Economics, Culture and Society—Alternative Approaches: Dissenting Views from Economic Orthodoxy
by Oscar Nudler and Mark A. Lutz (Editors)

reviewed by A.V. Avadhuta

The theoretical roots for alternatives to the present system of corporate capitalism are well-presented in this collection of essays edited by Oscar Nudler and Mark A. Lutz.

Although interest in such alternative approaches has waned somewhat during the post-cold-war years, the present unsteadiness of the global economy will certainly stimulate many to again question the idea that the present system offers the only road to economic prosperity and well-being.

The most readable section and perhaps the heart of the book is Mark Lutz's description of what has come to be known as the "Humanistic School of Economics." The best known exponent of this school is E.F. Schumacher whose 1973 Small is Beautiful spoke of an economics "as if all people mattered." Lutz traces the origins of this line of thought back to 19th Century writers such as J.C.L.S. Sismondi, Thomas Carlyle and John Ruskin and continues with a discussion of the contributions of 20th century thinkers. Tying this school together is an understanding that "a person is not a thing and should not be treated as such." Thus the exponents of the Humanist School have favoured an economic system based on worker self-determination and self-management.

One of the non-economists who influenced the Humanistic School was the psychologist Abraham Maslow who said that in addition to basic survival needs, humans also have higher aspirations (the desire for self-actualization or self-realization) which should also be fulfilled. The failure of capitalism and socialism (even in their most successful cases) to provide happiness and contentment is in large part due to a neglect of Maslow's observations. Building on this, the concluding essay by the late Willis Harmon, points to fundamental changes, a "sea change", in how people view "reality" and what implications this has for economics.

In the developed world Willis identified a value shift "away from the confident scientific materialism of the earlier part of the century and towards some form of universal transcendentalism." Thus, Willis observes, people have become more inner-directed and now wish to fulfill ecological and spiritual yearnings. In the developing world he detects a move "away from Western Materialism and toward a reassertion of the validity and truth in native cultural roots." Willis sees these value shifts as the basis for an increasing demand for alternatives to current economic models.

What these new models might look like is not thoroughly discussed in any of these essays, but for those who wish to understand the historical and intellectual basis for an alternative economics this anthology is a good place to begin.

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Where Reincarnation and Biology Intersect by Ian Stevenson, M.D. Praeger, Westport Connecticut, 1997  reviewed by A.V. Avadhuta

For anyone who thinks that reincarnation is only a philosophical doctrine which is not amenable to scientific study, Ian Stevenson's book may cause them to think a second time. Stevenson, who is a psychiatrist and a seasoned researcher, has presented a large body of evidence which he believes is best explained by the theory of reincarnation.

Stevenson studied more than 2600 cases in which young children claimed to remember details about a "past life." But this research is different from other accounts of past-lives in that the memories of past lives is correlated with an explanation of birth marks, defects, and deformities in the present life, and hence the title "where reincarnation and biology intersect."

An example is the case of a Burmese girl who was born with severe constriction ring on her left thigh (the limb was severly constricted with swelling on both sides of it), and also constrictions rings on the ankle, a birthmark on the left side of her chest and a missing finger. There was no explanation of these birth defects until the girl began talking and said that she was a man in her previous life and was murdered with a stab in the chest near the heart,in an attack in which the finger was also cut off. The child said that he had remained conscious while the murderers contemplated how to dispose of the body. Finally they decided to "compress it into as small a place as possible by tying the legs back on the thighs" shortening the body making it easy to put in a sack and drop in a well.

The story related by the girl fits the facts of a man who was murdered in a nearby village sometime prior to her birth. (The body was recovered from the well shortly after the incident and all the circumstances of the murder were discovered by the police.) Stevenson cites numerous cases like this and shows photos of the birth marks and defects. It is not pleasant to look at or read, but a certain pattern emerges which is interesting for physical science and also for those of a spiritual bent.

In almost all of these cases the death in the previous life was violent. Also, the deformities were always found on the victim of the attack (not the perpetrator) such as in the case narrated above. Stevenson also observed that those who remember their past lives do so at an early age (between the years 2 and 4) and that they stop speaking of these incidents between the years 5 and 8.

