and
disparities among countries and communities characterizes our
period. People in general are aware of this reality of
transformation, and of its economic and political causes, and of
its consequences in terms of relationships, which influence to
determine approaches and conditions.
People of one country are examining their environment and living
conditions and comparing them to that of others. Such
comparisons necessarily create expectations. But while some are
caught up in the wheel of these limited expectations, others go
beyond them and see the process of transformation as an answer
to their fundamental aspirations – liberty, dignity, equality,
economic welfare and social upliftment. Or at least they would
like the process to be moving toward these goals. They know that
the achievement of these aspirations should be the purpose of
all social organizations and social activities. The achievements
of people are cumulative; their effects and the collective
experiences of successive generations open new perspectives and
allow for greater achievements in the years to come. If these
achievements are positive and constructive, the society will
march forward on the road to progress.
In the evolution of the world economy, there are some countries
less favored. In these poor or “developing” countries, the vast
majority of people live in inhuman conditions. They feel
ostracized from the world community. They are also the losers in
the battle for survival. According to the UNDP Human Development
Report, the gap between the incomes of the richest countries and
the poorest countries was about 3 to 1 in 1920, 35 to 1 in 1950,
45 to 1 in 1975, 75 to 1 in 1992 and it is almost 100 to 1 now.
Global inequalities in income have increased alarmingly in the
last hundred years. More than 30,000 children die everyday from
preventable diseases. Some 90 million children are excluded from
primary education. About 790 m people are hungry and 1.2 billion
live on less than one dollar a day.
With the foreign debt and the iron rules of the world market
against them, the noose around their neck is threatening to
strangle these poor countries. Globalization and liberalization
are, it is said, the rich nations’ 21st century
strategies to oppress the third world. They confirm the
explanation that these inequalities are caused by a type of
relationship, which often has been imposed upon them. The poor
countries are convinced that the present status of the rich
countries is the outcome of injustice and coercion. Their level
of expectations, though somewhat indistinct, goes far beyond a
mere imitation of the rich countries. They are attempting to
overcome material poverty and misery in order to achieve a more
just and human society. But their internal diversity and
heterogeneity, and the presence of external determinants
contribute to the rise of different needs in different groups
causing a dynamics of conflictual action.
The term development
is not new. Much is written and said about it in recent times.
But its current usage in the social sciences is new. It has
become the keyword in the contemporary discussions on human
conditions. It seems to respond to the issues and problems,
which have emerged recently, and somewhat, synthesize the
contemporary aspirations of people for more just and human
living conditions. For some economists, the origin of the term,
development is, in a sense negative. They consider it to
have appeared in opposition to the term underdevelopment,
which expresses the misery and anguish of the poor countries
compared to the rich or developed countries. They advocate that
the dynamics of world economies leads to the creation of greater
income and wealth for a few and greater poverty and misery for
many.
Development, in recent years, has been synonymous with
modernization and reformism. Development strategies promoted by
international organizations have been closely linked to
governments and groups, domestic and foreign, which control
world economy. The rich countries projected themselves as models
of development and their approached did not attack the root
causes of misery and hunger. Their models have been timid and
really ineffective in achieving the desired transformation.
Great care has been exercised to protect their vested interests.
Many economists believe that the underdevelopment of the
“developing” countries is only the by-product of the development
of “developed” countries. It is the consequence of their total
dependence on rich countries. The earth is one, but the world is
divided on different grounds: rich versus poor, advanced versus
backward, modern versus traditional, developed versus
underdeveloped and south versus north. It is also divided into
three major blocks on the basis of development: First world
(Western Europe, USA and the Pacific- the capitalist), second
world (the Eastern Europe – the socialist) and third world
(Latin America and the Caribbean, Africa, the Middle East, and
Asia except Japan – the underdeveloped).
The concept of
development has no precise definition; there are a variety
of ways to regard it. The historical view of development,
following the process of changes in England, is simple. It
consists in increased wealth or a higher level of living. The
non-economic indicators of development were not given much
importance. As a result, developing countries did not perform
the way the economists predicted. The benefits of growth
remained confined to a small section of population. Those who
champion this view are few in number and the usage of this view
is also subtle and limited. The term became the object of severe
criticism due to the deficiencies of the development policies
proposed to the poor countries to lead them out of their
underdevelopment and also to the lack of concrete achievements
of the respective governments. The deficiencies of the
historical understanding have led to other views and their
elaborations.
Development can be seen as
purely economic, and in that sense it would be synonymous with
economic growth. But there is a fundamental distinction
between them. Economic growth refers to a rise in GNP or
per capita income and product. If the production of goods and
services in a country rises, by whatever means, one can speak of
that rise as “economic growth”. Economic development
implies more.
