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Religion and the spirit of the age
Hisham Mazhar Qureshi
A few years after the appearance of the Essays of Montaigne, there was published in France a work, which though few are aware of now, that possessed, in the 17th century, a reputation of the highest order. This was the celebrated Treatise on Wisdom, by Charron, in which we find (for the first time) an attempt to construct a system of morals without the aid of theology. In that era of renaissance, myriads of stars appeared on the horizon to enlighten the darkness of ignorance, to inspire the age of reason and to create the awareness of intellectual thinking. They deconstructed myth bound societies living in the haze of clergy based dogmas, superstitious values, norms and traditions.
Later, in the 19th century, Henry Thomas Buckle, a famous English historian, extended the same critical thinking to his masterpiece History of Civilisation in England, Volume II. He stated: “Charron reminds his countrymen that their religion is the accidental result of their birth and education, and that if they had been born in a Mohammadan country, they would have been as firm believers in Mohammadanism as they were in Christianity. If we look a little deeper we will see that each of the great religions is built upon that which preceded it. The religion of the Jews is founded upon that of the Egyptians; Christianity is the result of Judaism, and from these two last, there has naturally sprung Mohammadanism.”
Hence he opposed proselytism and took up philosophic ground by saying that religious opinions, being governed by undeviating laws, owe their variations to variations in their antecedents, and are always, if left to themselves, suited to the existing state of things.
Religion is known as a code of life. It guides people in shaping their ethereal and temporal lives and prepares them for the reward hereinafter of their deeds in this world. The good one does here, the better the reward afterwards. People tend to follow religious rites and practices with the hope of reward in the next world and to be known as ‘pious’ in society.
But when religion is blended with politics it becomes the most powerful exploitative force. The citizens of Pakistan are still paying the price of General Zia’s religio-political policies in terms of sectarian violence, religious extremism, a drugs and weapons culture and turf wars in the country. In India, the Gujarat carnage was the comeuppance of a religious zealot’s mentality. The burqa ban, minaret controversy and caricatures of the Prophet (PBUH) in Europe show the same mindset of hate mongering through religious politics. The war on terror has provided an opportunity to xenophobes to give vent to their religious fury against Muslim immigrants. If we cast a cursory glance over the world’s religions we find that many people generally practice religion either to obtain a spiritual thrust (mostly unsuccessful) or just to keep their ancestral tradition alive without having to implement it in their lives. Most of the time, religious seminars and gatherings are little better than socialising parties where a religious figure harangues a discourse on the significance of adhering to religious tenets and covenants. However, people can easily discern the nuance in the precept and practices of such figures. None of them possesses a vision to improve the lives of the general public. They inspire a blind and ignorant form of practicing the faith.
A French scientist, Blaise Pascal, once said, “Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction.” The governor of Punjab was assassinated amidst a blasphemy row. The assassin was motivated by an inflammatory sermon delivered by a religious cleric during Friday prayers. In the US, the Quran burning campaign led by a pastor ignited anger and resentment in the entire Muslim world. The Prophet’s (PBUH) caricatures appeared in the European press and ignited a new fire. Officials added fuel to the fire by defending this hateful act. They termed such acts as ‘freedom of speech’ but one wonders where their freedom of speech vanishes when it comes to discussing the Holocaust in a scientific manner.
A few months back all hell broke loose in Norway when 77 people were gunned down by a man who killed them to send a message to European governments to stop immigration, particularly of Muslims. Here, the horrors of the Gojra carnage and assassination of Shahbaz Bhatti are proof of Blaise Pascal’s thesis.
When people abandon their faith to a mere practice of rituals assigned by clerics, and accept religion as a means of social acceptance rather than for personal reform, the whole concept of moral right and wrong becomes distorted. Muslims need to regain the moral high ground and escape their current paradigms. Consider Maulana Ubaidullah Sindhi and his famous book Quran ka Shaoor-e-Inqilab” (Revolutionary Sense of the Quran). Maulana said: “The purpose of Abrahamic religion is to get mankind to excellence in accordance with nature.” Unfortunately, we do not see many adherents of his concept. There is vast room for improvement and restructuring the religious educational system. This will help train our younger generation, which aspires to learn religious tenets, achieve excellence in their lives and become the engine of growth and development of society rather than a burden and liability.
