Good morning, and welcome home for the weekend today. We present the fourth in a series of five broadcast on the Civil religion in America featuring Professor Russell Barta of Mundelein College, Chicago and South Dakota humanist sister and Kessler of Mount Marty College Yankton material for these broadcast is drawn from a forum held last fall at Dakota State College in Madison South Dakota that form was sponsored by the Lutheran Student Center the Newman Center and Dakota State College all of Madison and by the South Dakota United Ministries in higher education.Funds for that form were provided by the South Dakota committee on the humanities. We Begin today's program with some Reflections on the relationship between industrialization and the American dream of freedom and happiness for all the speaker is Russell Barta professor of social sciences at Mundelein College, Chicago The dynamic of the American industrial system was supplied by the American value system itself. And this value system was born in The Crucible of America's formative years as a nation into which Crucible their report heavy doses of the Puritan work ethic the American experience with its revolution. Its experience with political freedom and equality and I'm sure to a great extent the influence of life on a frontier. No, you may want to argue that the Puritan ethics no longer sustains the economic machine. We've built that the dynamite and dynamic now is purely secular and materialistic. And you may want to argue that the heady with? Being able to control your own destiny of political Liberty is now somewhat evaporated but I would insist I think that nevertheless that it was this original set of American values which gave peculiar shape and form to American industrialization and the American social system and I would argue that many. If not, all of those values still remain part of the central values system of our society. There seems to be our unique American ethos our value system and it seems to emerge out of a unique American worldview. A worldview is basically how people perceive the world just how it looks at it and they're ethos their generalized system. Is there General style of life the way they do things and and and how they like to see things get done when worldview and Ethos generally support and confirm one another. Do material changes in the society influence our values? Or is it our values which helped shape the direction material conditions are allowed to take. For the moment. I like to suggest a model. all developed by a political Scientist by the name of Seymour Martin lipset I think it's helpful. You may want to call with it. He holes. And it seems to work out at least the stuff he's done. He holds that it is the set of values usually stabilized or institutionalized when a country is born. That determine in what general direction that country's going to move. in other words as material conditions change, the society is under pressure to adjust its institutions to its Central value system in order to alleviate the stress of that Society by change. That's the Tennessee. And I suggest that a classic example of the way this model would operate in practices is the dramatic victories mostly legal of the civil rights movement of the sixties. Just watch the way that worked. If you look if you look at the history of the Civil Rights Movement since the latter part of the 50s and 60s, there was a strain there was conflict in the society. There were values Central values at the Civil Rights Movement was appealing to appealing 24 and ideologies. It was core American values institutions then have gradually to adjust and in this case they did a just rather dramatically and particularly as regards the law having something to say about Job discrimination in voting rights. How would we describe the American worldview and the value system? This is been done different ways by different people many people rely on the history of for observers with come to this country from the beginning of the country and said my this is so different from where we come from and have tried to describe the differences there different ways. They're going about this. I'm using a kind of a brief summary of This by Robin Williams at Cornell. See if you would agree. First of all, he says that American culture is organized around the attempt at active mastery. Rather than passive acceptance active Mastery and into this Dimension Falls the low tolerance for frustration. Or impatience when we're frustrated the refusal to accept a set of renunciation. positive emphasis on getting ahead couragement of Desire the whole Advertising industry is built on this stress on power on wealth. secondly When You observe Americans in over a long. Of time this Society this culture tends to be interested in the external world of things and events in the hyperbole in the immediate rather than liking some other countries other cultures rather in the inner experience of meaning and affect its genius is manipulative rather than contemplatively it's pragmatic Thirdly, it's worldview tends to be open to open way of looking at the world rather than closed it emphasizes Change clock movement. Hurly-burly. It central personality types. Jeremy have been people who are adaptive accessible outgoing in the similar. It turns this is the fourth summary density emphasize the past. Orion Orion to self strongly to the Future doesn't accept things just because they've been done that way before. The culture emphasizes individual personality rather than group identity. We do not send us a bird's the individual to the group. It's individualistic there for and it's reluctant. to accept group controls finally and I would add these to the Williams a list perhaps no other values. I'm sorry. No other value emphases are so Paramount in addition to the ones I've mentioned in American life as the twin values of egalitarianism or equality. And achievement Center staying