ETHICS AND CULTURAL VALUES IN DEVELOPMENT NOTES
Development Ethics
Ethics may be defined as the branch of knowledge concerned with moral
principles. It deals with the principles of right and wrong behavior and
the goodness or badness of human character, the adherence to the code of
behavior that is considered right or acceptable. Development
philosophers and other ethicists formulate ethical principles
relevant to social change in poor countries, analyze and assess the
moral dimensions of development theories and seek to resolve the moral
quandaries raised in development policies and practice:
- In what direction and by what means should a society ‘develop’?
- Who is morally responsible for beneficial change?
- What are the obligations, if any, of rich societies (and their
citizens) to poor societies?
Sources of Development Ethics
There are several sources for moral assessment of the theory and
practice of development. First, beginning in the 1940s, activists and
social critics—such as Gandhi in India, Raúl Prébisch in Latin America,
and Frantz Fanon in Africa—criticized colonial and/or orthodox economic
development.
Second, since the early 1960s, American Denis Goulet, has argued that
‘development needs to be redefined, demystified, and thrust into the
arena of moral debate. Goulet was a pioneer in addressing ‘the ethical
and value questions posed by development theory, planning, and practice.
One of the most important lessons taught by Goulet, is that so-called
‘development’, owing to its costs in human suffering and loss of
meaning, can amount to ‘antidevelopment’.
A third source of development ethics is the effort of Anglo-American
moral philosophers to deepen and broaden philosophical debate about
famine relief and food aid in the 1970s. Many philosophers debated
whether affluent nations (or their citizens) have moral obligations to
aid starving people in poor countries and, if they do, what are the
nature, bases and extent of those obligations. By the early eighties,
however, moral philosophers had come to agree with those development
specialists who for many years had believed that famine relief and food
aid were only one part of the solution to the problems of hunger,
poverty, underdevelopment and international injustice. What is needed,
argued these philosophers, is not merely an ethics of aid but a more
comprehensive, empirically informed, and policy relevant ‘ethics of
Third World development’.
A fourth source of development ethics is the work of Paul Streeten and
Amartya Sen. Both economists have addressed the causes of global
economic inequality, hunger and underdevelopment and attacked these
problems with, among other things, a conception of development
explicitly formulated in terms of ethical principles. Building on
Streeten’s ‘basic human needs’ strategy, Sen argues that development
should be understood ultimately not as economic growth,
industrialization or modernization, which are at best means (and
sometimes not very good means), but as the expansion of people’s
‘valuable capabilities and functioning’: ‘what people can or cannot do,
e.g., whether they can live long, escape avoidable morbidity, be well
nourished, be able to read and write and communicate, take part in
literary and scientific pursuits, and so forth.
Areas of Consensus in Development Ethics
Although they differ on a number of matters, development ethicists
exhibit a wide consensus about the commitments that inform their
enterprise, the questions they are posing and the unreasonableness of
certain answers. Development ethicists typically ask the following
related questions:
- What should count as (good) development?
- What should be a society’s basic economic, political and cultural
goals and strategies, and what principles should inform their selection? - What moral issues emerge in development policymaking and practice
and how should they be resolved? - How should the burdens and benefits of development be conceived and
distributed? - Who or what should be responsible for bringing about development? A
nation’s government, civil society or the market? What role—if any—
should more affluent states, international institutions, and
nongovernmental associations and individuals have in the
self-development of poor countries? - What are the most serious local, national and international
impediments to good development? - To what extent, if any, do moral skepticism, moral relativism,
national sovereignty and political realism pose a challenge to this
boundary-crossing ethical inquiry? - Who should decide these questions and by what methods?
In addition to accepting the importance of these questions, most
development ethicists share ideas about their field and the general
parameters for ethically based development:
First, development ethicists contend that development practices and
theories have ethical and value dimensions and can benefit from explicit
ethical analysis and criticism.
Second, development ethicists tend to see development as a
multidisciplinary field that has both theoretical and practical
components that intertwine in various ways. Hence, development ethicists
aim not merely to understand development, conceived generally as
desirable social change, but also to argue for and promote specific
conceptions of such change.
Third, although they may understand the terms in somewhat different
ways, development ethicists are committed to understanding and reducing
human deprivation and misery in poor countries.
Fourth, a consensus exists that development projects and aid givers
should seek strategies in which both human well-being and a healthy
environment jointly exist and are mutually reinforcing
Fifth, these ethicists are aware that what is frequently called
‘development’— for instance, economic growth—has created as many
problems as it has solved. ‘Development’ can be used both descriptively
and normatively. In the descriptive sense, ‘development’ is usually
identified as the processes of economic growth, industrialization, and
modernization that result in a society’s achieving a high (per capita)
gross domestic product. So conceived, a ‘developed’ society may be
either celebrated or criticized. In the normative sense, a developed
society, ranging from villages to national and regional societies, is
one whose established institutions realize or approximate (what the
proponent believes to be) worthwhile goals—most centrally, the
overcoming of economic and social deprivation. In order to avoid
confusion, when a normative sense of ‘development’ is meant, the noun is
often preceded by a positive adjective such as ‘good’ or ‘ethically
justified’.
