Buddhist Economics

Schumacher, E.F. 1999. Small is Beautiful. Hartley & Marks Publishers Inc. Vancouver, Canada

THE BUDDHIST ECONOMICS
summarized from chapter 4

the Buddhist point of view takes the function of work to be at least threefold”
- to give a man a chance to utilize and develop his faculties
- to enable him to overcome his ego-centredness by joining with other people in a common task
- and to bring forth the goods and services needed for a becoming existence.

from the Buddhist point of view, there are therefore two types of mechanization which must be clearly distinguished:
- one that enhances a man’s skill and power
- one that turns the work of man over to a mechanical slave, leaving man in a position of having to serve the slave

it is clearm therefore, that Buddhist economics must be very different from the econmics of modern materialsm, since the Buddhist sess the essence of civilization not in a multiplication of wants but in the purification of human character. character, at the same time, is formed primarily by a man’s work. and work, properly conducted in condisiton of human dignity and freedom, blesses those who do it and equally their products.

from a Buddhist point of view, this is standing the truth on its head by considering goods as more important than people and consumption as more important than creative activity. it means shifting the emphasize from the worker to the product of work, that is, from the human to the subhuman, a surrender to the forces of evil.
the very start of Buddhist purpose of this would in fact be employment for everyone who needs an ‘outside’ job, and the large-scale employment of women in offices or factories would be considered a sign of serious economic failure.
in particular, to let mothers of young children work in factories while the children run wild would be as uneconomic in the eyes of a Buddhist economist as the employement of a skilled worker as a soldier in the eyes of a modern economist.

while the materialist is mainly interested in goods, the Buddhist is mainly interested in liberation. but Buddhism is “ the middle way” and there fore in no way antagonistic to physical well being. it is not wealth that stands in the way of liberation but the attachment to wealth; not the enjoyment of pleasurable things but the craving for them. the keynote of Buddhist economics, therefore, is simplicity and non-violence.
from an economist’s point of view, the marvel of the Buddhist way of life is the utter rationally of its pattern-amazingly small means leading to extra ordinarily satisfactorily results.

The teaching of Buddha, on the other hand, enjoins a reverent and non-violent attitude not only to all sentient beings but also, with great emphasis, to trees. every follower of the Buddha ought to plant a tress every few years and look after it until it is safely established, and the Buddhist economist can demonstrate without difficulty that universal observation of this rule would result in a high rate of genuine economic development independent of any foreign aid.
much of the economic decay of southeast Asia is undoubted due to a heedless and shameful neglect of trees.