The world is faced with an unprecedented pandemic with the advent of Covid-19. In countries where there has been a strong moral leadership, such as Norway, Germany, Taiwan, South Korea and New Zealand, the pandemic has come under control. Scientists are saying that we need to understand that the novel coronavirus jumped the transmission chain from animals to human beings because we have indulged in deforestation and encroached into the space of animals and come too close to them. Earlier, Ebola too jumped into humans because of the same reason.
More than 200 billion animals are slaughtered every year for human consumption. This can be reduced if human beings decide to change their food habits. A huge amount of forests are cut for mining, and to create sports goods and habitats for humans. In the absence of moral leaders in the world who can influence a new kind of awareness to have a safe earth, human beings will continue to over-consume and endanger nature. Many scientists envision worse pandemics in the future due to this.
The industrial revolution invented lots of technology, goods and services that satiated the human hunger to live in comfort and luxury. It created a lot of good things that allowed us to travel faster, live better, have better health systems and live longer. However, it also created a sociological construct of competition and competitive advantage. The entire educational system, borne out of the industrial revolution, focused on creating people with a competitive consciousness. From early childhood, students were introduced to competition, to win against others by scoring the maximum marks in the examination system.
They were convinced that if one did well in this educational system, they would get a good job, which would ultimately result in having a high standard of living and a meaningful life. An interesting point is that they were not encouraged to start new industries, but were encouraged to work for the industrialists. Max Weber writes that the Church was used by the industrialist to convince people to lead a decent and sophisticated life with good behaviour, which essentially meant working for the industry. The industry also created a philosophy that the more we consume and live in luxury, the more satisfied we will be in life.
This led to greed and increased consumption and created an economy fuelled by consumption. Higher consumption in turn led to global warming, climate change and endangering the earth. Philosopher Terence McKenna says, “We have a crisis of consciousness and conditioning. We have the technological power and engineering skills to save our planet, cure disease, feed the hungry, and end war, but we lack the intellectual vision, the ability to change our minds.
We must recondition ourselves from 10,000 years of bad behaviour. And it’s not easy.” Robert Greenleaf in his book, Servant Leadership, spoke about the need for a different kind of leader in the industry and society, under whom followers will get transformed into better human beings and grow in maturity and wisdom with a want to serve society, than to lead. Peter Block spoke about stewardship, which means becoming caretakers of the company we work for and the earth.
Many earlier leaders and reformers, such as the Buddha, Guru Nanak, Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, etc., showed a holistic way to live without endangering the earth. Sri Ramakrishna, the guru of Swami Vivekananda, practiced the different paths of three religions, namely Hinduism, Christianity and Islam, to demonstrate that all religious paths lead to God and live with universal tolerance. Martin Luther King was a moral leader. In his famous speech, ‘I have a dream’, he said, “No man should be judged by the colour of their skin, but by their content and character”. His work had a proud impact in the reduction of racism.
With the advent of white supremacy in the US, we see again a rise of racism. The recent brutal murder of George Floyd demonstrated that racism still lives in the hearts and minds of some people. This led to the social movement, “Black Lives Matter”. Millions of people white, black, brown and other coloured people came together to fight this ugly monster of racism that has almost spread all over the world. We are seeing a rise in employment and wages in enlightened companies. People all over the world are fed up with inequality, violation of civil rights, exploitation and police brutality.
In India too, the Dalits and tribal population have been exploited for centuries. Except for some tokenism of giving them reservation in jobs and education, nothing significant has been done in the last 70 years to bring them to the mainstream of civilisation. With the declining trust in institutions, political leaders, banks and industries, the average human being is feeling helpless, apathetic and indifferent to what is happening around him. Albert Einstein said, “Humanity is going to require a substantially new way of thinking if it has to survive.” To create a new kind of consciousness to solve global problems, we will need, more than ever, moral and ethical leadership from the government and industries to work towards a sustainable future.
Ashoke K Maitra
HR and Strategy Adviser to Industries
(ashoke.maitra@gmail.com)