More equality better for all
The most progressive political vision for a country should be to reduce the gaps in society. Because it is the gaps between rich and poor that create our modern social problems – and those problems also fall upon the more well-to-do.
According to the book ”Spirit Level – Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better” (which I first presented at March 25) all groups in society will be affected by higher inequality. People in more equal societies, like Sweden, do better than people in more unequal societies, like the UK. Their health is better, so is life expectancy, infant mortality, obesity, mental illness etc...
In poor countries life expectancy etc goes up with the economic development. However, when the economy has reached a higher level there is no longer a correlation between life expectancy and income. That is the case among the thirty or so richest countries in the world.
Among those rich countries there is instead a strong correlation between life expectancy etc and the rate of inequality. In ”Spirit Level” inequality is determined as how much richer the richest 20 per cent of a society is compared to the poorest 20 per cent. In more unequal societies, like the UK and USA, the richest 20 per cent are 8 to 9 times richer than the poorest. In more equal societies, like Japan and Sweden, the richest 20 per cent are about 4 times richer.
What about the trends? Unfortunately, not encouraging. Inequality seems to be more popular than equality, inequality has risen in most developed countries during recent decades. In the UK inequality went up dramatically during Margaret Thatcher and has been high since then. In Sweden, which is much more equal, the income gaps have also widened since the early 1990s.
Most countries in the world need a lot of economic growth, so they can reach the level of standard that we in the rich world enjoy. However, have we in the rich countries reached the end of what economic growth can do for us? Is it time to shift focus from more growth to more equality?
(”Spirit Level – Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better” by Richard Wilkinson dan Kate Picket, Alen Lane 2009.)
Monday, May 4, 2009
Monday, April 6, 2009
Is aiding abetting?
An African author and economist, Dambisa Moyo, is interviewed in Guernica about aid, especially about western aid to Africa:
"Systematic western aid, Moyo argues in Dead Aid, has essentially turned Africa into one giant welfare state. The unending stream of money has created a situation where governments aren’t accountable to their citizens: since they don’t depend on tax revenue, leaders don’t think they owe their people anything—and the people don’t expect anything from their leaders. Moreover, says Moyo, since the money flows virtually no matter what, tyrants like Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe (three hundred million dollars in foreign aid was sent to Mugabe in 2006 alone, says Moyo) often pilfer it and buy foreign goods, or stow it in foreign bank accounts where it does nothing to help the country. Furthermore, aid stamps out entrepreneurship. Moyo offers the example of an African mosquito net maker. When aid arrives in the form of a hundred thousand mosquito nets, the net-maker is out of business, and one hundred and sixty people (employees and dependents) are now aid-dependent. This, she says, is not a sustainable model."
There are good reasons to question the aid that has flowed into Africa since 1970, because during the same period powerty has gone up from 11 percent of the total population to 66 percent. Instead of more aid Moyo wants trade and investments, which makes a lot of sense. (Read the article: Aiding is Abetting)
An African author and economist, Dambisa Moyo, is interviewed in Guernica about aid, especially about western aid to Africa:
"Systematic western aid, Moyo argues in Dead Aid, has essentially turned Africa into one giant welfare state. The unending stream of money has created a situation where governments aren’t accountable to their citizens: since they don’t depend on tax revenue, leaders don’t think they owe their people anything—and the people don’t expect anything from their leaders. Moreover, says Moyo, since the money flows virtually no matter what, tyrants like Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe (three hundred million dollars in foreign aid was sent to Mugabe in 2006 alone, says Moyo) often pilfer it and buy foreign goods, or stow it in foreign bank accounts where it does nothing to help the country. Furthermore, aid stamps out entrepreneurship. Moyo offers the example of an African mosquito net maker. When aid arrives in the form of a hundred thousand mosquito nets, the net-maker is out of business, and one hundred and sixty people (employees and dependents) are now aid-dependent. This, she says, is not a sustainable model."
