God's Own Globalization

For two weeks in early February, Redeemer University College, The Paideia Centre for Public Theology and Cardus had the privilege of hosting Dr. Bob Goudzwaard. Dr. Goudzwaard is professor emeritus of economics and social philosophy at the Free University of Amsterdam and a former member of Dutch Parliament.

As part of his visit, Dr. Goudzwaard gave a lecture titled Hope in Troubled Times: A New Vision for Confronting Global Crises. In his lecture, Goudzwaard brought his depth of experience and insight into the challenging and profoundly alarming issues facing the global market today.

Dr. Goudzwaard speaks at Redeemer University College. Photo by Nathan Giancola

He began the lecture by surveying the poverty, energy, and environmental crises (to name a few) that are currently facing the world, and by pointing out the interconnected nature of such crises. For example, Goudzwaard pointed out the reality of a decrease in global safety, clearly a crisis on its own, but a crisis that is intensified by its connection to the food and energy crisis and a rising world population As energy and food sources become potentially more challenging to come by, nations feel the need to reinforce their own safety to insure future access to food and energy sources. Many nations do this with little or no concern for environmental affects.

Alongside these types of crises are the deeply disturbing paradoxes that the world faces. Poverty rises even in the midst of the greatest riches. People feel stressed and short-on-time despite advances in technology that should be granting us greater leisure time. As efficiency advances, so do the demands for productivity and financial growth.

It is easy, in light of such complicated crises and paradoxes to feel hopeless and overwhelmed, especially when shortsighted and shallow responses to the problems seem to continually fail us. As one student stated, “we want concrete things we can do in order to work towards solving the problems we are faced with”.

Goudzwaard's response to this conundrum is for Christians to dig deeper for answers, as a young palm tree does when it is planted underground and must grow downward to the water table before it can grow upward and out. We seem to forget, as Goudzwaard says, that the roots of our present world crises lie in the fact that we like to act like gods instead of earth-bound creatures. Goudzwaard goes on to quote a statement by the churches of south-west asia, addressed to the churches and societies of the north. They wrote, “If, according to Ephesians 1, God is preparing in human history to bring everyone and everything under the Lordship of Jesus Christ, his shepherd King, shouldn't caring for and sharing with each other be the main characteristic of our lifestyle, instead of giving fully into the secular trend of growing consumerism?”

A real faith perspective enters in here. Once we recognize how rapid economic development is capable of enslaving us (see the documentary Manufactured Landscapes for a hellish glance into the Chinese process of manufacturing that supplies the Western world with all its “must-have” demands), we should be challenged to embrace a sense of sufficiency and contentment, which will lead to a deeper level of shalom than always longer for a more goods. We should turn away from a solely progress-oriented way of business, where the only things we push for are higher profits and a better standard of living, and instead embrace what Goudzwaard might call “God's own globalization”, a more sustainable, stable approach to our business and economics.

Now, I am admittedly not an expert in the area of business and economics, but it seems that Goudzwaard's call to sustainability is more than just the call of an academic throwing around a buzz word. While it may not at first glance address the deep structural flaws present in global economics, it is important to realize that a fundamental change in heart is often the foundation for sweeping and dramatic changes. Instead of overdeveloping, overspending and over-consuming, let's be challenged to find contentment in sustainable, stable economics. And let's not underestimate the power of our God who has claimed every inch of the universe as his own. I think we may just find, as our desire to consume declines and our contentment increases, that crises like world poverty, energy consumption, and the environmental crisis will be balanced out and mended as our hearts are realigned to the heart of a holy God.