Durkheim and Mauss were both socialists who emphasized the human interdependence entailed in an expanded social role for markets and money

The human economy from The Memory Bank 3.0 by keith

My case for a recent speed-up of global integration rests on three developments of the last two decades: 1. the collapse of the Soviet Union, opening up the world to transnational capitalism and neo-liberal economic policies 2. the entry of China’s and India’s two billion people, a third of humanity, into the world market as powers in their own right and the globalization of capital accumulation, for the first time loosening the grip of America and Europe on the global economy and 3. the abbreviation of time and distance brought about by the communications revolution and a restlessly mobile population. The corollary of this revolution is a counter-revolution, the reassertion of state power since 9-11 and the imperialist war for oil in the Middle East...

Humanity is now caught between national and world society; and that is why new ways of thinking are so vital.

Classical liberals promoted markets as a means of greater individual freedom from the arbitrary social inequality of the Old Regime. But the industrial revolution brought about a shift to urban commerce that made vast new populations of wage workers rely on markets for food, housing and the rest of their basic needs. Under these circumstances, society itself seemed to retreat from view, being replaced by an ‘economy’ characterized this time by market contracts instead of domestic self-sufficiency. Others hold that society’s remaining defenses are simply too weak to hold out against the rising tide of global money: you can’t buck ‘the markets’. This notion of markets as a natural force beyond social regulation serves to legitimize wealth and even to make poverty seem deserved.
The founders of modern social theory all considered markets to be progressive in that they broke up the insularity of traditional rural society and brought humanity into wider circles of discourse and interaction. But they differed over what should happen next. Marx and Engels considered that private money (‘capital’) was too fragmented to organize the urban societies brought into being by machine production of commodities; so they looked to the large concentrations of workers for a truly collective remedy. Max Weber recognized that the formal rationality of capitalist bureaucracy often led to a substantive deterioration of livelihood for many. But, as a liberal, he considered wholesale state intervention in markets to be a recipe for economic disaster. Durkheim and Mauss were both socialists who emphasized the human interdependence entailed in an expanded social role for markets and money, while rejecting the Social Darwinist claim that capitalism ensures the ‘survival of the fittest’.

Polanyi never denied the utility of markets for the allocation of some goods and services. What he condemned was the elevation of the ‘self-regulating market’ to a position of dominance and the high price the British working classes paid for this. Laissez-faire liberalism was not the necessary, ‘natural’ concomitant of industrialism: the market regime could only emerge and reproduce itself thanks to specific interventions by the state. At the same time, there were counter-movements within society like Chartism, as the victims of the new liberalism sought to defend themselves. This ‘double movement’ constituted the self-protection of society. Polanyi sometimes wrote of the disembedding of economy under laissez-faire liberalism; but the market remained thoroughly ‘embedded’ in two senses: first, in its dependence on the state and second because it was associated with a range of social institutions, including some formed to counter allegedly impersonal and ‘natural’ market forces. Polanyi’s real objection was not to the market as such, but to ‘market fundamentalism’.
I find Marcel Mauss’s position on markets and money to be more persuasive than Polanyi’s as a basis for ‘institutionalist political economy’. The Gift is an extended commentary on Durkheim’s argument that an advanced division of labour could only be sustained by ‘the non-contractual element in the contract’, a largely invisible body of state-made law, custom and belief that could not be reduced to abstract market principles. Mauss held that the attempt to create a free market for private contracts is utopian and just as unrealizable as its antithesis, a collective based solely on altruism. Human institutions everywhere are founded on the unity of individual and society, freedom and obligation, self-interest and concern for others. The pure types of selfish and generous economic action obscure the complex interplay between our individuality and belonging in subtle ways to others.

Mauss was highly critical of the Bolsheviks’ destruction of confidence in the expanded sense of sociability that sustained the market economy. In his view, markets and money are human universals whose principal function is the extension of society beyond the local sphere, even if they do not always take the impersonal form we are familiar with. This was why he disputed Malinowski’s assertion that kula valuables could not be considered to be money. Mauss advocated an ‘economic movement from below’, in the form of syndicalism, co-operation and mutual insurance. His greatest hopes were for a consumer democracy driven by the co-operative movement. The true significance for him of finding elements of the archaic gift in contemporary capitalism was to refute the revolutionary eschatology of both right and left. Most of the possibilities for a human economy already co-exist in our world; so the task is to build new combinations with a different emphasis, not to repudiate a caricature of the market in the name of a radical alternative. Here Mauss follows Hegel — rather than Aristotle, Marx and Polanyi — in seeking the integration of institutional possibilities that have been variously dominant in history rather than representing them as mutually exclusive historical stages.
When the market is represented, as in neo-liberal ideology, as a force of nature giving expression to individual interests outside society, political opponents are apt to advocate either its abolition or at least closer control by collective interests. But this generates unrealistic and unsustainable programs that reproduce the neo-liberal model by negation. Mauss’s approach draws our attention to the institutional complexity of markets, while emphasizing their evolutionary function as means of drawing humanity into society on an ever-widening scale. Markets are thus an essential and dynamic feature of the human economy.

Money in the human economy
By calling the economy ‘human’ we insist on putting people first, making their thoughts, actions and lives our main concern. Such a focus should also be pragmatic: making economy personally meaningful to students or readers, relating it to ordinary people’s practical purposes. ‘Humanity’ is a moral quality, implying that, if we want to be good, we should treat other persons, people like ourselves, kindly. Since theoretical abstraction is impersonal and leaves no room for morality, a human economy would have to pay attention to the personal realm of experience; but it would be a mistake to leave it there. Humanity is also a collective noun, meaning all the people who have existed or ever will. So the human economy is inclusive in a sense reinforced by our contemporary witness to the formation of world society...

Money is often portrayed as a lifeless object separated from persons, whereas it is a creation of human beings, imbued with the collective spirit of the living and the dead. Money, as a token of society, must be impersonal in order to connect each individual to the universe of relations to which they belong. But people make everything personal, including their relations with society. This two-sided relationship is universal, but its incidence is highly variable. Money in capitalist societies stands for alienation, detachment, impersonal society, the outside; its origins lie beyond our control (the market). Relations marked by the absence of money are the model of personal integration and free association, of what we take to be familiar, the inside (home). This institutional dualism, forcing individuals to divide themselves, asks too much of us. People want to integrate division, to make some meaningful connection between their own subjectivity and society as an object. It helps that money, as well as being the means of separating public and domestic life, was always the main bridge between the two. That is why money must be central to any attempt to humanize society. It is both the principal source of our vulnerability in society and the main practical symbol allowing each of us to make an impersonal world meaningful.
Money thus expands the capacity of individuals to stabilize their own personal identity by holding something durable that embodies the desires and wealth of all the other members of society. Money is a ‘memory bank’, a store allowing individuals to keep track of those exchanges they wish to calculate and, beyond that, a source of economic memory for the community. The modern system of money provides people with a wide repertoire of instruments to keep track of their exchanges with the world and to calculate the current balance of their worth in the community. In this sense, one of money’s chief functions is remembering. If persons are to make a comeback in the post-modern economy, it will be less on a face-to-face basis than as bits on a screen who sometimes materialize as living people in the present. We may become less weighed down by money as an objective force, more open to the idea that it is a way of keeping track of complex social networks that we each generate.
The reality of markets and money is not just universal abstraction, but the mutual determination of the abstract and the concrete. If you have some money, there is almost no limit to what you can do with it, but, as soon as you buy something, the act of payment lends concrete finality to your choice. Money’s significance thus lies in the synthesis it promotes of impersonal abstraction and personal meaning, objectification and subjectivity, analytical reason and synthetic narrative. Its social power comes from the fluency of its mediation between infinite potential and finite determination. To turn our backs on markets and money in the name of collective as opposed to individual interests reproduces by negation the bourgeois separation of self and society. It is not enough to emphasize the controls that people already impose on money and exchange as part of their personal practice. That is the everyday world as most of us know it. We also need ways of reaching the parts we don’t know, if we wish to avert the ruin they could bring down on us all.

