Author: CRT Admin

I recently shared with you a case study of the challenges of companies selling a “brand” linked to a cultural or political ideal favored by some, but not by others involving the Harley-Davidson company.

By coincidence, there was an editorial soon thereafter using Harley-Davidson as a case study in the efficacy and implicitly, the morality, of tariffs.

Tariffs are most closely associated, in my mind, with mercantilism, not an open system of moral capitalism.  When the first meeting of the Caux Round Table was convened at Mountain House in Caux, Switzerland, in 1986, the subject was, in effect, mercantilism and national industrial policies of the U.S., right or wrong, will raise barriers against importing goods from other countries.

The group resolved that, in the long run, competition was best for all, as markets expanded in size and the most innovation and efficient producers were to be rewarded, no matter their nationality.

Here is the editorial from the Wall Street Journal.

I ran across this article on Harley-Davidson, trending now due to the annual Sturgis motorcycle rally having taken place earlier this month.

Again, it speaks to a reality about consumers – different people have different values.  Is a company in the business of alignment with social values or product values?  How can a company learn what values drive purchases of its goods and services?  Does reticence in identifying a company or its products with non-commercial values make sense from time to time?  Or should a company position itself in the sweet spot of affinity for one, but not other consumers?

In the quest for practical wisdom, finding the intersection points where ideas are validated by worldly realities puts us on the course for knowing what is best to do.  Theories can help by presenting relationships between and among facts, but how many times have theories not aligned with practical realities in the long run?

There is a theory of capitalism and a theory of socialism.  Which is a better theory to guide our decision-making?  Which is more likely to bring about better outcomes?  There is a theory that democracy is the best form of government for people.  But how many successful democracies has humanity experienced?

The scientific method likes to look for facts and data and then examine them for patterns which repeat when the same facts and data are present and then propose a law of causation to explain why the pattern emerges.  The law of causation permits prediction of future outcomes.  So, if the law correctly correlates the necessary interdependence of some facts or data with other facts or data, then we can, with confidence, use the law to predict the future.

We can use the law to obtain desired results or use it to avoid outcomes we don’t want.  Thus, if we want to know what outcomes to expect from capitalism and from socialism, it is best if we find some facts in the real world which might lead to the discovery of patterns and then to predictions of what will happen if that pattern is followed in our behaviors.

Nigeria today presents us with such facts on systems of human governance and economics.  The conclusions we can draw from Nigeria, as a case study, are credible and revealing.

First, the July 13 issue of The Economist reported that “soaring food-price inflation is hurting Nigeria’s poor.”

Tomato prices that fluctuate with the seasons are normal in Nigeria, but the record annual pace of food inflation, which hit 41% in May, is not.  Most pinched are the poor.  Staples, such as beans and maize, cost 400% more than they did a year ago, while a 100kg bag of sorghum has more than tripled in price.  Since wages have barely moved, the result is a deepening food crisis.  Whereas hunger was once concentrated in conflict-ridden areas in northern Nigeria, now it affects poorer households nationwide (see map).  Of the 44 million people in west Africa and the Sahel who do not get enough to eat, more than half are Nigerian.

We may ask if the inflation is the result of free market capitalism?

The Economist reports:

Much of the blame should be heaped on the government.  A haphazard introduction of new banknotes under the previous administration led to a shortage of legal tender. This caused most hardship in the countryside, where penetration of bank or mobile-money accounts is lowest.  With cash scarce, farmers charged middlemen a premium if they used electronic payments, pushing up prices in the markets.

A weakening naira dealt another blow – its 40% fall against the dollar made it the worst-performing currency in the world in the first half of this year.  That has pushed up the cost not only of imported foods, but also of seeds and fertilizer.  The government’s removal of fuel subsidies, though necessary, further raised the cost of running farming machinery and taking harvests to markets. …

A year ago, Bola Tinubu, the president, declared a state of emergency for food insecurity.  Yet, promises that savings from the fuel-subsidy removal would be reinvested into farming have not materialized.  A program to give free fertilizer to farmers to boost production was subverted by politicians, who put their faces on the sacks and gave them to loyal voters.

This week, the government announced plans to waive import duties on maize and wheat and to set a recommended retail price.  The government itself also plans to import 500,000 tons of grain.  But so far, Mr. Tinubu’s administration has been unable to stop prices from soaring.  Last year, Nigerians were already spending 59% of household incomes on food, a higher share than in any other country.  How much harder can they be squeezed?

In the July 26 issue of Newsweek, it was reported that Nigeria is at a cross-roads, quoting former U.S. Ambassador John Campbell saying, “I would suggest that Nigeria, at present, is not holding together.  What you have is a government whose writ runs in only certain parts of the country and there are alternative power centers all over the country.”

