Tor The Proceedings of the South Place Ethical Society
Vol. 105 No. 7 . £1.50 - July/August, 2000 EDITORIAL - FROM DUALISM TO MATERIALISM
THERE is a chronic confusion abroad concerning the alternative ways available of describing the cause of behaviour: roughly speaking we may use mental or physical language, referring to mind or brain respectively. This in turn stems from the dualistic theory that we have an immaterial mind which acts on the material body.
Mental language sounds 'ordinary and not particularly scientific. For example, one might say of someone's anti-social behaviour that it was due to his mind having been influenced by his parents or his environment.
The second way might go something like this: the cause of someone's anti- social behaviour is the presence in his brain of a particular neurological structure. Thus we have two apparently competing ways of talking about the problem. Dualism is unable to resolve this conflict, which, owing to the advance of science, is rapidly approaching a crisis. As scientists obtain ever more information about the detailed structure of the brains responsible for the variety Of human behaviour, they are able to locate the immediate cause of the behaviour in some particular part or process of the brain.
For any machine, we have various ways of accounting for what takes place, different levels of description. For example, consider the action of a computer. We may choose to describe its actions in terms of how it has been programmed for its current task, or alternatively, from the point of view of the electronic engineer, in terms of its physics, eg thc tiny voltages in its various parts.
However, when the computer operator keys a word or number into the computer, they are simultaneously changing the programme and causing a physical change in the computer.
Similarly, the mind-brain conflict may be resolved by realising that the 'social' causes actually cause a physical change, albeit small and even reversible, in the brain. Materialism, whereby mind is dependent on the brain, thus emerges as the only coherent theory.
"WHY ARE MORALS SO REPULSIVE?' Susmuiah Wright 3 HAS HUMANISM A FUTURE IN SOCIAL HOUSING? Peter Heales 8 THE STAKEHOLDER SOCIETY - BOON OR CURSE? Gerald Vinten 13 BUTLER AND RUSSELL ON GOD AND RELIGION David E. White 17 VIEWPOINTS C. Bratchel; B. Smoke,: T Rubens, P Rhodes, R. Awbefy, V Monger 21 SOUTH PLACE ETHICAL SOCIETY Conway Hall Humanist Centre 25 Red Lion Square, London WCIR 4RL. Tel: 020 7242 8034 Fax: 020 7242 8036 website: www.ethicalsoc.org.uk [email protected]
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The views expressed in this Journal are not necessarily those of the Society. Ethical Record, JulylAugast, 2000 'WHY ARE MORALS SO REPULSIVE?' The turn of the century moral crisis and the solution of ICJ. Gould
Susannah Wright School or llomanities, Oxford Brookes University Lecture to the Ethical Soder); 12 March 2000
This quote is taken from Frederick James Gould's regular column in the Ethical World, 'The Armchair Philosopher'. Gould did not believe that morals were repulsive, quite the opposite. The statement is part of a comment on the lack of popular support for his efforts to introduce moral instruction into the country's elementary schools. Gould's work is interesting as a historical curiosity, but also worth analysing for what it has to offer to current educational and cultural debates.
England's Moral Condition First, it is important to look at widespread concerns in England at the turn of the last century because these provide a wider context for Gould's thought and work. People were deeply concerned about England's moral condition. Social investigators, politicians and educators, amongst others, felt that the country had reached a nadir of depravity and was in need of salvation. Intellectual and political developments - in particular the rise of mass democracy and advances in science - led to the questioning of previously unquestioned principles. Many also felt that the structural changes of industrialisation and urbanisation had eroded the stability that family and commtmity ties had once provided, and that the church was becoming less influential and consequently less able to guide and control.
Gould was not alone in his belief that schools would reinforce morality and change society for the better. Universal elementary education, introduced by the 1870 Education Act, was fairly new. All Christian denominations were optimistic that religious training in schools would redeem the rising generation. Yet others insisted this was inadequate to the task and instead advocated a programme of moral instruction independent of religious belief and doctrine. Gould fell into this camp. He was a key publicist and organiser within the movement for moral instruction, which originated in the Ethical Movement in the 1890s. (The Moral Instruction League was founded on an initiative of the Union of Ethical Societies on 8 December 1897.) Gould's views were criticised by Christians and even his secularist colleagues, but they were a significant part of the drive for moral regeneration.
Gould's Early Piety Frederick James Gould was born in Brighton in in 1855. He was educated at St George's Chapel, Windsor and then in the village school at Chenies, Bucks. Gould absorbed the religious fervour of his Anglican Evangelical upbringing: he was by his own account a pious teenager. This piety characterised his early teaching career in the village school where he was criticised for dragging Christ into every lesson. However, after a few years his faith started to waiver. Because of his unbelief he resigned from his second teaching post in 1879 and moved to the anonymity of London.
As a schoolteacher in I3ethnal Green, London, Gould started to campaign for reformist and secularist causes. In the early 1880s he came into contact with the National Secular Society and the Positivists who were to be so important in his later career. However, it was his work with the Ethical Movement that enabled him to
Ethical Record, July/August 2000 3 escape from board school teaching; Stanton Coit recognised Gould's abilities and persuaded him to work for the Ethical Movement full-time. Three years later Gould moved to Leicester where he served as secretary and organiser of the Leicester Secular Society till 1908.
Gould's teaching experiences undoubtedly convinced him of the need to develop new educational methods and programmes. He had nothing good to say about the system of payment by results, which, he argued, let to conditions of 'slavery' for pupils and 'turned education into a dull mechanism and starved the soul of young England'. He was also furious at his treatment by the authorities when he was transferred to Limehouse and barred from giving religious instruction after criticising the Bible in the secularist press. His farewell letter to the London School Board condemned the 'morally, intellectually and historically unsound' methods of religious instruction, and called for more attention to moral training. Gould felt that his early teaching experience taught him how to hold the interest of the child. but it was at the East London Ethical Society, free from school board regulations, that he found the space to experiment with ideas and techniques.
The evangelical zeal of Gould's early years was transferred to his promotion of moral instruction. He was a prolific writer who produced numerous books, pamphlets and articles to publicise his cause. While secretary of the Leicester Secular Society he got himself elected onto the school board, a feat that few secularists achieved, and, once that had folded, onto the town council's education committee. Gould used these positions to promote moral instruction. He did achieve a measure of success on the school board, which agreed to institute his proposed 'course in moral lessons in the curriculum of secular teaching'. However, his proposals to the town council in favour of secular education and more powers of investigation were less successful.
The Could Committee Still, his educational work clearly absorbed much of his time and energy while he was in Leicester. There is some evidence that this caused him to neglect the day to day running and financial affairs of the-Secular Society; certainly other members felt his priorities should have lain elsewhere. So although Gould presents his departure from the Society in 1908 as a natural progression - I obeyed an urge to other fields' - rather than due to conflict, his !caving must have been welcome to others in the Society. After his experimental Church of Humanity folded in 1910. Gould returned to London where he was appointed lecturer and demonstrator for the Moral Education League. (The Moral Instruction League was renamed in 1908.) This position was really the height of his 'fame' - he travelled across Britain and to America and India promoting his version of moral instruction. When lack of money forced the League to terminate his employment in 1915 a group of supporters formed the 'Gould Committee' which funded his writing and demonstration work, albeit on a smaller scale, for more than twenty years.
