Categoria: Política

Il significato di bioeconomia o di ecosviluppo

Leonardo BoffDeixe um comentário

L’attuale elezione presidenziale in Brasile ha riportato nuovamente a galla la questione dello sviluppo, tema classico della macroeconomia planetaria. Tema di assoluta gravità come le minacce che pesano sulla nostra vita e sulla nostra civiltà, che potrebbero essere distrutte sia dalla macchina nucleare chimica e biologica, sia dal riscaldamento crescente, devastante come suggeriscono molti scienziati, tale da distruggere gran parte della vita che conosciamo e che metterebbe a rischio il genere umano, notizie nemmeno riportate, sia per ignoranza, sia perché i candidati si renderebbero conto che dovrebbero cambiare tutto.

Come dice la Carta della Terra: “Il destino ci convoca per un nuovo cominciamento”. Nessuno ha avuto questo tipo di temerarietà, nemmeno Marina Silva, che ha suscitato – è questo il suo grande merito – il paradigma della sostenibilità. Ecco che cosa possiamo dire con certezza: così come sono le cose, non possiamo continuare. Il prezzo della nostra sopravvivenza è il cambiamento radicale nella forma di abitare la Terra. La proposta di un ecosviluppo o di una bioeconomia come ce la presentano Ladislaw Dowbor e Ignacy Sachs, tra gli altri, ci incoraggiano a camminare in questa direzione.

Uno dei primi a vedere la relazione intrinseca tra economia e biologia è stato il matematico e economista romeno Nicolas Georgescu Roegen (1906-1994). Contro corrente rispetto al pensiero dominante, questo autore già negli anni 60 del secolo passato, richiamava l’attenzione sulla insostenibilità della crescita per il fatto che i beni e servizi della Terra sono limitati. Si cominciò a parlare di decrescita economica verso la sostenibilità ambientale e l’equità sociale” (www.degrowth.net). Questa decrescita, meglio sarebbe chiamarla “crescita”, significa ridurre la crescita quantitativa per dare più importanza alla crescita qualitativa nel senso di preservare beni e servizi necessari alle future generazioni. La bioeconomia, in verità, è un sottosistema del sistema della natura, sempre limitata e per questo, oggetto di permanenti attenzioni da parte dell’essere umano. L’economia deve andare di pari passo e ubbidire ai livelli di preservazione o rigenerazione della natura (vedere le tesi di Roegen nell’intervista di Andrei Chechin alla IHU (28 ottobre 2011).

Un modello simile chiamato Ecosviluppo e Bioeconomia viene presentato tra gli altri dal già citato professore di economia della PUC-SP, Ladislaw Dowbor che cammina nel solco di un altro economista, Ignacy Sachs, un polacco, naturalizzato francese, brasiliano per amore. Sbarcato in Brasile nel 1941, ha lavorato vari anni qui e anima attualmente un centro di studi brasiliani nell’Università di Parigi. È un economista che a partire dal 1980 si è attivato per la questione ecologica e, probabilmente, è stato il primo che ha fatto le sue riflessioni nel contesto dell’antropocene. Vale a dire, nel contesto della pressione molto forte che le attività umane esercitano sugli ecosistemi e sul pianeta Terra come un tutto sul punto di perdere il suo equilibrio sistemico che si rivela attraverso eventi estremi. L’antropocene inaugurerebbe dunque una nuova era geologica che avrebbe nell’essere umano il fattore di rischio globale, pericolosa meteora strisciante e rovinosa. Sachs tiene conto di questo dato nuovo nel discorso ecologico-sociale.

Le analisi Dowbor e Sachs combinano economia, ecologia, giustizia e inclusione sociale. Da lì nasce il concetto di sostenibilità possibile, anche se dentro alle strette imposte dalla predominanza del modo di produzione industriale consumista, individualista, predatore e inquinante.

Ambedue sono convinti che non si raggiungerà una sostenibilità accettabile se non ci saranno sensibili diminuzioni delle diseguaglianze sociali, di incorporazione alla cittadinanza come partecipazione popolare del gioco democratico, rispetto delle differenze culturali e introduzione di valori etici di rispetto per l’intera vita e una cura permanente dell’ambiente. Una volta realizzati questi quesiti, si creerebbero le condizioni per un equo sviluppo sostenibile.

