Economic Progress and Cultural Values

BHABATOSH DATTA, M.A., Ph.D.

(An eminent educationist and economist, Dr Bhabatosh Datta is Emeritus Professor of Economics, presidency College, Calcutta, and recipient of Padma Vibhushan, second highest award of the Government of India, this year. He delivered the Institute’s fifty ­second Foundation-Day oration on ‘Economic progress and cultural Values’ on 29 January 1990. The following is the text of it:)

I FEEL greatly honoured by the invitation extended to me by the Ramakrishna Mission Institute of Culture to give the Foundation Day oration this year. I feel embarrassed also, because economists are not generally regarded as persons competent to speak on culture and values. They have often been considered antithetic to the refinements that make up culture. In the nineteenth century, Philosophers and creative writers called Economics “the dismal science” and “the gospel of Mammon”. A century earlier, Edmund Burke had said, “The age of chivalry is gone, that of sophisters, economists and calcula­tors has arrived”. And then there is the authenticated story that when the members of the royal Economic Society sought permission for an excursion in Windsor Castle, Queen victoria said that they must not be allowed to enter any room in which valuables were kept. Even today, in the academic field, Economics is not regarded as “human” enough to be included in humanities and not scientific enough by the scientists.

At the same time, one remembers that Adam Smith, the father of modern economics, was primarily a professor of Ethics and a noted author in that field. John maynard Keynes in our own times, was a great art connoisseur and a lover of the ballet (and also of the famous ballerina, Lydia Lopokova, whom he married). And just at present there is a brilliant scholar from Calcutta, Amartya Kumar Sen, who holds at harvard the twin posts of Professor of Philosophy and Professor of Economics and who has just been awarded the prestigious “Giovanni Agnelli international prize in ethics for “re-orienting economic science to include a great ethical and human dimension”.

At a much lower level, I take some courage from my experience that the Institute has not been apathetic to purely economic debates. I have taken part in a large number of these debates-from the time when the Institute functioned from three small rooms at the other end of Southern Avenue, under the devoted leader ship of Swami Nityaswarupananda, to the present times, when Swami Lokeswarananda has further widened the scope of the culture which the Institute seeks to study and develop. I do not feel a stranger here and I am sure my limitations will be forgiven.

In discussing what some would consider mutually incompatible categories, I have to begin by defining my terms. There is, in ordinary discussion, and even in learned studies, a confusion arising from the interchangeable use of the terms ‘economic growth’, ‘economic development’ and ‘economic progress’. Strictly speaking, economic growth means an increase over-time of a measurable variable, like the gross national product or the gross domestic product, either aggregate or per capita. I need not go into the interlinked concepts which can be derived by distinguishing net values from gross values, or factor-cost valuation from market price valuation. As long as we do not shift from one definition to another in the course of a particular analysis, and we adjust for price-changes, any of these categories can serve as an indicator of economic growth.

Economic development is a wider concept. Dudley Seers wrote more than twenty years ago about the possibility of “growth without development”. Statistically, there will be economic growth when, for example, there is a large increase in the production of luxury goods or services available to the high income-brackets, together with stagnation in the output of the essentials for the people in the lower brackets of the income-scale. There will be economic growth when there is an increase in the output of consumer goods and a failure to invest in the creation of capital goods, thus making it difficult to maintain the rate of growth. Economic development covers all this and means a move towards the desired economic transformation.

Economic progress has a still wider connotation. If growth means an increase in a specific indicator, and development means the creation of conditions for sustained improvement with the desired changes in income and wealth distribution, economic progress is a matter of what can be called “the quality of life”. It includes what the economist describes as the standard of life, but it includes much else also. It meets the frontier of culture in its widest sense.

The quality of life is not however easily measurable. When can we say that an individual today enjoys a better quality of life than he did yesterday? And when we take a macro view, our difficulties become insuperable. We should not only be able to indicate whether a group of people–say, a nation–is experiencing an improvement in the quality of life, but also be able to compare the quality of life of one nation with that of another. There are no yardsticks for all that.