In his later years Gould continued in educational work, but his promotion of moral instruction was eclipsed by other projects. These include: promoting the League of Nations among children, publicising Major Douglas' scheme of Social Credit, developing a unified curriculum that dispensed with traditional subject divisions. It seems that Gould's ideas appeared more and more idiosyncratic to those around him over time. Perhaps events overtook him. Perhaps he was taken less seriously because of old age. For whatever reason Gould seemed to think that his moment of fame had passed and that many of his former supporters had neglected him by the time he died in 1938. 4 Ethical Record, JulylAugust, 2000 Why Was Moral Instruction So Repulsive? This quotation is striking because of its questioning, almost plaintive tone, quite different from Gould's usual assurance and certainty. It is also a useful way of thinking about Gould's ideas, and the reasons why the idea of moral instruction was, as he suggested, unpopular.
What form did Gould's programme take? His suggested schemes contained a series of abstract nouns - such as truthfulness, kindness, patience, courage and sympathy - with (he meaning to be communicated in the lessons. These themes were ordered according to a logical and coherent plan. As Or as subject matter is concerned the main development in Gould's thinking over time was an increased emphasis on civics and citizenship. This mirrored developments in the Moral Instruction League/Moral Education League as a whole.
Realising that many found morals 'repulsive', Gould attempted to introduce an interesting and relevant scheme. He was convinced that the lack of enthusiasm for his ideas, and indeed for education in general, was partly due to a hatred of payment by results. He also felt that the poor quality of religious lessons tainted any attempt to teach morality. Gould himself witnessed 'horrific' lessons in Leicester where the teaching was 'inept or listless', the Bible was read without comment and the passages selected were of dubious morality, beyond the child's understanding, or both. Yet at the same time he thought that such lessons would convince the public that moral instruction classes were necessary.
So Gould wanted his scheme to be more effective and appealing than what had gone before. He argued that a systematic course of moral instruction lessons would bring together and reinforce moral impressions gained elsewhere. These lessons also had to be interesting. 11) this end Gould promoted the use of illustration and example, rather than the maxims and moralising that he telt tarred the image of the subject. He favoured concrete examples in which the moral element would not have to be laboured but would 'naturally emerge'. In the tradition of great moral teachers of the past, the teacher would tell stories which would secure interest and act as vehicles of inspiration. Gould gleaned illustrations from a wide range of sources - in type and geographical origin - in order to help pupils develop in a broad human understanding.
Making morality appealing was also the rationale behind Gould's positive approach. He believed that lessons on themes like anger and theft would alienate pupils, especially if individuals were picked out as examples. On the other hand, lessons presenting good conduct for admiration would encourage a proactive ethical response when faced with the complex moral choices of later life, which would require the will and the ability to think independently. The discussion at the end highlighted problems with this approach. Gould was probably naive to think that all children would automatically respond to the good in a positive way. Perhaps they also need to learn about the consequences of acting othenvise.
Gould wanted a programme that would be relevant and acceptable to all. He emphasised the 'unity of moral life under a diversity of beliefs and forms', and based his morality on this world rather than the will of a Deity and considerations of eternal life. Therefore he thought the contentious issue of sanctions was irrelevant. However, Gould's morality had a very Positivist slant. Fle saw the history of the race, embodied in the ideal of humanity as a Great Being, was the inspiration behind moral thought and action. It is debatable whether Christians unwilling to lose the Ethical Record, JulylAugust, 2000 5 theological sanction or secularists looking for a purely experience-based morality would have found this acceptable.
Gould gained a lot of recognition and support for his work. For instance, Gilbert Murray wrote an account of one of his demonstration lessons saying that he went along 'feeling sure that such a thing must be dull*, but came away impressed at Gould's ability to entertain and amuse:
'We had laughed again and again during the lesson, and I think tears were in most eyes at the end.'
However, Gould asking 'Why arc morals so repulsive?' in this way shows that he did not get the universal acceptance that he craved.
Why Could's Scheme Did Not Gain Universal Acceptance I believe that Gould's personality sometimes lost him support. The tributes that came in after his death emphasised his kindness and patience, but other sources reveal a different side to his character. He found it difficult to accept that not everyone shared his priorities. Articles in the Leicester Press show that his manner gained him enemies. In 1902 he was the subject of a parody of the school board's activities in the local press:
'When I came on the Board I could see at a glance Its affairs were absurdly at sea, A fact perhaps due to the Board's sad mischance Of existing so long without me. Let me mention an instance to show what I mean: The morals of scholars were fed On a book called the Bible which intellects keen (Like my own) have proved long to be dead'.
Of course this should be taken with a large pinch of salt, but Gould's domineering tendencies also come across in his dealings with non-Christian colleagues. He made no secret of his dislike of committee and fruitless discussion, and this authoritarianism could alienate fellow secularists.
Other factors made Gould's scheme unpopular. Not surprisingly he failed to convince those who believed that Bible lessons provided all the moral instruction that was needed. Gould was treading on thorny ground trying to introduce non- theological moral instruction into an elementary school system beset with internecine quarrels, and he aroused controversy. In 1905 the Cheshire Anglican and Roman Catholic diocesan bodies demanded the withdrawal of one of his books from local schools, provoking lively debate in the letter sections of the Cheshire papers and the Yorkshire Post.
Gould himself admits that many teachers in Leicester were unhappy with the introduction of his scheme of moral instruction. They felt encumbered by an already overcrowded timetable. They feared the new. Was the average teacher equipped to deliver the course effectively? Gould himself thought enthusiasm was more important than prior training, but many teachers would surely have found the material difficult to handle.
6 Ethical Record, JulylAugust, 2000 He was also lambasted for using the Bible and other religious texts. Some Secularists argued that the Bible could not be an effective ethical guide because of its irrelevance and objectionable morality. The other major objection to this source was the inherent difficulty of avoiding linking the Bible to questions of truth and divine sanction in the popular imagination, whatever the teacher intended.
Others questioned Gould's view of the child's psychology. John Dewey criticised Gould for neglecting the child's immediate response. Indeed, Gould seems to neglect the whole problem of different children reacting to the same teaching in different ways. This point was highlighted in the discussion at the end when it was argued - on the basis of personal experience of moral instruction lessons - that the child could leave with the 'wrong' impression. Some also felt that moral instruction would turn children into prigs who were over-conscious of a moral mission and looked down on others, which would negate the benefits that Gould proposed.
Finally, there was the fear that moral instruction could be a vehicle for bigotry and party politics taking over moral instruction lessons, that state regulation of morality left room for corruption. Indeed, some believed that it was impossible to find common ground about the meaning of the central concepts used in lessons. These arguments dominate current debates about introducing citizenship education into the national curriculum.
The Relevance of Gould for Today It is enlightening to look at Gould's ideas in the light of recent proposals for citizenship education; there are illuminating parallels. What is especially revealing is that the response to the attempt to introduce this subject today is echoed in the reaction to Gould. Thc 'boredom factor' (Ken Livingstone predicts that citizenship would be the most bunked-off subject), an overcrowded curriculum, the threat to Religious Education, the danger of political indoctrination, the impossibility of giving a neutral view of central concepts. These issues dominated discussions in Gould's time as much as they do now. We cannot ignore these problems, but current debates can only benefit from a historical perspective that could help is take a long- term view. Thus, Gould raised issues that transcend the time gap and give us food for thought today.
Bibliography Gould, F.J., The Life Story of a Humanist, London: Watts & Co., 1923 (Gould's autobiography) Gould, Ft, The Children's Book of Moral Lessons, 4 vols., London: Watts & Co., 1899-1907 (It was Volutne One of this series that aroused controversy in Cheshire.) Gould, F.J., LIP and Manners, London: Watts & Co., 1906 Gould, F.J., Moml Instruction, London: Longman's Green & Co., 1913 (The most detailed work on the theory behind his proposals for moral instruction.) Gould, F.J., Love and Service of Country, London: Watts & Co., 1915 Gould, F.J., Conduct Stories, London: Swann Sonnenschein & Co., 1910 Hayward, F.H. and White, E.M., The Last Years of a Great Educationist. A Record of the Thought of ET. Gould from 1923 to 1938, Bungay: Richard Clay & Company, not dated. (For information about Gould's later life. Gilbert Murray's account of Gould's lesson is reprinted here.)