Classical liberal way of looking at the world

Classical Liberalism and the Times of India from The India Uncut Blog by Amit Varma

Gautam Adhikari, in an important piece on the Times of India edit page, lays down the philosophy of the ToI edit pages...I quote at length because I approve wholeheartedly of such a direction. Apart from publishing voices from across the spectrum, I hope Adhikari also ensures that ToI‘s editorials reflect this classical liberal way of looking at the world, and defend freedom in all its senses. Niranjan Rajadhyaksha of Mint had made a similar commitment when that newspaper launched, but ToI, with its massive audience, could have a far greater impact on public discourse.

Mutually incompatible inclusion, expansion and excellence

Home > Edits & Columns > Let’s plan nano-towns P.V. Indiresan Indian Express: Monday, January 14, 2008

‘Inclusion, Expansion, Excellence’ is the three-part motto of the XI Five Year Plan. It is a good way too to define the social engineering issues of modernisation and globalisation. Unfortunately, it is not possible to maximise all these three simultaneously:

• Inclusion of everyone will not lead to excellence; it will retard expansion too.
• Rapid expansion will necessarily place a premium on the competent, exclude the less able and increase disparities. Due to paucity of skilled manpower, rapid expansion will have to sacrifice excellence too.
• Likewise, maximising excellence will adversely affect both inclusion and rapid expansion.

The challenge of social engineering lies in putting together the mutually incompatible inclusion, expansion and excellence in such a manner that it causes least offence. The solution is not easy. Compromises will be necessary, and no compromise will satisfy everyone. The writer is a former director of IIT, Chennai indiresan@gmail.com

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Home > Edits & Columns > Track every rupee Jaithirth Rao Indian Express: Monday, January 14, 2008

Over the years, we have developed excellent think-tanks in Public Policy. The Centre for Policy Research is a good example. As a result, we have a broad consensus on policy issues. Everyone is agreed that inclusive growth is a must. Leaving the majority of the country abysmally poor (in absolute, not just relative terms) is morally obnoxious; those who are not troubled by morals will relate to the fact that a large sullen underclass represents a danger to private prosperity inside high-rises or gated communities...

We are in need of think-tanks that are focused, not on policy objectives, where there is more unanimity than we give credit for, but on the mechanics, processes, systems and incentive signals for implementation and execution. The beneficiaries of high growth in India’s private sector need to rise to this challenge. Dealing with this challenge will determine what kind of India we bequeath to our children. The writer is a student and observer of the contemporary Indian scene jerry.rao@expressindia.com

Numerical majority doesn’t mean that the capable are being elected

Maulana Amir Siddique, the head of Lal Masjid and nephew of Maulana Abdul Rashid Ghazi, who was killed last July in the Pakistan Army operation on the mosque-madarsa complex, told The Indian Express: “In democracy, the weightage of votes by an illiterate or a drug addict is the same as that of an educated, pious person. Numerical majority doesn’t mean that the capable are being elected.” ...

“In today’s elections, people are gaining power using money. What else can you expect from people who consume nicotine or alcohol? They get sold out to people who lure them with money,” says the 42-year-old madarsa-educated Maulana, who took charge of the family-run Lal Masjid about three months ago when it re-opened following the Pakistan Supreme Court’s order...

“We feel that democracy is not the solution, because it’s the writ of Allah that is supreme and not the writ of the people,” he says. However, he qualifies his “anti-democracy” stance by saying he believes in an individual’s democratic rights of freedom...The Maulana adds that “violence always begets violence, it never achieves peace”. “The siege of Lal Masjid was not an action, but a reaction... in our Islamic traditions, there is no room for violence,” he says. Lal Masjid’s new chief takes old line: democracy is no solution Shubhajit Roy
Indian Express: Monday, January 07, 2008 11:16 AM

Others will trust you and you will benefit by betraying the trust

Rationality, Trust & Development Kaushik Basu Hindustan Times January 06, 2008

Individual rationality is a central concern of economics. This is because of the influential view, associated with Adam Smith, that, even if all individuals are selfishly rational, the ‘invisible hand’ of the market will guide society to achieve efficiency. Smith’s work in the late eighteenth century had a huge impact because it seemed to controvert Thomas Hobbes’ thesis that human beings, left to themselves without the controlling hand of the government, would end up in anarchy and chaos.

Over time, neo-conservative writers contorted Smith’s thesis to assert that, as long as the government does not interfere with the individuals’ pursuit of self-interest, an economy will prosper. All the government has to do is not be there. But this thesis is flawed.

First of all, modern game theory illustrates that rationality itself is a contentious idea. In ‘strategic’ situations, where several ‘rational’ agents confront one another, the meaning of rationality may be innately contested. Last year I published a paper in Scientific American, called ‘The Traveler’s Dilemma’, to demonstrate this. I had also hoped that it would rid some of our public intellectuals of their neo-conservative predilections. But, while I got a lot of response from around the world, the article went virtually unread in India. However, my paper now shows up on a travel and tourism website next to the announcement: “Fight Traveler’s Diarrhea, developed by a gastroenterologist.” Given the Indian obsession with gastric health, my hope is that people will find this website and then mistakenly read my paper.

Second, new research in economics shows that while the individual urge to maximise income and accumulate are stimulants to growth, a society also needs altruism, integrity and trust. These are the flora and fauna which enable industrialised economies to flourish, and their absence can doom an economy to stagnation. In some of the poorest parts of India, there is no trace of government. By the conservative argument these should be the most prosperous regions. One reason they are not is because they lack the enabling social norms and customs.

If a group of people is known to be trustworthy, they will find jobs more easily (since they will not have to be monitored closely), others will be willing to sign business contracts with them (since they will be less likely to renege), and, over time, this society will become more advanced. There is evidence that some groups are believed to be more trustworthy than others. Some recent laboratory experiments in Israel show that Ashkenazi Jews are more trustworthy than Eastern Jews. In Delhi, South Indians were believed to be more trustworthy as used-car sellers. I remember in the early eighties numerous car advertisements in newspapers claiming: “car owned by South Indian”. (When I went to see some of these cars, on more than one occasion I was met by a large North Indian, who assured me that the South Indian owner was having a bath.)

The reason why individual rationality is not sufficient to generate trust is the ‘free-rider problem’ — If your community is known to be trustworthy and you are not, you will do even better. Others will trust you and you will benefit by betraying the trust. Hence, trustworthiness and pro-social behavior survive only when these are social norms, and people adhere to them instinctively, without thinking of self-interest.

Inculcating the norms of honesty and pro-social behavior is important not only as an end in itself but because it is good for development. A part of the trust problem can however be solved, without overcoming the free-rider hurdle, if people become far-sighted. Being more trustworthy means being willing to take some immediate losses in order to build up a good reputation and do better in the future. I believe this is happening in India. It is difficult to provide hard data for this, but there is one piece of indirect evidence. India’s savings rate has risen sharply in recent years. But saving is the desire to sacrifice current consumption for future gain. This suggests that Indians are beginning to taker a longer run view of their own welfare. This in turn is making them more trustworthy. And from the point of view of development, this is reason for hope.

