Выступление нашего постоянного корреспондента профессора Виктории Компаниец (Украина) на конференции «Православный ученый в современном мире. Ценности православного мира и современное общество» (Греция, сентябрь 2015 г.) на английском языке.
“You ask about the reason of the current crisis or judgement of God? There is always the only reason. The reason of all droughts, floods, epidemics and other perils is the same as the reason of the current crisis – it is apostasy. The sin of apostasy has brought about this crisis as well, and God has allowed it to awaken and sober people to make them come to senses and get back to Him”.
St. Nicholas Serbian [1, p.15]
The current growing social and economic crisis is only the tip of a system-wide crisis having affected all spheres of society’s activities. The basis of a systemic crisis is formed by moral and spiritual crisis, by the crisis of human person, and, for Russia and Ukraine, this crisis has come out from the erroneous choice of a civilizational way of development. And our education, including the economic education, follows this misguided path as well.
Today, education, which is losing the moral and spiritual, cultural and social basis, participates in creation of a nosogenic crisis and converts to a tool of destruction of the Orthodox civilization. It is clearly seen through the example of economic education, which actively introduces the values alien to the Orthodox civilization and proposes a model of the so-called market-driven economy as being the only correct one (it can be called capitalism or chrematistics in other words), and the main goal of this model, if not covered by nice definitions, is getting rich and obtaining powers by the select few. And, of course, the degradation of education is absolutely necessary to implement this goal. Indeed, if you erect a building of education on the moral and spiritual, cultural and social grounds, being focused on the all-round (spirit, soul and body) development of personality, development of soul (mind, will, senses) by encouraging the revelation of the image of God in a person, then it will be impossible to produce the most valuable resource of the market-driven economy – an unthinking person deprived of moral compass.
Economy is a worldly and finite phenomenon, but paradoxically as it may seem, it influences the destiny of man in the eternity. The same can be said about the content of economic theory and economic education on the whole. In fact, the type of economic behavior, management and activities in the economic sphere in general, which is to be selected by a student today and will be selected by future specialists, managers and entrepreneurs tomorrow, depends on the understanding of the essence and objectives of economy and laws determining its development, types of social and economic systems and management models, on the understanding of the sense of and correct attitude to work, wealth, cooperation, competition, that is, of all the things communicated via economic education (and secured by experience and example of activities in the current economic sphere).
The national ideology has been long absent in our society, and it has been “successfully” substituted by economic “science”, in a point of fact transformed to the monetary ideology. Economy, and to be more correct – chrematistics, as well as both ideology and human relations, has resolved into an anti-Gospel. It evangelizes, and also from the lips of professors and scientists, and also through the behavior of those in power, business elite and the majority of entrepreneurs, that “everyone and everything is driven by profit” and that “money is the source of all goodness”. Unfortunately, our scientists, teachers and students, entrepreneurs and managers, for the most part, do not know at all about the ideals of the Orthodox economic management model historically inherent in us – about the attitude to work as a virtue; attitude to property, wealth and power as an ordeal and responsibility; about the moral law also governing the social and economic development; about foreign economic (social, humane, environmental, moral, soteriological) objectives of economy. They also do not know that these ideals have been implemented in real practices for centuries and have demonstrated the examples of highly efficient economic management.
The monetary ideology had effect and has caused changes in consciousness of society and, especially, young people. The value pyramid of society, that of young people including, is upside down as compared to its ideal formed in the Orthodox culture. Now the main values do not include God, Motherland, family and creative labor, but rather include accumulation, wealth and consumption, obtaining maximum of pleasures. But distorted consciousness, as it is known, generates a deformed behavior. Hence, the erosion of families, society and economy sinking in unprecedented corruption.
To change the situation, we need to build-up economic education on moral and spiritual, social and cultural coordinates.
We should separately dwell on the laws determining the development of economy, and in a wider sense – of all social systems. The following “economic laws” are usually given to students: law of requirements increase; law of demand; law of supply; law of demand and supply interdependence; law of diminishing returns; law of economy of scale; law of time saving; law of competition, etc. In fact, all the above are not the laws, these are only some dependences and regularities manifesting themselves not all the time and not in all social and economic systems.