All religions on earth had one purpose in common at the time of their advent: to improve the common man’s life and to develop a progressive society where freedom, equality and justice prevail. Those religious doctrines changed the course of history and revolutionised their followers’ lives. However, with the passage of time, their teachings could not evolve and keep pace with society’s requirements. Consequently, they were removed from their followers’ social lives and their revolutionary spirits vanished. Such religions were termed as “opium for the masses” by Karl Marx and supplanted by other progressive doctrines, which provided relief to their followers and catered to society’s needs. The law of nature says that change is inevitable. When societies become so rigid and irrational that no innovative ideas are welcomed then their destruction is the writing on the wall — one need only recall the Egyptian civilisation, Babylonian civilisation, Mayan civilisation and Mohenjo Daro, etc. Their ruins tell the story of their destruction, caused by maintaining the status quo.
The spirit of the age demands us to work for the common good of humanity. All faiths’ fundamental teachings revolve around ‘love for all’ and ‘service to mankind’. We should develop the broad based strategic vision needed to make this world a peaceful place. For this purpose, the UN has developed the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). We should all strive to achieve them so as to live in an educated, progressive and developed world.
The writer is a freelance columnist and can be reached at hisham.mazhar@gmail.com
Hisham Mazhar Qureshi
A few years after the appearance of the Essays of Montaigne, there was published in France a work, which though few are aware of now, that possessed, in the 17th century, a reputation of the highest order. This was the celebrated Treatise on Wisdom, by Charron, in which we find (for the first time) an attempt to construct a system of morals without the aid of theology. In that era of renaissance, myriads of stars appeared on the horizon to enlighten the darkness of ignorance, to inspire the age of reason and to create the awareness of intellectual thinking. They deconstructed myth bound societies living in the haze of clergy based dogmas, superstitious values, norms and traditions.
Later, in the 19th century, Henry Thomas Buckle, a famous English historian, extended the same critical thinking to his masterpiece History of Civilisation in England, Volume II. He stated: “Charron reminds his countrymen that their religion is the accidental result of their birth and education, and that if they had been born in a Mohammadan country, they would have been as firm believers in Mohammadanism as they were in Christianity. If we look a little deeper we will see that each of the great religions is built upon that which preceded it. The religion of the Jews is founded upon that of the Egyptians; Christianity is the result of Judaism, and from these two last, there has naturally sprung Mohammadanism.”
Hence he opposed proselytism and took up philosophic ground by saying that religious opinions, being governed by undeviating laws, owe their variations to variations in their antecedents, and are always, if left to themselves, suited to the existing state of things.
Religion is known as a code of life. It guides people in shaping their ethereal and temporal lives and prepares them for the reward hereinafter of their deeds in this world. The good one does here, the better the reward afterwards. People tend to follow religious rites and practices with the hope of reward in the next world and to be known as ‘pious’ in society.
But when religion is blended with politics it becomes the most powerful exploitative force. The citizens of Pakistan are still paying the price of General Zia’s religio-political policies in terms of sectarian violence, religious extremism, a drugs and weapons culture and turf wars in the country. In India, the Gujarat carnage was the comeuppance of a religious zealot’s mentality. The burqa ban, minaret controversy and caricatures of the Prophet (PBUH) in Europe show the same mindset of hate mongering through religious politics. The war on terror has provided an opportunity to xenophobes to give vent to their religious fury against Muslim immigrants. If we cast a cursory glance over the world’s religions we find that many people generally practice religion either to obtain a spiritual thrust (mostly unsuccessful) or just to keep their ancestral tradition alive without having to implement it in their lives. Most of the time, religious seminars and gatherings are little better than socialising parties where a religious figure harangues a discourse on the significance of adhering to religious tenets and covenants. However, people can easily discern the nuance in the precept and practices of such figures. None of them possesses a vision to improve the lives of the general public. They inspire a blind and ignorant form of practicing the faith.
A French scientist, Blaise Pascal, once said, “Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction.” The governor of Punjab was assassinated amidst a blasphemy row. The assassin was motivated by an inflammatory sermon delivered by a religious cleric during Friday prayers. In the US, the Quran burning campaign led by a pastor ignited anger and resentment in the entire Muslim world. The Prophet’s (PBUH) caricatures appeared in the European press and ignited a new fire. Officials added fuel to the fire by defending this hateful act. They termed such acts as ‘freedom of speech’ but one wonders where their freedom of speech vanishes when it comes to discussing the Holocaust in a scientific manner.
A few months back all hell broke loose in Norway when 77 people were gunned down by a man who killed them to send a message to European governments to stop immigration, particularly of Muslims. Here, the horrors of the Gojra carnage and assassination of Shahbaz Bhatti are proof of Blaise Pascal’s thesis.