Kaushik Basu is Professor of Economics and Director, Center for Analytic Economics, Cornell University

The spiritual man who can guide human life towards its perfection is typified in the ancient Indian idea of the Rishi

Location: Home > E-Library > Works Of Sri Aurobindo > Social And Political Thought Volume-15 > Religion As The Law Of Life

The Western recoil from religion, that minimising of its claim and insistence by which Europe progressed from the mediaeval religious attitude through the Renascence and the Reformation to the modern rationalistic attitude, that making of the ordinary earthly life our one preoccupation, that labour to fulfil ourselves by the law of the lower members, divorced from all spiritual seeking, was an opposite error, the contrary ignorant extreme, the blind swing of the pendulum from a wrong affirmation to a wrong negation. It is an error because perfection can- not be found in such a limitation and restriction; for it denies the complete law of human existence, its deepest urge, its most secret impulse. Only by the light and power of the highest can the lower be perfectly guided, uplifted and accomplished. The lower life of man is in form undivine, though in it there is, the secret of the divine, and it can only be divinised by finding the higher law and the spiritual llumination.

On the other hand, the impatience which condemns or despairs of life or discourages its growth because it is at present undivine and is not in harmony with the spiritual life, is an equal ignorance, and ham tamah. The world-shunning monk, the mere ascetic may indeed well find by this turn his own individual and peculiar salvation, the spiritual recompense of his renunciation and Tapasya, as the materialist may find by his own exclusive method the appropriate rewards of his energy and concentrated seeking; but neither can be the true guide of mankind and its law-giver. The monastic attitude implies a fear, an aversion, a distrust of life and its aspirations, t and one cannot wisely guide that with which one is entirely out of sympathy, that which one wishes to minimise and discourage. The sheer ascetic spirit, if it directed life and human society, could only prepare it to be a means for denying itself and getting away from its own motives. An ascetic guidance might tolerate the lower activities, but only with a view to persuade them in the end to minimise and finally cease from their own action. But a spirituality which draws back from life to envelop it without being dominated by it does not labour under this disability.

The spiritual man who can guide human life towards its perfection is typified in the ancient Indian idea of the Rishi, one who has lived fully the life of man and found the word of the supra-intellectual, supramental, spiritual truth. He has risen above these lower limitations and can view all things from above, but also he is in sympathy with their effort and can view them from within; he has the complete inner knowledge and the higher surpassing knowledge. Therefore he can guide the world humanly as God guides it divinely, because like the Divine he is in the life of the world and yet above it. Page-168

Genuine democratic governance and rule of law involve dignity, opportunity and justice

Lok Satta has no intention to support communal agenda. The 2007 Gujarat verdict bucking the usual anti-incumbency trend and several local adverse factors needs to be interpreted in a citizen-friendly manner.

There can be two possible inferences of the verdict. First, hardcore Hindutva has won again. Second, it is unrelated to religious sentiments, and people responded to better delivery of services and reduced corruption. Clearly, the latter interpretation is both accurate, and is more likely to encourage parties to improve performance rather than polarize people on caste and communal lines. Such an interpretation in no way lets a government off the hook elsewhere. It merely emphasizes the importance of delivery to gain public support. The net result is a shift from communal agenda to development agenda.

Clearly, genuine democratic governance and rule of law involve dignity, opportunity and justice. Lok Satta aims at all these. In today’s India, all three are at a premium and Gujarat reflects that deficit. Happily, there is no trade off between development and justice, and both need to go together. That we value development does not mean we value justice any less. Nor does it mean that poor development guarantees justice. We have to strive for both. That is our goal.

With warm regards, Jayaprakash Narayan Reply to a Question on Dr. JP's comment about Modi Victory from Jayaprakash Narayan's Blog by JP

A true democracy demands constant revitalisation of the spirit of openness, generosity and liberality of opinion

Painting the art world red Ranjit Hoskote
Home Views Editorials Opeds Hindustan Times May 13, 2007

It appears that the champions of a resurgent Hindu identity are acutely embarrassed by the presence of the erotic at the centre of Hindu sacred art. As they may well be, for the roots of Hindutva do not lie in Hinduism. Rather, they lie in a crude mixture of German romanticism, Victorian puritanism and Nazi methodology.

What happens next, we wonder? Will the champions of Hindutva go around the country chipping away at temple murals, breaking down monuments, whitewashing wall paintings, and burning manuscripts and folios? Perhaps they will not stop until they have forced the unpredictable richness of Hindu culture to conform to their own tunnel vision of life, art, image and narrative. The first move in the establishment of a fascist system is thought-policing, the curtailment of the liberal imagination. We see this in the breaching of the sanctity of academia, with goons ransacking the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Pune, in January 2004, or police entering the M S University campus last week. And physical attack or arrest has become the first response to any criticism or departure from convention. If anyone had a problem with Chandramohan’s images, for instance, surely they could have resorted to the old-fashioned option of talking to the artist? But conversation has long ago vanished from the menu of problem-solving devices, as India turns into an illiberal democracy.

Periodic elections do not, by themselves guarantee a liberal democracy; they only guarantee periodic changes of government. A true democracy demands constant revitalisation of the spirit of openness, generosity and liberality of opinion. Democracy is not an achieved set of laws or a manual of instructions; it is a work in progress. It is a space that allows diverse imaginations to interact, it is a community of conversations. Given the direction in which we are heading, can we recover democracy as a community of conversations, rather than as a space segmented and partitioned by communitarian claims? Can we allow for the interplay of diverse imaginations, with none exerting a monopolistic claim on experience? Can we productively reconstitute the same objects in different discourses, without inviting assault on our civic and cultural freedoms? Can we preserve nuance, detail and polychromy in our accounts of ourselves – as complex selves in a complex society – without being coerced into subscription towards one group identity or another by colour-blind demagogues? Can we protect the right to artistic truth and the right to critique?

It wasn't too long ago that what we call the modern individual Self did not exist

It's an Ideal World to Become Who You Are from One Cosmos by Gagdad Bob

In One Cosmos, I don't explicitly delve much into politics at all, but if there is a coonfluence between my political and spiritual views, this is it. For if the purpose of life is to realize one's archetype, then the ultimate value of a culture or nation or political movement will be the degree to which it either impedes or makes this realization possible (see page 180):

"We must each of us, in our own way, fight for the cultural circumstances that make intellectual, emotional, and spiritual growth possible, because most cultural circumstances actively suppress our growth as human beings."

As such, any purely materialistic political philosophy will be a non-starter. I never say that "Republicanism" is any kind of ideal. Far from it. It's just that the left is so incredibly dangerous and destructive to human ends, that it must be opposed, just as the Islamofascists must be. In the case of the latter, their great evil is the same: the systematic smothering of our spiritual individuation. To force women to live in bags -- i.e., to deprive them of their face -- is a terrifying metaphor of what they do to the soul, which is to say, bury it in darkness. Likewise, radical feminism sophicates the beautiful archetypal feminine form in an airless black bag of faceless ideology.

At any rate, all of the archetypes are collective save for one, which is your unique Self, and which is yours to keep as a consolation prize for this difficult journey we call life. Now, presuming there is a Creator, each person represents a unique "problem of God," something spoken of by Sri Aurobindo. And this is where we can run into a bit if trouble with institutionalized, "big box" religions, which can tend to cater to a psychological "type" rather than the individual. It doesn't have to be this way, any more than a Big Mac has to taste the same at every McDonalds in the world, but it's amazing how you can get people to choose things that aren't in their interests with enough salt and fat.

Now, there was clearly a time when it was necessary for institutionalized religion to be geared toward the collective, since it wasn't too long ago that what we call the modern individual Self did not exist -- or at least for only a very few lucky souls. If you don't believe me, try digesting Charles Taylor's 600 page explanation, Sources of the Self, followed by his latest offering, A Secular Age, and get back to me. I think he pretty much covers the waterfront on that topic.

Both nations will form some type of confederation, based on shared interest in trade and culture

Re: India’s Independence and the Spiritual Destiny by Rich on Thu 27 Dec 2007 07:47 AM PST Profile Permanent Link Deshpande wrote: “I agree that Sri Aurobindo opinion would have changed with time…” Does it mean that he would have revised his stand about the removal of partition, that by whatever means it be it must go? That is the basic question.<

Well you or I can never know that because he has been gone 57 years now. We can only infer and draw our own interpretations based on our various intellectual and cultural backgrounds. My own opinion is that eventually both nations will form some type of confederation, based on shared interest in trade and culture.