La sostenibilità esige una certa equità sociale, cioè “livellamento medio tra paesi poveri e ricchi”, e una distribuzione più o meno omogenea dei costi e dei benefici dello sviluppo. Così, per esempio, i paesi più poveri hanno diritto di espandere il loro passo ecologico (quanto di terra, acqua, nutrienti e energia occorrono, per soddisfare i loro bisogni), mentre i più ricchi devono ridurlo o contrarlo. Non si tratta di assumere la tesi equivoca della decrescita, ma di dare un’altra direzione allo sviluppo, di decarburare la produzione, riducendo l’impatto ambientale, favorendo il predominare di valori intangibili come la generosità, la cooperazione, la solidarietà e la compassione. Enfaticamente ripetono Dowbor e Sachs che la solidarietà è un dato essenziale e costitutivo del fenomeno umano e l’individualismo crudele cui stiamo assistendo al giorno d’oggi, espressione di concorrenza senza freno e avidità di accumulare, significa una crescita che distrugge i lacci della convivenza e così rende società fatalmente insostenibile. E di loro due questa bell’espressione «civiltà della biocivilizzazione», una civiltà che dà centralità alla vita, alla Terra, agli ecosistemi e a ogni persona. Da lì emerge, nel loro bel linguaggio la Terra di Buona Speranza (vedi “Ecosviluppo: crescere senza distruggere”, Intervista, in Magna Carta, 29.08.2011).

Questa proposta mi pare uno dei più sensate e responsabili davanti ai rischi che corrono il pianeta e il futuro della specie umana. La proposta di dopoh (http//dowbor.org) e Sachs merita di essere considerata perché mostra grande funzionalità e viabilità.

Traduzione di Romano Baraglia

El sentido de una bioeconomía o de un ecodesarrollo

Leonardo Boff2 Comentários

Las actuales elecciones presidenciales han sacado a la luz la cuestión del desarrollo, tema clásico de la macroeconomía globalizada. Temas de absoluta gravedad como las amenazas que pesan sobre la vida y sobre nuestra civilización, que pueden ser destruidas ya sea por la máquina nuclear, química y biológica, o por el calentamiento creciente, eventualmente abrupto, que, como sugieren muchos científicos, destruiría gran parte de la vida que conocemos y podría poner en peligro la propia especie humana, ni siquiera fueron mencionados, bien por ignorancia, bien porque los candidatos se habrían dado cuenta de que tendrían que cambiar todo. Como dice la Carta de la Tierra: «el destino común nos convoca a un nuevo comienzo». Nadie ha tenido ese tipo de osadía, ni siquiera Marina que suscitó – ese es su gran mérito– el paradigma de la sostenibilidad.

Lo que podemos decir con toda certeza es que así como está no podemos continuar. El precio de nuestra supervivencia es un cambio radical en la forma de habitar la Tierra. La propuesta de un ecodesarrollo o de una bioeconomía como nos la presentan Ladislau Dowbor e Ignacy Sachs, entre otros, nos anima a caminar en esa dirección.

Uno de los primeros en ver la relación intrínseca entre economía y biología fue el matemático y economista rumano Nicholas Georgescu Roegen (1906-1994). En contra el pensamiento dominante, este autor, ya en los años 60 del siglo pasado, llamaba la atención sobre la insostenibilidad del crecimiento debido a los límites de los bienes y servicios de la Tierra. Se empezó a hablar de «decrecimiento económico para la sostenibilidad ambiental y la equidad social» (www.degrowth.net). Ese decrecimiento, mejor sería llamarlo “crecimiento”, significa reducir el crecimiento cuantitativo para dar más importancia al cualitativo en el sentido de preservar los bienes y servicios que les serán necesarios a las futuras generaciones. La bioeconomía es en realidad un subsistema del sistema de la naturaleza, siempre limitada, y, por eso, objeto de permanente cuidado por parte del ser humano. La economía debe obedecer y seguir los niveles de preservación y regeneración de la naturaleza (vea las tesis de Roegen en la entrevista de Andrei Cechin en IHU (28/10/2011).