There are two types of laws determining the development of a social system. The first law reflects the decisive influence of moral and spiritual factors on the entire scope of social development (in a wider sense – the development of both society and nature), including the progress of historical process and also the development of economy. Let us call it the law of moral and spiritual determination of social as well as economic development. This law is fully recognized in the Orthodox theology, it was first substantiated by the theologian of the 20th century – Saint Nicholas Serbian [2]. As related to economy, it can be stated as follows: the development of social and economic system fundamentally depends on the moral and spiritual factors (moral and spiritual capital of people).
The other law reflects the influence of the type of religion (belief) and, consequently, of the type of culture on peculiarities, condition and development of a social system, its economic component including. Let us call this law the law of social and cultural (civilizational) identity. It was first laid down in the 19th century as a law of untransferability by the Russian scientist and social activist N.Ia.Danilevsky. As related to economy, it can be formulated as follows: the successfulness of economic development of one or another civilization and a country belonging to it depends on the compliance of a social and economic model of development with the culture of this civilization. Today, the impact of this law onto the development of society (local civilizations), economic development including, is recognized by many scientists.
The necessity of moral and spiritual development of society being in advance of its material development and also the creation of conditions inside a system promoting the above is the consequence of the first law. It presupposes the subordination of economic development to moral and spiritual principles, the necessity of designing of the corresponding strategy and policy of the state.
The necessity of compliance of control over all components of a social system with the principles and rules of culture it was formed in is the consequence of the second law. In the economic sphere, it will mean the necessity of designing of a strategy and a policy complying with the cultural foundation of this or that civilization, which, of course, does not exclude the use of technical and technological achievements and experience of other civilizations.
Since the law of moral and spiritual determination of social development is the least explored sphere, let us dwell on it in detail.
What is the essence of the moral and spiritual law? The moral and spiritual law applies to everyone. This law involves living honestly and respecting commandments, the two highest commandments of which are love for God and love for neighbors. The fulfillment or violation of these rules has an impact on the destiny of a person and humanity in general. It means both the worldly consequences of just and unjust life and the fate of a person in eternity.
As far as the economic problems are concerned, the dependence between moral and spiritual condition of society and the level of economic development is hard to trace. It is explained by the following circumstances.
The evidence will be fully accepted only when researchers are in the same “system of coordinates”, i.e. accept the same ontology and paradigm of social development, economy including (linear paradigm – abnegating or non-linear paradigm – recognizing the unique nature of difference social and cultural systems and civilizations).
It should be understood that the moral and spiritual social and cultural system, including the Orthodox civilization historically inherent in us, unlike the sensual and immoral system, recognizes the existence of two dimensions of social and economic development: horizontal and vertical. The vertical dimension is connected with the recognition of the truth of spiritual world existence and effectiveness of its laws, which cannot be understood from the position of the horizontal – worldly – dimension.
Thus, the renowned scientist and thinker of today – A.S.Panarin – reasoning about the crisis of progress theory writes about two types of ontology. He notes: “On the one hand, we have the ontology of economic, technical and political world, where the laws of gradualism, time hierarchy of early and late, more and less developed have effect, and on the other hand – the ontology of moral and spiritual world being unaware of such hierarchies and the corresponding correlation between the technical and economic maturity and spiritual perfection. In spiritual sphere, the latter are quite frequently the first if judged by progress parameters, the humble ones get ahead of dynamic and self-assured ones” [3, p.188].
If based upon the ontology of moral and spiritual (ideational) social and cultural system and theological worldview, then gaining of insight into the regularities of social and economic development of society must presuppose a reasonable synthesis of such components as theological knowledge, “knowledge”, experience of belief; metaphysical thinking and positive knowledge. And the first “knowledge” is the basis.