When people abandon their faith to a mere practice of rituals assigned by clerics, and accept religion as a means of social acceptance rather than for personal reform, the whole concept of moral right and wrong becomes distorted. Muslims need to regain the moral high ground and escape their current paradigms. Consider Maulana Ubaidullah Sindhi and his famous book Quran ka Shaoor-e-Inqilab” (Revolutionary Sense of the Quran). Maulana said: “The purpose of Abrahamic religion is to get mankind to excellence in accordance with nature.” Unfortunately, we do not see many adherents of his concept. There is vast room for improvement and restructuring the religious educational system. This will help train our younger generation, which aspires to learn religious tenets, achieve excellence in their lives and become the engine of growth and development of society rather than a burden and liability.
All religions on earth had one purpose in common at the time of their advent: to improve the common man’s life and to develop a progressive society where freedom, equality and justice prevail. Those religious doctrines changed the course of history and revolutionised their followers’ lives. However, with the passage of time, their teachings could not evolve and keep pace with society’s requirements. Consequently, they were removed from their followers’ social lives and their revolutionary spirits vanished. Such religions were termed as “opium for the masses” by Karl Marx and supplanted by other progressive doctrines, which provided relief to their followers and catered to society’s needs. The law of nature says that change is inevitable. When societies become so rigid and irrational that no innovative ideas are welcomed then their destruction is the writing on the wall — one need only recall the Egyptian civilisation, Babylonian civilisation, Mayan civilisation and Mohenjo Daro, etc. Their ruins tell the story of their destruction, caused by maintaining the status quo.
The spirit of the age demands us to work for the common good of humanity. All faiths’ fundamental teachings revolve around ‘love for all’ and ‘service to mankind’. We should develop the broad based strategic vision needed to make this world a peaceful place. For this purpose, the UN has developed the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). We should all strive to achieve them so as to live in an educated, progressive and developed world.
The writer is a freelance columnist and can be reached at hisham.mazhar@gmail.com
Jango
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This paragraph sums it up pretty well.
Religion is now simply social acceptance. Women ( you know , the kind ) do ALOT of things, but they say they are muslims, rather than saying they are atheists, although they dont pray or anything. They just want social acceptance.
muse
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Some may be interested in the unique and important insight Dr. Amin offers, I hope you will enjoy reading it
Political Islam in a Pakhtun village
Dr Husnul Amin
Friday, February 15, 2013
The writer is an Islamabad-based academic and an expert on Islamic social movements.
While leafing through Maududi’s Islami Riyasat (Islamic State) in 2006, as a doctoral fellow at the International Institute of Social Studies (ISS), The Hague, I remembered first reading it in 1991, when I was a student-activist in an organisation that subscribed to Maududi’s ideology.
Conducting research on the Islamic movement, the Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan, its ideology, historical trajectories and the perpetual dissent it spawned over time, is not merely an academic pursuit for me. The Jamaat and its deep imprints on society are personal for me.
This discourse is an elaborate history of my childhood; I was brought up in an overwhelming Jamaati environment (a family or social condition shaped and deeply influenced by Maududi’s ideas and activities of the Jamaat). Like most of his contemporary modern educated, middle class revolutionary friends or inqilabi dost, my late father embraced the Jamaat’s inqilabi dawat (revolutionary message) in the 1970s wholeheartedly. His personal thinking, political, economic and social life, and worldview were an embodiment of the new message. As a true believer in the supremacy of his newfound identity, my father preferred his mission of spreading the message to everywhere around his village, to his family and social responsibilities.
When I was born, my surroundings and family were dominated by the thoughts of Maududi, Qutb and Hassan al-Banna. Maududi’s books formed the dominant academic resource that ruled and subdued all other household articles. A number of weekly and monthly politico-religious magazines further bolstered the intellectual dominance of the Jamaat literature and moral-story digests in my childhood home. This rich intellectual resource centre, as my father would repeatedly remind us, was augmented further by frequent meetings with my father’s Islamist friends, missionary brothers – as tehreeki bhai (brothers in movement) – at our hujra (guesthouse).
As kids, we would attend to the guests as waiters as per the Pakhtun tradition of hospitality. My old, sane and traditional grandfather would, time and again, resent such alien activities of my father and exhort him to stick to the traditional Islamic school of thought prevalent in the village – Deobandism. Grandfather did not like my father’s intellectual subordination to Maududi’s teachings and the associated social and political activities. My father’s subscription to Islamism was Maududiyyat – a derogatory term for Maududi, which was coined and popularised by traditional ulema – for many, including my grandfather.
