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ECONOMIC WISDOM FOR BABIES 10

By W.A. WIJEWARDENA

VIOLENCE: YOU CAN’T HAVE AN OMLETTE WITHOUT BREAKING AN

EGG

I was in the habit of having tea with a group of undergraduates regularly at the

cafeteria. They used the opportunity to discuss, among themselves, many issues of

economics and politics. My role was to moderate it and intervene, if necessary, to re-

rail any de-railed discussion.

“The level of violence in modern societies is on the increase” One

undergraduate remarked. “It has come to a level that no one is safe today. I’m angry

because I can’t do anything about it”

“It’s true” Another one joined. “Violence is eating into our lives”

“When can we have a society free from violence?” A girl lamented.

I listened to them for sometime. When they found that the discussion did not

lead anywhere except that each one was commenting on its evil, they looked at me for

an answer.

“Economists look at violence from a different point of view” I said. “For

them, violence is an inevitable input which a society has to use when undertaking any

activity, not necessarily economic activities. Society, like you guys, doesn’t like it.

But, it has no choice. It drives all activities through violence. Some even have

categorised it as the sixth factor of production, just like land, labour, capital and

enterprise and the latest addition as the fifth, environment”

They could not understand the logic of my argument. So, they all cast a

puzzling look at me.

“Violence is simply the mental and physical pain which one would inflict

either on himself or on someone else” I began my explanation. “Without causing

mental and physical pain, we can’t do even a very simple activity. For example, take

the case of reading a book. You’ve to strain your mind and body to do that. When you

strain them, it causes pain and that pain causes suffering. So, it’s violence you have

inflicted on yourself”

“But, the type of violence we talk about is different. That’s the pain which one

person inflicts on another. That’s a social disease” A student interjected.

“It happens when we get others to work. Suppose I hire one of you guys to

work for me. There, I have to inflict violence on you. I may threaten that if you don’t

do the job as I expected, I would fire you. It causes fear in you and that fear causes

mental pain. Again when you actually work for me, you strain your physical body

causing pain again. So, because of the violence I unleashed on you, you unwillingly

strain your body. But, if I don’t use violence, you don’t work properly. So, what

you’ve been driven is nothing but violence”

“But, can’t we get people to work by offering them incentives, instead of

threatening them?” A girl countered my argument.

“You can get people to work through incentives. But, it would free you only of

the mental pain caused by fear which I’d have inflicted. You still have to strain your

physical body to deliver the output. If the work is rather difficult and challenging, it

causes mental stress as well leading to pain. So, what has happened is that, instead of

my unleashing violence on you, you’ve chosen to do it by yourself. It doesn’t matter

whether violence is inflicted by someone else or by yourself. It’s still violence” I

explained to them.

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“If violence is inevitable and necessary, then, what’s wrong with it?” One of

the students inquired.

“Violence, whether it’s self-inflicted or not, causes pain and pain causes stress.

If stress is not properly managed, it leads to a wide array of destructive mental

conditions like mild to severe depression and sometimes, more serious illnesses like

paranoia or schizophrenia. When the labour force is mentally sick like that, it reduces

productivity and adversely affects economic well-being” I said.

“You mean to say that we’ve to contend with violence as an inevitable

happening?” One of the students inquired.

“No” I said. “Violence is bad. But, fortunately, there are social safeguards that

allow the violence produced in the society to get itself dissipated without causing a

major break-down. You’ve problems only when these social safeguards are not

permitted to function”

“How interesting? Can you explain them?” The same student asked.

“They’re of four types” I started to explain. “One is social safety valves. They

release the excess pressure built in the society. Good examples are drinking and

gambling. One may add sexual activities also. Unfortunately, all these safety valves

have been termed as evils and society tries to control them. Then, you’ve social shock

absorbers. One good example is loved ones. Another is family. It absorbs your stress.

Another type is social fuses. Like any other fuse, it kills itself to save society from a

bigger damage. The final one is social cooling systems. They don’t allow the system

to over-boil and explode. You’ll see that they all are similar to the protective

mechanism that you find in a motor car engine. If any one system malfunctions, the

engine becomes non-functional. You’ve high level of violence, because you don’t

permit the safety mechanism to function properly, because you term them to be evil or

immoral. The result is that the society is continuously over-boiling and that over-

boiling is manifested in the form of violence, either inflicted on oneself like

committing suicide or on others like homicide. It may come out purely as family

violence or violence at the work place or as ethnic, religious or racial violence”

“What you say is that higher economic development breeds a higher level of

violence?” One of the students remarked.

“That’s right. Higher economic development means working harder. It causes

greater stress and if we don’t permit the safety mechanism to function properly, it

leads to a higher level of violence as well” I said.