The Institute for Nonviolent Economics
Santa Fe Resident Takes A Different Approach To Modernization
By Gussie Fauntleroy
This article appeared in The New Mexican on February 11, 2001
Santa Fe resident Sarah Laeng-Gilliatt recounts an experience she had a few years ago in Ladakh, a small, isolated Himalayan region still largely untouched by the changes of modernization. While Laeng-Gilliatt was in the capital city, a young Ladakhi woman was raped by a soldier in the Indian military. It was the first time such a crime had been committed against a Ladakhi.
The next day every store in the city was shut down. Despite the fact that there was very little telephone or computer communications between the capital and the outlying villages, many people from rural areas swarmed to the city in shock, outrage and solidarity against the woman's rape.
Laeng-Gilliatt relates the story as a challenge to one of the contemporary world's most prevalent myths about the past: that before the arrival of modern technology there was little or no connection or communication between distant places. Along with this idea comes the widely held belief that unchecked development is inevitable and ultimately desirable on a worldwide scale.
But Laeng-Gilliatt and many others today see things differently. As much as we in the developed world enjoy the comforts and conveniences of technology, many believe it is neither desirable or viable to envision the majority of the world's population living as we do. The planet's resources and environment could not sustain such a rate of consumption, they believe.
Laeng-Gilliatt, an activist with the Buddhist Peace Fellowship, believes there are alternatives to the trend known as globalization, or the rapidly increasing concentration of wealth and power among multinational corporations and a small segment of the world's population.
These alternatives focus on support of vibrant, diverse, sustainable local economies and communities around the world, each with a strong connection to, and understanding of, the bioregion in which they are located. At the same time there must be an effort to enact laws and policies that will counter the steam-roller effects of globalization and over-consumption by the First World, she said.
To share ideas and information on these issues, Laeng-Gilliatt is leading an ongoing series of films, lectures and workshops in Santa Fe on what she calls Spiritual Economics -- a nonviolent, Buddhist-inspired approach to the transformation of global economics.
Laeng-Gilliatt will present the first lecture, ``Mobilization Against Globalization,'' at 7 p.m. Monday, at Isis Medicine on Botulph Lane. The films, also presented at Isis Medicine, focus on various aspects of globalization and its worldwide impacts on communities and cultures, the environment and human and civil rights. The films also look at the growing international movement to counter globalization.
The day-long workshops will delve more deeply into these issues and provide training and support for those interested in taking part in future nonviolent civil actions and ongoing projects. All events are sponsored by the Buddhist Peace Fellowship.
Laeng-Gilliatt, 35, is a regular visiting faculty member at New College in California. She has a degree in socially engaged Buddhism from the Naropa Institute, and has attended Schumacher College in England, where she studied with well-known activists Vandana Shiva of India and Martin Khor of the Third World Network.
She has edited three books on the roots of nonviolence in various spiritual traditions. And she has worked closely with Helena Norberg-Hodge, director of the International Society for Ecology and Culture and author of "Ancient Futures: Learning from Ladakh". Along with other members of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship, Laeng-Gilliatt was in Seattle in November 1999 to help support the thousands of people who had gathered to protest the activities and policies of the World Trade Organization.
Laeng-Gilliatt's approach to activism involves what she sees as three important intertwining threads: globalization and the alternative movement toward localization; the principles and methods of Gandhian nonviolence; and a spiritual practice based on Buddhist precepts -- although she stresses that workshop participants do not need to be Buddhist.
"Buddhism is a very powerful lens for understanding reality and the complexity of our world, and for understanding how transformation takes place and how we can apply this on a larger scale," she said. "It inspires one and helps one to be motivated by love, rather than anger and despair. We see that ultimately activism can come from a sense of love for life."
Taking a broad, interdisciplinary approach also provides a context for understanding how the innumerable issues surrounding globalization fit together and how the structure of the prevailing economic system must be fundamentally altered to effect real change, she said.
"Helena Norberg-Hodge says that when we do our small piece with a sense of the larger context, our little actions become all the more powerful. She compares it to pulling a thread of a rug -- we know which thread to pull and how, to effect the entire rug. For example, by buying locally grown food we're helping the community, the environment and the economy.
"In one fell swoop we're addressing many problems, rather than seeing all the different economic, environmental and community issues as unrelated. They are all related."
