The Effect of Modern “Development” Trends on the Pacific
By Rev. James Bhagwan
General Secretary, Pacific Conference of Churches
Presented at
Reweaving the PNG Household – Towards a PNG Ecological Framework for Development (PNGEFD)
Papua New Guinea Council of Churches
Association of Protestant Churches and Missions in Germany
Church Partnership Programme
Alotau, August 19th – 23rd, 2019
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Excellencies, Mothers and Fathers of the Church and Community in Papua New Guinea, dear sisters and brothers:
My sincere appreciation to PNGCC, Bread for the World and the Church Partnership Programme and the Australian High Commission for their work to host this meeting.
Last Wednesday, during the CSO/NSA dialogue, I reflected on the Blue Pacific concept of the type of Pacific Regionalism focused on by the Pacific Islands Forum as a Pacific Household. This theme of household was part of the leaders’ reflections and responses on the issues we discussed during that dialogue.
I also highlighted common Pacific values of spirituality, family life, traditional economy, culture, mutual care and respect, which celebrates quality of life and values human beings and creation over the production of things.[1]
Last Tuesday night, when we had the official opening the Forum Leaders’ Meeting, the devotion by the President of the Ekalesia Kelisiano Tuvalu, Rev. Kalahati Kilei, shared a contextual reflection on the final parable of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, from Matthew 7: 24 -27 – the Wise and the Foolish Builder – a house built on foundation set in the rock or a house simply built on the sand.
While speaking to the contexts of both Tuvalu and Climate Change and Pacific regionalism and the Leaders’ Meeting, Rev. Kilei reflected on the household, saying that, “in our Pacific culture, ‘house/home – fale’ is an integral part of our culture as it builds the very foundation, security and resilience for our children, our families and island communities. House is not simply a dwelling place or a shelter, it goes well beyond such perception. A house is were relationships are created based on love and justice, where wisdom from the house flows. This is the particular aspect of our Pacific life that cannot be found elsewhere – only in what we call “HOME”.
To build a house on the rock, he said, was a call “to build a strong spiritual foundation that is based on love and justice.”
Referring to the wind and the rain and the waves in the parable as, “‘cyclones and rains’ that not only teardown our communal way of living and force us to accept the logics offered by neo-capitalism that relationship is only possible in the market space.” Rev. Kelei, observed that these were “the new rains and cyclones that deteriorate and shook the very foundation of our faith in God – these rains and cyclones draws boundaries with our neighbours.
He challenged leaders that the future of the Pacific, “must not be measured by commercial terms – but rather determined by the smile and the happiness of our children. Jesus Christ is the foundation of our faith was convicted, killed because of the economic and political ideologies of the time – hence, he took that cross, pain and agony into his own hands because of his love and compassion for the whole world.”
Rev. Kelei, used that concept that speaks to all of us. The household.
The conference background booklet has a section on the PNG Household which is the adopted framework by PNGCC and CSOs, not only for ecumenism but that the PNG context for Household means and includes the human community and the environment.
Whether from an Economic perspective, an Ecological perspective or an Ecumenical perspective – the household is key. That is of course because the root word for all three in Greek is “Oikos,” the home or the household – which can also be understood as the whole inhabited earth.
The words economy (oikos-nomos, meaning – the proper management of the household), ecology (oikos-logos, meaning- the studied knowledge of our planetary household), and ecumenicity (oikou-menikos, meaning an openness to the worldwide household) all share a basic orientation to home.
Yet the sad reality is that economics no longer deals with the whole household—with the economic subsystem’s impact on society as a whole and its social, ecological, cultural context. The current focus on economics alone has led to the dangerous assumption that the household is only made up of one room.
There is a famous Native American saying, which is becoming to sound more and more like our future reality if the hunger for economic gain overshadows the concerns of the rest of the household:
“Only when the last tree has died and the last river has been poisoned and the last fish been caught will we realize we cannot eat money.”
The Western model of development, based on a ideology of domination has severed the sacred thread that connected economics, ecology, and morality with devastating consequences. We have forgotten that an eco-system is a system whose elements interact with their surroundings, the ecological, social, intellectual, and spiritual context as a unit – the whole household.
While the roots of our Pacific indigenous science and technology, philosophy and wisdom go back many millennia, the story of the severing of the sacred connection between economy, ecology and the sacredness of the household of this planet, is only a few hundred years old. For while there have been structures of dominance, structural legitimation of oppression and economic imperialism for more millennia, the present model of development and the widespread exploitation and destruction of the environment is very much a result of the modern age.