Re: Bhutto Assassinated: N.Y. Times by Rich on Thu 27 Dec 2007 05:41 PM PST Profile Permanent Link An emergent confederation or free trade zone which balances China's hegemony is certainly not out of the question, if the region can "get its shit together" and so I got to say, no matter the rap there seems to be against Gandhi in some Sri Aurobindo circles, I think the first thing everyone must due, is stop exploding each other with hatred. It is only such an evolutionary future which I would consider progressive... cheers rich

Re: India’s Independence and the Spiritual Destiny by RY Deshpande on Tue 25 Dec 2007 04:49 AM PST Profile Permanent Link “I agree that Sri Aurobindo opinion would have changed with time…” Does it mean that he would have revised his stand about the removal of partition, that by whatever means it be it must go? That is the basic question. However, there are fundamentals also and there is also the aspect that the fundamentals should not be mixed up with the operational perspectives.

In terms of the specifics, it is totally beyond me to say if Sri Aurobindo would have changed his “opinion” in any particular situation or not. In fact, the question is: Does he hold opinions? His actions are in the play of the universal forces and what he would have done can be understood only in the knowledge of the workings of these universal forces, in their dynamics. As we do not have access to these workings, knowledge of the universal forces, to these dynamics, the best we can do is to go by our bests, bests discerned by our deepest and sincere-most perceptions. These perceptions will of course change from individual to individual and imposing one perception on another will amount to fanaticism. If there is religious fanaticism, there is also the rationalist fanaticism; the conflict between Reason and Faith is deep-rooted and is a fact of our present state of consciousness, our state of awareness. Actually, there are different types and grades of fanaticism, of every kind, small and too human as we are. But I also think we here at the sciy are enlightened enough to eschew from such impositions. As these postings are in the sciy fold, I take for granted the Aurobindonian outlook of things and it is in that outlook that we are holding discussions. Otherwise, for a general audience, it would entail writing a full-length book which, if necessary, should also be done. But I don’t think, at the moment, I’ve inclination to do anything of the sort. Anyone coming forward? It will be a welcome attempt. Let’s hope this happens. RYD

Re: India’s Independence and the Spiritual Destiny by Rich on Thu 27 Dec 2007 07:47 AM PST Profile Permanent Link Moreover RYD comments: However, there are fundamentals also and there is also the aspect that the fundamentals should not be mixed up with the operational perspectives. In terms of the specifics, it is totally beyond me to say if Sri Aurobindo would have changed his “opinion” in any particular situation or not. In fact, the question is: Does he hold opinions? His actions are in the play of the universal forces and what he would have done can be understood only in the knowledge of the workings of these universal forces, in their dynamics.<

Well if you choose to deify Sri Aurobindo the above perspective would logically follow. I personally do not and yes I think both he and Mother as human beings (however exalted they were) both reasoned and formed opinions which were subject to change depending on the passing of local and world events. I am however somewhat perplexed - and maybe you can explain this - how the followers of Sri Aurobindo and Mother can deify them and claim that integral yoga is not absolutely a Religion (with a capital R) rc

Re: India’s Independence and the Spiritual Destiny by RY Deshpande on Thu 27 Dec 2007 03:47 PM PST Profile Permanent Link Rich With regard to the “Pakistan imbroglio” let me quickly quote again Sri Aurobindo’s Independence Day Message:

“India today is free but she has not achieved unity… It is to be hoped that this settled fact [political division] will not be accepted as settled for ever… This must not be; the partition must go. Let us hope that that may come about naturally, by an increasing recognition of the necessity not only of peace and concord but of common action, by the practice of common action and the creation of means for that purpose… But by whatever means, in whatever way, the division must go; unity must and will be achieved…”

This statement of Sri Aurobindo is in the public domain; in fact the message was broadcast on the Radio. It’s a pity that no political leader of the country with the weight of his personality had at that time approached Sri Aurobindo asking for guidance to resolve the “imbroglio”, seeking his greater clarification about “by whatever means, in whatever way, the division must go.” That is why I had said that “there is no end to our stupidity.”

But presently my simple question is just the following: Do you think that, after sixty years, Sri Aurobindo would have revised his stand vis-à-vis the Partition? accepted it today as a “settled fact”? The rest is immaterial, inconsequential. RYD

Re: Harmonious Confederation by RY Deshpande on Fri 28 Dec 2007 05:36 AM PST Profile Permanent Link Rich You write:

…the idea of nation statehood as a European social construction does not exactly come to my mind when he says partition must go. I think he would have been pleased if a harmonious confederation in pursuit of similar regional, social, cultural interest could be achieved.

I think this observation of yours is very perceptive, quite positive, and I echo with the idea of “harmonious confederation”, the solution which was suggested by the Mother after 1971. And yet the question is: how is it going to be effected? I’ll add that Sri Aurobindo never considered India just a piece of land marked somewhere by geographical lines—she was Motherland for him. While her latitudes and longitudes belong to occult and psycho-spiritual dimensions, there is also something of them projected on the physical. Sri Aurobindo considered her as a mighty Shakti and hailed her so, she a great embodiment of spiritual Power in the cosmic working. Naturally, therefore, one cannot accept her as a fractured person. This is perhaps the basis which we can read in his Independence Day Message. RYD

Good social science knowledge is not available to policy-makers and the public

Secularism: The assassination of Benazir Bhutto posted by Craig Calhoun
Benazir Bhutto was my classmate at Oxford in the 1970s.

It is one of the jobs of social science to help people do better. Social scientists do this by filling in historical background and geopolitical connections. By analyzing demographic trends and structures. By reporting on economic development, gender relations, the state of government institutions, the options for education in villages. Emergencies offer a lens through which to see the interaction of many different factors of social life. But we can only make sense of emergencies if there are studies of these various factors on which we can rely...

Understanding enough to respond in meaningful ways requires knowledge of the contexts and connections in which this event was embedded. And it requires more general knowledge of patterns and causal relationships in social life—of how markets and militaries and popular mobilizations work. Social scientists have long pursued a silly internal dispute that undermines effective public knowledge. Some have favored breaking social life into its most generalizable elements, abstracting from particular contexts. Others have favored studying contexts and connections, seeing the general mechanisms at work in particular situations. We all suffer when one pursuit is valued at the expense of the other.

And by “all” I mean not only professional social scientists but everyone. For when good social science knowledge is not available to policy-makers and the public, both effective planning and democratic judgment of the policies chosen are undermined. Thus we should all want knowledge pursued in depth and discussed among specialists. But we should also want this knowledge synthesized for effective communication—to a broad public, to students, and to policy-makers.

Benazir Bhutto studied social science but made her career in politics. She was an unusually well-educated politician as well as both a courageous and a flawed leader. And one of the virtues of democracy is that well-informed leaders can help to educate broader publics. This is not to say that they should be believed on all points, but that electoral campaigns and public political participation are educational processes. Citizens learn by getting involved. But while we hope that politicians will make use of knowledge and seek understanding, we cannot and usually do not rely on them to educate us fully about public issues. They call attention to crucial points but they also “spin” them. It is vital in a democracy that there also be sources of knowledge to which politicians can be held account, and analyses by scholars who may not always manage to be neutral but whose commitments to the truth outweigh expediency. In Pakistan, as elsewhere, no political party has a monopoly on truth. But when parties and leaders allow open debate, they make it easier for the truth to be seen. And better understanding based on necessary knowledge can make it easier for opposing parties to find common ground on some issues... This entry was posted on Friday, December 28th, 2007 at 4:10 am and is filed under Secularism. [See my most recent book, Nations Matter.] SSRC Home SSRC Blogs Blog Home Pakistan in Crisis.