As I will go on to look at moral education for my PhD, I would be very grateful for any comments or suggestions. e-mail: [email protected]. School of Humanities, Oxford Brookes University, Gipsy Lane, Oxford OX3 OBP
Ethical Record, JulylAugust, 2000 7 HAS HUMANISM A FUTURE IN SOCIAL HOUSING?
Peter Heales Lechar to the Ethical Society, 15 May, 2000
This lecture is occasioned by the fact that Humanist Housing. for over forty years the Humanist movement's own housing association, is about to merge with St. Pancras Housing Association. The new association, to be called St. Pancras and Humanist. will be a much stronger unit capable of taking the housing values of the founders - which arc shared by St. Pancras - into the future.
The term 'social housing' has a de facto meaning in current government policy but it is not easy to define. It implies some arrangement intended to improve the living conditions of people who cannot afford the economic cost of adequate housing. The arrangement inay or may not be philanthropic, but it will certainly exclude housing built or managed for profit.
One ancient form of 'social housing', alms houses, served many towns and villages from the sixteenth century onwards. A benefactor would typically bear the cost of construction and endow them in perpetuity so that the residents could live without hardship. He or she might also specify who should enjoy the benefits the charity and set out conditions to be kept. A foundation might he open to 'honest, godlearing poor women' or whatever, religious observance being a common but not universal condition. Alms houses arc, of course, anachronisms. Many of the buildings survive but few continue to house people as originally intended. Where they are still in charitable use, the original endowment has to be replaced by modern funding.
A second traditional form of 'social housing' were the community workhouses. They grew out of the poor relief that parishes were required to provide by law. A parish or, more commonly, a group or 'union' of parishes would build a workhouse in which the parish poor could live, he fed and cared for. Those with nothing were expected to work at tasks set by the governors in order to pay for their keep. I had occasion to visit Christchurch (formerly in Hampshire; now in Dorset) last year, and found that, towards the end of the eighteenth century. the female children in the workhouse there were hired out to a local entrepreneur to make fusee chains for watches. Their small hands were their main asset for work that was both tedious and a great strain on the eves.
Workhouses acquired a reputation and a stigma which may not have been wholly justified. Some horrific cases of abuse caused a stir when they came to light but the majority of institutions seem to have been well run. Perhaps the worst aspect of life in the workhouse lay in the system of separating families: men, women and children had to live separately and families might spend, say, one hour each Sunday together in the public area. The workhouse system evolved over the years and became less important after the introduction of the state old age pension. Nonetheless they were finally abolished only with the creation of the National l-lealth Service after the Second World War.
Workhouses were not just the last resort of the destitute, however. They also acted as hospitals and even as 'hotels' for poorer members of the community. Harriet Martineau, the author who had been greatly encouraged by William Johnson Fox,
8 Ethical Record, JulylAugust, 2000 describes in her Autobiography how, as an impoverished young woman, she travelled with a friend in search of material and, being unable to afford even modest hotels, put up in workhouses. She was complimentary about the ones she stayed in.
Just within the concept of 'social housing', some purpose-built villages provided better than average dwellings for their residents. Landowners were not notably concerned for their tenants, but some certainly did consider their welfare. Purpose-built villages are usually recognisable by the uniformity of their buildings. Milton Abbas in Dorset offers a good example: the one street is lined on both sides with similar semi-detached thatched cottages. They are, of course, primitive by modern standards, but are soundly built and would have provided comfortable homes by the rural standards of the day. Another, later, example is at Weston Birt in Gloucestershire. In Victorian times, the traditional village was demolished so that the estate owner could build the vast house and garden that now stands there. The new village, just outside the extended grounds of the house (now a school), is a fair example of rural building of the time.
The genesis of social housing as we now know it lies in the industrial towns that began to grow up in the second half of the eighteenth century. The progressive enclosure of agricultural land that had previously been open for cultivation condemned a whole class of previously self-sufficient country folk to depend upon wealthy land-owning farmers I'm employment. When a workforce was needed to tend the machinery in the new mills and factories. many badly paid and unemployed farm labourers came in search of higher wages. Most of the houses built for them proved to be woefully inadequate. Some mill owners may have intended to provide decent housing. Whether they cared or not, they did not foresee the consequences of crowding hundreds of primitive houses into small areas.
The notorious 'back-to-back' housing enabled builders to maximise the density of dwellings. Each house might be let to several families. They were built to the basic rural standards of the time. Housing for the majority of the rural population was indeed primitive but with. at least, good clean air, space, and the amenities of the open country to compensate for the absence of sanitation, a basically healthy life would have been possible. All those compensations were denied to the new industrial town dweller.
Adam Smith (1723-90), in his famous work An Enquiry into the Causes of the Wealth of Nations (1776), investigated the economic forces at work in the emerging industrial society. The book is not prescriptive, as it is sometimes represented, but a description of the mechanism he saw as the necessary precondition of economic prosperity. Politicians were quick to use his conclusions to underpin the laissez fitire policy that for decades allowed whole communities to be ruthlessly exploited. It is not clear that Smith himself would have approved. In his earlier book The Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759) - written while he was a professor at Glasgow and before he became economically independent - he explores the Enlightenment idea that morality has its origin in human nature. He traces its source to a natural feeling of sympathy for others. He would have expected the appalling conditions of factory workers to stimulate philanthropic responses.
Of more importance to the future of social housing were the slightly later writings of Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832), especially his Introduction to the Prthciples of Morals and Legislation (1789). Bentham's utilitarianism has been much debated as a moral principle, and its defects as a stand-alone philosophy are
Ethical Record. July/August, 2000 9 well documented. Nonetheless, it has had a long term effect upon the climate in which public policy is determined and remains a significant factor to this day. The essential point about Bentham's stance was that it placed upon legislators a moral responsibility for the welfare of the whole population. Philanthropy, although admirable in itself, was not enough for Bentham. He saw the need to create laws and develop social structures that would ensure a minimum standard of well-being for all. 1-lis pragmatic judgement was that the powerhouse for social change would be the middle classes. They had won the freedom from insistent daily toil that would enable them to think and plan, something denied the workers in their constant struggle to earn a bare subsistence. The aristocracy were too remote to understand, let alone feel concerned for, the plight of the workers.
In the event, early initiatives to provide better housing combined philanthropy with sound business sense. The Labourer's Friend Society came into being in 1830, shortly before Bentham's death. It is sometimes referred to as the first 'housing association'. In 1844 it began building tenement blocks to let at low 'affordable' rents. The rent income covered costs and provided a modest return on the capital invested. It survived until the 1960s when it was taken over by the Peabody Trust. Some of its buildings are still in use.
George Peabody, an American, born of poor parents, started life as a grocer's apprentice. His business ventures in America succeeded; later he moved his interests to London where he prospered as a banker. He made gifts totalling more than half a million pounds to a trust he founded to improve the conditions of poor workers. He also expected his Trust to make a profit on the dwellings they built, which would be ploughed back into the enterprise so that more dwellings could be constructed. Such was its success that by the end of the first twenty years of its existence the Peabody Trust owned 3,500 dwellings which housed 14,600 people.
