Retreat must tackle values

Ian Boyne, Contributor

The Cabinet goes into its fifth retreat today, and its minister responsible for information, Sandrea Falconer, told the Jamaica House press briefing last week that its members will discuss "the growth agenda, including job-creation strategies, human-capital development, social inclusion, improved security and safety, fiscal prudence and the pursuit of a credible economic programme". All big, august matters deserving of the attention of the country's Cabinet.

But I dare say all of that will evaporate into nothingness unless the retreat also considers that overarching issue of values and attitudes, or what social scientists call social capital. Just two weeks ago, the country's shame was on display all over the United States as television stations featured tear-jerking, anger-inciting documentaries on Jamaica's lotto scamming, while United States senators heard heart-rending tales about the havoc wreaked on senior citizens' lives by heartless, depraved Jamaican scammers.

And last Thursday morning, Jamaicans woke up to a headline in The Gleaner which screamed 'Insurance scam', with the subtitle 'Lawyers, doctors, 'accident victims' collaborate to swindle millions', in that latest Jamaican scam. In this scam, it is not just poor or greedy youth and bling-minded working-class persons who were involved, but lawyers and doctors whom the country has used taxpayers' money to educate. Lawyers find out about legitimate accidents, pad 'victims' in these accidents; find legitimate doctors who doctor up medical claims to swindle insurance companies of millions. Just another day in 'Samfie Jamaica'.

When your professionals are reputedly masterminding scams rather than putting their skills to building Jamaica, you know we are in serious trouble. And only last Sunday, this newspaper stunned Jamaica with that front-page story of that 'businessman' (every alleged crook is called a businessman) from Rose Town, who had reportedly not just been involved in corrupt and criminal activities but was able to buy out our policemen who could bring documentation to him showing who had reported him - and then those patriotic, community-minded Jamaicans would have their lives snuffed out for being good citizens who report criminal activities. Welcome to Jamrock!

MORAL CRISIS

Meanwhile, we continue to murder our women, children and old people while we ingeniously hatch the latest scams. An economic-reform programme cannot take place in this kind of environment. Moral degenerative syndrome is what Dr Ana Perkins of the University of the West Indies calls it in her published GraceKennedy Foundation lecture, delivered a couple of weeks ago.

From as early as 1992 in his own GraceKennedy Foundation Lecture, the Rev Dr Burchell Taylor had said insightfully, "One of the most urgent needs confronting the society at the moment is for morality to be given its central place in our social order and existence - in our socio-economic, political and social order and existence - and in our policy orientation. This requires more than theoretical commitment. It must be reflected in our social practice."

The Boston College and Cambridge University-educated intellectual adds her own voice to the debate on morality. Said Perkins: "Today, we are faced with the necessity of re-engaging the discussion of morality in a fashion that makes it a national, as well as a personal priority, the concern not only of priests and parsons but also political leaders, civil servants, dancehall DJs, business people, academics and civil society."

And then she makes this critical connection: "Morality must be a central part of our national discourse because it will take moral people with shared values and a common identity to craft the kind of society that will take us into our 2030 vision of Jamaica as a place of choice to live, work and raise families."

Our elites continue to marginalise discourse on morality. To them, it's inherently churchy, religious, and ethereal. But the intellectual father of capitalism, Adam Smith, realised that if you did not get the moral sentiments of a people right, the very foundations of capitalism were threatened. The market needs values and certain attitudes if it is to engender prosperity.

With all the talk of the necessity of an economic-reform programme, and of the need to engage the International Monetary Fund (IMF), no one has stopped to analyse what this set of austerity measures are likely to do to the middle class. Yes, it is true as our prime minister and finance minister have stressed that there have, indeed, been provisions for
"the most vulnerable". In fact, the IMF itself has stipulated that no
less than three per cent of the Budget is to be dedicated to social
insurance and programmes for "the most
vulnerable".

The IMF has, over the last few years,
become more sensitive to issues of social inclusion and social
protection for vulnerable members of society. Concerns about inequality
have now been mainstreamed in economics. It is not surprising,
therefore, that the lead essay in the March/April issue of
Foreign Affairs is on 'Capitalism and
Inequality'.