Conversely, the 1980s brought about an era of Zia’s ill-conceived Islamisation and Afghan jihad projects. More comfortable in the company of the new dictator than representative democratic governments, the Jamaat jumped on the Afghan jihad and Islamisation bandwagon. From my first introduction to these new subjects, I observed intrusion of a strong ****** bias in the meetings of the Jamaat and its student wing, Islami Jamiat-e-Talaba Pakistan. In these meetings, jihad assumed primacy over all other positive/productive social, political and religious reformation as the space where these activities were hijacked by propagandist literature.
My home library also suffered from this change. Books and pamphlets, posters and handbills on active jihad made their way onto bookshelves, replacing mere ideological and religious material. The shift in the balance was considerable and was felt by everyone. The 1980s was also an important decade for the villagers because their incomes rose remarkably due to a flourishing timber business and remittances coming from the oil-rich Arab countries. The rising incomes had a demonstrable effect with a construction boom, improved nutrition and modern consumption.
Then the village received a telephone exchange and the number of TV sets increased. The Jamaat activists now had more sources of leisure and less time for friends and ideological discussions. Grown-up children and competition in business and jobs demanded more attention, leaving less time and resources for friends and relatives. Now, even the most urgent issues could be discussed over the telephone.
Nevertheless, the opportunities had different effects on income, lifestyle and consumption patterns of the Jamaat activists. This invoked a tension within the Islamists’ network. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the Jamaat’s central leadership changed; the USSR withdrew from Afghanistan; in Pakistan, democracy was restored; the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank (WB) entered as more visible actors in controlling the economy and economic policy; and an armed struggle in Kashmir was launched. In addition, all of my father’s movement brothers transformed into new individuals in terms of age, profession, lifestyle, income, family size and pessimism with the arrival of an Islamic revolution.
Thus, in 1989, I joined the Jamaat student wing when I was in ninth grade. From that point onwards, the Jamaat activism was not something that I would only observe as an outsider but became an internal experience that I was passing through. My father’s generation of Jamaat activists sowed the seeds of an Islamic movement, and it left a “rich resource centre of ideological books” for us as the most precious asset in inheritance (my father would tell us all the time) that we, the sons, were now dealing with the fruits of the Afghan jihad project and were building on that.
Though, for us, it was not the USSR but the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan and Dr Najeeb’s government in Kabul that were the main hurdles in reaping the crops of the Afghan jihad. The new goal was to liberate Kashmir from Indian occupation. I actively participated in all electoral campaigns which were held in the 1990s; these included fundraising schemes for the Kashmir jihad and student activism on campuses.
Today, most of my father’s friends have tired of this endless struggle, become grievous of the growing elitism in the Jamaat environment, or cried over Jamaat’s current leadership, which deviated from its original ideology and the path set by Maududi. Some negotiated space between Jamaat activism – their own business and politics – and negotiated their current positions within the Jamaat by switching from more political activism to more dawah and social activism.
Still, others left of their own accord or were expelled over growing differences with the ideology and strategy of the Jamaat. I am witness to the introduction of Javed Ahmad Ghamidi and his students steadily making their way through their audio lectures and booklets in our home library. My father and his friends would never allow me to read Ghamidi’s books or listen to his lectures. These, he insisted, were based on a deviation from Maududi’s ideology and were based on the intent to harm the Jamaat’s cause.
Through this connection, in the mid-1990s, I faced the same attitude and response from my father as he confronted his father: to my grandfather, my father’s defiance was a serious offence because he was deviating from the traditional Islam as was told and narrated to them by the village imams and ulema. To my father, my defiance was substantial because I deviated from the most modern interpretation, ideology and strategy of an Islamist movement, which were Maududi and the Jamaat. My grandfather accused my father of creating havoc in the original religion; my father accused me not only of deviating from Islam but also from Maududi’s political Islam.
At the time, it was not an academic argument (which it would later become) that enabled us to pass through competing understandings of Islam, and its relation to state and society – my grandfather’s insistence on traditional Islam, my father’s commitment to Maududi’s Islamism, and my own introduction to Ghamidi and his ideas. These were religious tensions within and without. We experienced these tensions but could not describe them in academic terms.
I see this incessant dissent, rupture, discontinuity, change, transformation, mutation and deviation as a normal pattern within my own lived Islam, and not an exception found only in the modern western world.
Political Islam in a Pakhtun village
Dr Husnul Amin
Friday, February 15, 2013
The writer is an Islamabad-based academic and an expert on Islamic social movements.