These are but examples of a pattern of housing provision that gained momentum before the end of the Victorian era. Most of the housing associations of the time were set going by massive donations, but had to be self-sufficient once launched. Some, like Port Sunlight and Bourneville, had a dual purpose, namely to ensure that the endowing employers would reap the benefits of a healthy and contented workforce.
These pioneers achieved two things beyond the actual homes they created. They set increasingly high standards that came to be accepted as norms and the subject of building legislation. They also created a model for the provision of social housing that had been used and adapted by most housing associations since that time.
The advent of the 'garden city' also helped to advance housing standards. In Britain, their principal advocate was Ebenezer Howard (1850-1928). The two garden cities he inspired, at Letchworth (founded 1903) and at Welwyn (founded 1919), were designed to create a wholesome and attractive living environment for ordinary people.
Legislation permitting councils to build housing was enacted in the late nineteenth century, but it was only after the First World War that council housing became significant in meeting housing need. In spite of the laudable efforts of the housing pioneers, the majority of poor people lived in squalid conditions. The effects on the health of the population became evident during the campaigns to recruit men 10 Ethical Record, JulyOtugust, 2000 to the armed forces and women to the workforce. The need to raise the living standards of the poorest section of the population at last became evident. At the end of the war, the housing problem was exacerbated by an estimated shortfall of a million dwellings against the demand for homes. The government would no doubt have preferred to leave the solution of the housing crisis to the private sector, but to do so would have been political suicide. The mood of the country, epitomised by the movement to build 'homes fit for heroes to live in' ensured that the government would subsidise the building of council housing that could be let at affordable rents.
The period between the wars proved to be the high water mark for council housing. People in housing need turned naturally to their council for accommodation. Housing associations continued to provide dwellings; old associations continued as before and some new ones were founded, especially in areas of acute housing need. They were not, however, in the forefront,, and from some points of view began to seem an anachronism.
It was the housing crisis that followed the Second World War that energised the modem housing association movement. The failure of government initiatives to close the gap between supply and demand, coupled with the fact that a majority of people in housing need could not command the capital for ownership led to many innovations in the provision of housing. The freeing up of mortgages to help first time buyers with little equity helped, but the process was slow and of no service to people whose income was insufficient to impress the lenders. A large number of housing associations or similar bodies were founded in the post-war period. By the nineteen fifties, three broad types of association could be identified (all had antecedents further back in the history of housing): (a) 'charitable' associations run by people concerned about the living conditions of others less fortunate than themselves; (b) 'industrial', associations providing housing for workers in a defined industry, such as coal mining; (c) 'co-operatives' organised in partnership by people who wanted to provide housing for themselves, sometimes on a 'self-build- basis.
The Ethical Union Housing Association came into being in this period. It was to change its name to 'Humanist Housing Association' after the creation of the BHA. It was, and is, a 'charitable' association sct up with a specific purpose, which arose out of the circumstances of thc time. A large number of the charitable associations were then linked to religious bodies; that was especially true of associations offering homes to older people. Most church-based associations were open only to people of their own denomination and maintained an ethos unacceptable to others. Humanist Housing met the needs of elderly Humanists to whom church associations were naturally closed. It never adopted a 'closed door' policy, however; from the start it accepted tenants of any persuasion who wanted to live in its properties.
The founders of Humanist Housing, who included Rose Bush and Mora and Lindsay Burnet, determined from the start that their residents should enjoy the highest quality of service. When planning their first property, the conversion of an old house in the Hampstead area, they fought and won a battle with the authorities. In the mid fifties central heating was considered a luxury and therefore inappropriate for social housing. Against that attitude, the Committee argued that a warm environment in winter was essential for older people. Through their persistence, Humanist Housing became the first association ever to receive a grant to install central heating. Throughout its life. Humanist Housing has fought to maintain high standards coupled with rents as low as circumstances would permit.
Ethical Record, JulylAugaw, 2000 I I In the fifties and sixties Humanist Flousing made progress, finding suitable sites and raising loans to buil(1 properties on them. Rose I3ush Court (named after one of the founders), in Parkhill Road, Hampstead, dates from this early period and is notable for having amongst its first residents a high proportion of Humanists. In 1974, the new Labour government sought to promote housing associations and, through the Housing Act of that year, made large sums of In one), available to them as grants for the development of new social housing. Like many other associations, Humanist Housing benefited from the new provision and in the ensuing decade expanded to the point where it managed nearly one thousand homes. It built in several districts in the south eastern quadrant of England, ranging from Cambridge to Tunbridge Wells, from Chelmsford to Farnham, although its greatest concentration remained in the borough of Camden. This widespread expansion grew out of the conviction that a need for housing based on Humanist principles existed everywhere. It was a policy that created practical difficulties for later management.
Humanist Housing has never been a wealthy association; substantial loans were needed to build all its properties and most of them entailed large govern In ent grants. In the eighties and nineties it paid a high price for its use of government money. After the Thatcher government took office, the climate of social housing changed. Far from supporting housing associations as they originally thought of themselves, the government insisted that they should compete with each other for limited resources. As in many other areas of public concern, the 'market place' mentality began to dominate. Nor was the competition free; the Government, through the agency of the Housing Corporation, controlled events so tightly that the housing association movement became, in effect, a direct instrument of government policy. Indeed, by arranging for housing associations to take over much of the council housing stock, it created an illusion of 'privatising' social housing, whilst controlling it at every stage.
Only a relatively small number of housing associations could deliver what the government most wanted: mass building at the lowest possible cost. Humanist Housing became one of those associations that stagnated. It has barely expanded since the early eighties. It has managed to maintain high standards in lens of its management of existing stock, and has expanded somewhat by entering into a number of arrangements to manage property owned by other associiitions.
Members of the Humanist movement will, no doubt, be sorry to see Humanist Housing lose its independence. In the housing association movement of today. Humanist Housing is a minor player and, in that context, its merger with St. Pancras H. A. will barely be noticed. True to its principles, the Board has ensured that its tenants will continue to receive the service they have come to expect and that the ethos will remain entirely secular.
What then of the forty-five year record of Humanist Housing? The association came into being at a specific time when Humanists felt a specific need. Onc group of people who needed and deserved better housing were being excluded because they did not have a suitable religious affiliation. The ideals and dedication of its founders helped it pioneer modern standards and the Association has always been a credit to its founding movement in the way it served its tenants. The need that promoted its foundation passed quite quickly. By the seventies, a growth in secular housing associations had overtaken the near monopoly once enjoyed by religious foundations. Discrimination on grounds of religion is now illegal. (I do not say that it has been eliminated in practice). No Humanist in housing need today would have Ethical Record, JalylAugust, 2000 any difficulty in finding a home managed On secular principles. Were the founders of Humanist Housing viewing the current situation, it is doubtful whether they would see any need to set up an expressly Humanist association. They would, no doubt, be concerned about progress and standards in social housing at large.
It seems to me that the Humanist movement is not about 'looking after its own', although there may be circumstances where that is necessary. The main thrust of Humanism is to create a unified society in which religious belief is irrelevant; all people are of equal value because they are people. The history of social housing suggests that our culture has moved gradually in that direction over the centuries. The Humanist movement, and its predecessors, played a significant part in inducing that trend. We should be realistic, though, and recognise that recent advances are probably due to an increasing public awareness of the relath:iry of religion induced by the multi-faith and multi-cultural society ill which we now live.
The setting up of specifically Humanist charities or other organisation to do work already being done is not, I would contend, a core purpose of the Humanist movement. It is must be more important to work for a society where such an activity is unnecessary. There is, and always will be, a clear role for Humanists as individuals in social housing (as in many other aspects of social provision) working to enhance its standards. The role of the movement as a whole is to campaign for all social amenities to be provided on an equitable secular basis.