For example, what has been
happening in South Korea since 1960 is fundamentally different
from what has been happening in Libya as a result of the
discovery of petroleum. Both countries experienced a large rise
in per capita income, but in Libya this rise was due to foreign
corporations who produced the product. The people of Libya had
very little to do with producing that income. The effect of
petroleum development has been as if a rich country gave Libya
large amounts of grant in aid. Libya’s experience is not usually
described as economic development. Economic development, in
addition to a rise in per capita income implies fundamental
changes in the structure of the economy.
The work of Joseph A. Schumpeter throws light on long-term
development process. He studied the “ Circular Flow” of
capitalist economy that suffered from structural stagnation, and
suggested “ Innovation” as a measure to break the capitalist
equilibrium. Innovations are techno-economic and simultaneously
socio-political, hence they help to overcome the prevailing
system. Schumpeter calls this process “ Entwicklung”, which is
translated as “development”.
Australian economist Colin Clark’s contribution affirms that the
aim of economic activity is not wealth, but well-being of
people. He proposes to measure well-being by making comparisons
between the performances of different countries by various
indicators. He shows that the highest levels of well-being are
found in the industrialized countries and concludes that
industrialization is the road to progress.
The Bandung Conference of 1955 played an important role in the
evolution of the term, development. A large number of countries
that met there, especially African and Asian recognized their
common membership in a third world – deepening poverty and
marginalization, and facing the two developed worlds. The third
world countries unanimously proclaimed their unacceptability of
underdevelopment. It was their feeling that the real development
of the Third world countries will come only from the liberation
from the domination of the First and second worlds. Only a
radical break from the existing system of private ownership and
concentration of power in a few hands and nations would usher in
the change to a new social order.
An important element in development is that the people of the
country must be major participants in the process that bring
about changes in structures. Participation in the process of
development implies participation in the enjoyment of the
benefits of the development as well as the production of those
benefits. Different UN resolutions show that there are three
basic ways to view people’s participation in development:
people’s contribution to development efforts; collective
decision-making and sharing of the fruits of development. If
growth benefits only a small, wealthy minority, whether domestic
or foreign, it is not development.
In this context, Amartya Sen explains, “ millions of people
living in rich and poor countries are still unfree; they are
denied elementary freedom and remain imprisoned in one way or
another by economic poverty, social deprivation, political
tyranny or cultural authoritarianism. The main purpose of
development is to “remove the sources of unfreedom and to expand
the real freedoms that people enjoy”.
Sen weaves his recent thoughts on economic development, social
justice and human rights into a coherent vision of a better
world. “ Values, institutions, development and freedom are all
closely interrelated”. He links them together into an analytical
framework to address the social basis of people’s well-being.
He shows that the quality of our lives should be measured not by
our wealth, but by our freedom. “ Economic development is in its
nature an increase of freedom.
Another important and frequently used view defines development
as a total social process, which includes social, economic,
political and cultural aspects of life. It stresses the
interdependence of the different factors and allows a country to
advance both totally and harmoniously, and to avoid dangerous
setbacks. Development in one area implies development in all of
them and vice versa. As Huntington has identified, development
processes are complex and multidimensional, and involve a series
of cognitive, behavioral and institutional modifications and
restructuring; they are systematic, revolutionary in nature,
global, harmonious, irreversible and progressive”.
According to social scientists concerned with third world
countries, development as a total social process leads to a
constructively critical consideration of 1) the external and
internal factors which affect the economic evolution of a
country, 2) the distributive system of good and services, and 3)
the system of relationships among the agents of its economic
life; and incorporates self-esteem, sustenance, freedom and
well-being. Development in this respect necessarily presupposes
a concern for human values. It implies an ethical dimension. It
is to understand development from a humanistic perspective. This
approach places the notion of development in a wider context –
wholistic historical vision in which human family takes control
of its own destiny.
Francois Perroux has worked consistently along these lines. For
him, development means “ the combinations of mental and social
changes of a people which enables them to increase, cumulatively
and permanently, their total real production”. Going further, he
says, “ Development is achieved fully in the measure that, by
reciprocity of services, it prepares the way for reciprocity of
consciousness”. The issue of development considered in this
sense is nothing but liberation. Development, in other words, is
rethought in terms of liberation. It finds its right place in
the universal, profound and radical perspective of liberation.
It is only within this framework that development finds its true
meaning and possibilities of accomplishing something worthwhile.
Today to speak about liberation and its process is more
appropriate and richer in human context. Liberation in the first
place expresses the aspirations of oppressed nations and people
at odds with wealthy nations and bourgeois classes. Secondly,
the liberation process can be applied to understand history in
which man becomes totally responsible for his own destiny and
creates a new society.
We speak of liberation not
only from exterior pressures, which prevent man’s fulfillment as
a member of the human family – region, country and society, but
also from within, from interior bondage – liberation on a social
plane and simultaneously liberation on a personal or
psychological level. The personal liberation is a prerequisite
for social liberation. The process of achieving liberation is
not without a struggle. It is a never ending, continuous human
struggle against all forces that oppress man and society. It is
a process already begun, and we have to continue it. “Freedom, O
freedom, Where are thy charms”, is the cry of every soul.
TOP |