Nigeria is beset by the lack of governance and the rule of the gun – a Hobbesian condition, where the life of people can easily be “solitary, nasty, brutish and short.”  The country, reports Newsweek, is beset by Islamist insurgents, separatist movements, kidnapping and robbery.  This year, through May, saw 7,519 incidents of violence, 9,892 killed and 6,292 abducted.

One woman said, “You can see people going crazy.  They are not crazy, they are hungry.  They are frustrated, they don’t have work to do, they don’t have anywhere to go.  That is why you see them walking about stealing, doing armed robbery, kidnapping.”  This would not be expected in a successful capitalist society, where wealth is created through enterprise and shared with stakeholders.

Nigeria sits near the bottom of rankings for corruption and still has a reputation after decades of being home to scammers who operate globally to strip the innocently trusting and the naïve of their savings.  Long has Nigeria been under the thumb of military rulers.  Tinubu won election as president in 2023, when less than 10% of registered voters bothered to vote.

Hard to have capitalist wealth creation where there is no morally responsible government.

The new government took steps to move towards more market rationality – ending subsidies for fuel and letting the currency float to a market value.  But the initial consequences of those steps towards market efficiency is seriously higher inflation.  A critic commented that the reforms were not part of any larger, broader program to boost the economy, again a shortfall on the part of government and the culture to value enterprise.

Nigeria’s government and economy run mostly on the proceeds of selling oil, not producing goods and services.  This is the curse of dependence on rent extraction from natural resources. The cash flow does not come from workers earning wages through capitalist wealth creation.  Nigeria ranks 127 out of 133 countries for diversifying its economy.  It gained independence from Great Britain in 1960 – 64 years ago.

Fifty years ago today, Richard Nixon resigned as president of the United States.

He gave up his office rather than defend himself in an impeachment process in the U.S. Senate that, if successful, would remove him from that office.

What might we learn of contemporary international relevance from this American’s voluntary surrender of his authority?

First, we might consider how rare is the resignation from office of presidents and prime ministers.  Pope Benedict stepped down as Pope.  From time to time, royals have abdicated in favor of their heir apparent, but most, like Queen Elizabeth II of Great Britain, retain the crown until death.  Sheikh Hasina, the Prime Minister of Bangladesh, just resigned as protestors stormed her official residence.  Just last month, President Joe Biden resigned as the presidential candidate of the Democrat Party.

Few leaders come to feel that it is prudent or necessary for them to resign from high office.  They tend to prolong their tenure as long as they can get away with it.

The issue for political systems is when does a president or a prime minister or a monarch become unfit for the office and so deserves removal from that position?  What behaviors make an incumbent unfit to serve?  Who should decide whether removal is justified?  Do rulers like Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping have to worry about being removed from their offices?

In the case of Richard Nixon, the rules and procedures for removal were written in the Constitution of the United States: the behavior deserving removal is the commission of “high crimes and misdemeanors.”  The decision to remove a president is made by the U.S. Senate after an impeachment petition has been approved by the U.S. House of Representatives.

The removal of high royal officials for “high crimes and misdemeanors” was a practice of the English parliament for several centuries and was borrowed by the Americans who drafted the federal constitution of 1787.  The proposal to set the standard for removable conduct as “high crimes and misdemeanors” was made by George Mason to include the precedent of the impeachment of Warren Hastings by the British Parliament.  Hastings was charged with corruption and other abuses of power when acting as the governor general of Bengal for the British East India Company.

Edmund Burke brought the impeachment before the House of Commons.  The Commons impeached Hastings.  Then Burke made the case before the House of Lords in Parliament assembled that Hastings justly deserved impeachment:

Do we [lack] a tribunal?  My lords, no example of antiquity, nothing in the modern world, nothing in the range of human imagination, can supply us with a tribunal like this.  We commit safely the interests of India and humanity into your hands.  Therefore, it is with confidence that, ordered by the Commons, I impeach Warren Hastings, Esquire, of high crimes and misdemeanors.

I impeach him in the name of the Commons of Great Britain in Parliament assembled, whose parliamentary trust he has betrayed.

I impeach him in the name of all the Commons of Great Britain, whose national character he has dishonored.

I impeach him in the name of the people of India, whose laws, rights and liberties he has subverted; whose properties he has destroyed; whose country he has laid waste and desolate.

I impeach him in the name and by virtue of those eternal laws of justice which he has violated.

I impeach him in the name of human nature itself, which he has cruelly outraged, injured and oppressed, in both sexes, in every age, rank, situation and condition of life.