THE STAKEHOLDER SOCIETY -BOON or CURSE?
Professor Gerald Virden Lecture to be given to the Ethical Society, 2 July 2000
The term stakeholder is becoming part of the corporate and indeed national and global vocabulary. Stakeholding buds are bursting into blossom across countries, contexts, cultures, conferences and companies, not to mention the public and voluntary sectors of the economy. Despite all this, there are voices raised in the business community which are uncomfortable with this development, and in the extreme case would seek to abolish the term, and in the less extreme would wish for a closer definition of terms. The small business, fighting for survival, cannot be expected to take into consideration the range of stakeholders appropriate to a multi- national company.
Definitions provide a hint as to why the theory may precipitate problems and objections: Stakeholder Theory. The theory that a firm should be run in the interests of all its stakeholders rather than just the shareholders. Stakeholder. A term now widely used to mean someone who has a real or psychological 'stake' in an organisation; to include anyone who has significant dealings with it, such as customers, employees, suppliers, distributors, joint venture partners, the local community, bankers and shareholders. It is generally a normative rather than a descriptive term, implying that the user believes that a number of stakeholders have a right to determine what happens within an organisation, and more particularly in a firm, rather then just the owners.'
The anti-stakeholder Milton Friedman represents an extreme form of monetarist economic theory, which considers notions of company social responsibility beyond a duty to shareholders to be subversive, and by extension ideas of stakeholder rights. Those who follow his views consider that stakeholder theory Ethical Record, July/August, 2000 13 is for those who would like to be offered a free lunch, and enjoy the benefits of business without the discipline of business:- Stakeholding would do away with business as it has been traditionally understood, mid subvert the essential features of business accountability. Stakeholder theory is parasitic. It is an ill-defined notion encouraging arrogant and unresponsive managements, and extravagant salaries, perks and premises, and resistance to takeover bids beneficial to shareholders. Stakeholder theory is, therefore, to be firmly resisted as both deeply dangerous and wholly unjustified, and is compared to mugging. It undermines private property, the duties that agents owe to principals, and wealth.
In its origins in the 1950s and 1960s the term was plainly related to the interests of shareholder, since it was 'those groups without whose support the organisation would cease to exist'. In the famous Freeman definition 'A stakeholder in an organisation is any group or individual who can affect or is affected by the achievement of the organisation's objectives.'
Some anti-stakeholders then amend this to: `...all those who can affect, or are affected by, an organisation.' It is'...doctrine that businesses should be run not for the financial benefit of their owners, but for the benefit of all their stakeholders. It is an essential tenet of stakeholder theory that organisations are accountable to all their stakeholders, and that the proper objective of management is to balance stakeholders' competing interests.' All means absolutely everybody and anybody, since the number of people whose benefits need to be taken into account in infinite. A business is specific and limited, and its defining purpose is to maximise owner value over the long term by selling goods or services. To treat business as more inclusive than it is, substitutes, they say, a comprehensive, pretentious notion of business for the narrow, prosaic one which is valid and achievable. The internal auditor would find it difficult to cope with the stakeholder approach. Factors such as customer satisfaction and staff morale were added to traditional financial measures as drivers of long term economic value.
The term stakeholder originated in the territorial claims USA frontier settlers would stake, and so is viewed as using yesterday's language to describe the world of tomorrow. On that basis one could jettison many words in the English language.
The Vinten balanced working definition for a social responsibility audit is: 'A review to ensure that an organisation gives due consideration to its wider and social responsibilities to those both directly and indirectly affected by its decisions, and that a balance is achieved in its corporate planning between these aspects and the more traditional business-related objectives'.
This leads readily to a definition that the stakeholding corporation is one which recognises not only its direct legal and statutory responsibilities to its shareholders, creditors, bankers, external auditors, customers, employees, central and local government, and all those who facilitate the running of its business, but also recognises its need to a 'licence to operate' and responsibilities to those indirectly affected by its activities and decisions, past, present and future, and including the natural world, with a measured balance achieved.
The stakeholder co-operatives in Mondragon in the Basque area of Spain suggests that sensible balance can be achieved, so long as we suspend the financially unviable condition of universality. There are historical examples such as Robert Owen and Lanark in the 1S20s, Saltaire outside Bradford and Sunlight City outside Liverpool. Two interconnected pension schemes (Mineworkers' Pension 14 Ethical Record, July/August 2000 Scheme/British Coal Superannuation Scheme) state that: 'The Trustees are conscious that companies have responsibilities other than those to shareholders, including those to their employees and the wider community and they will take account of these wider responsibilities in considering the practices adopted by investec companies'. Those major British companies affiliated to Business in the Community provide further evidence, and the John Lewis Partnership is one of the most advanced examples of employee involvement.
In fact there are several approaches for conducting a stakeholder analysis such as the six stages: Map stakeholder relationships Map stakeholder coalitions Assess the nature of each stakeholder interest Assess the nature of each stakeholder's power Construct a matrix of stakeholder priorities Monitor shilling coalitions
Key questions to be answered by managers as they attempt to assess the extent of stakeholder interest, legal and/or moral rights, and/or ownership rights are:
I Who are the stakeholders? 2 What are their interests and/or rights 3 What challenges and/or opportunities do they present? 4 What responsibility has the firm to each group, i.e. economic, legal, ethical, philanthropic? 5 What strategies and/or actions are best designed to accommodate or cope with these challenges or opportunities, i.e. direct or indirect dealing, reactive or proactive response, offensive or defensive posturing? 6 Whether the response should be accommodating, negotiating, manipulation, resistance, or a combination?
The 1995 UK Institute of Directors standards posits a classic dilemma: 'The Board is expected to be focused on the commercial needs of the business while acting responsibly towards its employees, business partners, and society as a whole.' The European models of corporate governance and the Social Chapter, are much more orientated to stakeholders than the British model. Owners are a proxy for the public interest. Companies which choose to ignore their stakeholders may find themselves the target of consumer pressure and boycotts and the activity of whistleblowers. This is particularly true of environmental issues, and although there is a mixed record here, the trend is for the responsive companies to favour more voluntary disclosure and action.
The influential 1995 Royal Society of Arts report provides copious evidence of companies with competitive advantage through a stakeholder approach. It resulted in the notion of the inclusive company. It recommends that companies move towards partnership, teamwork, and shared values and goals. They should focus less exclusively on shareholders and on financial measures of success to include all their stakeholder relationships, with a consequential broader range of measurements to think and talk about their purpose and performance.
Anti-stakeholders are delighted to find that even governments exclude certain 'stakeholders': the certified insane, convicted felons and the underage may not vote;
Ethical Recon4 JulylAugust, 2000 15 peers of the realm may not vote for elections to the House of Commons, even though affected by its actions: and foreigners stiffer taxation without representation. All these are special cases, and assume incorrectly that the vote is the only manifestation of stakeholding. Each of these groups has substantial rights, often determined by statute, especially where a group may be considered vulnerable, such as the underage. Even illegal immigrants have some rights! It also assumes that the only manifestation of democracy is at the ballot box.
Another objection is that stakeholder theory undermines private property, agency and wealth. Apparently stakeholder theory additionally denies investors their just desserts in favour of achieving vaguely 'nicer! business behaviour. This perpetuates the myth that we are talking about a win-lose rather than a win-win situation. It may be argued that to have any defensible property rights at all, one must recognise a fundamental commitment to helping those in need. Stakeholding is receiving increasing mention as a natural part of business strategy and management. Indeed in the sector of the economy that is variously called not-for-profit, the voluntary or the charitable, where there are no shareholders, stakeholding might be considered the term of first resort. With the public sector, with its diverse types of organisational form, stakeholding could also be argued as being one apposite term, especially when with certain public goods, it may be tricky to identify the precise beneficiaries.
