Massaro Catholic Social Teaching section 5

Chapter 5, section 5 within the handout by Massaro indicated that the material things can only be good if they are shared amongst a community for the common good with a wide availability. Massaro indicates that the Catholic Church isn’t necessarily opposed to private ownership. The church simply encourages that the private ownership of property be used efficiently in a way that the resources i.e., material goods associated with the property are equitably distributed amongst people, offering them incentives to be more productive and care for the goods as though they were somehow sacred to God. The Church tended to follow the teachings of Thomas Aquinas on property ownership, who admonished those for being greedy with material wealth and proposed that individuals ought to impose limits on themselves in terms of how much property they could hold. Alas, some of these admonishments by Aquinas and the church fell on deaf ears, largely being ignored by some. The Church believed according to Aquinas, that God didn’t favor individuals to have unlimited wealth and there seems to be an implication that it’s a kind of social sin to not share those excess material goods with ones less fortunate neighbors. In God’s eyes all people are equal as his children, therefore to redistribute material goods to the less fortunate is in God’s plan.

The Catholic church under Paul VI indicated that there was great concern amongst the clergy about excessive hoarding of wealth. Especially amongst the land owning classes in Latin America. Paul VI indicated that if lands weren’t being used efficiently and their resources weren’t being given to the common good that perhaps the church should encourage measures in which the people would forcibly take those resources for themselves if they couldn’t acquire it peacefully. But the pope at the time indicated that this would have to be reserved for circumstances defined as “extreme measures when he presented these arguments in 1967; as a consequence of the industrial revolution people were more dependent upon some implied means and modes of production. Many it seemed implied didn’t own their own modes of production, so therefore there ought to be measures in place for people to have upward mobility in which they could have their needs met. This would require a certain amount of social responsibility and socialization. John XXIII indicates that government could act as a catalyst to seize and redistribute material goods for the common good using church principles as guidelines for their distribution. The church began to recognize that the government and private sectors of life ought to have a vested interest in promoting redistribution of material goods for the common good of the people. But, make no mistake about it, the church doesn’t suggest all property ought to be collectivized, since early in the section the church endorsed limited individual property rights.

Rise and Fall of Communism

It’s always interesting for me to reflect on the rise and fall of Communism. I was 9 years old when the Berlin Wall fell. I remember it happening, but it didn’t really register with me at the time about how it divided people between east and west. Those of us who grew up during the Cold War had the perception of life behind the Iron Curtain being very dreary and monotonous, as this video attempts to convey western perceptions of communist life: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-AjzrnEgew Communism wasn’t really in a position as an ideology to be considered a real competitor with Capitalism on a world stage until after World War II according to the textbook.  It can be understood that while the Soviet Union and China wielded most of their power in Europe and Asia, they didn’t have military services outside of their respective spheres of influence. In Latin America, for example, the most that Russia or China might have contributed was financial aid, weapons, and diplomatic attachés. The Warsaw Pact countries were for the most part, “buffer states” to stand between the Soviet Union and the west to prevent further invasions into the Soviet Union.  There was also quite a bit of mistrust towards the west not only because Germany had invaded the Soviet Union, but also because the U.S. and other European powers had actually sent special forces into Russia following the Bolshevik revolution to aid czarist armies, to help them overthrow the Bolsheviks. The Warsaw pact countries saw the Soviet Union as their protector, and modeled their economic systems and governments after the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union promoted the idea of a global communist revolution partly because they believed Marx thought the fall of communism was inevitable. But, not everyone was keen on the Soviet Union being the highest model of communism because China and Russia almost went to war over ideological differences stemming from China not being treated as an equal partner in the spread of Communism. While The Soviet Union and China may have promoted world communism, some of the countries they supported such as Vietnam and Korea were more concerned with unifying their countries under communism rather than being focused on spreading it beyond their borders. Some states had agendas that were “national communism” in nature while others were internationally oriented. In many ways, although ideologies changed, imperial ambitions remained very much intact in that like their czarist predecessors, the Soviets had little interest in giving autonomy to countries like Ukraine, who were their vassals. In some cases they even “Russified” the populations by trying to move Russian immigrants into these countries, but these countries always managed to retain their identity, language, and culture despite these attempts.

Strayer: Intro to chapter 21 and Chapter 21 reading

The introduction argues when the 20^th Century really ended, whether after the Cold War ended or after 9/11, but I personally believe that for most people the notion of the 20^th Century worldview ended after 9/11. I remember once actually watching the film, “Clear And Present Danger” based on the Tom Clancy novel, and a commentator on whatever channel it was described it as a “period piece” because it reflected a time between the Cold War and 9/11 when it was very feasible to see other things like the war on drugs being more of a threat to national security than conventional foes or terrorists, in the context of 20^th Century worldviews versus Post-9/11 world views.