There are good reasons to question the aid that has flowed into Africa since 1970, because during the same period powerty has gone up from 11 percent of the total population to 66 percent. Instead of more aid Moyo wants trade and investments, which makes a lot of sense. (Read the article: Aiding is Abetting)
Sunday, April 5, 2009
About changing your opinion…
It should be a natural and common thing to change your own view. Instead it creates almost a sensation if a well known person changes his or her opinion. Lately in Sweden, Marit Paulsen, an politician, writer and an old advocate of organic food, published a new book where she criticizes some of her old opinions. The reason is that ecological agriculture gives less production than ordinary agriculture and therefore need more energy per unit. And that is not good for the environment, particularly not for the climate.
However, why does it make big headlínes if someone changes his or her opinion? After all, as someone else, in old China I believe, wrote: If you have the same opinion today as the day before yesterday, what did you learn yesterday?
I have no desire to change my basic values (about equality etc) – but whenever I find a good reason to change my opinions (such as how to promote more equality), then I hope I won’t hesitate.
By the way, Marit Paulsen emphasizes in her new book that the most important contribution for the environment you can make when it comes to food is to finish all leftovers and throw away as little as possible. All production of food – ecological or not – require a lot of energy.
It should be a natural and common thing to change your own view. Instead it creates almost a sensation if a well known person changes his or her opinion. Lately in Sweden, Marit Paulsen, an politician, writer and an old advocate of organic food, published a new book where she criticizes some of her old opinions. The reason is that ecological agriculture gives less production than ordinary agriculture and therefore need more energy per unit. And that is not good for the environment, particularly not for the climate.
However, why does it make big headlínes if someone changes his or her opinion? After all, as someone else, in old China I believe, wrote: If you have the same opinion today as the day before yesterday, what did you learn yesterday?
I have no desire to change my basic values (about equality etc) – but whenever I find a good reason to change my opinions (such as how to promote more equality), then I hope I won’t hesitate.
By the way, Marit Paulsen emphasizes in her new book that the most important contribution for the environment you can make when it comes to food is to finish all leftovers and throw away as little as possible. All production of food – ecological or not – require a lot of energy.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
After capitalism…?
What will be the end of the economic crisis we are facing? A reformed capitalistic system, maybe an ”enlightened capitalism”, according to Neville Isdell (Coca Cola) or something else? The good thing with a crisis is that it opens up for new possibiities. Like forests, which need large forest fires now and then to thrive, societies may need economic crisis now and then to develop.
However, a new economic system – or a reformed capitalistic system – is needed not only to handle our financial systems. Above all, it’s needed to handle the main problems and challenges of today: poverty, inequality, environmental problems, especially global warming, etc.
The capitalistic system is very efficient in creating economic growth – but is that the most urgent need today? More and more people seem to answer ”no”. And it might be easy to agree, thinking of all our abundant consumption – at least here in the rich countries. However, most people in the world have never experienced any ”abundant consumption”, hardly any consumption at all.
All these people still desperately need eonomic growth. Would it be possible to develop an economic system that on one hand creates growth in poorer countries and on the other leads to a ”steady-state” situation in the richer societies?
In Prospect, the British monthly magazine, Geoff Mulgan has written a very readable essay, ”After Capitalism”: After Capitalism
What will be the end of the economic crisis we are facing? A reformed capitalistic system, maybe an ”enlightened capitalism”, according to Neville Isdell (Coca Cola) or something else? The good thing with a crisis is that it opens up for new possibiities. Like forests, which need large forest fires now and then to thrive, societies may need economic crisis now and then to develop.
However, a new economic system – or a reformed capitalistic system – is needed not only to handle our financial systems. Above all, it’s needed to handle the main problems and challenges of today: poverty, inequality, environmental problems, especially global warming, etc.
The capitalistic system is very efficient in creating economic growth – but is that the most urgent need today? More and more people seem to answer ”no”. And it might be easy to agree, thinking of all our abundant consumption – at least here in the rich countries. However, most people in the world have never experienced any ”abundant consumption”, hardly any consumption at all.
All these people still desperately need eonomic growth. Would it be possible to develop an economic system that on one hand creates growth in poorer countries and on the other leads to a ”steady-state” situation in the richer societies?
In Prospect, the British monthly magazine, Geoff Mulgan has written a very readable essay, ”After Capitalism”: After Capitalism
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
The root cause to most problems?