A sixth area of agreement is that development ethics must be conducted
at various levels of generality and specificity. Just as development
debates occur at various levels of abstraction, so development ethics
should assess:
- Basic ethical principles,
- Development goals and models such as ‘economic growth’, ‘growth with
equity’, ‘basic needs’ and, in the nineties, ‘sustainable
development’, ‘structural adjustment’ and ‘human development’
(United Nations Development Programme), and - Specific institutions and strategies.
Seventh, most development ethicists believe their enterprise should be
international in the triple sense that the ethicists engaged in it come
from many nations, including poor ones; that they are seeking to forge
an international consensus; and that this consensus emphasizes a
commitment to alleviating worldwide deprivation.
Eighth, although many development ethicists contend that at least some
development principles or procedures are relevant for any poor country;
most agree that development strategies must be contextually sensitive.
What constitutes the best means—for instance, state provisioning, market
mechanisms, civil society and their hybrids—will depend on a society’s
history and stage of social change as well as on regional and global forces.
Areas of Disagreements in Development Ethics
A first unresolved issue concerns the scope of development ethics.
Development ethics originated as the ‘ethics of Third World Development’
there is no consensus, however, on whether or not development ethics
should extend beyond its central concern of assessing the development
ends and means of poor societies.
Some argue that development ethicists should criticize human deprivation
wherever it exists and that rich countries, since they too have problems
of poverty, powerlessness, and alienation, are ‘underdeveloped’ and,
hence, fall properly within the scope of development ethics. Others
contend that since development ethicists address questions of rich
country responsibility and global distributive justice, they should not
restrict themselves to official development assistance but also should
treat international trade, capital flows, migration, environmental
pacts, military intervention, and responses to human rights violations
committed by prior regimes.
The chief argument against extending the boundaries in these ways is
that development ethics would thereby become too ambitious and diffuse.
If development ethics grew to be identical with all social ethics or all
international ethics, the result might be that insufficient attention
would be paid to alleviating poverty and powerlessness in poor
countries. Development ethicists also are divided on the status of the
moral norms that they seek to justify and apply. Three positions have
emerged. Universalists, argue that development goals and principles are
valid for all societies. Particularists, reply that universalism masks
ethnocentrism and (Northern) cultural imperialism.
A third approach tries to avoid the standoff between the first two
positions. On this view, development ethics should forge a
cross-cultural consensus in which a society’s own freedom to make
development choices is one among a plurality of fundamental norms and in
which these norms are of sufficient generality so as not only to permit
but also to require sensitivity to societal differences.
Development ethicists also differ with respect to whether (good)
societal development should have—as an ultimate goal—the promotion of
values other than the present and future human good. Some development
ethicists ascribe intrinsic value, equal to or even superior to the good
of individual human beings, to human communities of various kinds, for
instance, family, nation or cultural group.
Others argue that nonhuman individuals and species, as well as
ecological communities, have equal and even
superior value to human individuals. Those committed to
‘eco-development’ or ‘sustainable development’ do not yet agree on what
should be sustained as an end in itself and what should be maintained as
an indispensable or merely helpful means. Nor do they agree on how to
surmount conflicts among intrinsic values.
Culture and Development
Culture is defined broadly to include every aspect of the day-to-day
life of a group of human beings that is transmitted from one generation
to another. Economic transactions, social customs and relationships,
political ideologies, artistic expression, language, and religious
practices reflect cultural values and behaviors. Cultural sustainable
development implies development that is shaped by – and takes into
account its impact on – the shared ideas, beliefs, and values as well as
the intellectual, moral, and aesthetic standards of a community An
increased sensitivity to cultural aspects within mainstream development
theory can be attributed to the decline and disintegration of those
cultures subjected to the forces of “westernization.” The shortcomings
of past development efforts have challenged development practitioners to
broaden their focus to include culture. Besides the lessons of history,
two broad forces have influenced the emerging awareness of culture in
development thinking:
postmodernism and cultural pluralism.
In postmodern philosophy the focus is no longer on discovering
absolutes, but on exploring the relationship between probabilities.
Relativity rather than exclusive absolutism has become normative.
Postmodern philosophy has pointed out that scientists (and others) are biased not only by their
convictions about preferred theories and methods, but also by their
metaphysical worldviews. The cultural plurality of our global community
has not always been affirmed. History is full of examples of cultural
elitism in which one group made exclusive claims for itself and
condemned others. Recent history has shaped the demand for a recognition
and acceptance of pluralism. The world wars in the first half of this
century resulted in a greater consciousness of the right of differing
cultures and people groups to exist.
More recently the struggle for justice of aboriginal peoples everywhere
has made us poignantly aware of the power of solidarity in language and
spirituality, and of the resilience of culture. Formal recognition of
aboriginal peoples and their right to self-determination has supported
the notion of cultural plurality.
Models of Development and Cultural Change
Central to the concept of cultural sustainability is an understanding of
the process of change. Cultures evolve; and change is inherent in the
life process. Cultural change often results from an introduction of new
ideas or technology