that every study I've seen done by psychologists. Other particular cultures there is generally less emphasis. Are the cheap and at least the way it emerges in the American culture? What does emphasis on a treatment it tends to look to an individual's ability? Or performance rather than is inherited qualities. The question is what do you know how to do? What can you do not so much as speak now in general terms. You sure can take a lot of exceptions not so much. Who are you? What does emphasis on equality? It tends to encourage universalistic Norms by which people are treated the same you can think again of experience is perhaps in your own life in which that's not true. I'm talking about the general tendency and that's about all you can speak it when you're talking about cultures if americanism is anyting it is an ideologies and bought it in the Declaration of Independence, which proclaimed the validity of egalitarian and universalistic social relations, and these have left their mark on the American social system. For example about why we've never had A very strong except maybe some periods in our lives history a very strong socialist movement. in the United States and some people have suggested that you don't need one. That's a language that you find in the definition to sanitize the language that end in the Declaration of Independence. Its emphasis on universalism if he'd everybody the same on equality and achievement is the traditional language of socialism and that is why the American labor movement, which is one of the most aggressive labor movements in the world in terms of the demands Relentless demand incessant demands to put on what's on American employers has really had much to do with a socialist ideology unlike the development in other industrializing countries. Another impact of this kind of ideologies in American society is that we have a very fluid class system. Oh sure. We have people some people who are richer a heck of a lot richer than other people. What is pretty difficult in American society to tell who belongs to what class by the way people talk to one another? It's very easy in England. For example to find out who's on top and who's on the bottom who takes off who's had the whom? And the experience of many Americans who have a background to go back. Find the situation in there the country they were born an intolerable Sibley from that point of view. There's a sense of elitism over there that you don't find her taking your tipping your hat. I took your head off in Banks all kinds of practices which asserts that those people who hold office and important positions are little bit better than you. You don't find that. One of the impacts of this conglomeration of American values is that it's probably the most visible Society in the world. Everybody knows everything and if you don't eventually you find out. Americans have no problems with discussing their problems openly and I don't think you're going to find that in most countries in the world and in England, for example, it's a very quiet Society. There's a certain kind of sense of privacy that we don't have their for this visibility makes us perhaps one of the loudest society in which people tend to shout at one another. There's a clamor. What did the timer be for economic Goods rights? There is finally because of this kind of language in the in the Declaration of Independence I would argue. A kind of moral overstrain in American society just recently I was reading in in one of the daily newspapers the results of a study in which Americans were you probably right at 2. They were sizing up some of the major towns in the United States according to a norm of quality of life that I just don't think that kind of looking over our shoulder looking over your shoulders trying to see how your Measuring Up typical of other because we're always speaking in relative terms as it is what you're talking about Nations. Let me move on then to pinpoint that specifically I can a select number of things that I call crises. Although I Forgive the word. It's a Chicago word and it's probably too dramatic. first of all the crisis in participatory democracy No earlier, I refer to the change in the human scale of American society the American Revolution after all took place in the society who scale was very very small and in such a setting the town hall meeting became an important relevant key Institution. It was incidentally in such a setting that American political leaders of that time discovered what they didn't know how to describe. They call the public happiness. The Greek sense of speech and action when you appear before your peers in a public space and they discovered the Delights of arguing in persuading for the sake for the good of the Commonwealth. An orange and ruining Pokemon Revolution argues that this sense of public happiness. Eventually lost out. To the search for private happiness. emphasis on production and wealth What's a revolution in sheer size decision-making was gradually push to ever hire in more remote levels? Cities like the city of Chicago. have lost the Great Seal of Power of decision-making to the state and states for a long. Of time. I've lost a great deal of control over their Destiny to the national government. Neighborhoods in large Urban centers struggle with the local city Administration for control over their schools and their neighborhoods or as the case may be over the police department in their neighborhoods. a growing awareness of this problem a participatory democracy has resulted in all kinds of efforts to Grapple with it. Not the crease the size of the American society to figure out ways of getting at decision-making for example in the sixties. We had poverty programs all over the country and they were launched. With a requirement to Legal requirement that they involve the participation of the poor. Today, there are so many. I can't list them all the federal programs that