The business world is questioning a need to operate with deeper intentions. Recently, the government imposed a compulsory 2 per cent CSR tax on all businesses with annual revenues over `10 billion. It is the beginning of a more government-restricted economy in India. Should businesses be forced to be accountable for their environmental and social footprints or should it be up to the individual to respond? Either way, it is becoming clear that businesses with good CSR are considerably outperforming businesses with a traditional profit-based approach.
Profit Consciousness
When wealth is generated in terms of physical assets such as property, money and so on, then a lot can be done with it. There are many tangible and intangible things that come from it. Therefore, over the course of history, businesses began focussing more on generating profits than on fulfilling their function. Profit became the overriding goal. We have all heard about the famous economist Milton Friedman. In 1970s he declared that the most important responsibility of businesses is to generate profits. As long as a business stays within the rules of the game, then generation of profit is the only objective. No doubt without generating profit, a business cannot exist and cannot sustain, but things became out of proportion. Friedman’s proclamations eventually gave rise to a free market economy. He launched it and afterwards came a huge surge of free market activity that culminated in many tragic events in the commercial world. In 1987, the stock market crashed and the movie, Wall Street, heralded the iconic mantra “Greed is good”. Perhaps what they actually meant was: “Greed is God.” As time passed that is actually what became the reality and this has been the driving force for economic activity down the ages in history.
Many thinkers began questioning the basis of capitalism, which has been a matter of debate for many years. Karl Marx had come up with a response to capitalism, which took great force because of the industrial revolution and the renaissance before that. The communist revolution took place in Russia and after that it spread. Communism took the view point that capitalism, within which the free market forces are let loose, is basically nothing but a toolset for exploitation in which a certain privileged class, the bourgeoisie, exploit the ordinary people. Marx’s communist philosophy was based on this principle, and communism was successful for many years. But eventually, it could not sustain itself and the Soviet Union collapsed. One of our great thinkers and spiritualists, ISKCON’s founder-acharya Shrila Prabhupada, used to say that the different “isms” that have come into play in modern intellectual thinking are all basically different forms of exploitation. Capitalism, communism, socialism, or any other kind of “ism”, though with good intentions, do not take into account the fundamental flaw of human nature. Without rectifying human nature, no political or economic system can work, and none of these systems address this fundamental point. They are essentially materialistic. Therefore communists called it dialectic materialism.
Shrila Prabhupada spoke about dialectic spiritualism being an antidote to the materialistic philosophy of modern day politics and economics. Dialectic spiritualism addresses the root problem of human nature by smoothening out the rough edges of the human psyche and bringing everyone’s spirituality and divinity into the forefront. The history of this world is a history of exploitation, yet it is also in the pursuit of equality. And in the pursuit of equality, exploitation becomes more prominent because unfortunately human nature does not accommodate equalitarianism. We see a kind of variety and diversity in nature that is impossible to undo. That is how nature is. It does not mean that we can justify exploitation, but rather we must find the fundamental spiritual unity that underlies this diversity. Therein lies our solution. Today we have a form of capitalism (or some kind of “ism”) that has run amok. Within it are economic systems and political systems powered by paced human instincts—greed, lust, envy, anger, pride and ego. As long as these remain the driving forces for social, economic and political activities, humanity will not know any peace.
Spiritual Economics
Therefore, devoid of spirituality, whatever political or economic philosophy we devise, it cannot make us happy or successful. It’s only by delving into our inner depths and bringing one’s innate spirituality to the surface that we can actually succeed. Many thinkers across the world are talking about sustainable capitalism. They are talking about capitalism that will not destroy itself. Because when there is unbridled greed, it will always be self-destruct. But how does one make it sustainable? What is that one software that will make it sustainable?
It’s easy to change political, economic and social philosophies but can you change the heart of the people? Human nature doesn’t change. Unless the human heart and human nature is changed, unless we transcend the lower natures, and unless we come to a higher platform of consciousness, we will not be able to solve our problems. If you want to solve a problem then you have to go to a higher level of consciousness than the consciousness that gave rise to the initial problem. This is what Einstein said. In short, if you want to solve material problems you have to come to the spiritual platform which is superior.
The author is the spiritual leader of ISKCON