Is Capitalism a Dirty Word?
INTERVIEW
There has been in recent times mounting criticism on capitalism, cascading from those in policy-making and civil society circles right down to the person on the street. Emphasis is shifting from profits to planetary and social concerns with the increase of social enterprises, corporate requirements for CSR and so on. The development of the sustainable development discourse has raised red flags on our current economic systems, resulting in the launch of the sustainable development goals.
Debbie YM Loh interviews Dr Christopher Chong Eu Choong, a signatory to the Kairos Dialogue Network statement and an active member in Malaysian civil society to pick his brains on what’s not working for capitalism. Chris as he prefers to be called is an Assistant Professor in UTAR teaching Political Communications, and is involved in the Malaysian civil society circles through Aliran, a reform movement. More of his work here.
Is capitalism a dirty word? What are the fundamental characteristics that have created these problems?
Should there be a reform, or a revolution? How is capitalism playing out in Malaysia and what can the church do? Communal vs individualistic societies in Malaysia.
There has been a surge of interest in socialism lately. What should we know about socialism?
Should we then practice socialist values?
Chris, is capitalism a dirty word? We have to first and foremost define what capitalism is. I would define capitalism as an economic system. For many, capitalism is a good thing because it has the ability to give us a lot of material benefits. A simple example: look at the pace of technology that has exploded in the last 50 years, compared to a 100 years before this. All this happened because of the free market system, the drive to improve life, to make profit, etc. That is the good thing about it.
The bad thing about it is that essentially this system creates a very wide gap between the rich and the poor. And perhaps the greatest flaw in this is it tends to look at things in terms of economic values, not just terms in of the things that we use, but in terms of relationship itself. For example today when we see a person, we ask “What are you?”. In essence what we are asking is “Who are you in terms of your relationship to the economy? Are you a worker, what type of worker are you? If you are a doctor, you have a higher status. This status is depending on how much you earn.”
So this is the problem with capitalism itself. It has great benefits but it also has its costs. And perhaps its costs are really higher than the benefits.
Another example is ecology. Capitalism is premised on the need for profit. Everything is about profit. So, nothing is sacred as long as you can derive economic value, that’s fine. So my question is what is the cost to the ecology? Bascially if our focus is on economic value alone, then what is a tree? A tree is assessed in terms of what value it can bring in terms of creating products like this table here. So you don’t see it in terms of the tree as playing a role in the ecology (the ecological value), but in terms of economic value.
What are the fundamental characteristics that have created these problems?
Capitalism’s basic logic is the need for profit. This (fundamental question) of such an economic system is therefore – “Can it bring profit?” Other types of values are not considered important. The most important one is the economic value – can I derive profit from it? The problem is this economic value is not limited to economics sphere but has moved to all other spheres of life. For example, human relationships. If I see a stranger, the first question we ask is, “can this stranger benefit me economically”? I don’t see that person as a person first, I see that that person as, “can I benefit?” Even within families, (in the case of) inheritance – the focus has become very materialistic. So, this is the thing about capitalism, that it overrides all other values.
What do you think about self-interest? Self-interest is everywhere. But there is also group interest. Compared to say 20 years. No, actually, go to a village today. Compare a village setting with an urban setting like ours. Which would you think exhibit more self-interest? Why is it happening in urban areas? Because it is based on the capitalistic value that to derive profit, I must win, someone must lose. It becomes a zero sum game.
This is the problem with capitalism, that it permeates in all spheres of life.
Would you say that capitalism encourages individualism? It has to, because this is how the system works. The system is based on competition. Competition not just in terms of economic organisations among companies but even among individuals. Again, a simple example. If you are looking for a job, what happens first? You have to go to an interview. Are you the only one being interviewed? No, you have to send in your CV and so on, and basically it is a form of competition.
Should there be a reform, or a revolution?
The first path is the idea of gradual improvements and etc. This path comes more from people who can very much see the flaws of capitalism but wants to maintain it. They say that while capitalism is flawed, that it is still the best economic system we have and therefore what we need to do is to improve it. Classic example, people like Bill Gates. He makes a lot of money in the system but he says he does his philanthropic work to try to fix the problem from within. Or look at the Davos forum - who attends Davos if not the richest and the most elite of the capitalist economic system? They recognise the flaws and want to fix it, but keep the system.
The revolution path says capitalism is a dead end. No matter how much you try to reform it, it will still produce that misery, the human misery in terms of exploitation, in terms of human suffering and etc. Now we talk about looming ecological disasters. They say we need revolution in terms of overthrowing the system.
