Sounds of Silence

As the rhetoric heats up in the present election campaign, I am struck by the sounds of silence around issues that really matter.

There is a need to address issues of substance relating to the viability of our lifestyles – actions we need to take now to ensure a more sustainable future. Instead we hear about short-term fixes to the economy. And most often the banter is fear-based. That is, if we don’t find the right formula our economy will shrink. Horrors!

How is it that the Economy has become king in terms of our social discourse? There was a time when the political question was how the economy could serve society. Now it seems that the most important question is what we can and must do to keep the economy going. As David Suzuki says, we have come to worship our Economy above all other gods.

The Economy has been given a life of its own. John McMurty describes it as follows: “Players in the global capitalist order, transnational corporations and the global financial institutions, have managed to separate themselves from the rest of society, radically decreasing their responsibilities. The ideology supporting this de-coupling from society was developed in parallel and effectively places the abstract “economy” on a pedestal above any other social institution - whether government, community, family or individual.”

The “doctrines” of this all-encompassing Economy are more or less as follows: In order to be healthy, any economy must grow at least two or three percent a year. Citizens must be re-designated as “consumers” and encouraged to buy more and more stuff. The Gross Domestic Product of a country is the best indicator of societal health. And, if you really want to make it big, find ways of making money from money rather than from productive activity.

These prominent doctrines raise a lot of flags which we need to think about. But given the holy status of our Economy, these are concerns that any political party wanting to win an election can ill afford to raise.

What politician would raise the concern that our preoccupation with economic growth might kill us in the end? That unlimited growth is simply unsustainable? An economy growing at 2.5% annually will double its output in about thirty years. Given our limited natural resources, will we not soon have to consider zero growth as the standard?

What political party will try to convince us that buying more stuff won’t bring us more happiness and that it will strangle us in the end? There is empirical evidence that beyond having our basic needs met, happiness and a sense of well-being does not increase significantly with increased wealth. Consumerism is not all it is cracked up to be.

And who on the election trail will alert us to the fact that making money from money, instead of sustainable productivity, represents a house of cards that will ultimately collapse?

We might be surprised how far we could go as a society if we stopped bending the knee to the almighty Economy.

Jack Heppner