The Economic Religion of Michael Novak: Wealth Creation vs. the Gospel; Big Government foes seek Government Protection by Mark and Louise Zwick [page 2 of 3]
Novak makes it clear in several of his books that "to have a system of markets, private property and profit" does not constitute capitalism. These "minimum characteristics are common to all traditional precapitalistic economies." (Este hemisferio de libertad, p. 108-109). He goes on to make other various conditions for the existence of capitalism which favor neoliberal policies, the kinds of policies which have created the enormous multinational con-glomerates which control our world today and have put so many small firms out of business, especially in the Third World. Big Government Foes seek Government Protection His recommendations are phrased in acceptable language, but when one looks at the results of these recommendations, they have a different meaning. Novak cites three necessary conditions for the existence of neoconservative capitalism: "Capitalism begins when the right to personal economic activity is protected and nurtured, when economic activities are liberated from state opppression, and when the cause of wealth, the creativity of the imagination and the mind of each citizen can count on the freedom to which it has a right" (Este hemisferio de libertad, p. 108-109). Since these recommendations are coupled with insistence on privatization, removing all government care for the poor or for children, one wonders of whose freedom and whose protection we are speaking. Neoconservative/neoliberal capitalism is not the capitalism of the Mareks, the Cordúas, the Linbecks, or the Strakes in Houston, or of Zwicks' Department stores, for that matter. Fortuitous Donation Michael Novak's book, Este hemisferio de libertad (This Hemisphere of Liberty), published in Mexico by Diana in 1994, was donated to Casa Juan Diego with several bags of clothing. We noticed as we read it in Spanish that in chapter one he said it was especially revised for Catholic Latin America. Este hemisferio de libertad provides many examples of what Novak
himself describes as a new articulation of morality, one which had been
lacking in Catholic teaching. Quoting Adam Smith and David Hume, (not Catholics,
but thinkers from the Scottish Enlightenment in the eighteenth century),
he teaches that self-interest and self-wealth-creation are the methods by
which virtue is brought into society, order is brought into economics, into
the whole of life, even in its moral and cultural aspects. On page 101 he
expresses his formula: "Pues sí, the pursuit of riches represents
a fundamental improvement in human understanding of the way to virtue."…
"Hume, Smith and others perceived correctly that wealth is a useful
way to open to all…the way to virtue." A New Moral Guide? Novak, with his inimitable style, is more seductive than Salome in drawing people to accept what might be called a capitalism with the gloves off. He puts this in prayer form in Business as a Calling, published in 1996 by The Free Press as a vade mecum for Catholic business people. Novak's writing is so smooth, that at first glance one does not notice that Business as a Calling is totally divorced from Catholic social teaching and the Gospel. The problem with this book is that it allows CEO's to think they are doing the right thing when they are not. In the same way, Este hemisferio de libertad allows Latin American people in power to garner wealth in the name of economic development. Novak's writings give per-mission to put wealth creation before concerns for the worker and do not address unfair trading practices, especially in the Third World, but also in the United States. The practices of a company like Walmart, for example, to move into an area, lower prices until the small business are put out of business and then raise them again, represents unfair trading practices. Transnational companies take advantage of small ones in poor countries, squeezing them out. How odd that Novak does not make reference to Catholic social teaching on these topics. He had only to look to Laborem Exercens, No. 79, to find where John Paul II states so clearly that "The highly industrialized countries, and even more the businesses that direct on a large scale the means of industrial production (the companies referred to as multinational or transnational), fix the highest possible prices for their products, while trying at the same time to fix the lowest possible prices for raw materials or semimanufactured goods. This is one of the causes of an ever increasing disproportion between national incomes." Misunderstanding Dorothy Day In the April 1999 issue of First Things Michael Novak passes off Dorothy Day as being hopelessly "eschatological," which means, in his own words, "that the world is sinful, broken, even adversarial" and that Dorothy chose to light within it "the fire of the love of God while having as little to do with the things of this world as she could (p. 23). It is rather incredible that Novak puts Dorothy Day in the class of those who do not believe in being active in the world, but rather believe in "pie in the sky when you die," so often attributed to Christians by Communists. It is impossible to split Dorothy into eschatological (concern for final things) and away from the incarnational (transforming the world with the Gospel). Dorothy was both. She believed totally in heaven and totally in transforming society and she did not believe in separating the two. There was no dualism in Dorothy. She always said, "It is only what we do in and through Christ that is of lasting value." She meant this for every facet of life. Dorothy is different from Michael Novak in that she believed in taking Jesus to the marketplace, New Testament and Catholic social teaching in hand. Michael Novak writes that one has to leave all religious values at home in the closet because it is "inappropriate" to bring religion to the marketplace in a pluralistic society. (The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism, p. 67). Instead of the Bible Novak approaches society with Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations and Max Weber's The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism in hand, evangelizing by the promotion of enlightened self-interest. In Novak's scenario, the world will not be saved by love or beauty, but by privatizing religion and enhancing people's ability to possess more material things; no holds barred. The authors