While leafing through Maududi’s Islami Riyasat (Islamic State) in 2006, as a doctoral fellow at the International Institute of Social Studies (ISS), The Hague, I remembered first reading it in 1991, when I was a student-activist in an organisation that subscribed to Maududi’s ideology.
Conducting research on the Islamic movement, the Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan, its ideology, historical trajectories and the perpetual dissent it spawned over time, is not merely an academic pursuit for me. The Jamaat and its deep imprints on society are personal for me.
This discourse is an elaborate history of my childhood; I was brought up in an overwhelming Jamaati environment (a family or social condition shaped and deeply influenced by Maududi’s ideas and activities of the Jamaat). Like most of his contemporary modern educated, middle class revolutionary friends or inqilabi dost, my late father embraced the Jamaat’s inqilabi dawat (revolutionary message) in the 1970s wholeheartedly. His personal thinking, political, economic and social life, and worldview were an embodiment of the new message. As a true believer in the supremacy of his newfound identity, my father preferred his mission of spreading the message to everywhere around his village, to his family and social responsibilities.
When I was born, my surroundings and family were dominated by the thoughts of Maududi, Qutb and Hassan al-Banna. Maududi’s books formed the dominant academic resource that ruled and subdued all other household articles. A number of weekly and monthly politico-religious magazines further bolstered the intellectual dominance of the Jamaat literature and moral-story digests in my childhood home. This rich intellectual resource centre, as my father would repeatedly remind us, was augmented further by frequent meetings with my father’s Islamist friends, missionary brothers – as tehreeki bhai (brothers in movement) – at our hujra (guesthouse).
As kids, we would attend to the guests as waiters as per the Pakhtun tradition of hospitality. My old, sane and traditional grandfather would, time and again, resent such alien activities of my father and exhort him to stick to the traditional Islamic school of thought prevalent in the village – Deobandism. Grandfather did not like my father’s intellectual subordination to Maududi’s teachings and the associated social and political activities. My father’s subscription to Islamism was Maududiyyat – a derogatory term for Maududi, which was coined and popularised by traditional ulema – for many, including my grandfather.
Conversely, the 1980s brought about an era of Zia’s ill-conceived Islamisation and Afghan jihad projects. More comfortable in the company of the new dictator than representative democratic governments, the Jamaat jumped on the Afghan jihad and Islamisation bandwagon. From my first introduction to these new subjects, I observed intrusion of a strong ****** bias in the meetings of the Jamaat and its student wing, Islami Jamiat-e-Talaba Pakistan. In these meetings, jihad assumed primacy over all other positive/productive social, political and religious reformation as the space where these activities were hijacked by propagandist literature.
My home library also suffered from this change. Books and pamphlets, posters and handbills on active jihad made their way onto bookshelves, replacing mere ideological and religious material. The shift in the balance was considerable and was felt by everyone. The 1980s was also an important decade for the villagers because their incomes rose remarkably due to a flourishing timber business and remittances coming from the oil-rich Arab countries. The rising incomes had a demonstrable effect with a construction boom, improved nutrition and modern consumption.
Then the village received a telephone exchange and the number of TV sets increased. The Jamaat activists now had more sources of leisure and less time for friends and ideological discussions. Grown-up children and competition in business and jobs demanded more attention, leaving less time and resources for friends and relatives. Now, even the most urgent issues could be discussed over the telephone.
Nevertheless, the opportunities had different effects on income, lifestyle and consumption patterns of the Jamaat activists. This invoked a tension within the Islamists’ network. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the Jamaat’s central leadership changed; the USSR withdrew from Afghanistan; in Pakistan, democracy was restored; the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank (WB) entered as more visible actors in controlling the economy and economic policy; and an armed struggle in Kashmir was launched. In addition, all of my father’s movement brothers transformed into new individuals in terms of age, profession, lifestyle, income, family size and pessimism with the arrival of an Islamic revolution.
Thus, in 1989, I joined the Jamaat student wing when I was in ninth grade. From that point onwards, the Jamaat activism was not something that I would only observe as an outsider but became an internal experience that I was passing through. My father’s generation of Jamaat activists sowed the seeds of an Islamic movement, and it left a “rich resource centre of ideological books” for us as the most precious asset in inheritance (my father would tell us all the time) that we, the sons, were now dealing with the fruits of the Afghan jihad project and were building on that.
Though, for us, it was not the USSR but the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan and Dr Najeeb’s government in Kabul that were the main hurdles in reaping the crops of the Afghan jihad. The new goal was to liberate Kashmir from Indian occupation. I actively participated in all electoral campaigns which were held in the 1990s; these included fundraising schemes for the Kashmir jihad and student activism on campuses.