EQUALITY CONCERNS

The
latest buzz in development economics is the concern over inequality. So
it's not hard for this Government to convince the IMF to make some
provisions for "the most vulnerable". But what will happen to the large
numbers of Jamaicans who don't fall in that "most vulnerable" group but
who effectively constitute the New Poor? What will happen to
middle-class people who will not be eligible for PATH benefits or First
Start cheap homes?

What will happen to journalists,
civil servants, young professionals who have student loans to repay,
some siblings to help to send to school, aged parents who need help, and
spouses? What about their prospects to own a home, a car and to buy
some good clothes? There are large numbers of working-class and lower
middle-class people who are obviously not "most vulnerable", but who are
broke, busted and disgusted.

There are journalists
who are enjoying the pleasure of seeing their names in the newspapers
and whose faces are shown on television but who cannot afford to pay
their rent and have to be hiding from creditors. They are begging and
borrowing (Yes, dear readers, there are journalists like
that.)

In a profession that not only demands but
depends on integrity and probity, what will make them remain moral and
upstanding in face of their economic vulnerability? They will be sorely
tempted to give some favourable coverage to some business interests, to
big up some people on their media programmes and in print to get some
money or some benefit.

If they don't have traditional
values which would lead them to take the bus over paying down on that
car loan because of payola; if they don't choose to live in some
downscale community rather than have an apartment or town house uptown
with corrupt money from politicians, business people - or even dons -
then dog 'nyam wi supper' in this democracy.

Hey, get
it in your head: This economy does not have enough money to pay people
to be moral. They will have to find motivation for morality outside of
material interests. If our journalists can be easily corrupted because
their economic position has so eroded; if their views are bought, what
of the quality of democracy? If the 'information' we are getting is
manipulated by special interests, how can people make informed decisions
and function effectively in a capitalist market? The market system
depends on certain values, though economistic analysts don't grasp
this.

RELAUNCH VALUES CAMPAIGN

This
Cabinet retreat, after it has looked at all the technical analyses and
brought in all the experts and bigwigs, should spend some time carefully
considering how an effective renewed values-and-attitudes thrust can be
relaunched. To create wealth and to build the industries we need, we
have to have the bright, enterprising people who feel motivated to stay
here and contribute.

We talk about the poor and "most
vulnerable", but if those who are not poor and "most vulnerable" look
only to money and financial rewards as their motivation, why would they
stay and struggle here when they can build wealth somewhere
else?

Some 85 per cent of our tertiary graduates
already leave our shores in search of the better life. How can we keep
them in a time of austerity? Many of "the most vulnerable" have nowhere
to go, so they are stuck here. Those not "most vulnerable" have
options.

What will keep them here when rent is going
up, housing costs are soaring, the price of a vacation is increasing.
All the things that middle-class people want are becoming more
expensive. Only if we find people who are motivated by more than money
and material gains can we attract them to stay here to create the wealth
we need.

The IMF is to put us in a position so we can
grow. How are we going to get people to want to live, work, do business
and raise families here, as the 2030 Vision optimistically proclaims,
if increasing economic hardships and our austerity programme produce
more crime, corruption, bandooloo, scams, teenage pregnancies, broken
families and flight of our middle-class
professionals?

If people are not prepared to sacrifice
for Jamaica and to believe in something outside of their narrow
material interests, why stay here and struggle when you can do better
elsewhere - including right here in the Caribbean? The Cabinet needs to
put front and centre this issue of values and attitudes. To engage the
Jamaican people, you have to offer more than bread. Especially when
there is little bread around. The people have to be motivated around a
set of ideas and a vision that can energise them

As
Harvard's professor of government, Michael Sandel, says in his
insightful 2012 book, What Money Can't Buy: The Moral Limits of
Markets: "Our reluctance to engage in moral and
spiritual argument, together with our embrace of markets, has exacted a
heavy price; it has drained public discourse of moral, civic energy and
contributed to the technocratic, managerial politics that afflicts many
societies today."

We need a whole Cabinet
retreat to discuss that.

Ian Boyne is a veteran
journalist. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and
ianboyne1@yahoo.com.