discovered in Este hemisferio de libertad that Novak, unlike Dorothy, states the belief that the eschatological and incarnational expressions of Christianity are "polar opposites" and that it thus is not possible to operate in a unity of faith and everyday life, especially in economics. This has left Novak in the untenable position of supporting corporations and an economic system which use slave labor. He would never say that he supports slave labor; however, as a matter of fact, the corporations he defends use slave labor. Real World of Slave Wages People were quite surprised a couple of years ago to discover that Kathy Gifford's clothing line was made by slave wages. The world was appalled that Gifford, almost a household name (and her football husband's name, too), was making money off her clothing line from clothes made by slave labor. People in Latin America were paid a pittance to make that clothing, for which she received a sizeable profit. At the same time people learned that the Gap store was selling shirts made in Latin America (El Salvador) for around $25.00. Again, the world was enraged because a teenage girl was paid $.16 to make the shirt. Young workers in maquiladoras have no freedom, no opportunity to exercise creativity, are not allowed to speak or to go to the bathroom, let alone use their inventiveness and other God-given gifts. The great American way responds to slave wages by simply saying that you must buy your clothing from other stores: Sears, J.C. Penny, Walmart, etc., etc., that don't use slave wages. But then it was discovered that this clothing was made by slave wages, also-in fact, it appears that most clothing purchased anywhere is made by slaves. This creates quite a dilemma: How can we buy clothes? Or worse yet, how can Catholic business people sell clothing without participating in slavery? That would certainly be immoral. Would pastors refuse the Eucharist to those who have stock in slave labor companies? Our first orientation to slave wages began some years ago as immigrants told us their reason for coming to the United States. They had been working in Honduras in First World (Europe, U.S.A., Korea) factories and were paid $.37 cents an hour- about $14.00 per week, ironically, what the average manufacturing job paid per hour in the United States. The immigrants responded that on this salary they could survive if they only bought food and had nothing for rent, or they could pay rent and have nothing to eat. Don't mention clothing or medication. A further irony: these immigrants to the United States were accused of being greedy people for migrating by the very same people who were creating wealth for themselves through paying slave wages. Child Slavery The most significant and undereported trend in the global market is the proliferation of child labor (Rourke, A Conscience as Large as the World, p. 186). As the multinational corporations expand through subcontracting arrangements, so does the enslavement of children. The Antislavery Society estimates that there are close to 200 million child laborers producing goods for the world economy. A recent study of Australian imports showed that sixty items from food products to clothing involved the use of child labor. Frankly, the editors can't believe that there are three-year-olds working in sweat shops, but this is what the reports say. Female Slaves Many young women have become enslaved in the global market, assisting in the manufacturing of very respectable products. As the increasing separation between service and profit continued to expand, plants licensed by Nike, Inc., which makes tennis shoes, paid an average female worker in Indonesia approximately $0.82 per day in the 1990's. The shoes were made for less than $6.00 and sold for $75 to $135 in the United States. From its profits Nike paid Michael Jordan of basketball fame $20 million-more than the wages paid to all the young women whomade the shoes (Rourke, p. 187). Some Catholics would say that the gap between the work provided and profit made is unconscionable. Michael Novak is not one of them. We would say to Mr. Novak that wealth creation may be OK, but not on the backs of the poor. Nineteenth Century Abuses Repeated It is tragic that we don't have a new Charles Dickens to journal and dramatically describe the re-invention of the abuses of the 19th century. That century has returned with a vengeance: child labor, chimney sweeps, dangerous conditions and all. A new colonialism has arrived with conquistadores worse than the first. People believed that the progress of civilization through legislation had removed the devil of 19th century industrialism, but the devil has returnedwith seven more, worse than the first. A historical example of abuse of workers which Michael Novak overtly endorses in that of Andrew Carnegie. In his book, Business as a Calling, he presents Andrew Carnegie not only as a model to follow, but borders on canonizing him. He even provides a lengthy explanation about Carnegie's involvement in the slaughter of workers at his Homestead Steel Plant. According to Novak, Carnegie repented. Carnegie retired at age 66 with $480 million in the bank and went on to build 1,946 libraries in the United States (and 865 in other lands). Novak attacks unmercifully the clergy-"the good reverends"-who raised doubts about this whole process of wealth creation and who would deny people like Carnegie the "private opportunity to realize their calling." Tens of thousands of workers in Carnegie's plants wished that he had discovered his calling earlier, especially when they were working for slave wages and at long hours. Mark's seminary professor and author, Msgr. Anthony Furst, spoke of the work required for Carnegie to gain this wealth in order to realize what Novak calls his calling and vocation. He described his father's work in a Carnegie factory: "I never saw my father from Monday through Saturday. He was gone before I got up and we were in bed when he came home." It was not only that the hours were interminable and the wages miserable, but the effect on the family was tragic. Novak claims that Carnegie didn't inherit this money, as he was born poor, and that he didn't rob banks to get rich. That is true. But he did rob the workers and stolen goods never belong to the one who steals. It is too bad that Carnegie had not paid his men the living wage that
was their due in justice rather than waiting to make restitution to society
at a later date for monies that were not rightly his.  |
