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A New Development Paradigm GDH instead of GDP

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บทความนำเสนอเกี่ยวกับ ""ความสุขมวลรวมประชาชาติ"" หรือ GNH เป็นแนวความคิดใหม่ในทางเศรษฐศาสตร์มหภาค (Macro Economics) ซึ่งตั้งอยู่บนฐานคิดของพุทธศาสนา มีความแตกต่างอย่างเด่นชัดกับ ""ผลิตภัณฑ์มวลรวมประชาชาติ"" (Gross National Product หรือ GNP) ""ความสุขมวลรวมประชาชาติ"" มี 4 ประการคือ 1. การพัฒนาเศรษฐกิจสังคมอย่างยั่งยืนและเสมอภาค 2. การอนุรักษ์สิ่งแวดล้อม 3. การรักษาและส่งเสริมวัฒนธรรม และ 4. การส่งเสริมการปกครองที่ดี ซึ่งเขียนโดย ศ.นพ.ประเวศ วะสี

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A New Development Paradigm GDH instead of GDP by Prawase Wasi Professor of Medicine Emeritus Mahidol University, Thailand Presented at the Seminar "Gross National Happiness in the Asian Context. The Message from Bhutan" at Asian Institute of Technology 24 September 2004 # 1. The Bhutan Initiatives We greatly appreciate the Bhutan initiatives on GNH (Gross National Happiness), particularly the decree by H.M. the King that "GNH is more important than GNP". Amids the world trend of money-oriented development, the Bhutan government, in the last two decades, has tried to understand and implement this important policy. Very obviously, Bhutan has been very careful in not allowing extreme greed to propel its development. It has taken a balanced action between the income from extensive tourism demand and the possible outcome of cultural and ecological disturbances, for examples. In February 2004 there was an international meeting on GNH in Thimphu. The increase in international interest in GNH is very healthy. With increasing negative impacts of money-oriented or GNP development, the world needs a new development paradigm. The follow-up meeting in Bangkok in September, 2004 should be an opportunity to look for a new model of development. Since in Thailand we speak more of GDP (Gross Domestic Production) than GNP, GDH (Gross Domestic Happiness) will be used in this article alternatively to GNH. ## 2. Money and Its Disruptive Power Money has radically changed the manner of thinking of mankind. Living with nature, man has observed the cyclical nature of things. Things move in circles. Money has a peculiar nature that the quantity can increase indefinitely. You can put 0 after any number at infinite length, such as 10000000000000 You can continue without end. Before creation of money, man had limited greed. There was no use to hunt too many animals, because meat and other food stuff would get rotten. But the figures of the money can be accumulated and kept indefinitely without decay. Thus human greed expands indefinitely. Here emerges an unresolved conflict between world resources which are finite and the illusion of money and greed which are infinite. Money, although an illusion, is power. This power leads to inequality and disruption. Figure 1 illustrates the old manner of "cyclical thinking" and the idea of continuous progress brought by money-oriented thinking. According to the famous Law of Causality or Itappacagata in Buddhism, all things are interconnected in a dynamic manner without 2 absolute beginning and absolute ending. In cyclical thinking of nature of things, there is no beginning and no ending. $$ \begin{align*} &amp;(a) \text{Things move in circles and} \\ &amp;\text{tend stay in equilibrium} \\ &amp;(b) \text{Progress is increasing} \\ &amp;\text{indefinitely, thus disrupting} \\ &amp;\text{equilibrium of all things} \end{align*} $$ Figure 1 Old thinking of cyclical nature of things (a) and a new thinking of non-stopped progress brought by infinite nature of money (b) Things move around endlessly. But they tend to maintain equilibrium. The idea of progress is new. It comes with money and industrial age. Continuous progress is an isolated thrust in one way and out of context, thus leading to disruption of equilibrium of all things. That what GDP development brings about. Resources are sucked and converted into money. Money is endless and so is the sucking of resources. Natural, cultural, social and spiritual resources are converted into the endless increase in GDP. Disruption of human, social and ecological sphere ensues. 3. Money and Unequality Money-oriented development has brought about extreme inequality throughout the world both within and between countries. A few hundred richest Americans have more money than over 2,000 million people of the world combined. A transnational corporate may have a capital bigger than those of several developing countries together. Massive amounts of money circulate around the world at the speed of light. Only 0.2 per cent of this vast amount of money has economic function, the rest just looking for an 3 opportunity to suck more money from people around the world who have less money, less information and less experience. Money is power. But this power is extremely unequal. This destroys human dignity and value, leads to social injustice, conflict, violence and wars. Materialism and consumerism lead to spiritual crisis and evaporating morality. Ecological crisis which includes rapid deforestation, chemical pollution, greenhouse effects and destruction of the ozone layer has brought the entire planet into its existence crisis. Some say the Nature ends. With the present economic and information system, the world is interconnected into a complex system. In a complex system, any small incidents occurring anywhere in the system can have incredibly large effects elsewhere --- the so-called "Butterfly Effects". This phenomenon is called chaos. Thus with a massive amount of money moving around the world with the speed of light and infinite greed of the world populace associated with monocacy repeated chaos is inevitable. The human system is not built to cope up with such a degree of chaotic world. Humankind is plunged into crisis. Human stress is a symptom of failure to cope with the crisis. Humanity can no longer live happily with the present economic model of GDP-oriented development. Happiness or well-being-oriented development should be looked for. That is why the Bhutan initiatives of GNH development are very important. ## 4. GDH-oriented Development Happiness consists of 4 components of well-being: * Physical well-being * Mental well-being * Social well-being * Spiritual well-being Figure 2 depicts these 4 components of well-being 4  **Figure 2. The 4 components of well-being** **Physical well-being** includes: physical health, sufficient economy, sound ecology **Mental well-being** includes: less stress, mindfulness, good mental health **Social well-being** includes: good living together in the family, community and society, and cultural development and peace **Spiritual well-being** includes: compassion, right worldview, less self-centeredness Thus happiness or well-being occurs from physical, mental, social and spiritual development in an integrated manner, not merely money. GDH index can be developed from this integrated model of development. GDH should be used to measure development instead of GDP. ## 5. Comparison between GDP and GDH Characters GDP-oriented and GDH-oriented development models have different characters. These are summarized in Table 1. 