An international ethics code, stressing the need for moral values in business decision-making, was launched in Switzerland in July 1994. The Caux Round Table Principles for Business has signatories front Japan, the US and Europe. and aims to set a world standard against which business behaviour can be measured, a benchmark which will help individual companies devise their own codes. Most well- known companies have codes, as do professional bodies. Stakeholders are regularly acknowledged in these, and the adoption of environmental management systems is motivated in part by responsibilities to stakeholders.
The European Quality Award has a section on impact on society which counts for 6% of the weighting, although ethical considerations appear elsewhere and so the overall weighting is greater. The section reads: 'What the perception of your company is amongst the community at large. This includes views of the company's approach to quality of life, the environment and to the preservation of global resources. Evidence is needed of the company's success in satisfying the needs and expectation of the community at large.
The British Labour Party has endorsed the RSA Report and its emphasis on stakeholding, with the further consideration that: 'We believe that in the appointment of non-executive directors companies should recognise that there are other stakeholders in the future of the company than shareholders.'
Stakeholder theory is not a universalised notion, but it is increasingly universally present, more so outside the Anglo-Saxon world in influential economies such as Japan. France and Germany. In the USA it is reckoned that 75 per cent of those working in corporations now recognise the meaning of the term stakeholder. The introduction of the idea of stakeholder pensions in the UK has also done much to bring the term into the forefront of public attention.
The anti-stakeholders, apart from being culturally bound, are also anachronistic. As a final indictment, they fail to treat those parts of the economy that 16 Ethical Record, JulylAugust, 2000 are not-for-profit or public sector, as well as the interactions between them and the private sector. Stakeholders are undeniably an integral part of these first two sectors of the economy.
It additionally shows the pace of change when the major accountingJauditing firms launched the Copenhagen Charter to present the business case for managing stakeholder relationships. The Institute of Social and Ethical AccountAbility (ISEA), simultaneous with the Charter, provides international standards to provide organisations with a tool by which to develop high quality systems and procedures for stakeholder dialogue and reporting.
BUTLER AND RUSSELL ON GOD AND RELIGION
David E. White St. John Fisher College, Rochester, NY USA Lecture to the Ethical Social); 23 July 2000
Joseph Butler and Bertrand Russell have much in common: as young men they both had a keen interest in religion, especially] the rational scrutiny of religion: both grew up in the intellectual tradition of Newton and Locke; they shared the same ethics of belief, that the degree of ascent must always be strictly proportioned to the available evidence; both eventually wrote professionally about God and religion. but mainly for the vast audience of ordinary readers rather than the narrow one of intellectuals: in their writings they have Iwo opponents in common: the Roman Catholic Church and protestant 'enthusiasts'. For all this commonalty, they were, of course, at opposite poles in the debate over Christianity. David Berman points out that for many people 'Bertrand Russell is the most formidable British atheist, if not the atheist'. C.D. Broad called Butler's Analogy* 'perhaps the ablest and fairest argument for theism that exists'. Russell concluded that all religions are untrue and harmful. or in an even neater summary, stated 'that there is no reason to believe any of the dogmas of traditional theology and, further, that there is no reason to wish that they were true'. (CP 11:548)
Russell mentions Butler only rarely, usually in relation to his theory of probability, and never in relation to religion. This is not surprising since, except for Leibniz. Russell did not reply at length to any of the classic philosophical apologists for Christianity; furthermore, Russell was born at just about the time I3ut ler had ceased to be of importance for young Christians. In 1876, Matthew Arnold mourned the passing of 13utler's influence.
Nevertheless, there can be no doubt that Butler and Russell were part of a single extended debate. This is literally true in that the passage from Mill's Autobiography that Russell cites for his rejection of the First Cause argument follows almost immediately the younger Mill's account of how his father came to reject the argument of Butler's Analogy, a work 'of which he [James Mill] always continued to speak with respect'.
Even if Me Analogy (by now 20(1 years old) was too dated to he worth Russell's attention when he was writing his most vigorous anti-Christian polemics,
*The Analogy of Religion, Natural and Revealed, to the Constitution and Course of Nature (1736).
Ethical Record, July/August, 2000 17 Russell and Butler shared an understanding that reason, and reason alone, should govern belief, and they were equally concerned with not just belief but also with the practice of what one believed. For his part, Butler seems to have known enough sceptics like Russell to make them the stated target in the 'Advertisement' to his Analogy.
Butler and Russell were both so fond of questioning their respective opponents' motives that their arguments ad hominem effectively cancel each other out. Butler used humour, but not as much or as effectively as Russell, and he urges the clergy at Durham not to try to match the sceptics in wit. There is also sonic small indication that Russell would have had more respect for Butler than for the religionists who were his favourite targets. Russell may have counted Butler as standing in the 'old respectable intellectual tradition' of theology he mentions in The Scientific Outlook. Russell also admitted that one who accepted the supremacy of reason might still be led to [theologically] orthodox conclusions, and that would be 'well and good' (CP 11:91).
Russell's Rejection of Christianity Russell's personal credo was at odds with Christianity, and his opposition to all organised religion was emphatic. Especially in his earliest writing on religion, Russell struggled to produce a positive statement of his religious sentiments. I3utler would consider these works expressions of an underlying passion or love for that- which-l-admire-most.
The chief philosophical objection to Russell's personal creeds is not so much to their heresy as to their individualism. Butler abhorred the idea of pretending to special gifts, just as Wittgenstein later rejected a private language.
Russell never claimed special gifts of the Holy Spirit any more than he claimed to speak a private religious language, but the main problem with his personal piety is that, however popular essays like 'A Free Man's Worship' may have been, they remain private affirmations unconnected with the larger body of religious (or anti-religious) discourse.
Except in his very earliest writings, Russell maintained that God's existence could neither be proved nor disproved. He considered himself technically an agnostic, but he thought that agnosticism was enough rationally to justify living the life of an atheist. Furthermore, Russell saw almost no good coming from the Church or any form of organised religion.
Butler's reply would be, in the words of the 'Durham Charge', 'the number of those who.., profess themselves unbelievers, increases, and with their numbers their zeal. Zeal, it is natural to ask - for what? Why truly for nothing, but against everything that is good and sacred amongst us'.
Russell's usual answer at this point would be to list the objects of his zeal: 'knowledge, kindliness and courage': 'that people feel their destiny is in their own hands' (CP 10:201) and, most importantly, a 'habit of basing convictions upon evidence, and of giving to them only that degree of certainty which the evidence warrants'. But Russell would know enough not to raise these points against Butler since Butler would agree with Russell entirely.
The point, Butler would say, is that our nature leads us in the direction of Russell's zeal and the world responds, at least to a degree, by affirming these values. 18 Ethical Record, JulylAugust, 2000 The partial and progressive coincidence of virtue and happiness is at least consistent with a benevolent governor of nature. It is this benevolent and just deity that we admire most, deem worthy of worship, and therefore do in fact worship. The arbitrary and despotic gods rejected by Russell would be scorned by Butler just as much.
Russell would, before long, confess amazement at Butler's complacency. 'I cannot but feel that an omnipotent Creator with millions of years in which to perfect His work might have produced something better than the Ku Klux Klan, the Fascisti, and the authors of the Great War' (CP 10:199-200).