The eighteenth century in Europe was marked by a revolutionary social and technological epoch known as the Enlightenment. During this period there were major developments in intellectualism, philosophy, politics and religion known as the Age of Reason; in farming techniques, known as the Agricultural Revolution and in technology and economics, leading to the Industrial Revolution. This dramatic process of change marked the beginning of the modern age. Accordingly it was also a time of rapid social change.
However it was a “century of contrasts,” as the Enlightenment’s “imposing superstructure was built on a foundation of poverty and wretchedness,” that was for the most ignored by ruling class and intelligentsia who were satisfied with the status quo. “Prosperity of the nation presupposed a permanent pool of poverty to sustain it and that there was a providential arrangement which had decreed that the many poor should serve the interests of the few rich.”[2]
The Enlightenment is best understood as an intellectual movement during the eighteenth centurythat had at its core, an intellectual scepticism to traditional beliefs and dogmas. The term “Enlightenment,” signifies an “illumined” contrast to the supposed dark and superstitious character of the Middle-Ages. Among the strains of thought that developed were:
A belief in the natural sciences as the correct model for thinking about the social and natural world over, for example, theology and metaphysics or indigenous/traditional knowledge and wisdom; and the accumulation of systematic knowledge within the progressive unfolding of history.[3]
In the space where the economic and the political met, the Enlightenment gave rise to “Whig history.” The term comes from the 18th century, when members of the English Whig party tended to see the past as continual progress toward the then-present state of liberty and enlightenment.[4]
When first coined, the term “Whig history” described a narrative where everything just got better all the time. Whiggish people were those celebrated as the Great and the Good among white men. Whiggish politicians argued that everything was being done for the good of the people, whether the people understood or agreed or not. Whiggish activists argued that they knew best what was good for everyone. This narrative promoted the widest spread of western civilisation, yet.
This narrative argued that each following set of development ideas would be the next level of joyous civilisation. To argue against this type of development model was, according to the Whig narrative, to argue against civilisation.
An example of the modern-day version of this Whig narrative in economic development terms was a declaration by the European Commission in 2010 that:
In many developing countries, the sustainable provision of public services that is necessary to achieve and maintain the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) requires an increase in domestic revenue. Their tax-to-GDP ratio ranges between 10 to 20% as opposed to 25 to 40% in developed countries.
The argument there is that as European nations have built high tax large State economies and considered themselves rich and developed; therefore, those countries which wish to become rich and developed must have high tax large State economies.
The Whig narrative is based on the principle that what exists now is great and everyone who wants to get to this level of greatness must do it in the same manner “we” did. That is, do what the Great and Good tell them to. Not just that “we think this is the best way to do it” but that it is the only acceptable mode of development.
As an example, think of the development of radio. Developed countries began with Short Wave, than Medium Wave and then FM and now online broadcasting and podcasting. But no development advisor these days would recommend that a country trying to strengthen communication networks use shortwave – which only need one transmitter and can be heard all over the world. Because they have moved online and that is the way to do it.
By insisting that how developed countries got to where they are is the only way anyone can become developed, all of those very interesting lines of enquiry are blocked off.[5]
In the 19th century, attention first focused on Pacific in the context of imperialist agendas. While initial interest centred on the need to secure raw materials for the burgeoning European industries, focus later shifted to the developing markets of Eastern and South-Eastern Asia and the desire to secure optimum geo-strategic positions.[6]This culminated in military conflicts in second and third quarters of the 20th Century. As Asia developed and Asian economic imperialism began in the last quarter of the 20th Century, the Pacific remained both unfinished business for Western Whig narrative of development and a source of raw materials for the now burgeoning Asian and Australasian industries.
We can see then that even Economic Globalisation which entails domination through an unjust economic system[7]followed the Whig narrative.
Making no reference to basic needs of the community, this economic paradigm assumes that wants are unlimited, while the means to satisfy them are limited.
It has dramatically transformed the nature of power. Democratically elected governments and their delegates in international organizations lose power to increasingly influential international bureaucracies, transnational corporations, media-owners and actors in the field of financial “global” capital.
Many political and economic processes require some kind of regulation at the international level. The need for international agreements, however, should not be employed by the state at the expense of the necessary protection of vulnerable people.
Economic globalization in its present form threatens values such as justice, charity, peace and sobriety which are rooted in Christian traditions. It replaces them with the values of unrestrained consumerism and increasing commercialization of society. Education, health care, arts, sports, the media, the environment and even safety are increasingly dominated by financial considerations. The culture of economic rivalry is usurping the culture of social co-operation with adverse consequences for weak and vulnerable people. [8]
There is something seriously wrong with an economic system that produces so much suffering and poverty, exploitation of labour and widespread environmental devastation.
