PASS Acta 16

Crisis in a Global Economy. Re-planning the Journey Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences, Acta 16, 2011 www.pass.va/content/dam/scienzesociali/pdf/acta16/acta16-mlcoch.pdf BUSINESS LEADERSHIP SINE SPECIE AETERNITATIS IRRESPONSIBILITY IN A GLOBAL SPACE LUBOMÍR MLCˇ OCH Motto: ‘The conviction that man is self-sufficient and can successfully eliminate the evil present in history by his own action alone has led him to confuse happiness and salvation with immanent forms of material prosperity and social action’. CariTas in VeriTaTe, 34 1. BUSINESS LEADERSHIP TO BE LEARNT Allow me, please, To sTarT wiTh a personal confession and an expression of graTiTude. I have no pracTical experience wiTh business leadership of greaT corporaTions – perhaps wiTh The excepTion of a very special, involun- Tary, fifTeen-year ‘sabbaTical’ in a Prague facTory during The communisT regime. Also, for hisTorical reasons, There is no equivalenT To The English word ‘leader’ in The Czech language. Two similar Czech words ‘vu˚dce’ and ‘vedoucí’ have negaTive connoTaTions: The firsT one calls To mind The German word ‘Führer’ from The period of The Nazi ProTecToraTe and The second indi- caTed a leading parTy cadre in The command economy for 40 years. Hence, The English Term ‘leader’ is now used in The Czech milieu. Readers are asked To noTe These reservaTions. For These reasons iT was imporTanT for us To learn a proper meaning of business leadership afTer The fall of communism. For six years, 1997-2002, I had an excepTional opporTuniTy To parTicipaTe in ‘The Leadership Forum Prague’ projecT. The firsT U.S. CaTholic universiTy GeorgeTown/WashingTon, D.C. offered To The hisTorically firsT universiTy in CenTral Europe – Charles UniversiTy – help in Teaching, building and fosTering business eThics for emerging markeTs. I am graTeful To God ThaT aT ThaT opporTuniTy I meT my laTe friend Milan (Mike) Miskovsky of WoodsTock Theological CenTre aT George- Town. Mike Miskovsky – who died lasT year – had a greaT spiriTual charisma 342 LUBOMÍR ML Cˇ OCH and a gifT To Teach whaT business leadership sub specie aeternitatis meanT – jusT by ‘doing annual conferences’ – abouT leadership, abouT The role of cor - poraTe governance and invesTor expecTaTions in a global markeTplace. In 2001, aparT from The ‘Success TogeTher’ conference, The Leadership Forum organized a lecTure by Professor STigliTz. AT The Time Charles UniversiTy gave him an honorary docToraTe, Thus anTicipaTing his Nobel Prize, which he received a few monThs laTer. The lecTure by Professor STigliTz had a propheT - ic air, he poinTed To The role of TrusT as a pre-condiTion for markeT Transac - Tions. The lasT Leadership Forum Conference Took place in 2002. IT dealT wiTh The TransformaTion of The Czech banking secTor and aTTracTed even The aTTen - Tion of Czech poliTical leaders, including The MinisTer of Finance... For These six years Mike and myself shared confidence and a common belief ThaT America was a model and a compeTenT Teacher of business lead - ership. LaTer, as a consequence of a series of scandals, such as ENRON, This TrusT was gradually eroded. IT happened noT only on our side: a crisis of self- confidence developed on The oTher side as well. The former Governor of The NYSE, RohaTyn, said aT ThaT Time ThaT These abuses had shaken public faiTh in The fairness of The American SysTem. I remember my lasT Talk wiTh Mike: alThough aT all previous Times he had encouraged me by repeaTing ThaT ‘pos - iTive Thinking was needed’, This Time he felT ThaT a global crisis was approaching, and ThaT iT was a moral crisis – a crisis which included also The Church – ThaT would cause The financial crisis. During his illness, Mike suffered Twice, physically and also from disTress – from feelings of fuTiliTy of his professional life efforT. AT leasT for me – and I believe also for many of The Leadership forum parTicipanTs – Mike’s efforT was noT fuTile, if for noThing oTher Than a glimpse of eTerniTy ThaT Mike had passed To us. BuT Milan Miskovsky’s fideliTy To The CaTholic social docTrine and his obedience To The Church’s MagisTerium did noT have any specTacular characTer; Milan was a humble man. 2. T HE CHURCH HAS ENTERED THE ECONOMY IN TWO DIFFERENT WAYS I discovered CaTholic social Teaching for myself aT The Fribourg confer - ence ‘ÉThique, économie eT développemenT – l’enseignemenT des êveques des cinq conTinenTs’ (1993). Professor Émile PoulaT (France) characTerised a novelTy of This Fribourg conference wiTh his proposiTion: The Church has enTered The economy. NeverTheless sixTeen years laTer, BenedicT XVI had To confess ThaT, ‘AfTer The collapse of The economic and poliTical sysTem of The BUSINESS LEADERSHIP SINE SPECIE AETERNITATIS – IRRESPONSIBILITY IN A GLOBAL SPACE 343 CommunisT counTries of EasTern Europe and The end of The so-called opposing blocs, a compleTe reexaminaTion of developmenT was needed...a comprehensive new plan for developmenT...also in The WesT and in Those parTs of The world ThaT were in The process of evolving. This has been achieved only in parT...’ ( Caritas in Veritate , 23). A series of quesTions arises here: as regards This challenge of a new plan for developmenT, why did The Church succeed only parTially? Why were neiTher Sollicitudo Rei Socialis nor Centesimus Annus by John Paul II enough for This Task? WhaT share of This only parTial success can we aTTribuTe To faulTs and failures of econom - ics? Does economic Theory – as one of The sciences abouT ‘earThly realiTies’ – wiTh iTs legiTimaTe auTonomy – bear iTs own responsibiliTy ( Gaudium et Spes , 36)? Why is iT ThaT only ‘The currenT crisis obliges us To re-plan our journey’? (BenedicT XVI in Caritas in Veritate , 21). Émile PoulaT had in mind noT only new reflecTions on economic issues in encyclical leTTers, buT also new iniTiaTives for The applicaTion of CaTholic social Teaching aT The level of differenT counTries, regions and conTinenTs. And The firsT bishops ThaT sTarTed This process and enTered The economy were The U.S. bishops in Their leTTer ‘Economic JusTice for All’ (1986). Con - sequenTly, in order To undersTand why The Church, when enTering The econ - omy (and economics) sTopped half way, we oughT To reTurn To The U.S. before ‘Economic JusTice for All’. During The preparaTion of This pasToral leTTer of The U.S. bishops, a ‘Lay commission on CaTholic social Teaching’ published anoTher documenT enTi - Tled ‘Toward The FuTure, A Lay LeTTer’, New York (1984). This lay leTTer had a greaTer ambiTion Than applying universal CaTholic social docTrine To The U.S. economy. Leading persons would raTher like To use The U.S. hisTorical experience To re-formulaTe The universal Teaching of The Church. This lay leT - Ter was dedicaTed To Pope John Paul II and To ‘our bishops’, neverTheless There was an inner Tension beTween These Two perspecTives (‘good inTenTions are noT enough’) o.c., p. X, ‘markeTs do noT bend To pious wishes’ (o.c., 44). To define one perspecTive as ‘lay’ and anoTher one as ‘bishop’ was probably misleading. NeverTheless, already Three years before, in The Corporation. A Theological Inquiry (eds. Novak, M. and Cooper, J.W. 1981), a spliT beTween The ‘clergy’ and ‘lay people’ was even clearer. The perspecTive of The world, as seen Through God’s eyes, and The ‘Theology of EarThly RealiTies’ (GusTav Thils: ‘Théologie des réaliTés TerresTres’) have been accepTed and newly for - mulaTed by The VaTican II Gaudium et Spes . John Paul II again sTressed This feaTure of The CaTholic social docTrine: ‘an ideal orienTaTion’ as ‘indispens - able’, i.e. ThaT cannoT be dispensed wiTh ( CA , 43). PaTrick de Laubier (1994) 344 LUBOMÍR ML Cˇ OCH says in This connecTion: ‘ ...la docTrine sociale de l’Église assure une régula - Tion, une orienTaTion idéale basé sur la loi naTurelle eT les BéaTiTudes...Les BéaTiTudes exalTenT ce que le monde n’apprécie guère: la pauvreTé, la dou - ceur, la pureTé, eTc.; ce sonT pourTanT des élémenTs essenTiels qui humanisenT une collecTiviTé...conTrairemenT à l’uTopie qui esT une idée humaine sans chance de réalisaTion, l’espérance chréTienne d’une civilisaTion de l’amour repose sur l’EspriT sainT qui TouT en respecTanT les liberTés humaines qui doi - venT coopérer à la réalisaTion du dessein de Dieu ’ (o.c., pp. 156-157) . The normaTive perspecTive of The CaTholic social docTrine includes inherenTly ‘oughT’. On The oTher hand, M. Novak sTresses anoTher perspec - Tive, ThaT of ‘is’: ‘We were TaughT (aT Harvard) The imporTance of The descrip - Tive and warned againsT The normaTive’ (Novak, M. – Cooper, J.W. 1981, p. 227). In The Theology of earThly realiTies, iT is jusT This normaTive perspecTive sub specie aeternitatis ThaT refers To God’s view; wiThouT ThaT The CaTholic social docTrine is endangered by ‘ une sorTe de raTionalisme reTenanT exclu - sivemenT ce qui esT humainemenT envisageable, sans se préoccuper de la fin dernière surnaTurelle... ’ (de Laubier, o.c., p. 159). On The oTher side (A Lay LeTTer, p. 3) a hope of possible complemenTariTy has been expressed. AfTer complaining ThaT ‘The many conTribuTions of The American experimenT To CaTholic social ThoughT have been given Too liTTle recogniTion’, There is a desire To learn from each oTher. To meeT half way is surely needed, never - Theless a complemenTariTy beTween ‘is’ and ‘oughT’ has To be clearly defined; oTherwise The CaTholic social docTrine could resulT in an uTTerly confusing and misleading message. 3. T HE PERSPECTIVE OF THE ‘P ROSPERITY GOSPEL ’ IS DIFFERENT FROM THAT OF THE GOSPEL Reginald H. Jones in his conTribuTion abouT The TransnaTional enTer - prise and world economic developmenT (in Novak, M. – Cooper, J.W. eds, pp. 129-141, and a discussion ThaT follows) raised The quesTion ‘Is Business SaTanic?’ and answered himself ThaT iT is noT.

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