Un modelo semejante, llamado ecodesarrollo y bioeconomía viene siendo propuesto entre otros por el ya mencionado profesor de economía de la PUC-SP Ladislau Dowbor, que piensa en la línea de otro economista, Ignacy Sachs, un polaco, naturalizado francés y brasilero por amor. Vino a Brasil en 1941, trabajó aquí varios años y mantiene actualmente un centro de estudios brasileros en la Universidad de Paris. Es un economista que a partir de 1980 despertó a la cuestión ecológica y es posiblemente el primero que hace sus reflexiones en el contexto del antropoceno. Es decir, en el contexto de la fuerte presión que las actividades humanas hacen sobre los ecosistemas y sobre el planeta Tierra como un todo hasta el punto de hacerle perder su equilibrio sistémico, que se manifiesta por los eventos extremos. El antropoceno inauguraría, entonces, una nueva era geológica, que tendría al ser humano como factor de riesgo global, un peligroso meteoro rasante y avasallador. Sachs tiene en cuenta ese dato nuevo en el discurso ecológico-social.

Los análisis de Dowbor y de Sachs combinan economía, ecología, justicia e inclusión social. De ahí nace un concepto de sostenibilidad posible, dentro todavía de las limitaciones impuestas por el modo de producción predominante, industrialista, consumista, individualista, predador y contaminador.

Ambos están convencidos de que no se alcanzará una sostenibilidad aceptable si no hay una disminución sensible de las desigualdades sociales, incorporación de la ciudadanía como participación popular en el juego democrático, respeto a las diferencias culturales, la introducción de valores éticos de respeto a toda la vida y sin un cuidado permanente del medio ambiente. Cumplidos estos requisitos, se crearían las condiciones de un ecodesarrollo sostenible.

La sostenibilidad exige cierta equidad social, o sea, «nivelación promedio entre países ricos y pobres» y una distribución más o menos homogénea de los costes y los beneficios del desarrollo. Así, por ejemplo, los países más pobres tienen derecho de expandir más su huella ecológica (sus necesidades de tierra, agua, nutrientes y energía) para atender sus demandas, mientras que los más ricos deben reducirla o controlarla. No se trata de asumir la tesis equivocada del decrecimiento, sino de dar otro rumbo al desarrollo, descarbonizando la producción, reduciendo el impacto ambiental y propiciando la vigencia de valores intangibles como la generosidad, la cooperación, la solidaridad y la compasión. Enfáticamente repiten Dowbor y Sachs que la solidaridad es un dato esencial al fenómeno humano y el individualismo cruel que estamos presenciando en los días actuales, expresión de la competencia sin freno y de la ganancia de acumular, significa una excrecencia que destruye los lazos de la convivencia, volviendo a la sociedad fatalmente insostenible.

Es de ellos la hermosa expresión «biocivilización», una civilización que da centralidad a la vida, a la Tierra, a los ecosistemas y a cada persona. De ahí surge, en su bella manera de decir, la «Tierra de la Buena Esperanza» (vea Ecodesarrollo: crecer sin destruir 1986 y la entrevista en Carta Maior del 29/8/2011).

Esta propuesta nos parece una de la más sensatas y responsables frente a los peligros que corre el planeta y el futuro de la especie humana. La propuesta de Dowbor (http://dowbor.org) y de Sachs merece ser considerada pues muestra gran funcionalidad y viabilidad.

Traducción de Mª José Gavito Milano

Elections in Brazil in light of the anti-populist history

Leonardo Boff3 Comentários

There is nothing better than viewing the present elections in light of the Brazilian history of tension between the elites and the people. I will avail myself of the contribution of a serious historian, educated in Rome, Louvain, and in the USP of Sao Paulo, father Jose Oscar Beozzo, one of the most brilliant minds of our clergy.

Says Beozzo: «the basic question in our society is the right of the marginalized to life, which is always threatened by the abysmal inequality of access to life’s necessities and by the meager opportunities open to the great majority of the lower strata.

As Caio Prado Junior teaches us, our unequal society rests on four pillars that are hard to dislodge: a) that ownership of the land is concentrated in the hands of the few, such that there is no “free” or “available” land for those who work it, or for those who were its original owners, the indigenous peoples; b) the predominance of monoculture; c) that production is focused on the foreign market (sugar, tobacco, cotton, coffee, cocoa, and now soy); d) the regime of slave labor.