Butler, in rebuttal, would challenge the credibility of Russell's 'feelings' on this matter. It is Russell who is complacent in thinking he can rather easily put himself in the place of the governor of the universe. Butler would claim that in all his inferences regarding what we can and should expect regarding how the universe is run, Russell needs to factor in our almost total ignorance of what is the case and of the hypothetical consequences of any change.
As regards God's existence, the debate between Butler and Russell begins rather inauspiciously. In Russell's case, his manner of presenting objections to the various proofs of God's existence allows even as sophisticated a reader as T.S. Eliot to think that the general form of his argument is:
The attempted proofs of God are unsuccessful. Therefore, there is no reason to believe in God and there is good reason not to believe.
Russell knew, of course, that for this argument to be valid he needed the additional premise:
If the attempted proofs of God are unsuccessful, then there is no reason to believe in God and there is good reason not to believe.
The trouble is that, especially in his best known discussions, this premise was left unstated and even obscured. To make matters worse, Russell admitted that he could not prove that God did not exist, and he was fully aware of the difficulty of explaining, especially to a popular audience, the difference between an atheist and an agnostic.
Butler's exposition of his position on God's existence is even more seriously defective. Butler believed that many successful proofs of God's existence were already in print and that the mere existence of God was not even in dispute. Both confusions appear in the first few paragraphs of chapter II of Mill's Autobiography.
What, if any, verdict we can reach from all this is suggested by J.H. Bernard's gloss on Butler's statement of the ontological proof. The most we can conclude is that had Butler taken the time to set out a reworking of Clarke's* argument, he may have been able to produce a proof that would escape all Russell's criticisms.
The First-Cause Argument In his A History of Western Philosophy, Russell presents Leihnils First-Cause argument as:
Ethical Record, JulylAugust, 2000 19 Everything has to have a sufficient reason. Therefore, the universe must have a sufficient reason, which must be outside the universe. This sufficient reason is, obviously, God. Russell then states that this argument is 'valid so long as we grant Leibniz's principle of sufficient reason, 'i.e., as long as we grant to first premise. Russell, of *Samuel Clarke: Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God (1705). See also The Unchangeable Obligations of Natural Religion and the Trust and Certainty of the Christian Religion (1706). course, never did grant the first premise. What might be called the Butlerian insight is that one who refuses to grant the principle of sufficient reason has the burden of proof. More specifically, even if the principle of sufficient reason is known to be false as a universal proposition. it still enjoys a presumption in its favour with regard to each specific application. Russell claimed, in effect, that he was rationally comfortable with the following:
Either God is the sufficient reason for the universe or nothing is, but we do not know which.
Butler, had he worked it through, would have produced a series of analogue propositions and asked us whether, as a practical matter, we were comfortable with any of them. For example, consider:
'Ladies and Gentlemen of the Jury: I admit the evidence has gone against my client. It has been demonstrated in this court that if anything were a sufficient reason for the victim's death, then that reason must have been the action of my client. All other possible causes have been eliminated. Nevertheless. I believe the judge will instruct you not to presume the principle of sufficient reason. In your deliberations you will be asked to consider the possibility that my client is innocent and there is no sufficient reason for the victim's death'.
A lawyer who actually gave this speech would, of course, be removed for incompetence.
Immortality, Reward and Punishment Russell always insisted that living a good life was not enough to be a Christian; one must also believe in God and the immortality of the soul, as well as have certain beliefs about Jesus. Russell was confident that all the scientific evidence was against the soul's survival, especially because of the apparent dependence of the mental on the physical. Russell does not raise any issues that were not considered by Butler, and his reply is particularly instructive. Russell looked for proof of immortality, and found none. Butler looked for a disproof of the soul's survival, and found none. So the question again comes down to who has the burden of proof.
The conclusion as regards immortality is, therefore, that once their opinions are spelled out in detail, it is hard to find any factually or practical disagreement between Butler and Russell on immortality. Butler's main point was that the evidence, even if it is against a future life, warrants living in anticipation (hope and fear) of a future life. Russell clearly believed that he would `rot' after death, but he does not seem to have acted in anticipation of not surviving.
Ethical Record., JulylAugust, 2000 Even if we have played to a draw so far. there is no denying that Russell and Butler understood punishment and the moral order of the universe very differently. Butler was well aware that punishment was a disagreeable subject, and Russell found fault with Jesus Christ mainly for his views on eternal punishment.
Russell's point regarding reward and punishment in the next life was that since we don't improve in this world, there is no reason to expect we will improve in the next. Butler might agree that there are many examples of those who do not improve, but his point is that the natural system of reward and punishment is progressive. That is, there is an initial tendency for virtue to be rewarded by nature and vice punished, and, as time goes on. this tendency becomes more pronounced. Russell, of course, would not acknowledge any obligation to God, and no special obligations to Jesus, but he does seem to have been profoundly influenced by the moral teaching ofJesus.
One of Russell's strongest objections to religion was that religion encouraged belief on insufficient evidence. But, according to Butler, reason sometimes requires that we act on less than an even chance, sometimes only a very small chance. Buying a lottery ticket might serve as an example. Butler would point out that there is only a very small chance the ticket will be worth anything. but it is only rational to treat the ticket with as much care as if one knew it were a winning ticket.
For his part. Russell rather enjoyed shocking people, so it is hard to take any one statement altogether seriously. Since Russell accepted the moral teachings of Christianity. and practiced them better than most nominal Christians, and since there do not seem to be any practical consequences to his denial of God and the immortality of the soul, it is hard to find a clear point of conflict on an issue that is both philosophical and really matters. Cl VIEWPOINTS
•Roourn' for Diversity and Experience I agree with Donald Rooum, (Viewpoints, ER June 2000) that prescribing a set of moral opinions as. to quote Barbara Smoker, 'the view of SPES% effectively, implies a condition of membership. It would be prone to make us, and the ethical principles we are to disseminate, exclusive, rather than inclusive. Our rivulet of new members will take us, or not, as they find us, and that is the best test. We are, however, to some small and valuable degree, both constrained, and broadened beyond Ethics and the moralism of Blairist dissemination, by our other object of cultivating a rational religious sentiment. The clause is primarily, of course, a genuflection back towards the mummery (and associated charitable benefits) from which the Society was born, but the coupling of 'cultivating', 'rational', 'religious' and 'sentiment has some enduring meaning. It differentiates us from other humanist bodies, as a promoter of a 'way of life', rather than the anti-religious humanist contention per se. Also, it implies we are not in the business of cultivating, directly or permissively, non-rational religious belief, and most particularly that we eschew any truck with cults. This needs to be said, and crisply reflected in our lettings policy. (Barbara's characterisation of the field of the Paranormal as Superstition begs the question; those who do not beg it, do so precisely because their perception of the evidence drives them to seek a non-reductive rational explanation.)
The Dillon court judgement put an aesthetic glos's on the whole phrase, as, roughly, cultivating our (and the community's) discrimination of, the feeling for, Ethical Record, JulylAugust, 2000 21 what is fine; rather than just what is of intellectual interest. Although our programme concentrates on the latter, we should declare ourselves as a body that looks to house opportunities for life-enhancing experiences, ;ind see ourselves as a home for the talented that can bring these about as an integral part of the life of our community. Chris Bratcher - London WC I The Society's Purpose I was very pleased to sec Dorothy Forsyth's commendation in the June Ethical Record, as I have been so disillusioned with the unwillingness of other SPES members to allow any sort of ethical statement to be made in the Society's name.