In any understanding of the world situation, Laeng-Gilliatt believes it is crucial to distinguish between globalism and global solidarity. Globalization is competitive, predatory and imperialistic, with deep roots in colonialism. Global solidarity or internationalism, on the other hand, is based on cooperation and a desire for the good of all people in all nations, she said.
She also points out a critical distinction between "free trade" -- as defined by policies established during the 8th round of the Global Agreement on Tarriffs and Trade (GATT) and continued by organizations such as the World Trade Organization -- and the truly free flow of ideas and appropriate technologies aimed at supporting sustainable local economies.
Counter-globalization does not deny the role of trade in the world, or the fact that in theory it makes sense for each region or country to export what it is best at producing. However, the economic system does not take into consideration the enormous environmental and social costs to much of the world's population, she said.
"What motivates me probably more than anything are the inequities between North and South (northern and southern hemispheres) -- the so-called underdeveloped countries and what I call the 'overdeveloped' nations. There's a net flow of billions of dollars south to north in the servicing of debt and in terms of trade loss. Our well being is based on the poverty of other peoples and the devastation of the planet.
"There's just a tremendous arrogance in the idea that somehow our science is the best science and our way is the best way. It's an arrogance that leads to a global monoculture where there's a McDonald's on the corner in every city all over the world, and this attitude is so ingrained that it doesn't even feel unnatural to think that the world's resources belong to us.
"And also, the scale of the economy is so large that it's hard for us to feel our impact, even if we want to be responsible."
Another deeply entrenched idea that must be overcome, Laeng-Gilliatt believes, is the notion that unchecked development is inevitable. Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher coined an acronym for this view: TINA, "there is no alternative."
However, Laeng-Gilliatt points out that globalization involves very specific policies that are actively pursued. Other policies could just as easily be developed and followed, she said. And these changes could have an enormous impact because half the world's population, including most people in the Third World, still live in rural situations with at least some connection to local resources and the local economy.
"Globalization is forcing people who were living more sustainably to move to cities, to live more like us, in less sustainable ways," she said. "We need to quickly change these economic policies so they can stay on the land."
While many organizations around the world are working on single issues such as the environment, social problems and civil and human rights, Laeng-Gilliatt and others believe fundamental systemic changes must take place in the structure of the world economy in order to counter the negative effects of globalization.
Among these changes would be unconditional cancellation of foreign debt among Third World nations, which would allow countries to funnel resources into their own economies and social needs instead of focusing on heavy exports for cash to repay the continually growing interest on debt.
There also must be a ban on "export dumping," in which products go onto the world market at below the cost of production, eliminating the possibility for competition, Laeng-Gilliatt said.
In addition, a shift in government subsidies away from large-scale monocultural production and agribusiness could provide needed funds to small-scale, diversified production for local consumption. As it is, "free trade" agreements do not allow developing countries to control food imports or increase subsidies to farmers in their own countries, while cheap imports from abroad flood their markets.
Laeng-Gilliatt points out that with both government and consumer support of local products worldwide, trade would still take place for products that cannot be made locally. However, if the real costs -- including environmental, fair labor, production, and social costs -- are accounted for, those who produce and buy products which are transported over long distances will be forced to take responsibility for the true costs.
Finally, a crucial element in countering globalism is the need for a massive, top-down, capital-intensive educational campaign -- which Helena Norberg-Hodge calls counter-development -- aimed at the developing world, Laeng-Gilliatt said.
The goal of this campaign would be to educate people in Third World countries about the negative impacts of development and modernization before it's too late. It also would help them understand the benefits of small-scale, sustainable economies that in many cases have been part of their own tradition for generations, she said.
"They need to know what progressive movements in the North are doing for this. They need to know that what they're doing (on a local level) is valuable and not backward, because the corporate media message says the only sophisticated way to live is like us," she said.
"We have the responsibility to allow them to make informed, free choices, because we have experience with modernization. As it is now, what they're given is a uni-dimensional glamorized vision of our world. This is to balance that view. We can't perpetuate the lie that it's possible for most of the world to live like we do.
"Mainstream economic proponents say the movement against globalization will be to the detriment of the world's poor. But the majority of people are not benefiting from the current system. It's promoted as helping the poor by lifting all boats, but it's mostly lifting yachts.
