Religion as a moral base

Religion as a moral base

A special issue of World Development on the relationship between religion and development, published in 1980, roundly criticized this instrumental approach to religion. In their opening article, the editors, Charles Wilber and Kenneth

CULTURE AND RELIGION

Jameson, argued that the limitations of development (as economic growth) and fundamental concerns about redistribution required that the Weberian approach to religion in (economic) development be revisited entirely. Equally, the secular view of religion – that religion is a purely private matter which has no place in the public sphere, and that religion can be neglected because when societies develop and become more modern, religion disappears from people’s

lives 7 – also required re-examination. Wilber and Jameson warn that these views ignore what they deem to be an essential aspect of religion: as the moral fabric of society, it also provides the set of norms within which the legitimacy and validity of the development process can be assessed. Viewing religious values solely as a means to achieve development goals derived from sources outside the social mores of a given society could, they argue, put the enterprise of development itself in jeopardy:

In most cases, the moral base of society has religious roots, and that moral base has been undermined during the process of capitalist development since 1945. But, unless this tension between moral base and development is resolved, the process of development will be self-limiting, and it is likely in many cases to engender major instability, which can radically transform the entire experience . . . This conclusion supports the claim that development must build on indigenous religious values because the preservation or growth of the moral base of the society is central to development . . . Religion is more than a mere instrument for development. A broad definition as meeting basic human needs would include religious values as one of those needs that are ends in themselves. (Wilber and Jameson, 1980, p475)

Thus, ignoring religion as the moral base of society may lead to a situation in which the development process, characterized by goals generated outside the country’s value system, alienates people and makes them reject the entire process. Wilber and Jameson conclude that, if the development process fails to rest on indigenous (religious) values, it risks being alienating and becoming a source of conflict, thereby distorting policy outcomes. One has to note here, of course, that their conclusion does not recognize the heterogeneity of a ‘society’s values’, as discussed in the section on culture above. Whose value system is a development process to be based on?

As we will see, the view that the development process has to rest on values originating from a given society was only fully taken on board – at least in theory 8 – during the 1990s, with the introduction of the human development and capability approach and its explicit recognition of development as a value- laden process. Basing development initiatives on the values that people have clearly entails, then, including religious values. If, for example, a community devastated by an earthquake values building a church, temple or mosque more than building a school, their values should be taken into account and not

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dismissed prima facie by aid donors with other views. A discussion and consensus-building process is required rather than the imposition of values and priorities over others – bringing us back to the importance of recognizing power differentials in any given context.