dealing with environment urban renewal that required by Statute some form of citizenship participation. It seems like Chicago's for years now citizens have organized themselves. It's a local community organizations. In order to have some say over there. Destiny. Things are simply too big. You have such experiments and movements. Have had only mixed success and the crisis. of the meaning of democracy in a large-scale society remains know unless we find new structures. That encouraged relevant real political participation popular participation. What we mean by democracy? We should not be surprised to Aunt to find a gradual withdrawal on the part of people from social and political involvement the crisis of equality. There's no question in my mind. At least about the progress our society is made in the area of equality. In the United States the most important vehicle for shaving and quality has been higher education. An American society provides more access to education than most Societies in race relations there been dramatic breakthroughs nevertheless despite this progress, which I think we need to appreciate if we are to keep the armor real. As a society are social failures in the area of the elbe Crowley really remain morally unacceptable. No, there's not that there's no industrial country in the world. For example that tolerates I levels of unemployment. Just won't tolerate. No major industrial country in the world has developed an underclass of dependent family is the size of ours for people. Yes dependent percentage is a very small. Many of these problems are cumulative even had there been no discrimination against the millions of poor Americans who flocked to wear a large Urban centers, especially after World War II. The Prejudice of the past had deprived them of Social and economic skills needed in the industrial areas of sectors of the society. Unlike the immigrants who poured into this country during the nineteenth and early Twentieth Century from Europe, but they were unskilled. Our new immigrants so I can call them that from the south Appalachia found. No heavy demand for unskilled study labor. In addition, we are much more aware today than ever before. That when you and I talked about equality and achievement. We may be talking about values which are not entirely compatible. BF versus on achieving in this country Text Aleta new inequalities. summer winners summer losers traditionally Americans have interpreted equality in the economic sphere to mean equality of opportunity. Give me a chance. But under the pressure of various groups in the society, we're shifting to an ethic of equality of results. Not so much an ethic of give me a chance. I want it now. The brutal fact is that equality of opportunity is not enough to ensure equality of results. and minority groups will have to be treated more equally to overcome the handicaps of the past. No to show you how things get complicated. The problem of it. It's not a problem. Why not wanting to apply it American value? It's not how do you apply it? One of the ways government is trying to do this in the eyes of many seems to contradict traditional note Notions of equality and achievement government agencies. Like h e w EEOC equal employment opportunity commission are pressuring American Business universities to have the composition of their Workforce reflect the population profile in their area. Loss of the population in your area is 20% black you are obliged to show cause while your Workforce is not at least 20% black you all required by law. If you have a federal contract, are you use federal money to develop affirmative action programs to achieve that result? currently the pressure is being exerted for blacks for Spanish-speaking for women. But already one can hear the voices if you live in Chicago you will. Or Buffalo or New York you hear the voices that are being raised by Italian Americans? buy polish Americans Slovak Americans for singing. Oh come to think of it. We're all so under-represented now as each group. Because to say well not wait a minute. We are not being represented it is. I do not predictive. It is feared that more and more you will move. It was a society which is based on a quota system. And what does that do? To the American value of freedom to the American value of achievement you're trying to work out these that this problem. It's not that nobody wants to apply them. They're beginning to run one into the other. The next Crisis is the prices of a limited world. The American Revolution I think you know. was not established how to solve the social question American Revolution was not established to solve social questions. American Revolution was a political revolution for political Liberty. most Revolutions in the modern world In contrast are wage not so much for political freedom. I would argue. For the sake of solving the problem of economic inequality is the problem of Injustice. Mere fact this country had its New Deal revolution in 1935 about 75 years late when compared to many European countries like Germany. Our strategy if you can call the strategy has been to leave the problem of the distribution of wealth to the marketplace. MBA strategy, there has been to increase the absolute size of the national pie the GMP of the gross national product leaving the relative shares pretty much the same. But the lowest quintile the lowest 20% in this country in terms of income 4.5 to 5% of the total personal income in this country. The lowest 20% and that's been relatively steady. Now what's happened? Of course, is that over the years the value of that share has increased. So the lowest when you're only getting the lowest 20% I only getting 4.55% but it means much more and therefore wouldn't if you take a historical look. poverty Did United States in Washington and 1875? There's no comparison? With that kind of poverty in the poverty of people in the United States today. It was worse off then. The