The standard of living is a very important constituent of the quality of life, but even this cannot be easily measured over time or over cross sections, when the components are different. Some social scientists have defined what they have called the “physical quality of life” and have taken three indicators-the rate of infant mortality, the percentage of literacy and the expectation of life at birth. A comparative ranking scale can be established, the nation with the highest literacy rate and expectation of life for its people and the lowest rate of infant mortality taking the topmost place. It may be mentioned incidentally that on the basis of the latest World Bank data, India ranks about 20th from the bottom among some 100 countries. The aggregated nation-wise statistics however conceal the position at different income levels. If the literacy rate in India is a little over 36 per cent now for the whole population, it must be much lower at the lowest income levels.

Generally, a high rate of economic growth and high index of the quality of life will go together. But there are some countries, as in West Asia, where the GNP per capita is very high, but the literacy rate is quite low. It is reasonable to argue that the concept of quality of life can be extended by taking into account a variety of other progress indicators, like the growth of general and technical education, housing, transport facilities, electrification, health services, caloric-intake, etc. A social scientist can take his choice, but has in every case to be aware of the difficulties of measurement and comparison over time and space.

It is here that cultural values come i, as an essential element in the quality of life. It becomes necessary here to define our concept of culture and of cultural values. We have to remember at every step that the visible indicators of culture are not necessarily a full reflection of the cultural values of a people. This distinction will be developed later, but before going into that we may note the difficulties of definition. We know that ‘culture’ and ‘cultivation’ are both derived from the same Latin root. It is reasonable to regard culture and cultural values as the product of the cultivation of the mind-the cultivation that brings out, is Swami Vivekananda’s words, the perfection in man.

This perfection finds external expression in philosophy and sci­ence, in literature and art, in music, dance and drama, in sculpture and architecture, in the development of rational thinking - and above everything, in the mores and manners of everyday life. The external indicators can be broadly evaluated, though there may not be a com­mon standard of accurate measurement. The cultural values, on the other hand, are a matter of perception. It is easier to recognize these values when they manifest themselves than to define them in precise terms. These values may not manifest themselves even when there is visible progress in the creation and acquisition of the objects of culture. The difference becomes quite clear when one thinks of a very rich individual who has built up a high-level picture gallery or a collection of the finest sculpture, but who is, at the same time, en­tirely devoid of a realization of cultural values. He may amass culture without being immersed in it.

The passage from economic progress and structural changes in society to the quality of life and the emergence and nurturing of cultural values is not always easy. There are questions which we cannot easily answer. When is an individual more cultured than he was earlier? When is he more cultured than another individual? When is a community made up of heterogeneous components more cultured than another? When can we say that the value system of a people has been fully imbued with cultural values? None of these questions can be accurately answered, unless, as between one position and another, there is a discernible improvement for every one in every component of culture and of cultural values.

This however need not lead to any defeatism in approaching the problem. It should be possible to accept postulate that a na­tion’s culture is meaningful for the nation as a whole only when it is widespread and not simply confined to at upper stratum. Similarly, cultural values, however defined, are values accepted in general by the entire people and not simply by the top level. The top level may be distinguishable by economic differences, but even when there is at the top an intellectual stratum, the nation as a whole cannot be said to have progressed culturally until the values have permeated down to all the levels.

It means primarily access to education at all levels. In older societies, education and religion were closely linked and very often it was the religious education that developed the human qualities. There may be different views about the theistic content of religion; but, at its highest, it is a quest for the unknown. At the worldly level it prescribes a code of conduct. The philosophy of religion has often been philosophy at the highest. And religion has stimulated art and various cultural creations-like temple architecture, mosques, churches and even mausoleums and sculpture, music and dance.

If it is said that all this represents ‘elite’ attainments, with the people involved only as workers in the initial stage and devoted worshippers later, it may be pointed out that the influence of religion was great in developing folk art in various forms-from paintings to dance and music and to what can really be called the people’s theatre.

This is one side of the picture. While religion can play a big role in advancing both culture and cultural values, it can also be used for seeking objectives that are totally antithetic to culture. We have distressing examples of this anti-culture use of religion, destroying much that is valuable in the culture that we have inherited and putting insuperable obstacles in the way of developing cultural values for the people as a whole.