7. Do social scientists need blogs or other media for interaction? Of course. We need to be challenged by questions, informed about things we forget or never knew, and pushed to be clearer. Would I ever suggest that it makes sense for “the rest of us” just to wait, listen and in due course be enlightened? No! Keep speaking up. Also reading.

Is there anyone today who cries “Mother, mother mine, mother great and free”?

India’s Independence and the Spiritual Destiny
by RY Deshpande on Sun 23 Dec 2007 06:02 AM PST Permanent Link

We must recognise that India is a land of richness, of plenty. She is rich in every respect. She is plenteous materially, vitally, mentally, spiritually. The Veda spoke of corn filled with milk in her fields. She is Bankim’s land of hurrying streams and bright orchard gleams, sujalām-suphalām. Here flourished great kingdoms, here flourished arts and sciences and crafts, here grew industry, commerce, trade. From here spread wisdom and knowledge all over the world. This has been the ancient land of tapasya.

India is rich
Even today India is rich in every respect. Indians may be poor but India is not poor. The soul of the country is as bright as the sun in a clear cloudless summer sky. But it is unfortunate that we do not live in it. We do not live in the brightness of that splendour, in its wonderful day. We do not know our own souls. We have lost contact with our inner being. We are sleeping the dark sleep of mediaeval ages. The unfortunate history of the last thousand years is weighing heavily on our mind and heart and body, on our spirit. But the backlash of time must be set aright. We must return to the foundational principles and values of our nation. We must see the causes, as to where exactly we had failed. We must awake to the call of Vivekananda, of Prabuddha Bharata, to the inspiration and message of Eternal India...

Where is authentic nationalism?
No wonder, we lack the spirit of authentic nationalism. No wonder we do not have our own programmes. We are ashamed of singing the National Anthem in the company of foreigners. We do not have our own priorities. No wonder that, we do not have our own science, our own literature, our own national life. There can be Indian life only when India recovers its Indianness. That is the imperative. When we Indians shall live according to the nation’s swabhāva and swadharma, then only will there be India’s happy fulfilment. Indians must know India. They shall prove the heroes who will steal the Promethean fire from the Hearth of the Spirit. We are looking for adventurers marching in celebration of the Truth. Only from the Fire of Sacrifice, National Yajna, can India rise to lead the countries of the world, assert herself in the march of mankind.

We do not have men “fit for the times”. But there is the expectation that the soul of the country shall awake. It shall arise from the Yajna of the Tapasvins. It shall arise like a radiant goddess. The ancient Rishis lived in the forests, but one-sixth of their tapasya went as a state tax for the welfare of the land. It is that which sustained every excellence of the society. We have to do that kind of national tapasya.

We Indians believe that everything should be done for us by the government. We do not tell what we are going to do for the country. We forget that religion is not a state subject; nor is education, nor can be arts and literature and sports and advancement of knowledge. Organisation of Art and Culture activities by a government office is a strange laughable matter. Never will a dynamic society allow these things to happen. A government’s concern should be governance. It is the society that has to build cultural foundations. It has to put forward progressive social aims. It has to generate awareness to fulfil its own longings. It must do things in the nobility of its creative-expressive spirit...

Humanity’s conscious participation
Our hope lies in being open to the subtler nuances of the working of the forces of life that operate always within and around us. In the totality of our approach we will have to perhaps move from the rational to the luminous intuitive modes and tools of knowledge and action. Fortunate we will be if we can accept, understand and apply what has been given to us by the Seer of the New Age. The vastness of Sri Aurobindo's vision embraces the human difficulties in their several dimensions and offers to them fulfilling solutions. The real problem of the society, as in the case of the individual, is for it to find its soul, the true collective soul. Certainly, it is that which alone can guide it on its evolutionary march towards the emergence of a spiritualised humanity. In its absence, the external ego-self is bound to prove to be a false light; this will also imply that excessive subjectivism of the crude vitalistic kind cannot but lead it to disintegration and destruction.

There has to be a conviction that, culmination of the social development into the Age of the ageless Spirit is the secret urge and motivating force behind the evolutionary Nature’s long painstaking and patient working. Humanity’s conscious participation in it will assuredly hasten this triumph and this glory. The soul of India has the intuition of perceiving these possibilities and India’s freedom is meant for its growth in the progression of the manifesting spirit. If this can be kept as the focus, the celebration of India’s sixty years of independence will then be truly significant...

[NB: The article was first published in the August-September 2007 issue of Mother India, A Monthly Review of Culture, published by Sri Aurobindo Ashram, Pondicherry. The periodical was celebrating the 60th Anniversary of India’s Independence.] Keywords: Yoga, Vedanta, Veda, Tagore, SriAurobindo, Spirituality, Review, Religion, Pondicherry, Poetry, Pakistan, Mysticism, Life, Krishna, India, History, Hinduism, Gita, Education, Culture, Ashram

Conversion to CNG

Social Entrepreneurs - Silently Changing the World
from Desicritics by Shantanu Dutta

We have all heard of entrepreneurs. They are the business people with a difference; the ones with a prophetic footprint, who see an idea where others see only obstacles and then they unlike the dreamers and the visionaries go and do some thing about it. If their ideas succeed and they often do, the world is a different and often better place for their efforts. When I think of this genre of businessmen, the names of Sabeer Bhatia and Sam Pitroda are some of the Indian names that come to my mind.

When I had first heard of the Ashoka Foundation, I had imagined in my mind that it would be the social arm of a traditional Indian business house. With a name linked to the Emperor Ashoka, this was not a very unlikely possibility. Later on, when I discovered that they promoted social entrepreneurship, it still did not mean much to me.
So just who is a social entrepreneur? Allow the Ashoka Foundation, which popularized the term to explain: Social entrepreneurs are individuals with innovative solutions to society’s most pressing social problems. They are ambitious and persistent, tackling major social issues and offering new ideas for wide-scale change. Bill Drayton, the founder of Ashoka expands by saying that “Social entrepreneurs are not content just to give a fish or teach how to fish. They will not rest until they have revolutionized the fishing industry”
Although the term is one not often heard used in India, we have plenty of them, starting of course with the emperor Ashoka whose conversion to Buddhism sparked a 180 degree change in methods of governance in ancient India that was radical. Drayton cites the shift in the emperor’s paradigm – from merely holding on to the kingdom and enlarging it to ensuring that subjects living in the kingdom were well cared for and looking after their welfare as one of the most monumental acts of social entrepreneurship which inspired him to name his foundation which would support future entrepreneurial initiatives after the Buddhist icon.

Drayton has other unlikely inspirations. He cites the late Acharya Vinoba Bhave and his innovatively conceived Bhoodan and Gramdaan initiatives which largely failed as experiments in social entrepreneurship. The early years of the foundation and the movement it seeks to catalyze are documented in the appropriately titled book How to Change the World: Social Entrepreneurs and the Power of New Ideas (Penguin Books, India) authored by David Bornstein which was released in India by the IT entrepreneur, Narayana Murthy of Infosys.

Have there been other social entrepreneurs in India since Ashoka? Plenty, but their names might not be as familiar to the average Indian as the entrepreneurs from the world of business. I, who work in the social sector could recognize only a few whose work and activity occasionally draws them media attention – Javed Abidi, the disability activist, Flavia Agnes, the human rights lawyer, who appears occasionally on NDTV, Anil Aggarwal, the environmentalist whose crusade brought CNG buses to Delhi and Jeroo Billimoria of child line and a few others.
I think that social entrepreneurs deserve a bit more of name recognition, brand recognition too if you will, for the invaluable work that they do quietly and largely unsung in the grassroots. For at the end of the day, it does not matter how much India’s economy grows and what our GDP is if the disabled do not have access to jobs and amenities, if children do not have access to help, shelter and safe spaces and the elderly lives of lonely neglect. Gandhi famously remarked that the way in which we treat minorities is the measure of civilization in a society. In differing ways, we have all failed Gandhi’s test but the social entrepreneurs are trying hard to make a difference. They deserve our applause and laudation.