General with that kind of strategy you increase the pie the gross national product goes up. You still got the same relative share, but the piece gets bigger absolutely strategy seems to have worked. but what if We are reaching the limits of industrial growth. Simply because we're reaching the limits of certain industrial resources, like non-resort usable fuels reaching the limits to our freedom to pollute the environment. Or our freedom to exploit the third world societies. If we can't depend on our economic capacity. To really go on increasing the size of the pie the gross national product and thoughts ensure a somewhat acceptable distributions, and we're going to have to resort to difficult political measures measures that are going to fly in the face of our traditional notion of freedom and these political measures given are American values and only result in an inflammable political situation and it may well be true that the American value system with a stress on individualism and getting head on individual achievement which serve this Society well and it's climb to Industrial maturity may not be an ethic. That's no longer appropriate as a matter of fact obsolete. Obsolete in a world of limited resources. It was for this very reason that our former ambassador to Japan in the recent article in worldview suggested that the Japanese who have no natural resources after I get everything from the outside. That's a Japanese emphasis on the group subordination of the individual to the group its emphasis on group discipline may be a much more viable kind of ethic. In a world of limited resources than the American emphasis and self-aggrandizement situation. the the countries that have achieved amateur industrial status Are faced with the problem of meeting? It doesn't that people are saying. After they made that industrial client, it wasn't worth it when we got there. Like many an individual has when he finally gets enough to move out to the suburbs in Chicago says my God, what was I telling myself for its what does it mean? H e w in 1968 came out with a study of social indicators in this country through almost every indicator and people agreed. Things were getting better health income but have it isn't it's provocative. Doesn't it suggest something that the cultural revolution of the 60s? Came not from the children of working-class families, but from middle-class affluent well-off families the problem of meaning and perhaps the end result. all of the industrializing process is that it breeds questions ultimate questions all those questions of subjective meaning. What is Life about? I want to close with a April Tatian. One of my most favorite ones. It's taken from the great study of the Protestant ethic and the spirit of capitalism by Max Weber was written in the year about 1905. It could have been written in the 60s. Max Weber says the Puritan wanted to work in a calling we are forced to War when asceticism was carried out of monastic cells and everything in life and began to dominate worldly morality, it did its part in building the tremendous Cosmos for the modern economic order. This order is now bound to the technical and economic conditions of machine production, which today determine the lives of all the individuals were born into this mechanism. Not only those directly concerned with economic acquisition with irresistible Force perhaps it will is burnt in Baxter's view the care for external ghost should only lie on the shoulders of the saint like a white cloak which could be thrown aside at any moment. But fate decreed that the cloak should become an iron cage in the future or weather at the end of this tremendous of all entirely new prophets will arise or there will be a rebirth of old ideas and ideals. Or is neither mechanized petrification embellished with a sort of convulsive self-importance for of the last stage of this cultural development. It might well be truly said specialist without Spirit centralist without hard this nullity imagines that it has attained a level of civilization never for never before achieved. You've been listening to Professor Russell Barta of Mundelein College, Chicago share some of his thoughts on the effects of industrialization on the American value system in the second part of today's civil religion program. We hear sister and Kessler professor and head of the social sciences department at Mount Marty College of Yankton South Dakota sister and Kessler continues the discussion of industrialization and the American value system. The economic system are great technological progress has affected. Our American values are American Dream freedom and happiness. Do we have a problem of meaning? To quote the previous speaker. Is this really a new phenomenon? Is it possible that there really was a time that we didn't believe in one God capitalism the free-enterprise almighty who makes Heaven on Earth and that Jesus Christ came to show the industrialist how to Lord it over us for they were born of American Technology and seldom have suffered under less a fair more often crucified the people they exploited I to ethical principles in many cases should be buried. They descended into hell making a profit the God Almighty now that they decide the living and the dead. Do we still believe in the multinational Spirit the sanctity of the dividend and the interlocking of boards of directors the Forgiveness of corporate campaign donations the resurrection of more vertical companies and wealth is the Everlasting value. Amen. Speaking of civil religion my apologies to the apostles anyone else who might resent the parody on the Creed but I couldn't resist. Last year in April, I was asked to represent the United States Catholic Church at the Aspen conference sponsored by the Council of religion and international Affairs concerning multinational corporations and their effects upon lesser developed countries at any rate these multinational corporation