Independence from Portugal did not alter any of those pillars. Those who at that time dreamed of a different Brazil proposed a change from ownership of large tracts, to ownership of small plots, in the hands of those who worked the land; from monoculture to polyculture, from production for the international market to production geared towards local consumption and supply for the domestic market; from slave labor to free family work. This could be done in small regions peripheral to tropical monocultures, in the Gaucha and Catarinense mountain ranges, with German, Italian and Polish colonists, in a more democratic form of property ownership.

The large slave owners were strongly opposed to all those measures, and they crushed by fire and sword the popular uprisings that in any way looked towards democratization of the economy, politics, and above all, of labor relations. Suffice it to recall some of those revolts: the insurrections of the Males slaves in Bahia, the Balayada in Maranhao, the Cabanagem in the Amazon, the Playera revolt in Pernambuco, and the Farroupilha in the South.

The Revolution of the 30, with its nationalist tendencies, moved, if only partially, the country’s axis from foreign markets towards the domestic; from a model of agrarian exports towards one of substitution of imports; from the dominance of the coffee exporting elites of the Minas/Sao Paulo pact towards new leaders in the zones of production for the domestic market, such as those of rice and jerky of Rio Grande del Sur; from the restricted vote to the “universal” vote (except for the illiterate, still the great majority of adults at that time), from the exclusively male vote to women’s suffrage; from labor relations dictated only by the power of the masters towards regulation, at least in the industrial sphere, with the creation of the Secretary of Labor and of labor laws focused on the working class.The unavoidable dominance of the landowners within their properties could not be touched by labor regulations, which only occurred after 1964 with the Rural Labor Statute.

Getulio established a policy of appeasement between the classes, and of “cooperation” between capital and labor, the workers and the captains of industry, aimed at industrialization and the defense of national interests.

In the current electoral campaign, certain media have created the slogan: “Out PT”. They seek to end the dictatorship of the PT and to restore the “dictatorship of the financial market”. What really bothers them? Corruption and the “mensalon”?

As I see it, what bothers them are the democratizing measures, notwithstanding all their limitations, such as the Pro-Uni, the quotas in the universities for students coming from public schools rather than from particular colleges; the quotas for those whose grandparents came from the warehouses of slavery; agrarian reform, still inadequate to the task; the demarcation and official sanctioning of continuous areas of Yanomami land, opposed by a half dozen rice producers, backed by agro-business and a unanimous chorus of landowners, and all the social programs such as Bolsa Familiar, Light for all, My House, my Life, More Doctors, and more.

These critics never were annoyed when the State paid the tuition of young students from rich families whose children received a good education in private schools, making it easier for them to access free education in the public universities, which deepened the inequality of opportunity. For courses of medicine, those studies cost the state from six to seven thousand reales a month. Those families never protested the “handouts” given the rich, which they considered to be their “right” based on their merit, rather than a pure, and scandalous, privilege. They are the same doctors who refuse to practice in the interior of the country, or the favelas that lack even a single physician.

Those who raise their voices, saying that everything is going bad in the country, in spite of improvements in the minimum wage, the creation of millions of jobs, the widening of social policies geared to the poorest, the creation of More Physicians, oppose the policies of the PT that seek to assure citizens’ rights, to widen the democratization of society, to struggle against privilege and above all, to put some limits (insufficient in my point of view) on profits and the dictatorship of financial capital and of the “market”.

This is the reason for my vote for another project of country, that attends to the demands always denied to the great majorities. For that reason, I voted for Dilma in the first round and will do so again in the second, with respect for the other options».

I join in this interpretation, and in the vote for Dilma Rousseff.

A sickness called fundamentalism

Leonardo Boff7 Comentários

Everything healthy may become ill. Religion, contrary to what critics such as Freud, Marx, Dawkins and others contend, is part of a healthy reality: the search by the human being for the Ultimate Reality, that gives final meaning to history and the universe. That search is legitimate and is found in the oldest expressions of the homo sapiens/demens, but it also has unhealthy expressions. One of them, the most frequent now, is religious fundamentalism, that is also found where a unique form of thinking reigns in politics.