Government solutions are the answer to problems created by free markets

Rethinking belief in the perfection of free markets

America’s wealthiest colleges have endowments that are thousands of times greater than those at the least fortunate schools. The chasm is far deeper than that in other realms. After all, overpaid chief executives and investment bankers pay inheritance and income tax, so their wealth diminishes over time. Heavily endowed colleges and universities, however, suffer no such setbacks...

The investment income from Harvard’s endowment in the last academic year was reported to be nearly $7 billion — a 23 percent gain from the year before. At even the current low tax rates it wouldn’t hurt Harvard to give up $1 billion or so of its gains in order to make the sharing of our intellectual wealth fairer. Other colleges could make such a donation similarly unscathed.

I know it won’t be easy to convince well-off schools to share their wealth. But they should. They should see this act as part of a down payment on their professed mission: to create a stronger, smarter and ultimately more stable society. Herbert A. Allen is the president of an investment firm. nytimes.com/2007/12/21/

Editorial Decongesting the Skies NYT: December 21, 2007 The Bush administration’s remedy for the nation’s overcrowded skies, months in the making, correctly zeros in on the New York area where steady and sometimes monumental delays have created flying misery across the nation...The main feature of the plan, to take effect in March, involves flight caps at Kennedy International Airport — just more than 80 flights an hour at peak times, versus a load that reached 105 flights last summer.

The government should also consider expanding the use of military air lanes beyond holidays. For now, the administration deserves credit for not ignoring summer’s disastrous delays, for opening debate on a tough issue and for recognizing uncharacteristically that government solutions were the answer to a problem created by free markets. nytimes.com/2007/12/21/

Blindly Into the Bubble By PAUL KRUGMAN NYT: December 21, 2007 So where were the regulators as one of the greatest financial disasters since the Great Depression unfolded? They were blinded by ideology.

“Fed shrugged as subprime crisis spread,” was the headline on a New York Times report on the failure of regulators to regulate. This may have been a discreet dig at Mr. Greenspan’s history as a disciple of Ayn Rand, the high priestess of unfettered capitalism known for her novel “Atlas Shrugged.”

In a 1963 essay for Ms. Rand’s newsletter, Mr. Greenspan dismissed as a “collectivist” myth the idea that businessmen, left to their own devices, “would attempt to sell unsafe food and drugs, fraudulent securities, and shoddy buildings.” On the contrary, he declared, “it is in the self-interest of every businessman to have a reputation for honest dealings and a quality product.” ...

But Mr. Greenspan wasn’t the only top official who put ideology above public protection... Of course, now that it has all gone bad, people with ties to the financial industry are rethinking their belief in the perfection of free markets. nytimes.com/2007/12/21/

Editorial Arrogance and Warming NYT: December 21, 2007 The Bush administration’s decision to deny California permission to regulate and reduce global warming emissions from cars and trucks is an indefensible act of executive arrogance that can only be explained as the product of ideological blindness and as a political payoff to the automobile industry...

One of Mr. Johnson’s arguments was that a “national solution” to carbon dioxide emissions was preferable to a “confusing patchwork of state rules.” A national solution is precisely what the administration has refused to offer. And the California rule — once in force there and in 17 other states — would in fact constitute a uniform standard covering nearly half the car market. That is why the automakers lobbied so fiercely against it. It has been hard enough to trust Mr. Bush’s recent assertions that he has finally gotten religion on climate change. It all seems like posturing now. nytimes.com/2007/12/21/

Should we then go back to the caves! Can we stop Evolution?

Sri Aurobindo 6 Posted on Dec 19th, 2007 by Barin Confusions and Explanations I

During a discussion on Sri Aurobindo, a friend of mine stated that in order to solve the present evolutionary problems faced by the mankind, one should go back to Nature. Going back to Nature is the solution, instead of trying to transcend and transform the mental-vital-physical being of Man.
She quoted me from Sri Aurobindo : What Sri Aurobindo represents II and then said: The present evolutionary crisis is the result of an inequality between the limited faculties of man - physical, vital, mental and spiritual - and the technical and economical means at his disposal. Without a total and all-comprehensive inner change man can no longer manage and control the gigantic development of the outer life. The overwhelming importance of the collectivity, of the State is only a substitution of the collective ego in place of the individual ego. Humankind can survive only by a radical transformation of human nature. [ Sri Aurobindo : What Sri Aurobindo represents II ]

"I think an aspect of this is that humanity can best survive by returning to our true human nature, namely a pre-separation from GOD identity. It lies within each man and woman to do this, even right now, without further evolution or transformation, should the will simply become engaged and decide to release to the Wild Divine."

My friend had thus raised a deep-rooted and fundamental question of utmost importance. She thought that by going back to our "true" nature, bereft of the conception of God and stopping further evolution and transformation, humanity can best survive, and this can be attempted by individuals even now.
Should we then go back to the caves! Let us then withdraw ourselves from all our scientific, medical, intellectual, aesthetic, cultural and spiritual advancements and turn to our "true" aboriginal nature, as some people may still be doing in Andaman Nicobars, or in Taiwan or somewhere in South Africa, or even South America! Or, if nobody is found now-a-days, let us go back to the era of the Neanderthals! Let us forget God! Let us forget evolution and transformation!
Let us then go back to our cave, where we might be dwelling some fifty thousand years back, or even earlier. Let us then live a wild life, along with our wild animal neighbors, dressed in leaves and eating raw fruits etc only!
Would we be saved then? Would I no more require any education, any philosophy, any music, any art, any search for beauty, for truth, for goodness? Or should we no more need any medicine, any books, any food or dress which civilization or culture taught us to use? Would we not then contact anyone else anywhere through internet , or anyone over telephone, or even through post and telegraph, or be informed of the world news or the news of my country?
Let us forget everything for a while. But what shall we do with our inner Fire, our inner Urge, our inner Intensity to surpass all my limitations, all our animal wildness that makes us slaves, our unquenched eagerness to surpass all darkness and ignorance, and our askesis to receive the Help of any higher Power in our difficulties, in our sufferings and in the matters of death and diseases?
Can any human - who is nothing if he is separated from the Infinite Consciousness, who is an insect if he or she is pre-separated from God, the Eternal and Supreme Consciousness - can any human being survive if he or she is reduced to an wild animal, or to a natural helpless insect, after his Journey towards Fulfillment and Victory for fifty millennia or more?
And if we become separated from the Divine, will the Divine separate ourselves from Him? Are we independent enough to do that? In our being and in our composition, is it possible? Is God our imagination or our creation, so that we can stop Him from being, or do away with Him from our life?
Can we stop Evolution? Can we choose to do away with the necessity of Transformation?
If we stop Evolution, Evolution will stop us, the human beings! If we stop Transformation, we will be discarded by the Force transforming us! ...Posted on December 20, 2007 by Barin

When Sri Aurobindo wrote the book The Life Divine, He had already reached the threshold of the Supramental Consciousness, far above the plane of the Intuitive Mind, far above Intuition. He interpreted rationally in His philosophical treatise The Life Divine all His Wisdom and Knowledge that He reached directly by Identification, not only by Intuition. He did not discard Reason. To discard Reason and accept Intuition would have been against His approach of Integration. Can we and should we discard Reason which had been a help to us for millennia for surpassing the surrounding darkness? Reason may not be the highest means of Knowledge. But till the coming of Intuition, it has to be there. Only, it has to be transformed and widened and illumined as far as possible. It is an instrument, and its proper use is in our hands.
And all that appears to us as Intuition is not intuition. There are many false signals also. And the old earth-Nature, in its animal kingdom, worked with instincts. And often the humans work with impulses. All these have to be searched and scrutinized, for they appear to many people as Intuitions. And there are the Anti-Divine Forces, who intimations and we may often think that they are Intuitions. The Mother has many times cautioned us against all these.
These clarifications are added here, in order to ensure that those who read about Sri Aurobindo in my Blog or anywhere else are not misled by the words for their various meanings and usages.
Barin
Written on 20-09-2007 Posted in Zaadz on 20-12-2007. Access: Public Add Comment Print Send views (14) Tagged with: Sri Aurobindo, Mira Alfassa, The Mother, Supermind, The Supramental Manifestation, Evolution, Transformation

We need a fundamental reinvention of economics and its guiding indicators

Re: The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein by Rich on Mon 10 Dec 2007 08:40 PM PST Profile Permanent Link
well trickle down was just a slogan, that worked for a while until 20 years later when we see the disparity between CEO and line Worker is now 400 fold, rather than 20 fold!