Today, most of my father’s friends have tired of this endless struggle, become grievous of the growing elitism in the Jamaat environment, or cried over Jamaat’s current leadership, which deviated from its original ideology and the path set by Maududi. Some negotiated space between Jamaat activism – their own business and politics – and negotiated their current positions within the Jamaat by switching from more political activism to more dawah and social activism.
Still, others left of their own accord or were expelled over growing differences with the ideology and strategy of the Jamaat. I am witness to the introduction of Javed Ahmad Ghamidi and his students steadily making their way through their audio lectures and booklets in our home library. My father and his friends would never allow me to read Ghamidi’s books or listen to his lectures. These, he insisted, were based on a deviation from Maududi’s ideology and were based on the intent to harm the Jamaat’s cause.
Through this connection, in the mid-1990s, I faced the same attitude and response from my father as he confronted his father: to my grandfather, my father’s defiance was a serious offence because he was deviating from the traditional Islam as was told and narrated to them by the village imams and ulema. To my father, my defiance was substantial because I deviated from the most modern interpretation, ideology and strategy of an Islamist movement, which were Maududi and the Jamaat. My grandfather accused my father of creating havoc in the original religion; my father accused me not only of deviating from Islam but also from Maududi’s political Islam.
At the time, it was not an academic argument (which it would later become) that enabled us to pass through competing understandings of Islam, and its relation to state and society – my grandfather’s insistence on traditional Islam, my father’s commitment to Maududi’s Islamism, and my own introduction to Ghamidi and his ideas. These were religious tensions within and without. We experienced these tensions but could not describe them in academic terms.
I see this incessant dissent, rupture, discontinuity, change, transformation, mutation and deviation as a normal pattern within my own lived Islam, and not an exception found only in the modern western world.
muse
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ORIGINS OF WEALTH
Prosperity's timeless sources
By Reuven Brenner
Politicians and economists promise growth, prosperity and higher standards of living. What do they mean by these terms?
Are there good, relatively objective measures by which to judge whether people in a country expect technological and political innovations (including fiscal ones) to be beneficial and lead to the creation of more wealth? How can we be sure that a financial innovation, a change in company strategy or a change in government policy makes a society better or worse off?
The answer is that changes in the total market value of firms (value of stocks added to the value of outstanding debt) in a society added to the value of its governments' outstanding obligations would be the best estimate to make such judgment - once financial markets are well-developed, and institutions exist to hold matchmakers, be it in finance or government, accountable.
Then, when this sum increases, it means that the society's ability to generate revenues and pay back debt - whether private or public - has increased. And the contrary: when this sum drops (measured it terms of a relatively stable unit, rather than a particular currency), people signal that either their governments or the companies' management are making - or persisting longer than expected - with erroneous decisions.
The reason is simple: holding matchmakers in financial markets and governments accountable mitigate the magnitude and persistence of mistakes. By so doing they bring faster the better matching of capital and talent.
When the aforementioned sum diminishes, where does the wealth go? That depends.
The smaller is capital's and people's ability to move, the more the diminished value becomes a permanent loss. Those things that are expected to be solid - people's efforts and ingenuity - melt into thin air. More mistakes are made and they are expected to last longer. The decrease reflects diminished expectations of generating future revenues (since every mistake is a cost). Yet, generating future revenues is what "growth" and the ability to pay back debt means.
When capital and people can move, though, the wealth that disappears in one country reappears in others.
There are few better examples to illustrate these points than the wealth created by the various diaspora - Armenian, Chinese, the Huguenots, Jew - as well as the poorer immigrants of Europe, who built the newer continents. (Few of the rich left Europe. The emigrants were driven out of their homelands by politics and regulations). Let us briefly look in the first part of this series at how the movement of the most gifted and energetic of those people led to many of the world's economic "miracles".
Facts behind miracles
The Cinderella stories of poor or impoverished societies suddenly and quickly leapfrogging others have provoked admiration, envy, and intense discussions about why the outdone stumbled, and the humbler rose. The riches of oil-producing Middle East countries do not provoke such discussions because those countries fit the "finding treasure" pattern. But how do societies do it when they not only lack natural resources, but are even endowed with natural disasters? Can other countries emulate them and achieve similar degrees of prosperity?
The miracle of 17th century Europe was neither Spain, nor Portugal - both of which fit the "finding treasure" mold - but below-sea-level Amsterdam and Holland, whose riches were created despite natural obstacles. Later there was West Germany rising miraculously from the ashes of world war. There are some Asian miracles that deserve attention, such as Hong Kong and Singapore. And there was the somewhat forgotten example of Scotland's unique experience - about which in Part 3 of this series.