Strayer on page 618 in so many words is saying that the Chinese and Russian communist revolutions were social experiments that sought to create an alternative world to the capitalist system.  But, they were the apotheosis of past revolutions that had attempted to garner gains for the working class. Another feature of the 20^th Century that Strayer notes is the end of empires, and the rise of Republican states. And he suggests that with more freedoms populations grew more dramatically than they had during the age of empires.

It was interesting that Strayer began chapter 21 talking about a WWI veteran being dismayed about how WWI wasn’t “the war to end all wars,” that he’d seen so much bloody conflict in his own lifetime, but he was also glad that a stronger, more integrated world came out of it in the long run. It certainly wasn’t when you consider that had the Treaty of Versailles been a lot less vindictive and more amicable to the Germans in terms of territories they lost and the reparations payment play they were forced to abide by, the possibility of another world war might have been a little more remote or at least put off a little longer, suggests Strayer on pages 631 – 632.

Strayer describes WWI as “an accident waiting to happen,” but one who knows the history of the conflict would actually surmize that there was a certain eagerness to prosecute the war  in the beginning on the part of the powers involved. I remember British euphemisms from the time that said, “This will be a jolly good war,” or “This war will be short and we’ll be home for Christmas (which Strayer also quotes on page 629, last paragraph).” But, that was not to be so. It was really a mess of entanglements via treaties in which one party would feel obligated to to attack in equal measure the other if their ally were attacked. It’s hard not to entertain counterfactuals like, if only one of the powers had refused to honor their treaties and refused to participate. That might have dissuaded other powers from taking part.  Strayer only indicates on page 627 that it was an accident of history because nobody anticipated the assassination of the Arch-Duke of the Austro-Hungarian Empire would happen, nor that it would be the spark for the conflict. But, he indicates on page 629 that there was a military-industrial complex on all sides that had lots of munitions and troops being unused, so perhaps there was a certain ambition to test out their readiness to fight rather than let the armed forces go to waste.

Thomas Massaro reading: Living Justice

I must acquiesce that I had a brief moment of confusion with this scheduled reading. While there were some class notes taken on some of the terms in the reading, mentally I didn’t relate them to the reading due to some fatigue at the time. So, I am looking at this with fresh eyes. Thomas Morrow talks at some length about human dignity. He says that under Catholic doctrine all should be accorded diginity whether well, sick, the unborn, those who might be euthanized, or a social pariah. He also talks about equality from the standpoint of the Catholic Church, that all deserve equality, but it reminds me more of the words of Thomas Jefferson when he penned the Constitution, that we’re garranteed life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness et cetera. Marrow doesn’t say it’s bad for one to have more wealth than others perse, but just because you’re born into the right family or social circles doesn’t mean that the pursuit of wealth and power should outweigh the pursuit of equality, even though he admits that the playing field isn’t level. A person can be of nobility, but that doesn’t make him or her noble by virtue in other words. Marrow upholds the example of the Pope John XXIII, who listed a series of human rights as “universal, inviolable, and inalienable.” Again, very Jeffersonian in nature. Massaro seems to disagree with secular human rights traditions, that man cannot give other men human rights as much as God leds the way in being an example of what human rights ought to be accorded to men. I do remember vaguely in class discussion that there was a brief distinction made between ought and should because “ought” indicates a moral imperative, i.e., what one has a moral obligation to do, whereas “should” implies the world of the mundane, like you should pick up your laundry, or you should tip a certain percentage on a bill, for example. Of course, I learned that distinction in philosophy courses, although I suspect the distinction is sometimes lost on others.

I think that Massaro strategically mentions both the term Solidarity  and John Paul II on page 84 because he’s alluding to that the late Pope was from Poland and supportive of the Solidarity labor movement in Poland during the Cold War that helped foster the end of Communism there as and example of what idea of the concept can do when put into practice. And it’s as if Massaro is alluding somewhat to the notion of the Buttefly Effect when he talks about John Paul II emphasizing, “God not only allows people to depend upon each other, but absolutely wills that humans share themselves in the context of intimate as well as larger groupings of our neighbors. To be human is to be a social being, one whose very life is and should be bound up with those in close proximity and even distant strangers.” But, Massaro also says the concept of Solidarity must begin with in to transcend outwardly.

