This
Friday series is based on a paper I wrote for my Systematic Theology 2
class earlier in the year. It was a reaction piece to the book The Good of Affluence ,
by John R. Schneider and represents my own personal wrestling with the
contemporary expression of capitalism: consumer capitalism.
In light of the current economic crises and meltdown, I thought I would
post this each Friday for the next 6 weeks. Enjoy the repost and I hope
it helps challenge you in your thoughts and conclusions on capitalism.

The Series
1. Introduction
2. Is Affluence The Point
3. Consumerism: The End Result of Sin Marked-Capitalism
4. Globalization and the Brown Man’s Burden
5. Globalization and Moral Proximity
6. Conclusion

GLOBALIZATION AND THE BROWN MAN’S BURDEN

In the previous examples it is obvious that corporations, and even cities, have taken advantage of people groups around the world to maximize delight for the American consumer culture, and their bottom-line. Corporations that drive the American economy, and thus feed the American consumer appetite, have built themselves on the backs of the Global Brown Man, with little thought given to the consequences of their construction efforts. Unfortunately, Schneider fails to give due discourse to the responsibility of the powerful within American society to those on whom we’ve built an entire economy. If the American economy is built upon consumption–seventy percent of that economy is personal consumption–then do we not have a responsibility to those who have aided us in that building? In an age where all economies are tightly integrated, American Christians need to give greater thought to how we use the Other to fulfill our consumer predilections. While the author seems to find trouble accepting our responsibilities to other nations, we need to consider the affects of sinful forms of capitalism and discuss redemptive ways to reverse the affects of that sin.

In addressing that Christian responsibility to the global poor, Schneider exegetes Amos in relationship to “normal Western Christian” participation in the global economy. According to Schneider, Amos aimed his diatribe at the rulers of Israel and the class of ruling elites that extended the arm of the king. It was their responsibility to care for the economic conditions of the poor in society, and they failed to live out that responsibility. Even the wives of those rulers and ruling classes were condemned, because they used the profits of that misery to indulge themselves. Everyone involved, from the king down to the partners of the ruling class, were complicit in and responsible for the exploitation and oppression of the people they were suppose to have served. But in relating the sin of oppression of the rulers of Israel to Western Christians, Schneider declares, “It seems fairly obvious that what these rich people in Amos did was as deeply evil as it could be under the circumstances. But is it at all obvious that ordinary Christans are routinely committing evils comparable to theirs? Is it clear that the behavior [Ron] Sider describes [in Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger]–giving too little a percentage of their income to the global poor–is anything like what Israel’s ruling class did in spiritual and moral quality?” Unfortunately, the author does not explain why Western Christians are not somewhat guilty of the same negligence as the wives of Israel and the oppression of the ruling elites.

If we were to think redemptively about consumer capitalism, we might ask: When a Christian grandmother purchases a sweater at Gap made by an Indian 10 year old for her teenage grandson, is she not at least somewhat complicit in that Indian child’s suffering? Or when a Christian college student buys a pound of Guatemala Antigua Blend coffee from Starbucks for $12.95 for his late night study sessions, does he not in someway pronounce a blessing upon the Mighty Siren for the $.40 a pound they gave the Guatemalan farmer which perpetuates his life of poverty? What we the hyper-globally connected First World should consider is how our interactions with and use of the global poor differ in spiritual and moral quality than the exploitation and oppression Israel’s ruling class bore upon their own poor. If Western multinational corporations and national economies have built their entire businesses and economies upon the cheap labor and products of the underdeveloped world, are we not responsibile to those people?