But, were they thinking of the great social good, or the self-interest of an economic elite, I'd say the later. Friedmanism worked in Chile for awhile, but there is a Socialist back in power, as in most of South America, and I believe this is one of the most promising new economic counters to Neo-Liberalist Globalization, and the acceleration of the gap between the wealthiest and all the rest.

But sure, the neo-conservative Hayek, Friedman, and to an extent the neo-liberalist economist Jeffery Sachs thought they were doing great things when imposing shock therapy on Chile, Bolivia, Russia, and so did Deng in Tiananmen Square which began China's Shock Therapy China. Of course we all know about the well intention neo-cons Chaney, Rumsfield Wolfawitz, and the hundreds of thousands of Iraqs who have died and millions who are homeless. But shock therapy in theory and practice has real consequences for human beings.

Yes, the Chicago Boys did control the scourge of inflation, but they are ideologically driven Nerds. They respect calculations, modeling of populations on the economic man. They were like the engineers in early systems modeling platforms, disconnected observers playing with formulas and feedback loops with no requirement to empathize with the populations under control. Their position like the omniscient observers in the control rooms of cybernetic laboratories. When you are taking on the role of Cosmic Agent initiating vast economic turbulance and throwing millions out of work it is easy to loose touch with the lives of others. Your own salary like those of CEOs of multinationals increasing with the amount of workers you can downsize.

by ronjon on Tue 11 Dec 2007 09:12 AM PST Profile Permanent Link
I've just begun reading Riane Eisler's new book: The Real Wealth of Nations: Creating a Caring Economics. It seems obvious to me that we need a fundamental reinvention of economics and its guiding indicators. Here's a short video (7 minutes) of Riane describing her book: And here's another interesting link: www.globalonenessproject.org/ ~ ronjon

Reform democracy - use the information technology for human-self governance

Shreepal, a Concerned Global Citizen: A call to create New Civilization Zones !

14 Jun 2007 @ 14:45 by shreepal : Design versus Evolution

Yes, dear a-d, we are working to create a new civilization by our conversation. I appreciate your stand that to you the most important aspect of any subject matter is how it defines our ETHICS. Ethics - a normative prescription - is only a result, an outcome of a particular view point. It is the result of an understanding of things around us. We are human beings, rational beings, and we have to proceed to form our understanding by reason.By building our worldview on the foundation of current knowledge (science), we can proceed further to deduce our normative prescriptions, that is, ethical edicts. We cannot first take a particular ethics as correct one and then proceed to find reason for the same. However, there is another aspect to ethics. Ethics is a matter of heart and not of mind. But then there is not much scope for insisting on its justification on the basis of reason. You referred me the links that challenge Darwinism and advocate Creationism.

This debate, which is now fairly old, puts the matter as Science versus Faith. We need not jettison science to prove faith as the correct viewpoint. Science stands on somewhat solid foundation and we cannot jettison science, even on ethical grounds. If we donot believe in science, we have no moral right to use its products, on which our civilization is standing in which we live. Creation by a Willful Design is correct; but then Darwinism is also correct, though as it stands modified today. Why this Willful Design cannot adopt an evolutionary method as is suggested by Darwin? Is this Wll powerless to devise and put in use a mechanism that is found, as a hard fact, by science? Evolution, not only of life but even of Universe with all the galaxies, black holes etc. beautifully supports Creation by a Willful Design. Any way, please keep the faith up; I am with you there.

10 Jul 2007 @ 16:21 by shreepal : Life is complex...

Dear a-d, thanks for the enlightened comment on the subject under discussion. There has been delay on my part in reponding to your comments because I was enjoying my tranquility away from the wired world. The quotes by you from the Ming's Blog are the factual reality. Life is indeed complex, with all that it is comprised of, individually and collectively. And, still these things are very much ordered and precision-oriented, though we very often are unable to understand this precision. This is inability or deficiency only on our part. This reflects the lower level of our - human beings' - evolutionary stage. We are sure to understand better this clockwork of Nature with the passage of time; and this is evolutionary march. This simple fact - fact of evolutionary nature of our understanding - teaches us that we should not be fundamentalist, the rigid one, in our attitude. Again thanks and I apologise for the delay on my part.

28 Aug 2007 @ 08:44 by shreepal : True democracy, current need of mankind

The goal is to advance mankind collectively at the rapid pace towards her destination, whatever it might be. To anable this to happen, mankind has three elements to fall back upon: huaman resource, which includes human beings and their knowledge of science and technology available today; machines and tools made available to them by this scientific technology; the best co-ordination of these two elements to produce optimum result to the benifit of collective mankind. Mankind benifits by this co-ordination in the form of having goods that help her in lessening her hardship in their struggle against Nature, which does not yield easily in giving rewards of this struggle. These rewards are reflected in their standard of life. What could be this best co-ordination?

One way is to allow individuals, who are actuated by the sole motive of earning profits to get maximum comforts, to take initiative to bring together the elements for production of these goods in the maximum productive mode. There could be another way also. It could be to allow mind's planning to bring these production-elements together in the best productive mode. This planning can be done by people in a democratic manner, that is, by the people out of their free choice. It is a hoax, which is of sufficiently long standing now, that such planning can only be done by a dictatorial regime. It can be done in a more efficient manner in a democracy, provided there is true democracy. What is true democracy? It is self-governance of people where the will of the people is faithfully expressed and allowed to work.

Today, such true democracy is possible by the use of the available (information) technology. To make this happen two things are required: firstly, use this technology to elect people's representatives and to replace them constantly; and secondly, educate people, and particularly educate them in science, so that they can take an informed decision about their genuine welfare. Today's international agenda should be: reform democracy - use the information technology for human-self governabce. If people are empowered by the use of technology they would take care of themselves and of their best interests. With the help of today's science and technology there is no reason for the unemployment, poverty, ignorace, diseases and social-conflicts to exist on earth today; these today are mostly the signs of our improper use of the aforesaid three elements at our disposal.

We wrongly associate the glitter of our modern civilization to the industry and foresight of a few (a few in the face of the multitude of mankind) champions of private initiative. This glitter only belongs to our science and technolgy, which is harnessed only in a limited manner because of the inherent limitations of the nature of private initiative. Science and technology could be put in a more efficient way and better productive mode by planning by mind than by these few leaders. Such planning of production would be more benificial to mankind and more glittering in appearance.

1 Oct 2007 @ 13:26 by shreepal : Development, progress and planning

What is planning by Mind? What is planning by Desires? There is a general direction along which the human society is moving ahead. The signature tune of this direction is the humans struggle against Nature and their efforts to make this struggle less arduous and more result-yielding, which we call development and progress. This general direction may also be called the goal of human evolution. There is this goal, which constitutes one element in planning things by humans. Then, there are several factors, which are parts of another element in the planning, that may be arranged inter se in different combinations. These factors include man-made socio-economic relations of humans in the given society and natural resources available therein.