Human mind cannot always grasp the effect of moral and spiritual law. Human perception and understanding of certain truths depends on both cultural system he or she was brought up and educated in, and his or her personal moral and spiritual condition, “ego” power, and influence of spiritual world.
It is difficult to admit the effect of such law, as a result of empirical observations, in a system where the moral relativism reigns, and this is exactly the system, where the most part of humanity lives, including the Russian and Ukrainian society.
The following factors complicate the search for dependence between moral and spiritual level and level of economic development: necessity of researching over long time intervals; complexity and sometimes impossibility of collection of reliable information, inconsistency of data; relativity of estimation criteria and errors in their selection; impossibility to evaluate lots of phenomena in moral and spiritual sphere.
The impact of a time lag is also of great importance. The violation of moral law in social life and economic activity may have impact on an economic entity in some time and has an impact on economy in whole also when some time passes. The same can be said about the reverse effect: suppose that suddenly all economic entities start to observe moral rules within the scope of their activities after a long period of violations, then it will take some time for the positive effect to manifest: a certain period of time is necessary for the recovery of social and economic sphere and elimination of consequences of the previous violations.
There are also numerous constraints for human consciousness – impossibility of long-term observations of one and the same entity or system having violated the moral law. The field of vision is also very limited, for example, inner sorrows of a person, his or her illnesses, fate of his or her relatives can be hidden from us, and, finally, we do not know inner positive changes in a person, his or her repentance.
Apparently, all these complexities of research presuppose giving the benefit of doubt to the effect of moral and spiritual law, although, certain evidences do exist.
Very interesting, true and sufficiently convincing evidences of the effect of moral and spiritual law in society and economy as well are given by the renowned Serbian theologian, social activist and scientist (Doctor of Philosophy and Theology) – Saint Nicholas Serbian (1881-1956).
While researching the Sacred History of the Old Testament, he states and proves that the moral and spiritual law determines the effect of the so-called natural laws, the march of history, the destinies of peoples, and the effect of social laws. He uses the method of historical research, the results of different scientific theories confirming the truth of moral and spiritual law as the evidence. He shows that lots of historical events cannot be explained by science up till now, as they are outside the effect of the established natural laws. They can be explained only from the perspective of theological approach, recognition of truth of the Old Testament events and their biblical interpretation. In particular, it is scientifically non-cognizable, but theologically explainable mystery of human languages – formation of different languages of different peoples. How can it be explained scientifically that “peoples differ in language more than they differ in appearance and color or skin, feelings and perception. How can that striking dissimilarities occur, if all people originated from one ancestor as it is now affirmed by all scientists”, — St. Nicholas Serbian writes [2, p.31]. This is the reason of the Flood recognized, but not explained by scientists, and well-explainable by the violation of moral law by the first humanity. And science cannot explain the disappearance of the Canaanites as well. This fact can be explained only by the effect of moral law. Noah cursed the descendants of Ham – his grandson Canaan – because of Ham’s immoral behavior, and under the burden of this curse all their descendants fell and disappeared [2, p.31].
The disappearance of cities and entire civilizations is also associated with the violation of moral law. For example, Tyre – a rich and luxurious city – died not due to economic causes. Numerous iniquities, unjust trade, unjust wealth and luxury, abandoning of God, those were the reasons of disappearance of the city mentioned by prophet Ezekiel [2, p.57]. Wicked lust is the reason of destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Sulphur and fire storm poured onto Sodom and wiped it off, and this phenomenon itself cannot be explained by any laws of nature. Ancient Egypt and Babylonian Empire, which were considered to be well-developed civilizations (which is evidenced by today’s excavations), disappeared. And their disappearance can be explained only by moral law (worshiping of idols, over-subtleness of people, and immense wealth killed the people).
Saint Nicholas Serbian also shows, based on studying of sacred books and beliefs of different peoples (ancient Greeks, Muslims, people of the Orient), that all of them recognized the superiority of the moral law and its effect on nature, destinies of peoples and every person, health of people and giving birth to children.