Strayer: CH 20: Identity and Culture during the Colonial Era

Education seemed magical to people who’d been previously illiterate. For them it was a way to break the bondage of Colonialism.  They had few alternatives literally. It was either education or possibly being culled into forced labor, especially in Africa. It also meant that natives could get the education to get better pay. It allowed a certain amount of social mobility and elite status, but perhaps this was also a kind of collusion or collaboration for those natives who attained higher paying jobs via education, especially if they were administrative jobs in nature. The natives felt so seduced by European culture and what upward mobility within it could afford them. In India for example, Bengalis ignored their Hindu faith’s prohibition against consumption of beef because to consume western foods felt more sophisticated. European religions such as Christianity were especially spread strongly in Africa where confidence had been shaken in their pagan religions for a multitude of reasons, but mainly, missionaries were providing the bulk of education opportunities in the colonial world. Although, there was certainly syncretic elements carried over from their pagan religions in the form of medicines and chants. Christianity, however didn’t make much inroads in India. Interestingly, Hindu mystics and scholars such as Swami Vivekananda seem to have integrated some of Christianity’s tenents into Hinduism, but re-fashioning Hinduism to be both militant and charitable. Hindus decided that they ought to make Hinduism a more respected religion by committing to charity, feeding the poor, things that their Christian colonial rulers would both respect and admire. They felt the best way to preserve Hinduism was to have it’s scholars go west and share some of it’s wisdom with intellectuals. For Africans and Indians, they began to look at their history and accomplishments to find achievements on par with European innovations. It seems that the idea of a pan-tribalism was an artificial creation by European colonial powers. There probably were tribes, but not to the extent that they were tribes after Europeans forced them to be defined due to asking Africans to state their tribe and family groups on legal documents, and work applications et cetera. It’s really been a major problem in African history in modern times because this lead to national states in that post-colonial era, which conflagated into conflicts between peoples that both hadn’t existed as tribes in the past or they didn’t get along to begin with.

 Some hoped living a European lifestyle would somehow afford them more equality with whites, but not a clear cut equality. Some felt that by embracing European culture that they could somehow uses the tools of European laws and culture to reinvigorate their own sense of nationalism. Some Vietnamese leaders like Nguyen Thai Hoc, who was executed for crimes against the French believed until the end that they could will the colonial system to achieve their own political ends. The leader who would later lead North Vietnam, Ho Chi Min actually attended the Post-World War I peace talks hoping he could use European political venues to legally petition the European powers to grant Vietnam independence, long before he was ever a communist:  http://isq.sagepub.com/content/12/1/133.extract

Strayer: CH 20: Colonial Encounters:pp. 589 - 606

I was somewhat surprised to open this chapter and see it begin with a first person perspective. But, who decided to write this narrative in first person. Perhaps Strayer, himself? The author doesn’t say for sure. It seems odd that some Kenyans wouldn’t speak their native languages with their fellow Kenyans where Europeans were around. Apparently colonial authorities had fears and prejudices about teaching English to Africans because they were afraid that they’d learn how to seduce White women and corrupt their virtue. Of course, you don’t have to look to Africa to find these kind of irrational fears. The 1915 film, “Birth of A Nation” propogated these same fears. It is perhaps a holdover from slavery when there were fears about slaves having education. Instead, the British like Americans employed segregation in their African colonies, in which there was an insolated world for Whites and a separate world from natives.

There was also a second wave of colonialism in Africa and Asia after the European powers had their way with the New World and had decimated the native populations there. Now they turned their eyes eastward. Europeans found with their newfound industrial wealth and powerful, modern armies to secure more resources that they could annex and conquer more territories. Perhaps the simply wanted direct access to the resources rather than go through the whole trouble of the triangle trades to get spices and raw materials from Asian and African middlemen. So, but conquering territories in Asia and Africa they were cutting the middlemen out of the picture. The Europeans had just begun to develop primitive automatic machine guns that decimated their Asian and African advisories. Africans were however reduced by 75% in population by European diseases. They like Native Americans had relatively few if any immunities to European diseases introduced into their respective areas. It wasn’t necessarily easy for Europeans to conquer new territories in Africa and the Asia, but it wasn’t really difficult either these new forms of munitions. Tribal groups became dominated and Hindus in India, for example simply saw the British as one empire taking the place of their Mughal overlords of times past. The Europeans in some places practiced similar divide and conquer tactics that the conquistadors had employed in the new world by getting rival states that hated the empires dominating them to join Europeans in toppling the empires they were trying to conquer, such as the case in Indonesia, for example. In places like Australia and New Zealand, the British employed a philosophy of “Terra Nellius,” meaning “no man’s land” because the British didn’t recognize the Aborigines as having any property rights analogous to European ideas of land ownership, so they took land with the belief that it never belonged to anyone. Aborigines themselves didn’t even make significant gains in acquiring lands back that had been taken from them until the case of Mabo in Australia during the early 1990’s: http://www.nfsa.gov.au/digitallearning/mabo/tn_01.shtml

Of course, some Asian powers were doing their own imperialism. Japan in this era also began to annex territories in Taiwan and Korea, for example. U.S. and Russian expansion also brought many Asians under the influence of European dominance.