5 Table 1. Comparison between characters of GDP and GDH development models. <table><tr><td>GDP</td><td>GDH</td></tr><tr><td>1. Money capital</td><td>Human and social capital</td></tr><tr><td>2. Free competition</td><td>Living together</td></tr><tr><td>3. Free trade</td><td>Selected exchanges</td></tr><tr><td>4. Consumption-led</td><td>Sufficiency, saving</td></tr><tr><td>5. Materialism</td><td>Culture and spiritual development</td></tr><tr><td>6. Non eco-friendly</td><td>Eco-friendly</td></tr><tr><td>7. Imbalanced development</td><td>Balanced development</td></tr></table> These different characters of development can be studied in great details. They will be minimally discussed here. But from comparison in the table, it is very obvious which is more destructive and which is more creative. The GDP model emphasizes on free flow of money. Biologically 'free flow' is destructive to life. The cell is a basic unit of life. If a cell let free flow of everything through it, it will die. It exchanges with environment but in a selective manner to maintain cell identity and equilibrium. Family and community are basic social units. They need selected exchanges to maintain their identity and equilibrium. The money-oriented development which emphasizes free competition, free trade and free flow of money disrupts integrity of family and community. When the basic social units are disrupted, the entire society collapses. The economic growth model depends on continuous stimulation of consumption. In order to increase consumption the market economy does anything possible---marketing, lying, using sex-associated advertisement, encouraging indulgence to the extremes. This is contrary to traditional values of hard work and saving. Materialism and consumerism associated with economic growth model lead to low morality, unsustainability, and cultural and spiritual crisis. 6. Sufficiency Economy and Community Economy in Thailand Thailand has adopted modern economic development or the money-oriented model for half a century. The results are modernization on the one side and all the negative effects as described above on the other. H.M. the King has recommended 'Sufficiency Economy'. Sufficiency Economy embeds all the characters listed for GDH in Table 1. Sufficiency is integral in all dimensions---mental, physical, social, economical, and ecological in an integrated manner which leads to balanced development and happiness. 6 In the last 50 years, modern agriculture, which is cash-crop or mono-crop plantation, has been enforced by the government. This has led to devastation of the environment and farmers' economy and social life. Failed rural economy has led to increased urban migration, emergence of slums in cities, crimes, prostitution, drug addiction, HIV/AIDS and other social ill. However, a sign of change has appeared. Some residual farmers had not believed the government on mono-crop plantation. The others have rediscovered the integrated farming. Integrated farming has led to sufficiency, happiness and decreased violence. More and more farmers are doing this kind of farming. Villagers in approximately 1,000 Tambon are doing research about the community economic affairs. By doing that they discover why they are poor. They use the research results to draw up the master community plan for an integrated development. The new development paradigm brings them out of poverty, restoring balanced community life. Happiness is overwhelmed. The villagers themselves have formed "Master Community Plan Network 4 Regions" to promote movement toward the new development paradigm. Several organizations are supporting the villagers' initiatives. They include the CODI (Community Organizations Development Institute), the Bank of Agriculture and Agricultural Cooperatives (BAAC), the Local Development Institute, the Institute for Community Entrepreneurship jointly owned by the Village Foundation, the Petroleum of Thailand, the BAAC and the National Office for Science and Technology, the Thai Health Fund and the Office of the National Economic and Social Development Board. Although the government is still strongly moving in the GDP-led direction, the King's guided concept on Sufficiency Economy and the Community Economy movement are gathering momentum. The time will prove that as the GDP-led development is running more and more into crisis, the GDH-led development will gradually an inevitably prevail. ## 7. The Future The new development paradigm with GDH replacing GDP should be promoted. These may consist of the followings: 1\. Promote better understanding and common purpose through several methods. These include dissemination of documents, meetings, site visits, and media reporting. 7 2\. Promote and support community initiatives for integrated development. 3\. In each country, there must be mechanisms in terms of several organizations to support Sufficiency Economy and Community Economy movement. 4\. GDH index should be developed and used to monitor progress, finally replacing GDP. 5\. Research on various dimensions of GDH-led development should be conducted and results used to guide further movement. 6\. International spirit of GNH should be promoted through regular international meetings like this one. 7\. Political parties should be challenged to adopt GNH model development as a political platform. 8\. The New Development Paradigm: GNH instead of GNP must be the new consciousness of mankind for peaceful co-existence of humanity instead of hatred; competition and destruction as presently prevail. --- 8 pQET A New Development Paradigm GDH instead of GDP ประเวศ วะสี

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