As related to the social and economic sphere, Saint Nicholas Serbian explains the effect of moral and spiritual law as follows.
While considering the theory of K.Marx, he notes that the issue of conflict between labor and capital is absolutely misleading – “as an issue of interrelation of impersonal capital and impersonal labor opposed to each other as two speechless enemies”. The antagonism between capital, on the one hand, and work force, on the other hand, was caused by the disregard of moral power in person-to-person relations. “In a point of fact, the capital and labor relations is the issue of person-to-person relations, and any issue of person-to-person relations has the moral nature and, as such, must be subject to the moral law and be governed by only it” [2, p.66].
Answering to question: “what does economic position of any country depend on?” – Saint Nicholas Serbian specifies three factors: “on rain, on health, and on agreement and unanimity of people” [2, p.67]. In fact, these are natural and climatic conditions, demographic characteristics of population and moral and psychological qualities of people, whom the concurrence of actions depends on. He continues: “If crops are ruined by drought, people are killed by epidemics, and cattle – by plague, and if on top of all that there is no peace and conciliation among people, then what are the piles of management theories needed for? Then what for do we need all these economic management laws and regulations governing economic activities? But rain and health are given by God as consistent with faith, devotion, obedience and charity of the people” [2, p.67].
The fact that a human is practically unable to positively influence the natural and climatic conditions, and the other way round, unfortunately, frequently becomes the cause of natural calamities is commonly known today. The majority of contemporary scientists admit that the current changes in climate, heavy rains, floods and droughts are the results of human activities. Exactly these reasons raise serious concerns relating to the global food crisis and have impact on economic stability of many prosperous countries.
The next factor is peace and agreement between people. The fact that the quality of legal instruments, political and economic stability in the state depend on peace and agreement between people is evident as illustrated by the example of Russia and Ukraine.
The causes of deterioration of human health, high mortality and low birth rate at the post-Soviet territory during the period of “market reforming” have constituted the scope of a comprehensive research by the contemporary Russian scientist, member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, I.A.Gundarov [4]. Based on quantitative methods of assessment of demographic crisis causes, and also on studying of moral and spiritual teaching of human life rules existing in the main world religions, he came to a conclusion that the demographic crisis was caused, in the first place, by the effect of moral and spiritual factors. Having conducted a comprehensive research with mathematical modelling applied, he ascertained that the growth of mortality of Russian population for the period of reforms in 90s of the 20th century was only 16% connected with the impact of social and economic factors, and the remaining 84% referred to the impact of moral and spiritual factors (growth in aggressiveness, hopelessness, i.e. spiritual illnesses of people) [5]. The same can be said about the birth rate. Its reduction is, first and foremost, the consequence of erratic and immoral way of living at leisure, unwillingness to take additional care of others, establishing of possibility and moral impunity of abortions, deterioration of health of future parents, distrust to the moral principle that when giving life to a child the Creator also gives opportunities to provide a child with all the things needed.
The research conducted by other scientists also shows that, in countries having preserved the traditional religious model and values, the birth rate is significantly higher than in the Western civilization countries with the high level of material welfare, but with the changed value orientation, where personal income, pleasures and carrier occupy the first place, and only then goes a child requiring the self-sacrifice of parents.
V.I.Iakunin, V.E.Bagdasarian and S.S.Sulakshin consider the ideological and spiritual resource as one of the most important factors of economic development. They imply both spiritual motivation of work and economic activities and ideological motivation based on believing in power of the party, the people and the state. Of course, such combination may promote the assessment of impact of non-economic factors on economy, but it equates the spirituality and ideology, which, in fact, is incorrect, since ideology can be of both humane and anti-humane nature and can be grounded on both religious and atheistic worldview. Nevertheless, taking into account the formative rather than society-destructive ideology and by studying the economic development of Russia in the 20th century in connection with the spiritual and ideological factor, they come to very important conclusions.