Historically speaking the only alternative that took place was in the early 20th century when the Communist revolution took root in Russia and China. Unfortunately the socialist path did not work. At this point there is no alternative view. There is a popular saying that it’s easier to imagine the end of the world than imagining an alternative to capitalism.
How is capitalism playing out in Malaysia and what can the church do? We are part of the system; we can’t run away from it. Our economy is based on capitalism. How is it being played out? Basically there is great material benefit. Again if you ask your parents’ or grandparents’ generation they will tell you there has been tremendous material benefit. But the question we need to ask ourselves are – what are the costs to the Malaysian society?
The gap between rich and poor is quite wide in Malaysia. By looking at the Gini coefficient, (the gap) is one of the widest in South East Asia. You can look at the other cost in terms of people becoming disposable. Look at the migrants. There is basically exploitation of migrants in Malaysia. Up north our borders, they discovered (burial grounds of human trafficking victims). Why is it happening? Our industry demands cheap labour. We want our labour as cheap as possible so we can make a lot of profit. I am not saying that everyone is involved, but I’m saying it is happening. I’m not saying all industries are like that but I’m saying the fundamental logic is to make money and one way to do so is to lower costs – workers cost.
Our economy is basically a low-cost production economy. So this is happening. These are costs as well and we cannot close our eyes to it. This is one thing Christian businessmen should look into – pay your workers decent wages and basically do not be involved with human trafficking in terms of hiring trafficked workers.
There is a marked difference between more communal-type of societies versus more individualistic ones. E.g. when they interface the cosmopolitan communities, the indigenous and native communities would find it hard to fit in a system that rewards individuals at the expense of another. How do we work around these differences, especially when we are talking about development and economic empowerment for our native brothers and sisters?
You have to understand capitalism can be very brutal when it is introduced to the Orang Asli or the bumiputera of Sabah and Sarawak who have no (prior) contact with the system. The thing is we assume that we need to give them education and (that is all there is to it). And they would adapt. But that is not the case because their culture is so different from the modern culture and modern values that we on the other hand have been so enculturated with. The moment we are born, we are born in an urban area, our parents, our schools and our surroundings socialises or teaches us in this modern values and gradually builds up our immunity to the system so that we become part of the system.
But for Sabah and Sarawak, most of that especially in the rural areas is a really great shock. How to help them? I think it has to be a gradual process. That means understanding the culture of the people you want to help and slowly bringing them into the system because like it or not capitalism is encroaching even on the bumiputera rural areas. It is going to happen one way or another and it can’t be stopped. There are two ways about it. One is to let it be, and let it destroy those communities. Or, basically help them gradually adapt to the system. To do that you need people who are anthropologists, people who understand traditional societies. You need developmental experts and so on. Having good intentions is not good enough. You need people who knows and help. Sometimes we (wrongly) assume that because they are people, and we are people, that we by default understand them. We miss the point when we do not find out about their backgrounds, and we help them in ways that we think is right – that is where the pitfall is.
Last year there were some Orang Asli children who went to boarding school and ran away. Why – because they don’t understand the culture. They were afraid. That is where tragedies happen. I don’t pretend I have the answer. The thing about capitalism is that there will always be tragedies happening. What we can do hopefully as Christians is to prevent it as much as we can through helping these rural communities to gradually adapt to the system and to learn from our mistakes.
There seems to be a surge in interest in socialism of late. What do you want Christians to know about socialism? Understand the basic ideas, what it is about rather than some preconceived ideas on socialism. Socialism is not limited to the no-God variety. There is also socialism that has religious overtones in it. Not just the Christian type, there are many that has religious overtone that basically we are not aware of. For example ancient Chinese philosophy, the Mohis or Mohism is a form of socialism but that stressed the need for brotherly love – agape. There are such variations of socialism that needs to be explored. We cannot have a jaundiced view that socialism is a bad thing. Why is capitalism such a great thing – is my question. We should explore and keep an open mind.
Should we then practice socialist values? My first question is – how do you define “socialist values”? Rather than saying socialist values, for Christians, what are the fundamental principles that God wants Christians to practice? For me it’s very simply – the two royal laws. Love God, love your neighbour. If this is in accordance with these two laws, hey, you can call it whatever you want, be it socialism or capitalism.
If a Christian businessman exploits his workers so he can make more money. Is it really capitalism or does it go against God’s values? You can look at it that way.
So for me, instead of saying socialism, the question I would ask is – what are the basic values that God wants us to live out? It would be the two royal laws.
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