Where does economic progress come in? We have to seek an answer to the question raised at the beginning-does economic progress lead to a deep and extensive cultural improvement? We know that some objective forms of culture-especially architecture and sculpture-developed in the ancient world-in Greece, Rome or India-in the days of what seemed to be economic prosperity. It is sometimes argued that cultural development-and even the development of cul­tural values-requires the existence of a prosperous class with sufficient leisure to cultivate the mind and also with sufficient wealth to create a demand for objects of cultural value. Such an argument is often incorrect and always inadequate. The highest of Indian philosophy grew in the seminaries in which poverty was regarded as a virtue. There was leisure for the Brahmanical class, there was some support from the rich men also, but the highest of thoughts did not require economic prosperity. In the case of architecture and sculpture, upper class prosperity was a major stimulant, but such prosperity was not a sufficient condition for cultural development and not always even a necessary condition.

Speaking about individuals, one notes that Rabindranath Tagore came from a very rich family (rich in spite of its supposed impoverish­ment) which could ensure leisurely creativity, but Shakespeare came from a poor family and had to earn his living by writing and produc­ing plays for his touring party. Abanindranath and Gaganendranath Tagore were members of a rich, leisured class, but Ram Kinkar Bej was not. Swami Vivekananda had an affluent father, but Ramakrishna Paramahamsa was born in poverty. Gautama Buddha was born a prince, but Sri Chaitanya was the son of a poor Brahmin.

And yet, if the genius that creates culture and delineates new cultural values can be born in any social class, it has to be admitted that freedom from the strains and struggles for existence can give a start to creativity and the development of the mind. A minimum economic level for the large masses is a necessary condition for the spread of cultural values among the people. Ramakrishna Paramahamsa realized this when he said that religion cannot be pursed on an empty stomach. And Mahatma Gandhi said that God does not dare to appear before a hungry man except in the form of bread. Economic progress with economic justice creates the field on which culture and cultural values can grow, or can be made to grow.

This ideal situation has not been realized in the modern world, not even in the socialist countries. And when one compares one country with another, one finds that there are rich countries and poor countries, where the former are able to command control over at least the physical manifestations of culture. There are also within a country rich classes and poor classes, with the former able to attract towards themselves the physical heritage of the culture of the nation, even though they may not have any respect for cultural values.

There have been three very undesirable developments in our times-one, cultural ostentation; two, commercialization of culture; and three, imitative culture-all of them tending to demote cultural values. Cultural ostentation is blatant in rich countries and among the rich classes in poor countries. There are persons who purchase whole libraries, or valuable paintings and sculpture as a status symbol. Any well-known name or object in the cultural field sharpens their ostentatious greed. It may be Shakespeare’s manuscripts or relics, or the musical notes of a famous composer. It may be Rembrandt, and Gaugin, Picasso and Jamini Roy. It may be Bankura horses, Madhubani paintings or South Indian Natarajas. They all decorate the drawing room, do not transform the mind. Fashions, however, change quickly and the long-necked clay horses of yesterday are relegated to the lumber room to yield place to something more trendy. Sometimes the proud owners do not have any clear idea of the real value of the objects they acquire and display. One remembers the new-­rich culture-snob lady who thought that kafka was the latest brand of instant coffee.

With this is linked the commercialization of culture. It is not simply that cultural objects have become internationally traded goods-­often smuggled out and in-but also that culture itself has become an element in what the economists call “invisible trade”. I am not saying anything against the properly organized cultural exchange programmes, which bring nations together and make them realize the cultural values of different groups. But there are opportunist culture merchants in the field, who have taken up this trade as a high profit occupation. They are often able to extract official support and help from special funding arrangements. These cultural exports arranged by entrepreneurs in the field often adulterate the basic art forms (like music or dance) with what would be acceptable to the rich countries. Economic progress has often gone with the unfair terms of trade in cultural exchange and also with a deliberate attack on quality.

And then there is the third feature-imitative culture or grafting of imitations on basic culture. Such imitation, sometimes called ‘modern’ annex may be put alongside a grand old building. Other art forms may be atrociously westernized. A good example is provided by the old traditional popular theatre of Bengal-the jatra gan. It had developed over a long time a special type of presentation, a distinctive style of acting and a very attractive variety of songs and dance. It was this difference that counted, but the difference is being eliminated by ‘modernization’-said to meet the demand of the new classes who can pay liberally for what they want. The jatra is being reshaped not only by elements from the modern theatre but also by cinematic tricks.