While Schneider completely ignores issues of personal buying responsibility with seeming ease, failing to even acknowledge the connection between Western and developing economies, we can redeem the system by reconsidering how and where we shop. For instance, Grand Rapids church decided it was time to fairly compensate coffee farmers for a staple of the American culture. Instead of buying beans through corrupt coffee brokers, they are investing in a coffee growing family in Honduras, and return 100% of the profits back into that community at a value of $10 a pound. There goal is to fight corruption and greed in the coffee industry that results from American consumer capitalism, and is one way Christians can redeem the affects of the fall on capitalism. Before we can help, however, we must recognize our responsibility to our global neighbor and realize our buying patterns contribute somewhat to the injustice and oppression thousands of people face beneath the weight of a broken economic system.

Popularity: 2% [?]

This Friday series is based on a paper I wrote for my Systematic Theology 2 class earlier in the year. It was a reaction piece to the book The Good of Affluence , by John R. Schneider and represents my own personal wrestling with the contemporary expression of capitalism: consumer capitalism. In light of the current economic crises and meltdown, I thought I would post this each Friday for the next 6 weeks. Enjoy the repost and I hope it helps challenge you in your thoughts and conclusions on capitalism.

The Series
1. Introduction
2. Is Affluence The Point
3. Consumerism: The End Result of Sin Marked-Capitalism
4. Globalization and the Brown Man’s Burden
5. Globalization and Moral Proximity
6. Conclusion

IS AFFLUENCE THE POINT?

“In the past two hundred years the greatest achievement of the modern West was to create a middle class, allowing the common man to escape from poverty and live in relative comfort. Now the United States is ready to perform an even greater feat: it is well on its way to creating the first mass affluent class in world history.” Capitalism, no doubt, has contributed to great advances in modern societies. Even in emerging markets like India, Romania, and Mexico, capitalism is providing the soil to cultivate great economic and social advances that promote God’s original intentions of abundance for those societies. And according to John A. Schneider, those affluence-creating advances coincide with God’s “cosmic good” for original Creation. Throughout his book, the the author claims the condition of affluence is a cosmic good and core to God’s eternal vision for Humans. He insists that God originally desired Humans to acquire and enjoy a good, affluent existence brimming with the good stuff of life, and for good reason. Genesis does paint a beautiful picture of a Garden overflowing with every kind of good fruit and vegetable, a safe environment to raise a family, and undefiled relationships with which to grow old. God created a good Earth and placed Humans in a good Garden to enjoy and provide care.

But does God want us to be affluent, to be wealthy? Or rather, does He desire to give us an abundant life? You may think I am quibbling over words, here, but I think the author missteps by claiming that affluence is the point. Instead, both the early Genesis narrative and Promise Land Exodus motifs give us a picture of abundance, not affluence. Abundance is having a more than adequate supply of something. In our case, God desired that we Humans have a more than adequate supply of food, water, security, shelter, and relationships. The same was true for His chosen people: through the Abrahamic Covenant God wanted to bless them with abundance and give them a land with more than an adequate supply of everything they would ever need. Affluence and wealth on the other hand is having a quality of profuse abundance, of wealth beyond use. It seems that the kind of economic advantage Schneider advocates is beyond what God had in mind when he created Humans, and an example from his book illustrates the point.

In advocating affluence as an original design and intent of God’s good creation, Schneider insists Mercedes-Benz is an object in which people have the right to take pleasure. Of this right he says: “I also know how much pleasure they get from the nearly perfect performance of those vehicle. I think it is very like what other friends of mine get from the pieces of fine art that they own, or from the great books that they read. Outside of base resentment, I see no reason at all to think that either form of affection is unhealthy materialism. Why not instead wish that everyone could enjoy life at those levels?” In other words, Schneider believes taking delight in a $140,000 car is a right and cosmic good. And if a person has the means by which to enjoy the tight-handling of a Mercedes through the curvy Autobahn, then should he not feel spiritually free to exercise that right?