executives. spoke of their value system There were about 15 Executives from the giant corporations. When I speak of the multinationals. I speaking of course of place out of groups like and they were represented their General Motors Ford Dow Chemical Bendix coming Cummins engine IBM Bendix Westinghouse huge corporations which are usually based in this country, but have companies branches all over the world these companies who operate under the flag of the United States but operate in other countries for profit reasons. at this conference there were religious political labor legal representative. I found out that I was the only one of my particular Christian persuasion except one of the executives of Wonder the corporations. It gave me a little Ray of Hope and it also confirmed my skepticism about what's happened to our American values. I had in a past watching the economic system become more and more skeptical about our being a nation under God in whom we trust. And yet even if the men who were Executives of these corporations were beginning to question their own sense of values. publicly, they would say the stockholders want only one thing and that is a dividend to get the most profit possible. In the company, of course, I have to get plenty to reinvest to become bigger and bigger in private conversation. One got to know them a bit better and find their own personal value system was being questioned by themselves. They voiced a concern about their personal involvement in a Machiavellian Enterprise. When I was asked to speak I consecrate concentrated on the American belt Machiavelli and principal and questioned if and whenever the end could justify the means. Men later told me they thought I had it all together one mentioned that he appreciated how different I was I was not committed to make it making more profit daily, which was outstanding in that group the same executive set EnV me because I knew my goals. I did not wasted my adult life making money. I was dedicated. I was sure that there was a god of Heaven A Nurse and I can face my Creator was he he could not believe that his life had not been wasted in a certain sense. He told me that on a private conversation that he was probably in the top one tenth of 1% personal income that practically blew my mind to know it was obviously talkin Miss multimillionaire. but he envied my way of life because he felt that I knew that I had done something worth while he was questioning whether he had But when he spoke publicly he had to defend this company by saying there is only one ethical value and that is how much money can we make on every piece of stock? I felt sorry for him. Really. He told me that he was unhappy that he was insecure. And it was entirely different feeling from what he would give in public and I wondered how many more of those Executives felt the same way and that way I had hope because if there is some personal question about the ethical value, perhaps there will be some institutional change. Actually, all that was said at this conference of some 30 people with strictly off-the-record, but I can generalize that I came away more than ever convinced that most multi-national corporations. Do I operate on the value system that the end does justify the means That not all the executives feel happy about it or comfortable with it, but they are caught in the value system which made them what and who they are today. Their corporate responsibility was to their stockholders alone. Not to the people in the Philippines not to the people in Latin America or Asia where they put in Branch two companies and probably exploited workers. They only questioned that their stockholders would continue to buy because they would continue to make money. They did not believe that the stockholders even cared what they did as long as they got the good dividend and the stock went up and not down on the exchange. And isn't that patriotic anyway, it's a cheese mint. Isn't that the American way? One recent cartoon from the National Catholic Reporter pictured five big Executives of the multinationals that attention they were saluting. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the country. That gives me the best deal. Even when's dedication to America have to give in if another country can be cultivated more profitably. This is nothing new Thomas Jefferson way back there said that Merchants have no country of their own they are interested only in the source of their profits. Who cares if the American economic system collapses as long as the oil companies make a profit? How many stockholders private and corporate including non-profit corporate searches? Are a bit concerned about their proxy resolutions votes and so forth that the board of directors do it abdicate responsibility. Maybe that's because we've gotten so large. We begin to fake largest beautiful in that small is beautiful. Who checks to see what is unethical and what is illegal? In the way of the practices of the corporation executives are doing it. I didn't do it they did it but they did it in the name of the stockholders. How many ethical investors can we find? There is a book out the two authors. We're at the meeting John going to moon and Chuck Powers. It's called the ethical investor questioning how we as a people. Committed to the values that we have in the American system can go on not investigated. What are corporations are doing if we hold stock? Who really owns the world the multinationals? Who runs it the same? Who overthrew Allende in Chile the ITT the CIA the White House kubel's dedicated to control the whole International system in order not to threaten the profits of those who got enough that space in American values have become the values imposed Upon Us American people by the giant corporations. The multinationals have begun to think that what's good for them is good for the American people. There is definitely a personal profit motive to my great