Inequality is the root cause to almost all common social problems in the developed countries. That is the message in a new book: The Spirit Level – Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better (Allen Lane 2009). The authors, Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, claim that countries with less inequality, such as Sweden, also have less social problems than more unequal societies such as United States or United Kingdom.
Wilkinson and Pickett also claim that it’s not only the poor within a society that suffer from those problems but also the well-to-do. Those with higher incomes in more equal societies have for example a longer life expectancy than similar people in more unequal countries. Conclusion: inequality seems to have a direct negative impact on all groups in a society.
I will probably have reason to write more about this book later, but here are two links to try out:
– Equality Trust
– The Guardian
Inequality is the root cause to almost all common social problems in the developed countries. That is the message in a new book: The Spirit Level – Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better (Allen Lane 2009). The authors, Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, claim that countries with less inequality, such as Sweden, also have less social problems than more unequal societies such as United States or United Kingdom.
Wilkinson and Pickett also claim that it’s not only the poor within a society that suffer from those problems but also the well-to-do. Those with higher incomes in more equal societies have for example a longer life expectancy than similar people in more unequal countries. Conclusion: inequality seems to have a direct negative impact on all groups in a society.
I will probably have reason to write more about this book later, but here are two links to try out:
– Equality Trust
– The Guardian
Well-educated barbarians or…?
I happened to find an article on Internet, written by a Swedish social scientist, Bo Rothstein, 2006: ”The Constitution in a Multicultural Society” (my translation from Swedish). Rothstein quotes Yehuda Bauer, one of the leading scientists about the Holocaust, when he explaines what he regards as the most decisive reason why such an extreme annihilation could take place in a culturally developed nation like Germany.
Bauer’s explanation is that many of the most well educated in the German society – doctors, university teachers etc – became members of the Nazi party because they were promised good future prospects and status. When those ”intellectuals” started to collaborate with the party about the genocide it became easy to convince the rest of the people of the necessity to take part in the murder in order to achieve an utopian future.
Bauer, and Rothstein, wonder of course if we – the societies of today – still are producing ”technically competent barbarians at our universities”?
I would like to quote Ragnar Ohlsson, who several years ago wrote a definition of the Swedish word ”bildning”, which is a broader concept than just ”education” and in English maybe best could be translated into ”enlightenment”:
Is this a vision that characterizes modern universities?
I happened to find an article on Internet, written by a Swedish social scientist, Bo Rothstein, 2006: ”The Constitution in a Multicultural Society” (my translation from Swedish). Rothstein quotes Yehuda Bauer, one of the leading scientists about the Holocaust, when he explaines what he regards as the most decisive reason why such an extreme annihilation could take place in a culturally developed nation like Germany.
Bauer’s explanation is that many of the most well educated in the German society – doctors, university teachers etc – became members of the Nazi party because they were promised good future prospects and status. When those ”intellectuals” started to collaborate with the party about the genocide it became easy to convince the rest of the people of the necessity to take part in the murder in order to achieve an utopian future.
Bauer, and Rothstein, wonder of course if we – the societies of today – still are producing ”technically competent barbarians at our universities”?
I would like to quote Ragnar Ohlsson, who several years ago wrote a definition of the Swedish word ”bildning”, which is a broader concept than just ”education” and in English maybe best could be translated into ”enlightenment”:
”Bildning” can be understood as the shaping of yourself into a social human being. ”Bildning” lead to a kind of general life preparedness. You are ”bildad” if you have a wider perspective on your life, if you can see it in a wider context than the narrow everyday life, if you can see the relations between yourself and the rest of the world, the biosphere, other human beings – now living, dead since long time and future generations. But ”bildning” is not only intellectual skills and understandings; ability to take action and ethical qualities are essential elements in that shaping of your personality ”bildning” is supposed to provide. (My translation.)
Is this a vision that characterizes modern universities?
Children literatur prize to Palestinian institute
A Palestinian institute, helping children on the West Bank and in Gaza to read and write, has got this years literatur prize in memory of the Swedish writer Astrid Lindgren, probably most famous for her books about "Pippi Longstocking". The Tamer Institute for Community Education got the prize, the world's largest for children literature, for its work in promoting reading and learning among children on the occupied territory (Tamer Institute).