Fundamentalism is not a doctrine in itself, but an attitude and a form of living a doctrine. The fundamentalist attitude appears when the truths of its church or its group are understood as the only legitimate ones, to the exclusion of all others, which are deemed erroneous and therefore to have no right to exist. Those who imagine that their point of view is the only valid one are condemned to be intolerant. This closed attitude leads to contempt, discrimination, and to religious or political violence.

The niche of fundamentalism is historically found in the Northamerican Protestantism of the late XIX century, when modernity emerged not only in technology, but also in democratic forms of political coexistence and the liberalization of customs. In this context a strong reaction arose within the Protestant tradition, loyal to the ideals of the «founding fathers», all derived from the rigors of the Protestant ethic. The term fundamentalism is linked to a collection of books published by Princeton University for Presbyterians under the title, Fundamentals: A Testimony of Truth, 1909-1915.

This collection proposes an antidote to modernization: a rigorous, dogmatic Christianity founded on a literal reading of the Bible, considered infallible and unequivocal in each and every word, because it was considered to be the Word of God. They opposed all exegetic-critical interpretation of the Bible and the application of its message to the present context.

Since then, this fundamentalist tendency has been present in Northamerican society and politics. It gained religious expression in the so-called «electronic Churches», that use modern means of tele-communication, covering the country from coast to coast, and that have similar churches in Brazil and elsewhere in Latin-America. They combat liberal Christians, those who practice a scientific interpretation of the Bible, accept the contemporary feminist and gay movements, and defend the decriminalization of abortion. All that is interpreted by fundamentalists as the work of Satan.

The political side assimilated the religious, marrying it to the political ideology of «manifest destiny», created after the United States confiscated territory from Mexico. According to that ideology, it is the divine destiny of Northamericans to bring to all peoples, clarity, the values of private property, the free market, democracy and rights, as John Adams, the second President of the United States, asserted. According to the popular and political version, Northamericans are «the new chosen people» that will bring everyone to the «Land of Emmanuel, seat of that new and singular Kingdom that will be given to the Saints of the Highest». K. Amstrong, In the Name of God, (En nombre de Dios, Companhia das Letras, São Paulo 2001).

That political-religious amalgam has led to the arrogance and one sided vision of international relations found in Northamerican foreign policy, that is still prevalent under Barack Obama.

We find a similar type of fundamentalism in extremely conservative Catholic groups, that still claim that «there is no salvation outside of the Church». They are eager to convert the greatest number of people possible, to save them from hell. Some evangelical groups, especially in sectors of the charismatic churches with their TV programs, engage in fundamentalist disparagement, particularly with regard to the Afro-Brazilian religions, because they consider their celebrations to be the work of Satan. This results in frequent exorcisms and even invasions of terreiros to «purify them» from the Exu.

Fundamentalism in both Catholic and some evangelical groups is most visible in the moral questions: they are inflexible on the issues of abortion, same sex unions, and women’s struggles for freedom in decision making. They foster true ideological wars in the social networks and the means of mass communication against all who discuss such questions, even though they are part of the agenda of all open societies.

Sadly, we have a candidate to the presidency of Brazil, Marina Silva, who adheres to a type of fundamentalism, namely, Biblicism. She maintains a literal reading of the Bible, as if the solution to all problems could be found there. As Pope Francis put it so well, rather than a warehouse of truths, the Bible is an inspiring source for beneficial human initiatives. The Bible must be held in our brains to illuminate reality, not in front of the eyes, to obscure it.

The Brazilian State is lay and pluralist. It welcomes all religions without adhering to any. According to the Brazilian Constitution, no given religion may impose its points of view on the whole nation. An authority can have religious convictions, but must govern through the laws, not through these convictions. There are four Gospels, not just one. They coexist through the diversity of interpretations they give to the message of Jesus of Nazareth. It is an example of the richness of diversity. God is the eternal coexistence of Three Divine Beings, that through love form one single God. Diversity is fecund.

Free translation from the Spanish by
Servicios Koinonia, http://www.servicioskoinonia.org.
Done at REFUGIO DEL RIO GRANDE, Texas, EE.UU.