distress. I also hear professional people my friends speak of the barriers hostile e that stand in the way of making their million. To which we all have a right as Americans. No matter who has to suffer in the process. Let's forget the people who are on welfare. They should work. It comes out of close to me. My father was an immigrant. I'm A German German settlement in Russia. My family really appreciate the value Freedom. We got out in time. They came over in 1910. They appreciate the value to be able to rise socially to rise economically that America offered my father at a fourth grade education and with much hard work, he and my mother could develop a business in Aberdeen which presently does a grocer probably over 6 million, but he knew when he had enough he didn't need more he was often asked to open more businesses. Let's go vertical or horizontal. And though he appreciated what he could do. He felt that when one had enough. One shouldn't try to get more. We need some big businesses. We even need some transnational corporations, but we hardly need to buy Lettuce from Dow Chemical as we do tomatoes from Gulf and Western Farms turkeys from Greyhound and chocolate cream pie from I T & T. Perhaps they've expanded too far. Miracle Daniel Bell in his recent Monumental book The Coming of post in Duck industrial society quote There are today about 300 colossal multinational corporations whose production of goods and services adds up to about 300 billion dollars a year of your higher than the gross national product of every country except the United States. If one takes the hundred largest economic units in the world only 50 of them are nation-states the other 50 are the largest of these multinational corporations. That's real power. Can we say that they do not affect our values? Where have all our values gone how can we continents 25 million years not paying taxes last year when we have thousands. If not Millions below the poverty level in the middle class families struggling to pay their dues to the nation educate their children while scrimping on the luxuries in order to handle the Necessities to get rich. Not a time to live to be with to relate to pray to play. We complain about other cultures which do not share our work ethic perhaps it wouldn't be all bad if when we had enough we took time to enjoy it before we tried her anymore. Must we be committed to earning more and more and more perhaps our organization precludes that any other value system may not work. But maybe the rule does not yet our road to Salvation in measurement of Happiness seems to be the amount of increase in the GNP now including 25% by transnational corporations Our God does not seem at this point to be Justice when 15% of Americans income is below $3,500 for the lowest 20% of 5% of the income as was mentioned earlier in the top 5% get 20% of the national income. Their seeds of Communism there two revolutions of all kinds have began with similar mail distribution of income. There is that great concentration of economic power capable of inflicting. Its values are not their gross already reflects those value. We have become a society focused essentially on high-end Tamil ties is mentioned before to a shrinking so very obviously especially the family bonds the young are searching for the Lost value of community identity. Even religious communities are again witnessing an increase in new membership. We are Real life seems to be slipping familial lover relationships get researching for the old verities witness the complaint of loneliness all about it. No one has time for me. When will we value each other more than money and give time to listen to and share with those who need us and Those whom we need to form the real social community. When will we take time for the aesthetic for beauty for nature to gaze at a sunset to see the leaves turn in the leisurely stroll in the woods for courageous human sharing perhaps we need to re-evaluate how we have been showing of our values. We need to appreciate Gandhi statement is used by the real life group. The Earth has enough for every man's need but not for every man's greed. Have our values been determined by us. Are they human spiritual carrying or materialistic completely Arie, really patriotic loving what is really a value in the USA have we checked the ethics of the companies? Which hold our stock? Which hold our church of stock does the right to eat take precedence over the right to profit? Perhaps we could react. Oh Samuel Adams who said in 1776 let us disappoint the men who are raising themselves upon the ruin of this country and add lettuce disappoint the giant corporations by not allowing them to make their values hours. That was humanist sister and Kessler professor and head of the department of social sciences at Mount Marty College in Yankton South Dakota with her views on the influence of industrialization on the American value system. She was preceded by Russell Barnett professor of social sciences at Mundelein College of Chicago, Illinois addressing the same topic. This is been the fourth in a series of five broadcast on the Civil religion in America. These broadcasts are based on a forum held in Madison South Dakota last fall which was planned and sponsored by the Newman Center the Lutheran Student Center and Dakota State College all of Madison and by the South Dakota Ministries in higher education funds were provided by the South Dakota committee on the humanities. Join us next week at the same time on krsw for the final program in our civil religion series that program examines the roles of minorities in the American dream and features Rick Lapointe director of the Native American graduate program at the University of South Dakota Vermillion and sister Marjorie tweet of the Jesuit School of Theology in Chicago and chairperson of the National Assembly women committee on religious social concerns. Stay tuned for the krsw regional calendar.