It feels good to read positive news from the West Bank and from Gaza; unfortunately there are too many of other kinds of news. Here is another newsletter from my recent stay in the West Bank (see also Marsch 21 and March 23):
Security controls several times a day…
Many of us are nowadays quite used to security controls at airports. It’s not especially pleasant, you have to remove waistbelts and everything else which contain some metal etc. However, the security people are generally kind and helpful, they might even speak your own mother tongue – at least when you are travelling from your home country – and they make efforts to help you if it’s the first time for you.
Imagine that you have to pass such security controls two or more times every day, often after spending quite a long time queueing together with a lot of people who all need to pass the same control. Imagine that the security personnel often are not especially kind or helpful and that they many times appear patronizing and indifferent. Imagine also that small ”mistakes” from you can lead to – in best – unpleasant interrogations. If you are unlucky you might end up in a detention cell for a few hours before you are allowed to continue – if you are allowed to continue.
The security people also speak a language you probably don’t understand or only understand a little of and they seldom know more than a few words of your own language.
Besides, the security personnel is heavily armed, which hardly contribute to a positive atmosphere…
This could probably be an example of a military security control or checkpoint anywhere in the world, where such things exist. It is for sure an example of a checkpoint in the West Bank. There are different kinds of cheskpoints, larger or smaller, more or less permanent etc. Israel occupies the West Bank since more than forty years and many of the checkpoints are today permanent constructions.
During most of the time since the Six Day War 1967, the number of checkpoints was quite few and simple and they were mostly along the so called Green Line, the armistice line from 1949. However, during the last period, especially after the second Intifada, the checkpoints have become much more common and many of them are today well planned, with walkways which remind of those which are used for cattle and with narrow – very narrow – turnstiles. In the bigger checkpoints you will probably have to speak in a microphone with a soldier you hardly can catch a glimpse of behind thick panes of glass.
Bags and suitcases are generally controlled with x-ray, as at airport security controls, while cars are searched carefully.
Some things seem to happen randomly. A couple of young men, who are standing in the queue, are for example forced to open their bags and show the content for everyone to see – despite the fact that the bags anyhow have to pass the x-ray machine. In this case, the bags contained only sweaters and trousers. However, if they instead had happend to have underwear in their bags it might not have been as ”fun” to show all the others in the queue.
If you are a Palestinian and happen to have an ID-card with similar last digits as some one looked for, then you have to be prepared for trouble. For some reason the soldiers seem only to read the last four digits (according to Machsom Watch, an Israeli volontary organization of women who are watching checkpoints in order to make sure that the soldiers are following the rules and not are causing more problems for the Palestinians than necessary). And if those four digits are ”wrong”, then you risk being taking into detention until the soldiers have checked whom they have put into detention – and that might take some time…
Even if the soldiers are kind and acting with respect – which happens – the whole system is of course humiliating. Those who want to pass a checkpoint are – regardless of age and sex – totally depending on the soldiers, around twenty years old, who are actually doing the controls without having any training for such sensitive missions (according to ”Breaking the Silence”, an organization of mostly former officers who are informing Israeli citizens of what is happening on the occupied territory).
The soldiers are commanded to serve at checkpoints during periods of about three months, to meat people they probably have almost no knowledge about. After these three months they continue with their military training, which is something totally different from controlling ID-cards. For a long time some of the military leadership have been worried about the fact that soldiers are requiered to check ID-cards instead of preparing themselves for real wars.
The whole system also means that a lot of people loose a lot of time every day by passing checkpoints. I’m not sure about what would be the worst for me, the humiliation or all the time I would have to spend waiting in queues…?
(I worked for the Christian Council of Sweden as an Ecumenical Accompanier, serving on the World Council of Churches’ Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel (EAPPI). The views contained in this report are personal and do not necessarily reflect those of the Christian Council of Sweden or the World Council of Churches. If you would like to publish or disseminate it further, please first contact the EAPPI communications officer and managing editor (eappi-co@jrol.com) for permission. For mor information see: www.eappi.org/en/home.html)
A Palestinian institute, helping children on the West Bank and in Gaza to read and write, has got this years literatur prize in memory of the Swedish writer Astrid Lindgren, probably most famous for her books about "Pippi Longstocking". The Tamer Institute for Community Education got the prize, the world's largest for children literature, for its work in promoting reading and learning among children on the occupied territory (Tamer Institute).