THE VERY special dance forms are being converted into the worst form of cabaret. Economic progress is pulling culture and the cultural value downwards.

It is here that the social planner has to come forward. I must, however, warn against detailed interference by or involvement of the Government in matters cultural. In every country, and in our country more than in some other countries, Government involvement means politicalization. This is often seen in the policies on education, which seek to control not simply the administration of educational institutions, but also the Courses of study. There is often a clearly discernible trend towards imposing upon young students a special type of cultural values. Education, and more education, is required for preserving and developing culture, but the basic objective should be to develop free minds enabling the people to choose the cultural values themselves. The educational system can help by defining the alternatives and also by emphasizing their relative values.

I need not dwell extensively on the role of education, because the general principles will be accepted by all who try to keep themselves free of any biased ideology. But when speaking of education, one must emphasize that the enrichment of the mind of the people is brought about not simply by the educational institutions and their courses of study, but also by the Press, the wireless and television. All these media reach the households and reach persons in all the strata of life. They have the power to develop cultural values by methods which may vary from the direct to the subliminal. At the same time, they have the power to turn the clock , it seems sometimes that in many countries, including India, a television cultural is developing which, in the name of popular entertainment, is actually bringing down the tastes and appreciative faculties of the people.

It should be possible for a country experiencing economic progress involving not only growth and development, but also social justice, to achieve the right type of education through institutions and the me­dia. The essential requirement is to improve the ways of life of the people by evolving codes of private and social conduct that enrich life. These codes involve not only the behaviour to one another, but the ability to develop science and reason, to assimilate philosophy and literature and more generally to appreciate beauty every-where-in art forms of all sorts, it is this ability that transforms the people. Education and the mass media can expedite this transformation, when they are correctly planned.

Economic progress can lead the people towards the wrong way, but given the will, it can be a strong force in achieving the transfor­mation. There is no essential conflict between the urge for the good things of material life and the urge for what can simply be called ‘good life’. Economic progress offers the resources necessary to serve as the support for this good life. The economist knows that the problem of generating resources and that of proper use of the resource are closely linked. What the economist calls progress from his standpoint is without value unless it leads the people on to the stage where they can distinguish between the right and the wrong, the good and the bad, the beautiful and the ugly. These distinctions cannot be precisely defined, but all progress is meaningless unless society can develop an innate power to choose its scale of values. The economist can point out the way to economic progress, but he has also to be modest enough to recognize that economics is not everything and that economics can ultimately help, if it can enable the people to go beyond economics. And I have to repeat that when correctly formulated, economic values and cultural values are com­plementary to each other.

In our own times, we have achieved economic growth, devel­opment and progress, though not to the extent we wanted, or even to the extent which, given the determination, would have been feasible. We have developed in the Indian languages literature of the highest duality. Our painters and sculptors have shown remarkable originality. Our theatre at its best compares with the best in the world, our films are sometimes hetter than the best elsewhere. And we have learnt to appreciate all this. At the same time there is an opposite movement to drossy literature, to ghastly architecture and to cinema, television and similar entertainments that imitate the worst of the West. We have maintained the largest political democracy in the world and have accepted democratic values. At the same time we have devel­oped a political culture that is to the corruption and feudalism of the mediaeval days. We have developed in science and philos­ophy, but we also show the worst irrationality in our behaviour. We mix together nuclear physics and palmistry, astronomy and astrology, modern therapeutics and amulets. Our cultural value system is of­ten a curious mixture of reason and unreason. The resulting code of conduct makes the clock of progress turn wards.

Economic progress, I repeat, by itself does not necessarily pro­mote cultural values. It may sometimes do exactly the opposite. It is the duty of the social planner to ensure that the resources that economic progress makes available are utilized for enriching the peo­ple’s life in every way-material, intellectual and cultural. Economic progress should mean a better life for everyone. Cultural progress should mean a life that develops creativity, appreciation and codes of behaviour imbued with a social conscience. Cultural values go be­yond economic values, but society requires both the sets of values as supporting each other.

CULTURE is a pursuit of our total perfection by means of getting to know, on all matters which concern us, the best which has been though and said in the world.

MATTEW ARNOLD