My lords, at this awful close, in the name of the Commons and surrounded by them, I attest the retiring, I attest the advancing generations, between which, as a link in the great chain of eternal order, we stand.  We call this nation, we call the world to witness, that the Commons have shrunk from no labor; that we have been guilty of no prevarication; that we have made no compromise with crime; that we have not feared any odium whatsoever, in the long warfare which we have carried on with the crimes, with the vices, with the exorbitant wealth, with the enormous and overpowering influence of Eastern corruption.

My lords, it has pleased Providence to place us in such a state that we appear every moment to be upon the verge of some great mutations.  There is one thing and one thing only, which defies all mutation: that which existed before the world and will survive the fabric of the world itself—I mean justice; that justice which, emanating from the Divinity, has a place in the breast of every one of us, given us for our guide with regard to ourselves and with regard to others and which will stand, after this globe is burned to ashes, our advocate or our accuser, before the great Judge, when He comes to call upon us for the tenor of a well-spent life. …

My lords, if you must fall, may you so fall!  But, if you stand—and stand I trust you will—together with the fortune of this ancient monarchy, together with the ancient laws and liberties of this great and illustrious kingdom, may you stand as unimpeached in honor as in power; may you stand, not as a substitute for virtue, but as an ornament of virtue, as a security for virtue; may you stand long and long stand the terror of tyrants; may you stand the refuge of afflicted nations; may you stand a sacred temple, for the perpetual residence of an inviolable justice!

What Burke argued was that public office is a trust, not a personal property to be used selfishly, capriciously or stupidly by the incumbent.  The holder of the office is a trustee of the public good and so is held to perform fiduciary duties of due care and selfless loyalty to those who stand to benefit from the execution of powers so held in trust.

In the case of Hastings, Burke argued that the people of India, under British colonial rule, could not be abused by a British official, that they were beneficiaries of a trust held by that official.

The trial of Warren Hastings in the House of Lords started on February 13, 1788 and continued over a period of seven years, with 148 days of hearings.  The House of Lords acquitted him of all charges on April, 24 1795.

The first article of impeachment against Richard Nixon spoke similarly of abuse of power:

In his conduct of the office of President of the United States, Richard M. Nixon, in violation of his constitutional oath faithfully to execute the office of President of the United States and to the best of his ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States and in violation of his constitutional duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, has prevented, obstructed and impeded the administration of justice, in that:

On June 17, 1972 and prior thereto, agents of the Committee for the Re-election of the President committed unlawful entry of the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee in Washington, District of Columbia, for the purpose of securing political intelligence.  Subsequent thereto, Richard M. Nixon, using the powers of his high office, engaged personally and through his close subordinates and agents, in a course of conduct or plan designed to delay, impede and obstruct the investigation of such illegal entry, to cover up, conceal and protect those responsible and to conceal the existence and scope of other unlawful covert activities. …

In all of this, Richard M. Nixon has acted in a manner contrary to his trust as president and subversive of constitutional government, to the great prejudice of the cause of law and justice and to the manifest injury of the people of the United States.

Wherefore Richard M. Nixon, by such conduct, warrants impeachment and trial and removal from office.

(As a student at the Harvard law School, I was privileged to have been able to research the English parliamentary precedents of impeachment for high crimes and misdemeanors and have my conclusion that such impeachments were fiduciary proceedings for breach of public trust included as above in the articles of impeachment of Richard Nixon.  My law review article making that case is: “Public Office as a Public Trust: A suggestion that a fiduciary standard is implied in Impeachment for High Crimes and Misdemeanors,” Georgetown Law Journal, 1975.)

In his impeachment of Warren Hastings, Burke advanced principles of justice of global and therefore of cross-cultural application.  Today, in our world seeking to put behind it the abuses and injustices of yesteryear for the benefit of all humanity, public office everywhere should be held to standards of responsible stewardship of the public good.

Mencius argued that every monarch should institute governing by benevolence.  All persons living under Heaven would approve of such government. (Bk. 1, Pt.1, Ch. VII, 18)  He advised King Hui of Liang that he would find advantage in ruling if he delivered humanness and benevolence.  In other words, if he ruled as a caring steward of the people’s well-being.  A benevolent person has a duty to care for others.  Mencius referred to rulers as “shepherds of men.” (BK. 1, Pt. 1, Ch VI, 6)

Mencius said to King Xuan of Qi, “Suppose that one of your Majesty’s ministers were to entrust his wife and children to the care of his friend, while he himself went into Chu to travel and that, on his return, he should find that the friend had let his wife and children suffer from cold and hunger – how ought he to deal with him?”

The king said, “He should cast him off.”

