Occupy Wall Street - Corporate greed protest on NY's Brooklyn Bridge

Island, the last novel that Aldous Huxley wrote in 1962, is set on Pala, an imaginary island community in the Indian Ocean. The peaceful and truly content inhabitants have developed an idyllic society by committing themselves to personal spiritual growth based broadly on Shivaite Buddhism, along with some Hindu, Tao and Confucius influence. In addition they steer clear of the three pillars of Western prosperity: armaments, universal debt and planned obsolescence, the depreciation that is purposefully built into so many of our manufactured goods to encourage continual and wasteful replacement. The Palanese have equality without loss of individual initiative, empathy for all living beings and respect for the environment. And they hold an overriding belief that God is all pervading or immanent, and man is potentially transcendent, constantly seeking to find the Nirvana or Enlightenment of the ancient Eastern wisdoms.
Sadly the earthly paradise of the island is doomed. It is overtaken by the greed and militarism of an adjoining country, triggered when an English sailor shipwrecked on Pala becomes caught up in a world take-over bid for the island’s oil.

Fast forward to the plight we see today - the ever widening gap between the few rich and the very many poor. And much of the reasoning for this is tied up with the many flaws in our global economy, some at corporate level. I know that I am not alone in thinking that the loss of corporate heart and soul is not good for our planet.
As the late Anita Roddick explained, ‘The huge relentless wheel that is global capitalism is driven by faceless, unaccountable bureaucrats and businessmen who seem deaf to the needs of individuals, communities, indeed whole nations. Yet it takes little imagination to see that this situation is unsustainable if we wish to have a planet that is worth living in, and not one where the developed world becomes a fortress to repel the needs of poorer nations’ (or, indeed where, much closer to home, the 1% wealthy are cocooned and oblivious to the needs of the 99% who struggle for a better living). That is what Occupy Wall Street is all about.

Alastair McIntosh observes that a large company is:

"…a mindless monster, unless people all the way through the system devote themselves to making it otherwise. Then, and only then, can it start to become more like a community with values, and maybe even something of a soul…this means …having an ethic that serves profit but transcends mere money making. It is only human goodness that can bring this about and so humanize the otherwise inhumane world created by emergent properties of greed.

The wealthy corporate bosses need to listen to the people. Meanwhile the protest on New York's Brooklyn Bridge continues, and the world is watching.

Anita Roddick, 2001, Take it Personally: How Globalization Effects (sic) You, London: Thornson, 2001, From Introduction, quoted in http://www.pcdf.org/SVN_Living_Economies.htm#N_2_


Alastair McIntosh, Soil and Soul: People versus Corporate Power, London: Aurum Press, 2004.

Flaws in our Economy - Large companies lose their heart and soul

Those of you who have been following this blog over the last week or so know that I am exploring some of the fundamental flaws in our global economies. Later I shall consider ways in which we can correct some of these flaws. Meanwhile I am back to companies and the way they operate.

As a company grows, (and remember we have an economy where companies are driven to grow or die), it loses its heart and soul, it becomes ‘a person greater than its individual participants with powers that create, interpret or rise above the law, almost at will,’¹ no less than an ‘ogre striding the globe’, as Peter Challen describes them. M. Scott Peck warned of this fragmentation of conscience across a group such that it becomes less than the sum of all the individual consciences. He called it ‘passing the moral buck’, ² and saw this as a great potential for evil.

I know that I am not alone in thinking that the loss of corporate heart and soul has to be corrected at grass roots level, with the individual. Many agree that we have to change our values, submit to higher principles of love and truth and put profit motive firmly in its place. How on earth do we achieve that?

As the late Anita Roddick explained, ‘The huge relentless wheel that is global capitalism is driven by faceless, unaccountable bureaucrats and businessmen who seem deaf to the needs of individuals, communities, indeed whole nations. Yet it takes little imagination to see that this situation is unsustainable if we wish to have a planet that is worth living in, and not one where the developed world becomes a fortress to repel the needs of poorer nations.’³ At the end of the day, the Scottish environmentalist, human ecologist and activist Alastair McIntosh has observed, ‘It is the people that matter and can make a difference.’ A large company is

…a mindless monster, unless people all the way through the system devote themselves to making it otherwise. Then, and only then, can it start to become more like a community with values, and maybe even something of a soul….this means …having an ethic that serves profit but transcends mere money making. It is only human goodness that can bring this about and so humanize the otherwise inhumane world created by emergent properties of greed.⁴

With so many flaws in our existing system of finance, what should we do?

I am interested to hear others' views on what I have written thus far.

1. Peter Challen, 2005. Exposing Corporate and Money Autocracy to Public Scrutiny as Major Threats to the Global Commons http://www.sustecweb.co.uk/past/sustec13-2/exposing_corporate.htm From It’s Simpol ! -- The Simultaneous Policy News, Winter 2004/05 The quarterly newsletter from the INTERNATIONAL SIMULTANEOUS POLICY ORGANISATION (ISPO)

2. M. Scott Peck, People of the Lie: The Hope for Healing Human Evil, London: Arrow, 1990, p. 249.

3. Anita Roddick, 2001 Take it Personally: How Globalization Effects (sic) You, London: Thornson, 2001, From Introduction, quoted in http://www.pcdf.org/SVN_Living_Economies.htm#N_2_

4. Alastair McIntosh, Soil and Soul: People versus Corporate Power, London: Aurum Press, 2004, p. 280

Making the World a better place - The Big Issue

An article on baritone Bryn Terfel, advice on starting a small business, some beautiful poetry, photography, and artwork, film reviews including one on The King’s Speech, other reviews of sculpture, music events, books. A weekly magazine of wide appeal – and this is all for £2. A women’s magazine? A colour supplement? No it’s the Big Issue, approaching its 20th birthday in 2011. And the small business mentioned above is the business to help the homeless away from begging, sleeping rough, and the inherent dangers in their lifestyle, often forced upon them by circumstance.
The idea was launched by John Bird and Gordon Roddick, co-founder with his late wife Anita Roddick of Body Shop. John and Gordon saw a scheme on the streets of New York, where the homeless were given a free magazine and allowed to keep the proceeds of sale. They saw no future in this model, believing that this simply perpetuated the begging ethos. So they founded the Big Issue. With this model the homeless buy the magazine for £1 and sell it for £2. They therefore have the makings of their own small business, having to make decisions from day to day about how many magazines they will be able to sell, how much of their proceeds they should reinvest in to stock and how much is available for their food etc. They have the opportunity to interact with the public everyday, to engage with humankind; and that is essential for self esteem, confidence and human flourishing. And there are many success stories about those who have lifted themselves up from their life of poverty, cold, hunger, begging, through starting off with selling The Big Issue.

Another article in The Big Issue for January 3-9, 2011 is 36 Ways to Make the World a Better Place in 2011. Way Number 1 is to promote The Big Issue to help these people regain their spirit, bounce back from their often desperate situation, “sow the seeds of their own salvation.” (p. 9)

So don’t walk by, looking down at the pavement when you see one of these “small business” entrepreneurs. Buy their magazine. It’s only £2. Read it on the bus or the train or the tram as you travel home, give it to others to read when you have finished with it, let them see that it is interesting whilst serving such a worthwhile purpose. Help The Big Issue to make the world a better place in 2011.