Economist Galal Amin dismisses conventional concepts of progress, freedom, and human rights
CAIRO: Progress as we know it and understand it is tarnished in Galal Amin s new book, where the seasoned economist dismisses conventional concepts and gives in to what he unwillingly calls conspiracy theories. The pessimistic tone carries traces of optimism, as he suggests spiritual revolution as a solution to the problems he analysis in his book.
The Illusion of Progress in the Arab World: A Critique of Western Misconstructions poses consumerism as the great danger facing the cultures of the world and the Arab on in particular.
Describing it as a human weakness, Amin says consumerism affects all aspects of life. Take freedom for example. Freedom is restricted in an environment of culture of consumerism by all sort of advertising campaigns, he says in an interview with The Daily Star Egypt. In such a culture, he explains, the producers manipulate the consumers and this reduces their freedom.
This exploitation becomes worse the poorer the society is, he continues, Consumer culture in its countries of origin is bad, but when you see it in our countries, it is worse. This is because you see it side by side with extreme deprivation. It also lowers the rate of saving of the society as a whole.
In his book, Amin explains that consumerism has been wrongly associated with progress and has gradually been regarded as an indicator of progress. But in fact, progress itself is misunderstood. He dismisses the notion that humans are continuously getting better and that change means improvements.
He explains that there is no overall progress, but there are certain fields in which states or individuals advance. But due to generalizations, people often regard military supremacy or some aspects of economic development as overall progress.
Such belief in progress is indoctrinated to students as truth, he explains
The link between greater power, material wealth, scientific or technological advance, and progress and backwardness in other aspects of life is far from being obvious, reads the book.
With this background, Amin delves in the khawaga complex, a sense of inferiority towards the West.
With simple language, Amin combines his social observance with his economical background the same way he did with his previous popular book Whatever Happened to the Egyptians. The economics professor at the American University in Cairo incorporates his and his family s stories to explain his theories, spicing up what could other wise be perceived by the regular reader as boring material. Between the stories, Amin s sarcasm and the details of his feelings while discovering new concepts or hearing news, the book flows in a way only associated with fiction.
The development of the khawaga complex is thus explained in such a way. There are no theories or complicated terminology, but it is explained through the story of his grandfather, whose education and limited contact with the West prevented him from experiencing such a complex and his father, whose contact with the West, especially through the British occupation has implanted the complex.
My father was more exposed to the consumer side [of the West], but he could also read about the growth of productive capacity: factories and technology. He could see that they have become more developed both in consumer goods and in productive activities.
For Amin, the contact with the fascinating consumer elements of the West, doesn t necessarily lead to the khawaga complex. The mere contact won t lead to an inferiority complex, unless you notice two things: that you are much poorer and you are weaker, he says.
But the economic or military strength, in Amin s opinion, doesn t translate to better culture, freedom, ethics, human rights or human development. He explains that a gain in one aspect could equal a loss in another, like what the advanced economy does with consumerism.
We shouldn t let a country s success in economic and technological advancement blinds us to its failure to achieve advancement in other aspects of human life, he writes in the book. Yet, so many people and unfortunately intellects fall in this trap.
He is also against the universalizing of terms like human rights or development. For What exactly is the advantage of our viewing poverty, bad health, single-party rule, the effect of a certain tradition or culture with regard to keeping women out of work, state intervention in the market place and forcing new graduates into certain jobs, as if they were all merely different manifestations of one particular phenomenon: the lost of freedom?
The state of economy, for example, can t be simply explained through freedom because of various aspects involved. In the case of poverty, reads the book the loss of freedom may reach the point of being unable to choose between life and death, if people are forced to die of hunger . In the case of price controls, however, the loss of freedom involves hardly more than the loss of the producers ability to fix the price of his goods or to move into more profitable activities.
Indeed, the loss of freedom to some caused by price controls may be smaller than the gain of freedom realized by others, those being the poorer consumers who were denied those goods before the price control.
Noting the difference in cultures and the needs of each society, Amin sees comparisons between states as incorrect with even more misleading results. Thus, his book is critical of the United Nations Development Program reports that depend in measuring the development of nations on unrepresentative and limited criteria. The criteria used to Amin s dismay are freedom and democracy, the state of knowledge and the empowerment of knowledge.
The sole position [the report] takes may only be read between the lines, Amin wrote in his book. The idea that the report is influenced by other countries interests in developing countries is persistent throughout the book. Amin stresses that he didn t provide a general critique of this UN subsidiary but he was angered by their report, which made me think that they are under the command of ill-intended orders.
This leads to what Amin unwillingly labels conspiracy theories. For him the term refers to reading between the lines and not taking official explanations for granted. But he admits that in general the term translates to hallucination.
The term conspiracy theory is very vicious, he explains, They invented it to silence the truth. . Let s recognize that this is why they call us conspiracy theorists, because they don t want anybody to listen. When you tell someone that his words are conspiracy theory, it is as if saying you are crazy, you are hallucinating. But this doesn t mean that we are wrong.
In such a world filled with conspiracies the conclusion would be pessimism, especially that Amin sees the problems as universal. It s more evident in the Arab world, he adds, but the whole world suffers. There are conspiracies to suppress and eliminate the Arab culture, for economical and political gains, but other cultures are in danger as well, especially from the attack of consumerism.
Yet, he sees a possible solution: A global spiritual revolution. In Egypt and the Arab world, the specifics of such a solution is multi-dimensional, especially that current factors, such as the surprising fluctuation of the strength of the khawaga complex in younger generations, are part of calculation.
In tomorrow s issue: Amin compares theories with the current state of affairs, offers his opinion about the current political scene, and analyzes the potential solutions while surveying the reasons for pessimism and optimism.