Mencius proceeded, “Suppose that the chief criminal judge could not regulate the officers under him – how would you deal with him?”

The king said, “Dismiss him.”

Mencius again said, “If within the four borders of your kingdom there is not good government, what is to be done?”

The king looked to the right and left and spoke of other matters. (Bk.1, Pt.2, Ch. VI, 1)

The Qur’an provides guidance that all men and women were and are created by God to serve as stewards (khalifa) in his creations.  Their skills and powers, intelligence and capabilities, are given to all of them in trust (as an amanah) to be used wisely and selflessly.  We can properly ask if Islamic rulers today and throughout history have lived up to this exacting standard.  In adopting its global ethical principles for moral government, the Caux Round Table has followed the ideal articulated by Edmund Burke and others with similar idealism.  The Caux Round Table Principles for Government hold that:

Public power is held in trust for the community.

Power brings responsibility.  Power is a necessary moral circumstance in that it binds the actions of one to the welfare of others.

Therefore, the power given by public office is held in trust for the benefit of the community and its citizens.  Officials are custodians only of the powers they hold.  They have no personal entitlement to office or the prerogatives thereof.

Holders of public office are accountable for their conduct while in office.  They are subject to removal for malfeasance, misfeasance or abuse of office.  The burden of proof that no malfeasance, misfeasance or abuse of office has occurred lies with the officeholder.

The state is the servant and agent of higher ends.  It is subordinate to society.  Public power is to be exercised within a framework of moral responsibility for the welfare of others.  Governments that abuse their trust shall lose their authority and may be removed from office.

Yesterday’s Zoom round table discussion of the covenants given by the Prophet Muhammad to respect and protect Christian and Jewish communities drew forth concerns for creating relationships that embody commitments to respect others and live in peaceful coexistence.

The conversation brought to my mind violence.

Why so much violence?

A war in Ukraine, hundreds of thousands killed, more wounded, as I have read.

A war in Gaza, many thousands killed, more wounded.

On October 7, 2023, a killing spree with associated rapes and other wanton brutalities in Israel.

On July 13, a 20-year-old “kid” tried to kill Donald Trump.

Where does the inner compass of each of us end up – pointing to violence or pointing to harmony?

The teaching of history is clear – violence is in our DNA.  Some speak of original sin, which can only be remediated by a divine gift of forgiveness for our trespasses if we look to ourselves and work to deserve redemption.

But so is a moral sense in our DNA – a higher level of consciousness with more ability to create well-being – spiritual, social, economic, political.  But building moral competence out of that potential is not an automatic reflex, like the fight or flight response to danger.  Nor is it fully instinctive as breathing.

We are left with freedom to be violent or to seek peace.  Violence is sometimes forced upon us by others, making the choice of how to live for us.

My colleague, Michael Hartoonian, put the challenge before us as: “Given what I know, how should I conduct myself?”

So, then: what do I know?

And then: what should I know?

Those who can help us turn away from violence by sharing their learning and their good conscience are most needed at all times.

In March, for a second time, I took a very non-Western approach to making judgments about what choices to make in life.  I consulted the Yijing of ancient China and sent you my inferences for making good decisions this year, as stimulated by thinking about one of its 64 hexagrams hexagram 43.

Now, President Joe Biden has just announced that he will no longer seek re-election to the presidency of this country.

In my commentary on what the Yijing indicated might happen in the American presidential election, I wrote:

A yang environment, not restrained by yin energies, is a call to action, a time to start big projects, to aim high.  It is a year that will reward vitality with success.  Those with courage, tenacity, confidence and enthusiasm will do well.

To me, this bodes well for Donald Trump in the forthcoming American November election, but not for Joe Biden.  Trump is all energy and action.  Biden is, more and more, slowing down.

…

The hexagram supposes the flow of water parting or breaking through an obstacle, scattering whatever is in the way.  This will happen in a fortuitous coming together of supporters, say voters or investors.

In the American presidential election, again, this environment would seem to favor Trump, the challenger, over Biden, an incumbent.  Yet, will Trump provide a “sincere and truthful” message which will align with yang priorities?  Or will he pout and focus on himself, which are behaviors and casts of mind more aligned with yin attributes and so be out of sync with the times?

Some say that Trump’s near death experience a week ago with a failed assassination attempt indeed changed him when he later addressed the Republican Party convention to accept his nomination as its candidate for the presidency.  He did, for some, speak less as an obnoxious braggart, but with subdued sincerity about his caring for others.

Can we always rely upon the Yijing to accurately advise us as to the future we face?  I doubt it. But thinking about its values can more fully open our minds and hearts to different perspectives and possibilities.