And, then there is another element. It is the governing principle that dictates the pattern of this arrangement of the factors. This governing principle determines the "specifics" of manner of arrangement in service of this evolutionary goal. If the governing principle is Mind, it is planning by Mind. If the principle is Desires, it is planning by Desires. There is also a principle that is higher than Desires and Mind and things in society may be arranged in its light, which would be better than the things arranged in the light of Desires or Mind. But the himans collective consciousness today has not reached at the stage where things arranged in the light of this higher principle may be acceptable to them. All this classification is from the relative point of view of human consciousness, which has a concrete reality and is of great importance for the future of human beings in their physical existence.

First among equals

Ravi Mathai the living legend T T Ram Mohan ET 13 Dec, 2007

Fourthly, what is, perhaps, Mathai’s greatest bequest to IIMA: the principle of a single term for the director. After six years as director, Mathai stunned the community by announcing his decision to step down and stay on as professor. He gave two reasons for doing so.

• One, leaders of academic institutions tended to use their positions for career advancement; this was not good for the institutions.
• Two, it was important to establish the principle that the director’s position is not hierarchical; he is only first among equals. You are professor, you become director and then you become professor again.

This one contribution of Mathai’s cannot be overstated. In the present scheme of things, the director has sweeping powers. The board of governors does not quite have the monitoring authority of a corporate board. Faculty governance can work only to the extent the director is willing to let it work.

Limiting the director to one term is vital to good governance. It is the knowledge that a director’s actions can be looked into once he has reverted to a faculty role, the certainty that he will be cut dead in the corridors by colleagues whom he has mistreated that acts as a check, however inadequate, on the incumbent.

There is more to Mathai’s enduring impact than his grasp of the principles of good governance in academic institutions. He managed the relationship with government with great skill. He was a superb man-manager with the gift of drawing out the best in people. Above all, he had moral authority: he brought to his office high integrity, a spirit of sacrifice and self-effacement.

India has been fortunate in having had great institution builders. At the national level, we had people of the make of Nehru, Patel and Ambedkar. At the organisational level, we have had the likes of Homi Bhabha, Vikram Sarabhai and RK Talwar (of SBI). In that constellation of institution builders, Ravi Mathai shines brightly.

Adolescent motive to aggrandize the individual ego

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Putting economics back to where it was in the firs...": Tusar,

Your next post re babarianism and the Shock Doctrine provide an excellent riposte to the adolescent fools at MR and their celebration of "creative" destruction.

The film/movie of some years ago titled Beavis & Butthead Do America sums up the motives and the actions of the anti-"culture" that these adolescent fools advocate. Two morons who quite literally trash everything they come across. Applied "creative destruction"!!!

Meanwhile a quote.

"When the entire world founds itself on the adolescent motive to aggrandize the individual ego-"I", then everyone is collectively working towards the destruction not only of human culture and mankind itself, but even of the Earth itself, the very vehicle that supports life."

Posted by Anonymous to Savitri Era Political Action at 4:48 AM, December 13, 2007

Economic Barbarism and the neo-conservative agenda

Re: The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein Science, Culture and Integral Yoga

by Rich on Sat 08 Dec 2007 10:04 AM PST Profile Permanent Link I forgot to add when I posted this article, that the disaster Capitalism practiced by the Chicago School of Economics authored by Hayek and Friedman and a standard practice of the neo-conservative agenda is, in my opinion, the incarnation of the Economic Barbarism Sri Aurobindo refers to in the Human Cycle.

Reply by ronjon on Mon 10 Dec 2007 01:59 PM PST Profile Permanent Link What a scary article Rich! Yet it feels true.

• Do you think that the Chicago School economic fundamentalists believe their Friedman gospel will lead (eventually) to a better world for all (via "trickle down" or whatever)?
• Or are they self-serving through and through, with no need for justifying rationales?
• Re IY, I'd be interested in your perspective of how SA's essay on "The Principle of Evil" (posted on SCIY by RYD a couple of weeks ago) might relate to such horrifying practices as the shock doctrine? ~ ronjon

Putting economics back to where it was in the first place

Tyler Cowen on Adam Smith from Adam Smith's Lost Legacy by Gavin Kennedy

Tyler Cowen, a top economist blogger at Marginal Revolution (here) is interviewed by KnowledgeWharton (here)

Tyler Cowen is right: “He had an inner drive to get his ideas out there.” I especially liked the second quoted paragraph:

“Adam Smith, was also a moral philosopher. This is returning to the true roots of economics. I think it's the other economists who have been subversive. I'm just putting economics back to where it was in the first place and never should have left. Economics used to be a moral philosophy, very connected to the humanities."

This has got to be the right approach to economics today. Having abandoned so much of the field of political economy as seen by Adam Smith, many economists have retreated into a mystical imaginary world of their own, replete with mathematical abstractions far removed from how economies work with people in them.

The interview is about Tyler Cowen’s book, The Inner Economist. It has persuaded me to get it for myself this Christmas.

Alternatives to capitalist/market version of (commodity) exchange

Steven Shaviro The Pinocchio Theory

I think that The Mad Man stands alongside Marcel Mauss’ The Gift and Pierre Klossowski’s La monnaie vivante (Living Money, unfortunately still not published in English translation) as one of the great texts about alternatives to capitalist/market version of (commodity) exchange. trackback 7:31 AM

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Graeber discusses Marcel Mauss’ theory of the gift as an alternative to orthodox economic assumptions about the centrality of markets and “exchange”, and Pierre Clastres’ arguments about societies that explicitly sought to avoid the formation of a State. 8:19 AM

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Rancière probably wouldn’t like this assimilation, but I think that his theory of art fits well into the Kantian-Deleuzian genealogy of aesthetics that I have been trying to pursue. Kant’s aesthetics has to do with the singularizing limits and extremities of the mental faculties, with the points at which they break down or enter into discord with one another, or (as Deleuze reads Kant) find a harmony only through this discord. In other words, commonality and universality are precisely problems for “aesthetic judgment”; Kant takes commonality and universality for granted in the First and Second Critiques, but problematizes them in the Third. The problem of aesthetic judgment is the problem of communicating things (sensations) that are absolutely singular, and heterogeneous in relation to one another.

In a way, therefore, the problem of aesthetic judgment is the same as the problem of the commodity in Marx (how a universal equivalent can be found for things that in themselves are heterogeneous), and also as the problem of how to find a “common” or commonality or communism that is not just a reductive quantification via translation in terms of the universal equivalent (this is the side of the Marxist problematic that is highlighted in Hardt and Negri’s discussion of “the common”; following it out would seem to involve both thinking Marx and Kant together as Karatani does, and thinking about alternative currencies and trading systems, which Karatani approaces vis his interest in LETS networks, and which Keith Hart has done a lot to illuminate, referring to Mauss’ The Gift as well as to the Marxist tradition)...This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 5th, 2007 at 12:11 pm and is filed under Books, Theory. RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback

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There is something I miss in Rancière, however, and that is a sense of political economy, as opposed to just politics. This absence may have something to do with Rancière’s rejection of his Althusserian Marxist past. He is certainly aware of the plutocratic aspects of today’s neoliberal network society. He doesn’t make the mistake of focusing all his ire on the State, while ignoring the pseudo-spontaneity of the Market and its financial instruments. But he never addresses, in the course of his account of democracy, the way in which economic organization, as well as political organization, needs to be addressed.

Here, again, is a place where I think that Marx remains necessary (and also, as I said in the previous post, Mauss — as expounded, for example, by Keith Hart). Exploitation cannot be reduced to domination, and the power of money cannot be reduced to the coercive power of the State or of other hierarchies. Aesthetics needs to be coupled with political economy, and not just with politics. So I still find a dimension lacking in Rancière — but he helps, as few contemporary thinkers do, in starting to get us there. This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 5th, 2007 at 4:42 pm and is filed under Books, Politics, Theory. RSS 2.0 feed. leave a response, or trackback 5:25 AM 5:33 AM