My question is this: why do we define the enjoyment of life by a $140,000 machine? Does God really want us to take pleasure in how a car performs? Is this how Jesus defines the life of His Kingdom? This argument sounds more like a defense of the American Dream than an explanation of the life God has for Humans. Schneider begins to fail in his defense of capitalism by getting the beginning of the Story wrong: God originally created a world of abundance for Humans to enjoy and continues to define that abundance not by the affluence of sin-marked American-Dream consumerism, but by the Kingdom of Heaven. While I believe capitalism in its basic form is good and provides a framework for private property, encourages rule of law, and insists on basic human rights, we give capitalism too much credit, especially considering it is a human construct marked by sin.

Popularity: 2% [?]

This Friday series is based on a paper I wrote for my Systematic Theology 2 class earlier in the year. It was a reaction piece to the book The Good of Affluence , by John R. Schneider and represents my own personal wrestling with the contemporary expression of capitalism: consumer capitalism. In light of the current economic crises and meltdown, I thought I would post this each Friday for the next 6 weeks. Enjoy the repost and I hope it helps challenge you in your thoughts and conclusions on capitalism.

The Series
1. Introduction
2. Is Affluence The Point
3. Consumerism: The End Result of Sin Marked-Capitalism
4. Globalization and the Brown Man’s Burden
5. Globalization and Moral Proximity
6. Conclusion

INTRODUCTION

The recent edition of Adbusters, a postmodern indy magazine devoted to deconstructing how corporations, capitalism, consumerism, the media, and governments create meaning for our Western culture, reveals what Christians are now just beginning to realize: over the last four decades capitalism has created a culture of mindless, meaning-sapped consumers, the results of which are destroying our society and others. In an essay entitled “Redemption,” author Micah White explains, “The fact is that we live in a world that has been structured to produce a society of consumers, and even our inconsequential actions or desires are thereby implicated in the destruction of the physical environment. The ease of consumption, and the nonstop encouragement to consume that we receive, makes it nearly impossible for modernity to attain a detachment from consumption and think differently enough to create viable alternatives.”

In an another essay, entitled “Cool: The Rise, Fall and Rebirth of An Attitude,” the magazine explores how corporations have leveraged the insecurities and insatiable desires of a fallen world to milk the capitalistic system for all it’s worth by constructing a culture of cool. Author’s Dick Pountain and David Robins write: “As Thomas Frank explains in his 1997 book, The Conquest of Cool, bit by bit cool ‘became central to the way capitalism understands itself and explains itself to the public.’ Ad agency gurus [then] figured out ‘how to construct cultural machines that transform alienation and despair into consent.’” As a result, “the defining problem of modern industrial society is not injustice but alienation.” Their solution? “Liberate [ourselves] from the corporate mindfuck,” a state of being related to our alienation from our originally created selves thanks to our communal consent to corporately constructed Cool ™.

While this characterization might cause more pietistic Christians to cringe, one thing is clear: the Other is aware of our fallen capitalistic culture and senses we need to redeem what has been lost. Humans were not crafted to mindlessly consume nor find our meaning in Cool ™. Instead, we were created to live abundant lives connected to our Creator. In light of this worldview, how then should we structure modern economic systems? Should we affluent American Christian consumers blush in the face of so much affluence, let alone consumption? Doesn’t capitalism provide the best means for constructing economically prosperous and socially stable societies consistent with God’s original intent for Humans, despite its minor hang-ups? John R. Schneider seeks to reconcile these questions in his book, The Good of Affluence.

In his book, Schneider seeks to explain “the relationship in Christian theology between faith and affluence.” In the end, though, he gives capitalism a pass without seriously engaging the problems of the contemporary version of that Enlightenment economic system: consumer capitalism. This paper will examine capitalism and Schneider’s claims through the Creation-Rebellion-Redemption Story of Christian spirituality to provide a balanced, more biblical understanding of 21st century capitalism and its resulting consumeristic form. While I agree capitalism in its basic rendition is the best economic system for creating economically and socially stable nations, that stability does not come without a price. Adbusters insists, we need to launch a “fantastic curveball into the heart of capitalism that changes everything.” I agree.

Popularity: 2% [?]