What's common between these miracles? The Dutch were the first European republic, both tolerant toward all religion (when the rest of Europe was still severely discriminating against many), and with sound rights to property, which opened opportunities for relatively unhindered trade and financial innovation.
But it would be misleading to say that "the Dutch" did it - these and other myths have been created by nationalist mythologies. The openness of the new republic attracted to Amsterdam well-connected and educated immigrants, merchants and moneymen; Jews and Huguenots, discriminated against elsewhere in Europe, were prominent among them. They helped turn Amsterdam to the financial and trading center of the 17th century world. The city had the world's first stock market, where French, Venetians, Florentines, Genoese, as well as Germans, Poles, Hungarians, Spanish, Russians, Turks, Armenians and Hindus traded not only in stocks but also in sophisticated derivatives.
Much capital active in Amsterdam was foreign-owned, or owned by Amsterdammers of foreign birth. There was "globalization" during the 17th century, even if nobody bothered to use the term.
Max Weber didn't bother to look at migratory patterns when he came up with his speculation that somehow religion - the Protestant Ethic - had much to do with Amsterdam's spectacular success. Although academics quoted Weber's idea frequently enough for it to pass for fact, it wasn't true in Amsterdam or in any other prosperous trading city or state. Educated and ambitious trading immigrants, with networks around the world, disciplined brains and trust, turned 17th century Amsterdam to a "miracle".
The same factors have been behind other miracles. The histories of Hamburg, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan and West Germany have much in common with Amsterdam's, but shared religion is not a factor. In each of these places, the state provided an umbrella of law and order, had relatively low taxes, and gave people a stake in what the business society was doing - attracting immigrants and entrepreneurs from around the world. These critical talents' influence radiated around the world.
Sir Stamford Raffles designed Singapore as a port at the beginning of the 19th century, and backed it with administrative, legal and educational system that was open to its multiracial population. From a small settlement Singapore rose, attracting Chinese, Malays, and Europeans. Trade and security brought prosperity to the penniless immigrants from Indonesia, and, in particular China.
Taiwan (after the 17th century), Singapore and Hong Kong offered immigrants opportunities denied them by the Chinese hinterland, which was dominated at first by warlords and a status-conscious bureaucracy, and later by communist bureaucracy.
Hong Kong benefited from waves of emigration from China, in particular from the inflow of Shanghai merchants and financiers when Mao Zedong "liberated" China in 1949 - much as Amsterdam rose to prominence when merchants and financiers fled the Iberian Peninsula in earlier centuries, when the Huguenots fled France, and when Jews fled from many parts of Europe.
Immigrants from Shanghai initiated Hong Kong's textile and shipping industries. These Chinese emigrants established the network of merchants, traders, moneymen, and manufacturers - as Jewish, Italian, Armenian, Parsee and other immigrant groups did throughout history in various parts of the world - and as the present Chinese Diaspora of about 55 million brings its network to the more open China today.
Briefly, wealth that disappeared in one place reappeared in another. And as for the "vital few" who stayed behind, under regimes denying opportunities, their talents were lost forever.
Prosperity's timeless sources
By Reuven Brenner
Politicians and economists promise growth, prosperity and higher standards of living. What do they mean by these terms?
Are there good, relatively objective measures by which to judge whether people in a country expect technological and political innovations (including fiscal ones) to be beneficial and lead to the creation of more wealth? How can we be sure that a financial innovation, a change in company strategy or a change in government policy makes a society better or worse off?
The answer is that changes in the total market value of firms (value of stocks added to the value of outstanding debt) in a society added to the value of its governments' outstanding obligations would be the best estimate to make such judgment - once financial markets are well-developed, and institutions exist to hold matchmakers, be it in finance or government, accountable.
Then, when this sum increases, it means that the society's ability to generate revenues and pay back debt - whether private or public - has increased. And the contrary: when this sum drops (measured it terms of a relatively stable unit, rather than a particular currency), people signal that either their governments or the companies' management are making - or persisting longer than expected - with erroneous decisions.
The reason is simple: holding matchmakers in financial markets and governments accountable mitigate the magnitude and persistence of mistakes. By so doing they bring faster the better matching of capital and talent.
When the aforementioned sum diminishes, where does the wealth go? That depends.
The smaller is capital's and people's ability to move, the more the diminished value becomes a permanent loss. Those things that are expected to be solid - people's efforts and ingenuity - melt into thin air. More mistakes are made and they are expected to last longer. The decrease reflects diminished expectations of generating future revenues (since every mistake is a cost). Yet, generating future revenues is what "growth" and the ability to pay back debt means.
