This week’s column concludes the discussion of inequality and poverty in Guyana. It focuses on the moral and ethical aspects of these phenomena. And with that in mind the quotation in the title is none other than Pope Francis’ famous tweet sent earlier this year to Roman Catholics. Readers may well already know that the tweet has swept the world by storm, heartening and also enraging citizens everywhere because it has been viewed by most as both a blunt rejection of the status quo and a stirring appeal for social justice and equity.
I am not a Roman Catholic and even though I realize many readers would have already known about the tweet, I have discovered from internet searches it is sourced to the Pope’s Evangeli Gaudiam, published in 2013. In my opinion that 2013 document is easily the finest piece of writing I have ever come across on the subjects of inequality, equity and social justice. I therefore strongly recommend it to readers.
The worst in the best of us
The 2013 document emphasizes that inequality breeds the worst in the best of us. In particular, it notes that those who suffer from inequality become outraged, resentful, and eventually vengeful due to their circumstances. Meanwhile, on the other hand, those who benefit from inequality want to keep things as they are (maintain the status quo). Their benefits become all important; they hide them; they are deceitful about their extent; and, further, they become hoarders of their excesses. Perhaps worse still, beneficiaries of inequality move to embrace corruption, fraud and evasion of regulatory oversight (including from the legislature).Guyanese should also be aware that, worldwide, they have also embraced and supported the use of force against those who would deny them their excesses!
In my view, there are three core features of inequality as depicted in the Evangeli, which are the most dangerous, namely, 1) that in all its manifestations, whether economic, social, political, cultural, racial or religious, inequality is in essence the denial of human equality and it has influences on state institutions and the wider society; 2) that everywhere (including Guyana) equality is intrinsic to humanity and therefore it can never ever be justly and legally forfeited; 3) that therefore, the innate evil of inequality resides in its rejection of equal human worth. It follows from these observations that it is always obscene and unworthy to treat citizens as ‘second class’ for any reason whatsoever and/or to support persons and groups who consider themselves ‘too big to jail.’ Put another way, we might say the processes of unequalization and impoverishment in Guyana are essentially dehumanizing.
Furthermore, the Evangeli explicitly rejects contemporary economic inequality as is observed in the following condemnation: “We can no longer trust in the unseen forces and invisible hand of the market. Growth in justice requires more than economic growth, while presupposing such growth: it requires decisions, programmes, mechanisms and processes specifically geared to a better distribution of income, the creation of sources of employment and integral promotion of the poor which goes beyond a simple welfare mentality.”
One particular quote indicates Pope Paul’s strong position on inequality and therefore, its direct relevance to Guyana: “As long as the problems of the poor are not radically resolved by rejecting the autonomy of markets (and I should point out, especially our small, fractured and uncompetitive markets) and financial speculation and by frontally attacking structural causes of inequality, no solution will be found” to either the world’s or Guyana’s problems.
The Evangeli poses a number of other challenges for today’s world including its rejection of 1) a world economy based on the systemic exclusion of some countries; 2) the prevailing idolatry of money as the essential source of all value; 3) financial firms and structures that are better organized to rule than to serve society; 4) societies that reproduce inequality that spawns conflict. Indeed the aim of a just world should be to promote a global culture that consistently challenges persecution, alienation, selfishness, and pessimism
The conservative reaction
There have been thousands of tweets in support of, as well as strongly opposing Pope Francis’ famous tweet. I will review opposing positions in this section. I begin with citing the opposing tweet, which more than any other highlights the powerful impact of Piketty. The tweet was sent by a distinguished, if disgruntled reader, Joe Carter of the Acton Institute, who chides the Pope for trading the gospels of Peter and Mark for Piketty, a radical economist!
Over the years, perhaps the most celebrated conservative statement on the dysfunctional effect of a primary preoccupation with equality in the management of the economy and society has come from Milton Friedman. He argued: “A society that promotes equality before freedom gets neither. A society that puts freedom before equality will get a high degree of both.” Undoubtedly, this statement represents the idealist basis of free market capitalism, unfettered private property, and unrestrained individualism. It is a purist rejection of state and other social, collective or community/group based interventions aimed at directing/guiding private economic and social behaviour.
Many readers may find Friedman’s quote an overly simplified vision of the challenges confronting Guyanese today. This limited vision is further compounded by the consideration that Friedman presents equality and freedom as opposing goals, requiring a societal tradeoff of one for the other. No progressive position/ideology that I am aware of entertains this. Instead progressive positions on social change represent freedom and equality as complementary and even synergistic goals, enriching and energizing each other.
Conclusion
Readers might well ask: what does this brief exploration of the moral, ethical, or even philosophical issues portrayed in today’s final column have to do with the pressing reality of burgeoning inequality and poverty in Guyana? I hope today’s column raises much needed awareness of equity and justice; leads readers to question accepted dogmas and so-called facts; challenges official social data and their quality, methods of preparation, quality, and form of presentation. Hopefully, above all, it might well serve to encourage evidence-based analyses as inputs to national dialogue and advocacy on behalf of the poor and powerless.