The acceptance of things like “planned obscelescence” – intentionally designing things to break down in the interests of making more money because one doesn’t have to cover the real costs (pollution, environmental degradation in production methods, etc.) associated with waste. This leads to the throwaway disposable culture. These kinds of waste and degradation happens because we don’t acknowledge and appreciate what we’ve been gifted and because we continue to follow the Whig narrative that all of this is part of progress and is good for us.[9]
(Examples: Laptops, Smartphones, disposable items)
Pacific Island Forum Leaders meeting in Nauru last year emphasised how the negative externalities of consumption-based economic growth are undermining the health of our oceans and the safety of our climate. Indeed, despite sound climate science, the global economic system still privileges waste and consumption over well-being and ecological biodiversity. [10]
The Pacific has an opportunity to establish an economic ecological framework that is meaningful to the region, and indeed the world. A framework in that envisions what an economy might look like if it were to be based on the value of leaving our ecological value intact rather than extracting it.”
This narrative of development requires the changing of the story and reweaving if we are not only to survive the climate crisis, the social and economic crises in our region- but are to flourish.
One attempt to change the story at the turn of this century was the World Council of Churches project called the Island of Hope. The Island of Hope recognised that while Western economics revolve around profit and economic growth, the traditional economies of the Pacific are concerned with people and the total quality of their lives; caring and concern for others within the extended families and compassion for all people, especially for the sick and elderly are values of the communities; respect, hospitality, generosity, and forgiveness are other marks of the traditional communities. Nobody is excluded.[11]
The land, the sea and people are integral parts of one entity. Subsistence farming, a sustainable agriculture and the sensitivity of the sacredness of the trees and the sea are part of their identity. While traditionally these values operated mainly within the context of the wider family or clan, Jesus challenges us to extend them to all, because we are all members of the family of God
The Island of Hope is in tune with nature and by sharing and caring, to which people want to journey in order to celebrate life in all its fullness (Isa. 25:6). The Island of Hope has the “mana” (power) to draw human beings together.”
The Island of Hope is sustainable, wholesome, peaceful and all-embracing. The concept of the Island of Hope is not merely a dream. It is founded in reality and has been our normal life in our islands. This concept of the Island of Hope resonates very strongly with the PNG Household framework.
A key task that has been identified is agreeing to define the aggregated data on our shared ecological biodiversity as a regional good. Combining modern technology with traditional knowledge and practices, people living on remote islands can become data collectors and auditors for the ecological value of our ocean continent. Armed with such data we can account for it as regional equity, use it for risk informed decision making in the face of environmental uncertainty and, indeed, define the very substance of our ocean continent.[12]
Our task in Reweaving begins by opening up the mat, the thatching on the roof of our household and removing those strands which no longer fit in the new household and new mat we wish to weave.
Thankyou tru.
[1] World Council of Churches, Island of Hope: The Pacific Churches’ Response to Alternatives on Globalisation, (Geneva: WCC, 2001), 5
[2] Richard M. Cameron, “Methodism and Society in Historical Perspective,” in Methodism and Society: Volume 1 (New York /Nashville: Abingdon Pres, 1961), 27-28.
[3] Tim May and Jason Powell, Situating Social Theory(Maidenhead, United Kingdom: Open University Press, 2008), 7-8.
[4] Cyrus Mody and W. Patrick McCray, “Big Whig History and Nano Narratives: Effective Innovation Policy Needs the Historical Dimension,” in Science Progress, 6thApril, 2009, https://scienceprogress.org/2009/04/big-whig-history-and-nano-narratives/
[5] Tim Worstall, The Whig View of History, The Adam Smith Institute, 25th April, 2010, https://www.adamsmith.org/blog/tax-spending/the-whig-view-of-history
[6] Werner Kreisel, “The 21st century: A ‘Pacific Century’? An Introduction,” in The Pacific Challenge: Development Trends in the 21st Century, Michael Waibel / Werner Kreisel (Ed.) Published as Volume 10 of the series “Pacific Forum” Universitätsverlag Göttingen, 2005
[7] Island of Hope, 5
[8]Island of Hope, 23
[9] Tarita Holm, Belau Association of NGOs (BANGO), Notes on 2019 CSO / PIFLM Dialogue presentation
[10] Timothy Bryer, Remarks to the PIFS Regional CSO Forum 2019
[11] Island of Hope,5
[12] Tim Bryer, Presentation to PIFS Regional CSO Forum 2019
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