The Lab, the Temple, and the Market This page intentionally left blank THE LAB, THE TEMPLE, AND THE MARKET Reflections at the Intersection of Science, Religion, and Development Edited by Sharon Harper KUMARIAN PRESS © International Development Research Centre 2000 Published in Canada by the International Development Research Centre po Box 8500, Ottawa, on, Canada K1G 3H9 http://www.idrc.ca/books/ Published in Europe and the United States of America by Kumarian Press Inc. 1294 Blue Hills Avenue, Bloomfield, ct 06002, usa http://www.kpbooks.com/ All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers. All paper used in this book is recycled as well as recyclable. All inks and coatings are vegetable-based products. Canadian Cataloging in Publication Data Main entry under title: The lab, the temple and the market : reflections at the intersection of science, religion and development / edited by Sharon Harper isbn 0-88936-920-8 ccg cat. no. E97-7/2000E 1. Economic development — Religious aspects. 2. Technology — Religious aspects. 3. Religion and science. I. Harper, Sharon, 1965- . II. International Development Research Centre (Canada) HD75.L33 2000 338.9 C00-901336-9 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data The lab, the temple, and the market : reflections at the intersection of science, religion, and development / edited by Sharon Harper. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references. isbn 1-56549-116-5 (alk. paper) 1. Economic development—Religious aspects. 2. Technology—Religious aspects. 3. Religion and science. I. Harper, Sharon, 1965- HD75.L33 2000 338.9--dc21 00-055935 Contents Foreword — Pierre Beemans . vii Preface — Sharon Harper . ix Introduction — Farzam Arbab . 1 chapter 1 The Principle of Fundamental Oneness — Promilla Kapur . 7 The context . 7 Hinduism: the backdrop . 12 Self, society, and development . 18 Modern science and the Hindu religion. 27 Devotion, knowledge, and action. 32 Conclusion: an integrated paradigm . 51 Annex 1: Selected ethical principles of Hinduism-inspired movements for development . 55 chapter 2 Solidarity with the Poor — Gregory Baum . 61 A Roman Catholic idea of development. 61 The World Bank’s new interest in religion . 71 The subjective dimension of social-science research . 77 Annex 1: Excerpts from papal encyclicals and statements by the World Synod of Bishops concerning development . 82 chapter 3 Rediscovering the Resources of Religion — Azizan Baharuddin. 105 Introduction . 105 Science. 109 Development . 111 Religion . 113 Islam . 120 Conclusion. 137 Annex 1: Islamic scholars and organizations involved in science, religion, and development. 138 v CONTENTS chapter 4 Promoting a Discourse on Science, Religion, and Development — Farzam Arbab. 149 On personal experience . 149 Faith and reason . 177 Spiritual principles and the role of knowledge. 195 Capacity-building . 210 afterword Our Way of Proceeding — William Ryan, S.J. 239 appendix 1 Contributing Authors . 247 vi appendix 2 Acronyms and Abbreviations . 251 Foreword Only the most ingenuous or wilfully blind would pretend that after a half century of sustained effort and many, many billions of dollars, inter- national development agencies have at last “got it right.” If anything, there is a pervasive sense that, in some very real way, we have failed. True, there have been tremendous achievements: thanks in large part to the programs of these agencies, the dedication of their staff, and the advances of modern science and technology (s&t), more people today have more food, better health, longer lives, more access to education, and faster communications than ever before. And yet, more people than ever before are living in extreme poverty — physical, social, and moral. Education, health, and employ- ment systems have collapsed in much of sub-Saharan Africa. The Earth is choking in the poison and filth we have generated through ever- increasing industrial growth justified by models of human development that focus on consumption. Population levels outstrip the capacity of many countries to meet basic human needs, let alone the growth in social demand for conspicuous consumption. Both developed and devel- oping countries are facing waves of social disintegration, with crime, corruption, and violence as only the most visible features. The global shift in sociocultural value systems, characterized by Westernized pop culture and the deterioration of collective bonds of community and kinship, has deprived whole societies of their traditional spiritual and cultural reference points and bred disturbing patterns of social and spir- itual alienation. I am not implying that all of these problems can be laid at the door of international development agencies and models. These issues do suggest, however, that somewhere along the line we lost sight of some- thing or that we never saw it in the first place. Most, if not all, devel- opment agencies are inspired by a scientific, technological, economic, and positivistic worldview; perhaps, we have been unable to listen to what people outside our agencies and worldview have been saying. Most people situate themselves, their day-to-day decisions, and their hopes in the context of moral and religious belief systems that have traditionally been seen by development agencies as outside of — if not opposed to — our development models. As an institution with a 30-year history of looking at how s&t can be applied to resolve the development problems of the South, the International Development vii FOREWORD Research Centre (idrc) decided a few years ago to launch a modest inquiry that would help us better understand how our field of action relates to the spiritual and religious dimension of human well-being. This was a new and contentious area for an organization like ours, which has been accustomed to thinking of religion and spirituality as private matters with no place in our professional lives or in a public domain like that of “international development.” We were unsure of how to approach the question and of whom to ask. In the end, we were fortunate to encounter four individuals from different cultural and regional backgrounds, all believers in their own religious traditions and all trained as natural or social scientists, who were willing to work together to explore how science, religion, and development come together in their own personal and professional viii worldviews. Although we had intended to bring in other actors from various religious traditions and scientific disciplines, we decided to start with these four as a “critical mass” and to trust that others would join in as the inquiry progressed. This book is intended to launch that wider stage of inquiry. It is unclear to us at idrc where this experiment in research will lead, either within or beyond idrc. At the very least, we hope that it will enrich our thinking about development and about how we do our work. We also hope that it will be a useful contribution to the growing international discourse on the relationship between the religious, scien- tific, and “developmental” worldviews on the improvement of the human condition. And we would, of course, be delighted if there was enough interest to support a continuation of our inquiry into what I believe is one of the great challenges before governments and develop- ment agencies: how to harness the scientific, technical, and economic creativity of the modern world to improve the human condition while respecting and reflecting the underlying values about human well-being and our relationship with the world that are offered by religious and cultural traditions. Pierre Beemans Vice President International Development Research Centre Preface From the perspective of “research,” the conjunction of science, religion, and development (srd) is an enormous challenge — even to appreciate the scope of the issues. Merely a few of the entry points for research cur- rently being explored in this area are global or universal ethics, ethics and development, religious and faith-based responses to the concern for environmental sustainability, religion and development, religiously based development efforts, issues of globalization and cultural values, indigenous belief systems and knowledge, efforts to create interreligious dialogue and understanding, and religious and faith-based approaches to conflict resolution. The International Development Research Centre (idrc) srd project is a modest effort to tease out this knot of questions, concerns, and rich insights. This effort has been specifically designed for a research-for-development organization with an interest in supporting scientific research and research capacity for sustainable development, because, simply put, the srd project offered the opportunity to investi- gate what faith and science have to offer each other in the 50-year-old endeavour called development. One of the strengths of the project is that, given the breadth of the relevant issues, it does not ask people to change their approach to devel- opment or to reevaluate the skills they have in their various disciplines but to articulate their disciplinary contribution and the role played by their faith in their approaches. With each person writing from his or her perspective and skill set, we offer an eclectic set of reflections, but we hope that these reflections allow readers to see the relevance of these questions within