While most people who speak about reincarnation and the concept of karma (which says that actions from the present and past will bring reactions in the future) would think that the perpetrator of the act would most likely be "punished" by being born with a deformity or defect, Stevenson did not find any case like this. But, his finding that children remembered their past lives only in the early stage of their life conforms to conventional spiritual understanding (such as explained by P.R. Sarkar, in Yoga Psychology,) which holds that this "extra cerebral" memory of previous lives cannot continue into adulthood. The fact that those who remember their previous births suffered violent deaths is also fits with the ideas of spiritual teachers who say that if one is conscious at the moment of death then it is more likely that he or she will be able to recall it in a future incarnation.

These incidents will also provide plenty of food for thought for those looking into a physical explanation for such phenomena. Stevenson points out that a "single cause is rarely sufficient to produce a birth defect...The principal claim presented here is that the influence of a reincarnating personality may be one factor we would consider in the causation of some birth defects." Stevenson sums up by saying that reincarnation can not account for all birth marks and defects and that he is not proposing it as a substitute for genetics. He concludes by saying that reincarnation "deserves attention for the additional explanatory value that it has for numerous unsolved problems of psychology and medicine."

 While this book and the larger study which it has been condensed from, cannot "prove" the concept of reincarnation, it should serve as a mile-stone in efforts to enhance our understanding of one of life's greatest mysteries.

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Felicitavia

by Devashish Donald Acosta

reviewed by Dada Acyutananda

If the author of Felicitavia is cor rect about the power of art to influ ence society, then this would appear to be a key meta work of art. That is, its own specific influence on society will make artists themselves conscious of the power and the duty they hold—and by making them conscious, it will further empower them, further motivate them, in their efforts.

The power and duty that artists hold can be approached conceptually by taking writers as an example and looking at the Sanskrit word sa'hityika. Sa'hityikas are "those who write with the thought of the welfare of all humanity uppermost in their minds". Felicitavia aims to awaken creative minds in the battle for humanity's future.

Besides being a blueprint of how spiritual art can work, Felicitavia is an example of how spiritual art can work. Just how good an example it is, will of course be crucial to people's acceptance or non-acceptance of the blueprint, and must be the main topic of inquiry of any review. Acosta has undertaken something very ambitious here, and has attained a mixture of success and failure. But failures occurring within a grand design may still leave more on the positive side of the balance than would outright success in many lesser undertakings.

A work of art this book is, and a gripping story; but this book did hold an initial surprise for me. Knowing the author personally and knowing his love of novels, I expected him to write something that would be influenced by his spiritual ideology, but something that would be first and foremost a novel. Instead I would say that he has written a major intellectual statement based on his spiritual ideology, in the form of a novel.

If something like this was his method, then he has "covered his tracks" fairly well. That is, the book reads like an entertaining work of fiction; but some traces do remain of the disquisition which, I'm suggesting, was at the top of his agenda. For example, much of the dialogue by the major characters is expressions of philosophy, and philosophy defines its own language to a large extent; so some of the major characters —Lisa, Jelena, Ricardo—don't completely succeed in finding their own individual voices as distinct from that of Humberto, the narrator. The focal figure Marcel, in my experience of the book, really begins to display his personality only belatedly, at the time of the first "inner circle" meeting. An exception to the trend, however, is Stefan, a delightful and convincing character (whom I feel that I know, but I can't quite place him). Some of the minor characters such as Milo and Carlo also come to life.

 Regardless of any philosophical agenda, the author has spun a very fascinating story, and though I found that I did put the book down at times to contemplate some of its philosophical challenges, I would soon pick it up again, compelled by a timeless story-teller's magic into a timeless reader's wonderment as to what would happen next.

The plot itself is simple. A failing young Florentine painter pulls himself out of his depression in order to fulfil a commitment to an elderly relative, a God-centred aunt. One of her other visitors convinces him to try painting again. He travels to the Alps, and there meets the person who will become his guru—a guru with a special mission for artists. The painter's eyes begin to open to this world and the world within.

Apart from the plot, I found myself caught up in the stylistic texture of the book, looking forward to each new lavish cascade of description:

Felicitavia was a place that demanded magic because it lived it from the first intimations of the morning bells until the mountain settled into its diurnal stasis.

