Round The World
New Delhi, 27
January 2023
India’s G-20
Moment
RESET GLOBAL
ETHICS
Dr. D.K. Giri
(Prof.
International Relations, JIMMC)
Indian
politics and its governance, since India took over the presidency of G-20 last
December is abuzz with the planning and execution of events involving the
member countries. For the whole year, the entire country will be agog with
activities and festivities showcasing India’s assets in various sectors in
order to attract world attention. About 200 meetings have been scheduled in the
run-up to the Summit by the end of the year. They have begun to happen. G-20
year coincides with ‘400 days’ (396 at the time of writing this) of preparation
for the next parliament elections. The government will go all guns blazing to
earn glory without and power within by gaining another mandate.
Be that as
it may, competitive electoral politics is a part of the game in a multi-party
democracy. It should all be good for Indians, at any rate, as the government
will put its best foot forward at home and abroad. Prime Minister Modi has
promised to make fundamental as well as radical provisions for the poor in the
country in these 396 days. Admittedly, the government led by Modi, in the last
9 years, has come up with many innovative ideas and schemes in multiple
sectors. Some of them have been good, and if we listen to critics, quite a few
have not been so. The Foreign policy has been a mixed bag too. I have
repeatedly referred to such gains and losses, hits and misses, every week in
this column.
Today, I
wish to make a tangible suggestion that may lift India, mainly the Prime Minister
to the level of a Vishwaguru that he perhaps aspires for. And South Block has a
chance to present it as one of India’s core cultural and civilisational assets.
New Delhi has consciously coined the slogan for the G-20 Summit 2023, that is
“One Earth, One Family, One Future”, underscoring the essential oneness of the
world, expressed in the immortal words in chapter 6 of Maha Upanishad. They
read, Ayam Nijah, Paro Veti, ganana laghuchetcam; Udaracartitanatu,
Vashudheiva kutumbakam; One is a Relative, the Other Stranger, say the
Small-minded, but the Magnanimous say and believe that the entire world is a Family.
It is a
powerful, emotional, and social moral value indeed. The organisers of G-20
events have sounded a sensitive ethical tone, redolent of the words of Swami
Vivekananda, ‘Sisters and Brothers of the world’ in his speech at the World Parliament
of Religions in 1893, in Chicago, that had shaken the psycho-social proclivities
of those present there.
The sherpas
of G-20 may be well-advised to introduce another Indian, spiritual,
civilisational and ethical wisdom that may provide much-needed alternative to
the world. It may, in fact, begin to reformulate the global ethic concerning
planning, management and governance. That is putting people first.
According to
religious beliefs, people were created in the image of God. What is the
prevailing principle for growth and governance in the world? That is, to amass
wealth, regardless of moral and human values. And to use the power of that
wealth to control the citizens in a country, and confront other countries for
territorial expansion, economic and military domination etc. The nouveau riche
China epitomises this pernicious principle. China has validated the Marxian
concept of economic determinism in a malevolent manner having scant regard to
social and moral issues that Karl Marx failed to reckon- freedom of choice,
equality, justice and a host of other human rights.
The
consequences of the above strategy embraced by the world, typified by China are
horrendous. Some of them were captured by our Foreign Minister in 3Cs- Covid,
Climate Change and Conflict. There are many more in myriad forms. However, such
a growth strategy has created a Frankenstein like China, thanks to the
companies in the rich, western world who sought to exploit the cheap and
captivated Chinese labour force.
This has
also caused a universal debate and dichotomy between several contrasting
concepts; democracy and authoritarianism, leaders have begun to doubt the
economic efficacy of democracies, and to be enticed by the so-called gains of
Chinese authoritarian model; quantity and quality, pulled to greater production
and consumption that override the need for harmony and happiness, note the
Gross Domestic Happiness in contrast to GDP, propounded by a country like
Bhutan, located geographically and notionally between India and China; materialism
and metaphysics, embodied by the apostle of enlightenment, Lord Buddha who renounced the former and embraced the latter
signified in love, compassion and humanism; need and greed, remember the famous
warning of Mahatma Gandhi, “the world has enough for everyone’s need, but not everyone’s
greed”. Heedless of such advice, the capitalist companies seduced the people
for covetous consumption which led to a waste economy.
Furthermore,
nature and culture, the current model of growth led both by the countries in
the North and China based on ruthless and violent exploitation of the nature is
causing conflicts for resources and negative impacts of climate change
including pandemics; men and machine, the planners mercilessly ignored men and
women and focussed on machines leading to unbridled and unnecessary consumption
of technologies that dismantled social structures and disrupted human
interaction that is the bedrock of social harmony in and across countries.
Such
consequences were prophetically warned by the legendary German-English economist,
EF Schumacher who propounded the concept of Buddhist economy that made people
central to planning and the use of relevant machines which he called
Appropriate Technology. Buddhist Economics is also called compassionate economy
as it underlines the values of empathy and compassion. When his fellow-economists
asked him in ignorance of the concept, “Fritz, we understand your concern for
the poor, but what has compassion got to do with Economics?”. The conventional
economics is driven by the logic of profit maximisation etc. Schumacher stunned
them with his reply, “economics without compassion is like having sex without
love.”
Let India
take the initiative in resetting the Global ethic -- refocussing on people and
reinforcing the power of fellowship and compassion that should hold together
families, communities and countries. If the world is a family, as India has
pronounced to G-20, let that family be bound by brotherhood, wrapped with a
universal chord of love and solidarity.
Sounds
abstract and altruistic? Then examine the current trend, that is to measure the
citizens of a country and the countries in the world by how much wealth they
possess. If we continue to do so, we will validate Schumacher’s prophetic
remark. He had said that the “conventional economists are rearranging the
deckchairs in the Titanic.” Let India reflecting the thinking of Gandhi, Buddha
and Schumacher replay some of their words and warnings during the G-20 year in
the interest of the humanity across the world.---INFA
(Copyright,
India News & Feature Alliance)
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