Using the pair correlation method, they calculated the level of cause-and-effect relationship of the growth of gross industrial production with the material level (accumulated goods determining the quality of life of a person), the ideological and spiritual maturity and also with the value of work in public consciousness. For the purposes of calculation purity, they took a time interval in the second half of the 20th century (1946–2000) excluding the force majeure circumstances of the large-scale wars happened during the first half of the century (1904–1905, 1914–1920, 1941–1945), as well as the revolutions, when the third – external – factor was influencing the indicators of economic development [6, p.29]. The results obtained are absolutely frustrating from the point of view of neoliberal theory. The coefficient of correlation of the ideological and spiritual maturity of society and the growth of gross industrial production amounted to +0.59. The dependence of the factor of work value in public consciousness turned out to be even more weighty (the correlation coefficient equaled +0.69). The data obtained evidences the significance of motivation of spiritual and ideological content for economy. And the total material factor and the growth of gross industrial product in Russia, as based on the analysis results, are in anti-correlation to each other (with the value of –0.7). Thus, a link well-known at the level of everyday folk ideas has effect, and according to it, the higher the material wealth of a person is, the worse the person works. The materially motivated Russian society has a negative potential as related to economic development. Maybe, it is a unique feature of the Russian national mentality? But the trend of reduction of gross domestic product growth rates happening with the secularization of consciousness of a Western person noticed by scientists in the West allows to assume that this phenomenon has a universal nature. To give the final answer, a similar research needs to be carried out in Western countries [6, p.30-32].
As we know, the development of modern economy is impossible without new technologies. And the positive role here is also plaid by the moral factor. For example, a team of Russian scientists headed by Professor A.V.Iurievich, carried out a research, which resulted into the establishment of a close connection of moral condition of the Russian society with the indicators of innovative activities. Namely, the correlation between the moral condition of society and the number of advanced technologies used amounted to – 0.938, share of innovative product in total production volume – 0.888, number of advanced technologies created per 1 mln citizens – 0.574, number of patents per 1 mln citizens – 0.539 [7].
The renowned sociologist P.Sorokin tried to trace the relation between the dominating type of cultural mentality (sensual, idealistic, ideational) and economic conditions in the system [8]. According to him, such relation undoubtedly exists, but it is not a direct one. There are certain obstacles preventing the detection of the direct relation between the prevailing type of cultural mentality and the level of economic development and the coincidence of changes in culture and economic system: contradictions inside a social system; influence of different external and random factors; immanent consequences of development of culture itself. Let us dwell on the last point: in the event of high or even excessive development of sensual or ideational culture, causes leading to the decay of culture and to the corresponding changes in economic conditions occur in the system.
The sensual culture with its material ideals is characterized by striving of society for attainment, wealth, pleasures, by the dominance of economic egoism and high rates of economic development in the beginning. In time, these desires bring about the situation when one starts to forget the moral rules, people lose the sense of moderation and safety, which originates a high degree of social differentiation, then conflicts and wars sharply diminishing the level of economic well-being. That is how it is described by P.Sorokin, and he is supported by S.N.Bulgakov.
In his paper, “Main Problems of Progress Theory”, S.N.Bulgakov notes that the eudemonical ideal of progress, which dominates in the Western society and economic theory, when happiness equals pleasures gained from the growth of requirements and possibility of their satisfaction, is selfish. It brings about the growth of sensual pleasures, consumerism and destruction of the world [9, p.616]. And in his paper “About Economic Ideal”, he stresses the relation between moral and spiritual condition of society and development of economy and notes that, when society is focused on material values, it leads to spiritual decline, which is followed by economic decline [10, p.656-657].
But what can be said about the development of economy in an ideational social and cultural system? In such a system, the keynote of society development is formed by moral and spiritual values. However, it does not hinder the development of economy. The difference is that it develops according to different laws, principles and mechanisms, at rates and proportions differing from economy of a sensual society. P.Sorokin describes this peculiarity as follows: “In spite of negative attitude to wealth and material well-being, ideationalism gives rise to driving forces, which frequently promote the improvement of economic position of not only ideational culture bearers, but of a much wider community” [8, p.607].