The author has a facility for simile and metaphor in particular:

He spoke in his usual calm and measured voice, but it carried an emphasis that was unmistakable, like the raised seal on an official proclamation, unobtrusive but authoritative.

The sun followed us around all day like a fiery chauffeur in his limousine . . .

The author uses his descriptive skills in a way that we might call self-conscious — but not in an entirely bad sense; rather a reader might feel that they have been drawn into a compact with the author, a compact that a perfect description of some scene or some event does deserve whatever conscious effort may be required to bring it about. As with the writing, the reading is not easy, but many will benefit from making the necessary effort. (The publisher selected a metaphor for the back-cover blurb that is far from the best, but readers should not be put off by that.)

I have mentioned that this book is a sociological blueprint as well as a work of art. And is it a future study as well? A blueprint is necessarily for the future, but a blueprint need not enter into specific predictions of future events. In Felicitavia, however, an important part of the plot, as well as some of the most riveting imagery, concerns what the author often refers to simply as "the crisis" — an assortment of natural and man-made disasters. The crisis does not occur in any detail within the story except in the expectations of some of the author's characters. It does, however, occur generally as expected. This is confirmed by the "prologue" written at the end of the fictional narrator's life.

It is said that art reflects life, so readers may decide to take such fictional events as reflections, in the author's eyes, of future life. But in this novel the forecasts serve an artistic and philosophical function unrelated to whether or not they will ever really happen. Artistically and philosophically, the point is that such disasters could happen and that if they did, God would still be with us. In other words, the reader is drenched in a cold conviction that these things must be accepted as possibilities — we are forced to think about the unthinkable —but at the same time the author shows us that the spiritual game each of us is playing is ultimately so vast that even world cataclysm would not put a finish to our progress in that game.

After all, the size of the physical universe alone is beyond our present ability to measure and is perhaps fifteen billion years old. It has been said that "the expressed universe is an island in an ocean of unexpressed universe;" it has also been said that both the unexpressed and the expressed are within each of us. Measured against the vastness within us, a cataclysm on one small planet, particularly if "a spiritual consciousness sweeps across the globe in the aftermath," comes into perspective. The author understands that sometimes a scare is needed to force our minds to expand.

And it is here, in capturing a sense of a life beyond the births and deaths of our bodies, that the book scores its highest marks. Simply put, some of the author's descriptions of spiritual insights and experiences must be the next best thing to having the experiences themselves.

Then I began hearing a low hum, almost inaudible at first but growing steadily. I felt my mind being drawn out into the universe by that continuous, pulsating sound pouring out of the depths within me. It was indeed much like the sound of crickets, but without the lulls that real crickets have. A feeling of ecstasy welled up inside as my mind overflowed its boundaries, racing after this hypnotic sound that was coming from everywhere at once.

Just as the community of Felicitavia radiates consciousness in every feature of its design, Felicitavia the book radiates it on every page. You will not often find consciousness in such a convenient package.

In weighing the pros and cons of the book, it must be mentioned that the author has made one very important point but illustrated that point in a way that may be misunderstood.

One character says that religious dogma "has a major part of the world brainwashed." Marcel, the guru, to whom the author has lent great authority, seems to agree. The author seems to be saying that every religion retains within it a greater or lesser element of the genuine spirituality out of which the religion originally developed—yet at the same time every religion has overlaid that genuine element, that living truth perceived by its founder, with a set of rigid and simplistic beliefs more within the grasp of the mortals who succeeded him.

Through a discussion around this point by various characters, the author perhaps wishes to create a complexity of views within his fictional situation, so that his point will register even-handedly as far as the various religions of the world his readers actually live in. The passage is very likely, however, to be seen as punishing one religion for the sins of all, when it is the sins of all (and likewise the virtues of all) that really should have been addressed.

Felicitavia is available for $11.95 from the publisher, Good Karma Publications, Villa Interamericana, Calle 7, G-9, San German Puerto Rico 00683, USA. or for DM 20 from New Renaissance, Weisenauer Weg 4, 55129 Mainz, Germany.

This article was published in New Renaissance magazine Vol. 8, No. 2

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