It feels good to read positive news from the West Bank and from Gaza; unfortunately there are too many of other kinds of news. Here is another newsletter from my recent stay in the West Bank (see also Marsch 21 and March 23):
Security controls several times a day…
Many of us are nowadays quite used to security controls at airports. It’s not especially pleasant, you have to remove waistbelts and everything else which contain some metal etc. However, the security people are generally kind and helpful, they might even speak your own mother tongue – at least when you are travelling from your home country – and they make efforts to help you if it’s the first time for you.
Imagine that you have to pass such security controls two or more times every day, often after spending quite a long time queueing together with a lot of people who all need to pass the same control. Imagine that the security personnel often are not especially kind or helpful and that they many times appear patronizing and indifferent. Imagine also that small ”mistakes” from you can lead to – in best – unpleasant interrogations. If you are unlucky you might end up in a detention cell for a few hours before you are allowed to continue – if you are allowed to continue.
The security people also speak a language you probably don’t understand or only understand a little of and they seldom know more than a few words of your own language.
Besides, the security personnel is heavily armed, which hardly contribute to a positive atmosphere…
This could probably be an example of a military security control or checkpoint anywhere in the world, where such things exist. It is for sure an example of a checkpoint in the West Bank. There are different kinds of cheskpoints, larger or smaller, more or less permanent etc. Israel occupies the West Bank since more than forty years and many of the checkpoints are today permanent constructions.
During most of the time since the Six Day War 1967, the number of checkpoints was quite few and simple and they were mostly along the so called Green Line, the armistice line from 1949. However, during the last period, especially after the second Intifada, the checkpoints have become much more common and many of them are today well planned, with walkways which remind of those which are used for cattle and with narrow – very narrow – turnstiles. In the bigger checkpoints you will probably have to speak in a microphone with a soldier you hardly can catch a glimpse of behind thick panes of glass.
Bags and suitcases are generally controlled with x-ray, as at airport security controls, while cars are searched carefully.
Some things seem to happen randomly. A couple of young men, who are standing in the queue, are for example forced to open their bags and show the content for everyone to see – despite the fact that the bags anyhow have to pass the x-ray machine. In this case, the bags contained only sweaters and trousers. However, if they instead had happend to have underwear in their bags it might not have been as ”fun” to show all the others in the queue.
If you are a Palestinian and happen to have an ID-card with similar last digits as some one looked for, then you have to be prepared for trouble. For some reason the soldiers seem only to read the last four digits (according to Machsom Watch, an Israeli volontary organization of women who are watching checkpoints in order to make sure that the soldiers are following the rules and not are causing more problems for the Palestinians than necessary). And if those four digits are ”wrong”, then you risk being taking into detention until the soldiers have checked whom they have put into detention – and that might take some time…
Even if the soldiers are kind and acting with respect – which happens – the whole system is of course humiliating. Those who want to pass a checkpoint are – regardless of age and sex – totally depending on the soldiers, around twenty years old, who are actually doing the controls without having any training for such sensitive missions (according to ”Breaking the Silence”, an organization of mostly former officers who are informing Israeli citizens of what is happening on the occupied territory).
The soldiers are commanded to serve at checkpoints during periods of about three months, to meat people they probably have almost no knowledge about. After these three months they continue with their military training, which is something totally different from controlling ID-cards. For a long time some of the military leadership have been worried about the fact that soldiers are requiered to check ID-cards instead of preparing themselves for real wars.
The whole system also means that a lot of people loose a lot of time every day by passing checkpoints. I’m not sure about what would be the worst for me, the humiliation or all the time I would have to spend waiting in queues…?
(I worked for the Christian Council of Sweden as an Ecumenical Accompanier, serving on the World Council of Churches’ Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel (EAPPI). The views contained in this report are personal and do not necessarily reflect those of the Christian Council of Sweden or the World Council of Churches. If you would like to publish or disseminate it further, please first contact the EAPPI communications officer and managing editor (eappi-co@jrol.com) for permission. For mor information see: www.eappi.org/en/home.html)
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