The three pages of mine published in the April issue were not intended to be complete in themselves, but just the first instalment for the Society's website. The first amendment I was asked to make was to change the opening word in my statement 'We humanists judge the rightness of actions by their probable consequences' to 'most', and I acceded to this - though I still cannot imagine to what other basic ethical criterion any humanist could possibly subscribe. Now, Donald Rooum (Viewpoints, ER, June 2000), regarding as `valuable members' 'those who think that paranormal phenomena are probably genuine' and 'those who suppose that homosexuality is a dysfunction', asserts that 'the opinions of the Society as such must be minimal and rather vague'. To my mind, that is to nullify the very purpose of our existence. Barbara Smoker - Bromley, Kent Note: Dick Clifford of the South Australia Humanist Society, intends to publish Barbara's April statements as a Humanist leaflet. [Ed.] Once More, The Menace of the Multi-Nationals Paul Rhodes's talk to SPES on multi-national corporations (MNCs) in March this year (see summary in ER, May 2000, pp. 13-23) calls for a number of comments. Firstly, his argument, which is in favour of MNCs, is perhaps not wholly consistent: it is at one point apparently moral, at another of a 'realpolitile, harshly practical kind. On the apparently moral side. MNCs are seen as playing a crucial role in the task of wealth creation required 'to feed the world's 6 billion people and provide the basics of life" (p. 23). On the 'realpolitik' side, MNCs, especially British ones, need to export as must as possible: and 'Applying ethics to this equation means a dramatic reduction in profitable exports and a reduction in tax revenues.' (p. 19) He later extends this point by saying that most of the countries he has worked in as an MNC employee have poor human rights records, and yet 'it is these countries that provide a positive cash flow into our treasury'. (p. 22) Though this financial emphasis is to some extent mitigated by his statement that a reduction in domestic tax revenue would diminish funding for health, education and other services (p. 19), this latter point only begs the question about ethical universality. Should one society base its morally commendable provision of social services on an economic system which, as it relates to other societies, is morally dubious? Secondly, he connects MNC activity with the commitment, as declared by, for example, the British government, to `open trade', a 'one world' approach, the removal of trade barriers and any other impediment to free trade'. (p. 19) However, what he neglects to mention is that many Western governments, including the British, erect tariffs and other trade barriers to manufactured goods coming from the Third World. This practice is part of a general policy to protect Western 22 Ethical Record, JulylAugust, 2000 manufacturing interests .(including MNCs) from those of the Third World. The policy aims to imprison the majority of Third World countries in their traditional role in the global economy as suppliers of primary commodities and raw materials: the latter are bought cheaply by the West and then used to manufacture high-priced goods. This is not free trade.
In this connection, Paul should have paid more attention to the points I made in my talk on the MNCs (see El?, February 1999, pp. 3-12) on the strategic alliances and even mergers in which MNCs are now engaging in order to tighten their domination of the global economy. Such measures are a far cry from the promulgation of free trade and genuine competitiveness. Paul does, it is true, say that 'merger and acquisition activity will grow apace, and in many industries... only 5- 10 major manufacturers will survive'(p.21). But he does so without appearing to see how this point clashes with his earlier argument about the linkage between MNCs and an open economy.
Next, he makes several references to formal restrictions on MNC power which exist, at least at the official level. What are needed, however, are actual examples of these restrictions being implemented. For instance, when exactly have individual governments and the U.N. prohibited MNCs from operating in certain countries? When have individual U.S. states taken action against companies for trading with 'proscribed regimes, and which are these regimes? When have senior directors of North American companies have prosecuted for making illegal payments?
These questions need to be pressed, given the enormous political influence which MNCs exert behind the scenes, and about which I gave some details in my talk. Such influence implies that the 'competition legislation' which Paul sees as an effective control mechanism (p.23) may not be actualised to anything like the extent one would wish.
Even where this influence is only marginal, deep problems remain. For instance, Paul specifies that in many developing countries, it is local groups, not the MNCs with whom they work, who decide on wages and working conditions; the latter have to comply with local conditions and employment law. Yes: but the local situation is usually a product of poverty and underdevelopment; hence low wages and bad conditions are endemic factors. It matters little, therefore, that in many cases (thouoh by no means all). MNCs do not create these factors. What is significant is that they accept them - indeed welcome them - as part of their general global objective to minimise production costs. This objective is what has led them to shift much of their production to the Third World. So, the perpetuation of bad working conditions is something in which MNCs are, at the very least, complicit.
Finally. Paul argues that MNCs are the main repositories of the skills required in today's hi-lec world, and cites the example of India in the 90s, when the state- owned telecommunications system failed to provide adequate equipment for the country's needs and had to call in MNCs to do the job properly (p.20). Now it is indisputable that MNCs are the most technically advanced of all manufacturers. This, however, is because of their enormous wealth and resources (see my article for some salient data). Given a much wider spread of resources, there is no inevitable reason why other manufacturers, including publicly controlled ones, could not achieve the same high technical standards. Tom Rubens - London N4
Ethical Record, July/August, 2000 Ethical to be Elitist Last month's Editorial by Jennifer Jeynes (ER June 2000) was both accurate and depressing. 'We' have created a soap opera society! Politics have really become a form of show biz where populism and votes are more important than substance. There are politicians of principle, intellect and experience. I know because I meet them. The problem is that they cannot prosper if they shout too loudly and also they risk de-selection. Another frightening aspect is that our media (and in particular the BBC) do not give a balanced view; they have their own agenda and will often ignore or ridicule views that differ from their editorial objectives. I have raised various issues with politicians of the two main parties (what is the difference between them?) and privately they will confirm that my argument and facts are right - however to acknowledge this would lose them votes. On the very issues that underpin our society we are reduced to marketing policies like breakfast cereals! Paul Rhodes - London SWI9
I agree with Jennifer Jeynes (El?. June) that a God-validated hereditary dictator (Protestant), should not be at the apex of the British political system. Monarchy was invented in ancient Egypt about 5000 years ago. It is also incredible that the current royal dynasty based on Goerge I (57th in line to the throne) is still in power! George I was a German non-English speaking person. less royal than catholic royals in Britain. Some British royals. being ultra conservative as royals are, reverted back to the catholic religion. Thc political class chose an obscure minor German royal to be king to prevent a royal vacuum. If we are to become a super state in the European Union - what use is Westminster or the Monarchy? Robert Awbery - Reading
Cause for Concern When I joined the General Committee five to six years ago most of the GC members appeared to have a genuine concern in promoting the charitable objects of the Ethical Society. It now seems to me that with one or two exceptions most GC members are concerned only with the maximising the financial income from every square foot of the Conway Hall facilities. Surely a large proportion of GC meetings should be spent addressing the humanist cause, the objectives of the society, and especially what the Society should be offering its members. Instead, the four-hour monthly meetings are mainly concerned with problem solving - nlainly problems of its own making, which lead to unseemly quarrelling with Staff, with other GC members, with Tenants and with Clients.
I have been a member of the Hall -sub-committee for quite some time, trying to maintain the hall in a good condition and indeed a great deal of money has been spent to accomplish this. However. I worry about the fact that increasingly some of the trustees are clearly more concerned with profit-making rather than addressing the many humanist causes which we should be actively striving to promote. I like to think that at the Society's next AGM on I October our members will be made aware of precisely what is going on at the GC meetings and consequently what is happening to SPES; and as important perhaps members will realise how vital it is to inject fresh blood into our ailing Society and stand as strong candidates for the General Committee before it is too late. Victor Monger - London
Published by the South Place Ethical Society. Conway Ilall. 25 Red lion Square. WC t 4RL Printed hy J.G. Bryson (Printer) Lid. 156-162 High Road, London N2 YAS ISSN 0014 - 1690