Friday, 05 February 2010 09:41
Written by Benedetto Gui
As part of the day dedicated to the financial crisis during the 4th Buddhist-Christian Symposium
Financial Crisis and Wealth Disparity: the Role of a Renewed Economic Culture
Presentation by Benedetto Gui
Chiang Mai (Thailand), February 4, 2010
“People want meaning in their lives – the kind of meaning that comes only from knowing that you are doing your part to make our world a better place. … [This] is an aspect of human nature that is totally ignored in the existing business world.” (Muhammad Yunus, Creating a World without Poverty, p. 162).
“It must be remembered that the market does not exist in the pure state. It is shaped by the cultural configurations which define it and give it direction..” (Encyclical letter Caritas in Veritate, §36)
The recent financial and economic crisis has caused widespread pains around the world. The prevailing attitude in the present phase of the crisis is one of impatient hope that the recovery will come soon, so we can go back to the previous state of affairs.
However, we must reflect on what has happened. The spark of the crisis has been the burst of the speculative bubble of American house prices. If we go deeper, we find that behind the scene of the crisis there are structural causes, such as the systematic excess of consumption of US households and inadequate financial regulations. However, if we go deeper still, a crucial question resurfaces, one that is more pressing than ever: is there anything systematically wrong in the economic system we live in that we must fix?