The monasteries of medieval Europe and Russia are the most vivid examples of transformation of spiritual energy of ascetic work into high material achievements. The results of activities carried out by workmen’s groups and labor brotherhoods, in particular, by N.N.Nepliuev brotherhood – the special forms of labor organization typical only to the Orthodox economic management model and based on the priority of spiritual motivation of work and conciliarity of service – were also unique [11].
However, with the improvement of material well-being and building-up of sensual standards a crisis gradually germs even in this system, as it happened in different periods of the Byzantine Empire and the Russian Empire. Ascetic spirited and creative work combined with the sound policy of state gives birth to great achievements brining about the growth of both well-being and new ideas, inventions, progress. But then, the overwhelming temptation of pursuit of material things, the temptation of pride crops up for a person. And if this temptation is not subdued, a person will gradually direct his or her entire soul from spiritual things to material ones. The sensual component starts to grow within the framework of ideational culture, and there comes a time for crisis.
Recently, it has become fashionable to talk about the inefficiency of the Orthodox culture and economic management model and the efficiency of the Western – Protestant – culture when comparing the modern economic development of countries of the Orthodox civilization (Russia and Ukraine) and leading Western countries. But this statement is at very least incorrect.
First, one must not compare two different social and economic systems existing according to different laws – the moral and spiritual system and the sensual system – based on limited economic criteria.
Second, how can we speak of an efficient economic model, if we consider such indicators as at least the level of consumption and the level of foreign liabilities of the leading Western countries? For example, under the conditions of the “efficient” model of the US economy, one American consumes for eight persons living on the Earth, and as compared to the countries not belonging to the “Western civilization” – even for 12 persons. And this despite the huge budget deficit and state debt, both external and internal. The country accounting today for only 5% of population uses 40% of global resources and controls even higher percentage of resources [12, p.763]. The special financial and economic mechanism assuring the functioning of a system pumping the resources belonging to all of mankind for its own benefit exists in a well-established system of social and economic parasitism. The prosperity of the USA and leading European countries is explained by this very mechanism.
But this prosperity is false and temporary. It is very simple today to ruin the myth about the prosperity of Western countries. Usually, a share of the gross domestic product of the country in the global gross domestic product is given as an evidence of the global leadership of the USA. However, the statistics of calculation of the US gross domestic product is largely distorted, but even according to this distorted statistics, the US share in the global economy is diminishing, thus in 2013 it slightly exceeded 21% [13}, and in 1944, when the dollar became the world currency, it amounted to 50%. Moreover, the structure of the US gross domestic product raises doubts, since only 20.4% is occupied by the real sector, and remaining 79.6% – by service industries [14] (the most part of which is the financial sector services being, as V.Iu.Katasonov notices, the “financial foam” [15]).
Today, the USA is a bankrupt country. Thus, according to the data of the “US debt counter” as of October 6, 2013, the total joint debt of the USA (national debt, debts of state governments, local authorities, individual persons, non-financial companies, financial sectors of economy) amounted to 60.00 US dollar trillions or 377% of GDP [15, p.23]. And the value of “consolidated” debt (joint debt and social obligations of the state) of the USA is 186 US dollar trillions, which by 11.6 times exceeds the annual (2013) GDP of the USA [15, p.28]. There are no opportunities to repay this debt in principle: the valuation of assets of the US economy, which is included into the “debt counter” shows that, as of early October 2013, all US assets equaled 104.9 US dollar trillions, which amounted to 56.4% of the value of contractual debt.
The situation in Europe is none the better. As of early 2013, the foreign debt of the leading countries of the European Union – Germany and France – amounted to respectively 159% and 236 % of GDP and 70.583 USD and 81,061 USD per capita, and, in average, the value of debt for all countries of the European Union amounted to 101% of GDP and 31,313 USD per capita [16]. Thus, as of today, the Western economic system demonstrates the deepest economic crisis not to speak of the moral crisis.