"Early on (in this work), people told me I was idealistic. But I flipped that and said they were idealistic to think we could have a future if we didn't challenge these issues."
This article appeared in The New Mexican on February 11, 2001
Santa Fe resident Sarah Laeng-Gilliatt recounts an experience she had a few years ago in Ladakh, a small, isolated Himalayan region still largely untouched by the changes of modernization. While Laeng-Gilliatt was in the capital city, a young Ladakhi woman was raped by a soldier in the Indian military. It was the first time such a crime had been committed against a Ladakhi.
The next day every store in the city was shut down. Despite the fact that there was very little telephone or computer communications between the capital and the outlying villages, many people from rural areas swarmed to the city in shock, outrage and solidarity against the woman's rape.
Laeng-Gilliatt relates the story as a challenge to one of the contemporary world's most prevalent myths about the past: that before the arrival of modern technology there was little or no connection or communication between distant places. Along with this idea comes the widely held belief that unchecked development is inevitable and ultimately desirable on a worldwide scale.
But Laeng-Gilliatt and many others today see things differently. As much as we in the developed world enjoy the comforts and conveniences of technology, many believe it is neither desirable or viable to envision the majority of the world's population living as we do. The planet's resources and environment could not sustain such a rate of consumption, they believe.
Laeng-Gilliatt, an activist with the Buddhist Peace Fellowship, believes there are alternatives to the trend known as globalization, or the rapidly increasing concentration of wealth and power among multinational corporations and a small segment of the world's population.
These alternatives focus on support of vibrant, diverse, sustainable local economies and communities around the world, each with a strong connection to, and understanding of, the bioregion in which they are located. At the same time there must be an effort to enact laws and policies that will counter the steam-roller effects of globalization and over-consumption by the First World, she said.
To share ideas and information on these issues, Laeng-Gilliatt is leading an ongoing series of films, lectures and workshops in Santa Fe on what she calls Spiritual Economics -- a nonviolent, Buddhist-inspired approach to the transformation of global economics.
Laeng-Gilliatt will present the first lecture, ``Mobilization Against Globalization,'' at 7 p.m. Monday, at Isis Medicine on Botulph Lane. The films, also presented at Isis Medicine, focus on various aspects of globalization and its worldwide impacts on communities and cultures, the environment and human and civil rights. The films also look at the growing international movement to counter globalization.
The day-long workshops will delve more deeply into these issues and provide training and support for those interested in taking part in future nonviolent civil actions and ongoing projects. All events are sponsored by the Buddhist Peace Fellowship.
Laeng-Gilliatt, 35, is a regular visiting faculty member at New College in California. She has a degree in socially engaged Buddhism from the Naropa Institute, and has attended Schumacher College in England, where she studied with well-known activists Vandana Shiva of India and Martin Khor of the Third World Network.
She has edited three books on the roots of nonviolence in various spiritual traditions. And she has worked closely with Helena Norberg-Hodge, director of the International Society for Ecology and Culture and author of "Ancient Futures: Learning from Ladakh". Along with other members of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship, Laeng-Gilliatt was in Seattle in November 1999 to help support the thousands of people who had gathered to protest the activities and policies of the World Trade Organization.
Laeng-Gilliatt's approach to activism involves what she sees as three important intertwining threads: globalization and the alternative movement toward localization; the principles and methods of Gandhian nonviolence; and a spiritual practice based on Buddhist precepts -- although she stresses that workshop participants do not need to be Buddhist.
"Buddhism is a very powerful lens for understanding reality and the complexity of our world, and for understanding how transformation takes place and how we can apply this on a larger scale," she said. "It inspires one and helps one to be motivated by love, rather than anger and despair. We see that ultimately activism can come from a sense of love for life."
Taking a broad, interdisciplinary approach also provides a context for understanding how the innumerable issues surrounding globalization fit together and how the structure of the prevailing economic system must be fundamentally altered to effect real change, she said.
"Helena Norberg-Hodge says that when we do our small piece with a sense of the larger context, our little actions become all the more powerful. She compares it to pulling a thread of a rug -- we know which thread to pull and how, to effect the entire rug. For example, by buying locally grown food we're helping the community, the environment and the economy.
"In one fell swoop we're addressing many problems, rather than seeing all the different economic, environmental and community issues as unrelated. They are all related."
