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The Legacy of the Cold War

While AFSC and some individual Friends have continued to be concerned with the centrality of economics to the peace testimony, most Quaker organizations and Yearly and Monthly Meetings in recent times seem generally to stay well clear of policy issues in this area. This may be a hangover legacy from the Cold War when the communist ideology purported to claim the moral high ground of social and economic justice and pitted itself against free market capitalism. We all know how badly most of the command and control economies turned out, and how the leadership failed the moral claim with which their movement began.

But we also know how badly, in many respects, things are now going for human solidarity and ecological integrity with the drive for capital accumulation taking the virtually undisputed lead in world-wide economic behavior. Many economists, and political and corporate leaders have been acting as if, having vanquished the economic ideology that claimed the moral high ground, the moral high ground disappeared. Only capital accumulation and competition count in the so-called “new world order.”

But of course the moral dimension does not disappear. The questions around improving equity, advancing social justice, and protecting ecological integrity do not go away. They land squarely in the lap of the victorious free market culture whether it likes it or not. This situation has particular relevance for the Religious Society of Friends and our quest for a renewal of the peace testimony. In addition to having a long history of working for economic equity and social justice, Quakers have a long history of leadership in the scientific, technological, industrial, and commercial development of Western culture. Friends are, therefore, uniquely equipped with a heritage that can rise to the occasion of renewal—the renewal of the peace testimony within the renewal of the moral dimension of economics and public policy.

The time has come to clear out the hangover of the Cold War that put a heavy damper on the public advocacy of the economics of human solidarity and social justice. We need to engage with economics in response to John Woolman’s warning and his hope that the seeds of “great calamity” “may not ripen to the ruin of our posterity.” We need to engage with economics so the peace testimony can help unfold the evolutionary potential of Quakerism for addressing the social and ecological crisis of our time.

Ecological Collapse and Societal Breakdown

In the year before his assassination Martin Luther King began to speak publicly about the relationships between the economy, war making, American foreign policy, and the increasing poverty in the U. S. and around the world. In a famous speech at Riverside Church in New York City on April 4th, 1967, he said: “The war in Vietnam is but a symptom of a far deeper malady within the American spirit, and if we ignore this sobering reality [the] words of the late John F. Kennedy come back to haunt us. Five years ago he said, ‘Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.’

With a broader and deeper understanding of the human-Earth relationship, we can now paraphrase John F. Kennedy and say, “Those who make the rapid and peaceful change to an ecologically coherent and socially equitable economy impossible will make ecological collapse and societal breakdown inevitable.” War and violence among and between peoples is a subset of this reality. Wars are, and increasingly will be, situated within the trajectory of a deteriorating human-Earth relationship. Resource wars, the war-making economy, and the Quaker peace testimony are now enclosed in the great question of whether the human species can shift its economic activities to an ecologically coherent and socially equitable adaptation. This brings us to a deeper and more fully rounded understanding of Martin Luther King’s signature question from the last days of his life: “What is the moral assignment?”

The Moral Assignment

Friends Committee on National Legislation clearly understands this situation. They have placed their work on energy policy and ecologically sound economic adaptation (“an Earth restored”) within “the peaceful prevention of deadly conflict.” The Quaker peace testimony now has the whole panorama of the human-Earth relationship in which to unfurl its moral assignment

The study of the economy, as originally conceived by its founders in the 18th century, was a moral discipline. In light of ecological understanding, a fully developed study of the economy can now return to this foundation and become the arena where the ethics of human solidarity and the science of ecological integrity enter most fully into the service of the world. A certain fearlessness may be required. Those who benefit from human exploitation, resource domination, and structural violence do not want the present financial architecture and economic arrangements brought into a moral perspective—the perspective of right relationship.

Quakerism began when a small group of like-minded people decided they could not leave spiritual life to the established church. A century later a small group of Quakers decided they could not leave the slave trade and slavery to the political economy of the Empire. In our time, all who aspire to human solidarity and ecological integrity should be no more inclined to leave an economy of structural violence and global predation to the political-financial establishment and their supporting cast of economists and policy makers.

Inspired by this heritage, many Friends are linking minds, hearts, and hands with all those who are rising up in search of ecological integrity, economic equity, and governance for the common good. If the Religious Society of Friends can systematically put its shoulder to the wheel of the great historical turning before us, the peace testimony will be renewed in the fullness of its promise.

Keith Helmuth is member of New Brunswick Monthly Meeting (Canada) and a member of the Board of Trustees of Quaker Institute or the Future. He is a research associate of the Institute and the coordinator of the its Circles of Discernment Program.

References

A Call to Conscience: The Landmark Speeches of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. “Beyond Vietnam,” Address delivered to the Clergy and Laymen Concerned about Vietnam at Riverside Church, New York City, 4 April 1967, © Estate of Martine Luther King, Jr. <stanford.edu/group/King/publications/speeches/Beyond_Vietnam.pdf>.

Dreby, Ed, Editor, 2007. Seeds of Violence, Seeds of Hope, Friends Testi-monies and Economics, Earthcare Working Group of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, and Quaker Earthcare Witness. <quakerearthcare.org/Projects/FTE/FTE.htm>

What Can Friends Do?

1) Study and Discernment

Research and master a basic understanding of the relationship between Earth’s ecosystems and human economic activity. Get to the point in your thinking about the future of the human-Earth relationship that you see it through the lens of ecologically coherent, economic adaptation. The study guide Seeds of Violence, Seeds of Hope was developed by the Friends Testimonies and Economics for this purpose. It can be downloaded (see References) or contact Ed Dreby <drebymans@igc.org> for print copies.

2) Personal and Household Action

Re-adapt practices of life and livelihood to your understanding of ecologically coherent living. There are many helpful books available.

3) Community Action

Work on a community system of ecologically coherent re-adaptation, i.e. community gardening and local food system development, community-based environmental education, etc.

4) Public Policy

Start or join a group effort to help craft ecologically coherent and socially equitable economic policies and programs at the municipal, state, national, and global levels. Become fully engaged with Friends Committee on National Legislation <fcnl.org>.  Read “Who Owns the Sky?” and “Capitalism 3.0” by Peter Barnes. Contact Keith Helmuth <keithhelmuth@gmail.com> about starting or joining a Circle of Discernment under the auspices of Quaker Institute for the Future <quakerinstitute.org>.