Moa Jamir
Observing the prevailing state of affairs around us, one cannot help pondering whether the concept of community solidarity and social cohesiveness is gradually giving way to individualism, which Ayn Rands of the world would gleefully embrace and flourish.
It also makes one examine whether a Naga philosophy of life – common welfare and altruistic outlook is withering. In short, where are our moral values and ethics progressing? In philosophy, the theory of value or Axiology is defined as “the philosophical study of goodness, or value, in the widest sense of these terms.” Different philosophical schools of thoughts offer distinctive theories.
Therefore, what is intrinsically good may elicit distinctive answers, according to Encyclopaedia Britannica. For a Hedonist, it might be pleasure; a harmonious self-realization for a Humanist; compassion and charity for an Altruist; satisfaction, growth, or adjustment for a Pragmatist; a good will for Kantians; the love of God for a Christian and so on. There are others who argue that there are any numbers of intrinsically good things.
Similarly, it also brings us to the concept of value judgement, a branch in welfare economics which attempts to establish criteria or norms to judge or evaluate what is good or bad – say for instance economic policies from the viewpoint of efficiency or social welfare.
A widely used concept is Pareto’s criterion of optimality or efficiency which roughly states that “any change that makes at least one individual better off without making any other worse off is an improvement in social welfare.” The establishment of welfare activities in modern democratic government is attributed to this concept.
Looking at the present state of our society, one wonders whether we are witnessing an opposite scenario where at the behest of collective welfare, only certain individuals are benefiting from the system.
It also brings us to ask whether the “motivation and the goal of one’s own action” or egoism is gradually gaining grounds or already rooted. Another strain of the theory ‘Rational egoism,’ argues that promotion of “one’s own interests are always in accordance with reason.”
Its most provocative proponent, Ayn Rand, in ‘The Virtue of Selfishness’ postulated that “it is not only rational to pursue one’s own interests, it is irrational not to pursue them.”
Therefore, the idea of selflessness, solidarity or altruistic character is theoretically rejected.
Following this yardstick, we can ask, Is corruption in Naga society a natural manifestation of ‘self-interest’?
By this rationality, you can drive the latest model in the market, but do not care about the deplorable condition of the road on which you are driving the vehicle.
You send your children to the best educational institution, but do not care about those institutions where usually children with lesser economic means study.
For healthcare, you pursue the state of art treatment, but do not care whether the public healthcare deliveries are working or not.
Corruption, thus, is selfishness and self-interest personified. If you are guided by this logic, any project or scheme is guided by how much one can benefit out of it and not how much it benefits the society.
Is this trait visible in our societal governance and polity today? One can only wonder.
For any comment, drop a line to moajamir@live.com