In any understanding of the world situation, Laeng-Gilliatt believes it is crucial to distinguish between globalism and global solidarity. Globalization is competitive, predatory and imperialistic, with deep roots in colonialism. Global solidarity or internationalism, on the other hand, is based on cooperation and a desire for the good of all people in all nations, she said.
She also points out a critical distinction between "free trade" -- as defined by policies established during the 8th round of the Global Agreement on Tarriffs and Trade (GATT) and continued by organizations such as the World Trade Organization -- and the truly free flow of ideas and appropriate technologies aimed at supporting sustainable local economies.
Counter-globalization does not deny the role of trade in the world, or the fact that in theory it makes sense for each region or country to export what it is best at producing. However, the economic system does not take into consideration the enormous environmental and social costs to much of the world's population, she said.
"What motivates me probably more than anything are the inequities between North and South (northern and southern hemispheres) -- the so-called underdeveloped countries and what I call the 'overdeveloped' nations. There's a net flow of billions of dollars south to north in the servicing of debt and in terms of trade loss. Our well being is based on the poverty of other peoples and the devastation of the planet.
"There's just a tremendous arrogance in the idea that somehow our science is the best science and our way is the best way. It's an arrogance that leads to a global monoculture where there's a McDonald's on the corner in every city all over the world, and this attitude is so ingrained that it doesn't even feel unnatural to think that the world's resources belong to us.
"And also, the scale of the economy is so large that it's hard for us to feel our impact, even if we want to be responsible."
Another deeply entrenched idea that must be overcome, Laeng-Gilliatt believes, is the notion that unchecked development is inevitable. Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher coined an acronym for this view: TINA, "there is no alternative."
However, Laeng-Gilliatt points out that globalization involves very specific policies that are actively pursued. Other policies could just as easily be developed and followed, she said. And these changes could have an enormous impact because half the world's population, including most people in the Third World, still live in rural situations with at least some connection to local resources and the local economy.
"Globalization is forcing people who were living more sustainably to move to cities, to live more like us, in less sustainable ways," she said. "We need to quickly change these economic policies so they can stay on the land."
While many organizations around the world are working on single issues such as the environment, social problems and civil and human rights, Laeng-Gilliatt and others believe fundamental systemic changes must take place in the structure of the world economy in order to counter the negative effects of globalization.
Among these changes would be unconditional cancellation of foreign debt among Third World nations, which would allow countries to funnel resources into their own economies and social needs instead of focusing on heavy exports for cash to repay the continually growing interest on debt.
There also must be a ban on "export dumping," in which products go onto the world market at below the cost of production, eliminating the possibility for competition, Laeng-Gilliatt said.
In addition, a shift in government subsidies away from large-scale monocultural production and agribusiness could provide needed funds to small-scale, diversified production for local consumption. As it is, "free trade" agreements do not allow developing countries to control food imports or increase subsidies to farmers in their own countries, while cheap imports from abroad flood their markets.
Laeng-Gilliatt points out that with both government and consumer support of local products worldwide, trade would still take place for products that cannot be made locally. However, if the real costs -- including environmental, fair labor, production, and social costs -- are accounted for, those who produce and buy products which are transported over long distances will be forced to take responsibility for the true costs.
Finally, a crucial element in countering globalism is the need for a massive, top-down, capital-intensive educational campaign -- which Helena Norberg-Hodge calls counter-development -- aimed at the developing world, Laeng-Gilliatt said.
The goal of this campaign would be to educate people in Third World countries about the negative impacts of development and modernization before it's too late. It also would help them understand the benefits of small-scale, sustainable economies that in many cases have been part of their own tradition for generations, she said.
"They need to know what progressive movements in the North are doing for this. They need to know that what they're doing (on a local level) is valuable and not backward, because the corporate media message says the only sophisticated way to live is like us," she said.
"We have the responsibility to allow them to make informed, free choices, because we have experience with modernization. As it is now, what they're given is a uni-dimensional glamorized vision of our world. This is to balance that view. We can't perpetuate the lie that it's possible for most of the world to live like we do.
"Mainstream economic proponents say the movement against globalization will be to the detriment of the world's poor. But the majority of people are not benefiting from the current system. It's promoted as helping the poor by lifting all boats, but it's mostly lifting yachts.
"Early on (in this work), people told me I was idealistic. But I flipped that and said they were idealistic to think we could have a future if we didn't challenge these issues."