Third, the modern Western civilization and countries historically belonging to the Orthodox civilization, unfortunately, exist under the conditions of domination of the monetary civilization and immoral social and economic system. The only difference is that the “elite” of the leading Western countries has built up a system of exploitation of peoples of foreign countries, and our “elite” – of its own people.
Indeed, neither Russia nor Ukraine as the key countries of the Orthodox civilization can demonstrate any achievements in development of economy and society today. But then, neither cultural nor economic model of our state comply with the Orthodox system. These models are immoral and, in some cases, even antichristian. It is worth giving some figures, which are speaking for themselves: today, Russia and Ukraine occupy the 1st place in the world and the 1st place in Europe respectively in terms of the level of abortions; the 10th and the 2nd places in the world in terms of mortality rate; the 6th and the 8th places in the world for the number of suicides; Ukraine occupies the 1st place in the world for the level of children’s alcoholism and Russia – for the level of children’s smoking and heroin consumption; the countries are leading in terms of the level of corruption [17, 18]. And the level of economic crimes by officials, which is publicly available, is striking. All these indicators evidence the deep level of moral and spiritual decay of our society. So, what economic development can we talk about, when immoral behavior dominates in society and economy.
To conclude, the violation of moral and spiritual law is the general and the main cause of all crises. The word “crisis” translated from Greek means trial, decision, turning point, outcome. The current crisis must be understood as a trial of mankind, which steps back from the rules of morality in all spheres of life, and as a turning point, the selection of “possible otherwise”. And the time and opportunity to stop the crisis depend on just how correct people, the crisis makers, understand its real causes and on how much they want to change their consciousness and behavior, what steps they will make to live in accordance with the rules of morality, including the observance of these rules in economic activities.
Since the moral law is the main law governing the development of society and the condition of economy, studying the contents of this law and its effect shall become one of the main objectives of education in higher school when training and teaching specialist of all spheres.
Indeed, to our great regret, the modern “economic” system is not simply detached from Christianity, but is built-up in such a way so that as many people as possible are broken hooking someone by lucre and attainment, luxury and pleasures, and someone – by injustice, poverty, envy and misery. But this immoral system has been erected by us, it means that the way to changing of this system and creation of islands of Christian economic management is impossible without changing of our inner world and our mind.
God has generously gifted each of us by giving us the talent of Orthodox faith and making it possible for us to be born in a country, which our ancestors called Saint Rus. But will our descendants call our land the same? This is a question to us living today. In order to change our life, each of us must become saint in our doing: saint leader, scientist, doctor, entrepreneur, teacher, worker, student, and street cleaner.
We need to remember that our traditional model of culture and economic management grounded on the principles and values of Orthodox ethics has been highly spiritually and socially efficient and has assured the required economic efficiency. As A.S.Panarin rightly notices: “The Orthodox identity is not a physical fact, is not inheritance secured in our genes or in some similarly present things. On the one hand, is represents a phenomenon of memory, which we are free to make actual, and are also free to erase from our consciousness by sending it to the subconscious darkness. On the other hand, it belongs to the sphere of choice, the sphere of decisions in the same way as we fill in the “nationality” field today based not on the statements of natural origin submitted, but by the right of identity selected” [3, p.536]. And we need to choose this identity in culture, education, politics, economy, and life. There is no other way to overcome the crisis.
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17.What Places are Occupied by Russia in World Ratings [Electronic resource]. – Access mode: http://magelanin.livejournal.com/3968422.html
18.Ratings of Ukraine or When Will Ukraine Stop [Electronic resource]. – Access mode: // http://euroua.com/ukraine/economic/555-kogda-ukraina-ostanovitsya
V.V.Kompaniets, Doctor of Economics, Professor, victorya.kom@yandex.ua
Ukrainian State University of Railway Transport, Kharkov, Ukraine
Опубликовано в Сборнике материалов IV международной научно-практической конференции «Православный ученый в современном мире. Ценности православного мира и современное общество». Том 2 (25-26 сентября 2015 г. Салоники, Греция). — Воронеж: ИСТОКИ, 2015.