When capital and people can move, though, the wealth that disappears in one country reappears in others.
There are few better examples to illustrate these points than the wealth created by the various diaspora - Armenian, Chinese, the Huguenots, Jew - as well as the poorer immigrants of Europe, who built the newer continents. (Few of the rich left Europe. The emigrants were driven out of their homelands by politics and regulations). Let us briefly look in the first part of this series at how the movement of the most gifted and energetic of those people led to many of the world's economic "miracles".
Facts behind miracles
The Cinderella stories of poor or impoverished societies suddenly and quickly leapfrogging others have provoked admiration, envy, and intense discussions about why the outdone stumbled, and the humbler rose. The riches of oil-producing Middle East countries do not provoke such discussions because those countries fit the "finding treasure" pattern. But how do societies do it when they not only lack natural resources, but are even endowed with natural disasters? Can other countries emulate them and achieve similar degrees of prosperity?
The miracle of 17th century Europe was neither Spain, nor Portugal - both of which fit the "finding treasure" mold - but below-sea-level Amsterdam and Holland, whose riches were created despite natural obstacles. Later there was West Germany rising miraculously from the ashes of world war. There are some Asian miracles that deserve attention, such as Hong Kong and Singapore. And there was the somewhat forgotten example of Scotland's unique experience - about which in Part 3 of this series.
What's common between these miracles? The Dutch were the first European republic, both tolerant toward all religion (when the rest of Europe was still severely discriminating against many), and with sound rights to property, which opened opportunities for relatively unhindered trade and financial innovation.
But it would be misleading to say that "the Dutch" did it - these and other myths have been created by nationalist mythologies. The openness of the new republic attracted to Amsterdam well-connected and educated immigrants, merchants and moneymen; Jews and Huguenots, discriminated against elsewhere in Europe, were prominent among them. They helped turn Amsterdam to the financial and trading center of the 17th century world. The city had the world's first stock market, where French, Venetians, Florentines, Genoese, as well as Germans, Poles, Hungarians, Spanish, Russians, Turks, Armenians and Hindus traded not only in stocks but also in sophisticated derivatives.
Much capital active in Amsterdam was foreign-owned, or owned by Amsterdammers of foreign birth. There was "globalization" during the 17th century, even if nobody bothered to use the term.
Max Weber didn't bother to look at migratory patterns when he came up with his speculation that somehow religion - the Protestant Ethic - had much to do with Amsterdam's spectacular success. Although academics quoted Weber's idea frequently enough for it to pass for fact, it wasn't true in Amsterdam or in any other prosperous trading city or state. Educated and ambitious trading immigrants, with networks around the world, disciplined brains and trust, turned 17th century Amsterdam to a "miracle".
The same factors have been behind other miracles. The histories of Hamburg, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan and West Germany have much in common with Amsterdam's, but shared religion is not a factor. In each of these places, the state provided an umbrella of law and order, had relatively low taxes, and gave people a stake in what the business society was doing - attracting immigrants and entrepreneurs from around the world. These critical talents' influence radiated around the world.
Sir Stamford Raffles designed Singapore as a port at the beginning of the 19th century, and backed it with administrative, legal and educational system that was open to its multiracial population. From a small settlement Singapore rose, attracting Chinese, Malays, and Europeans. Trade and security brought prosperity to the penniless immigrants from Indonesia, and, in particular China.
Taiwan (after the 17th century), Singapore and Hong Kong offered immigrants opportunities denied them by the Chinese hinterland, which was dominated at first by warlords and a status-conscious bureaucracy, and later by communist bureaucracy.
Hong Kong benefited from waves of emigration from China, in particular from the inflow of Shanghai merchants and financiers when Mao Zedong "liberated" China in 1949 - much as Amsterdam rose to prominence when merchants and financiers fled the Iberian Peninsula in earlier centuries, when the Huguenots fled France, and when Jews fled from many parts of Europe.
Immigrants from Shanghai initiated Hong Kong's textile and shipping industries. These Chinese emigrants established the network of merchants, traders, moneymen, and manufacturers - as Jewish, Italian, Armenian, Parsee and other immigrant groups did throughout history in various parts of the world - and as the present Chinese Diaspora of about 55 million brings its network to the more open China today.
Briefly, wealth that disappeared in one place reappeared in another. And as for the "vital few" who stayed behind, under regimes denying opportunities, their talents were lost forever.
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