It is not even original anymore. Everybody in now calling the Banks and the privatised public services “the real looters”. And sure enough they continue ripping the benefits with complete disregard for the people forced to use their services. Some of the several million people who use the trains on a daily basis to come into London to work are announcing that they will come by car as it will be cheaper, not the greenest of ideas; but it is clearly not only the price increases that makes them angry. The £88m the chief executives are paying themselves and the dividends to the shareholders are just too much. [The Guardian]( http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/aug/19/stagecoach-hands-shareholders-payout?INTCMP=SRCH)
Legal Scholar and Professor of Law at the University of British Columbia Joel Bakan describes in his Book and documentary: [The Corporation, The pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power](http://www.joelbakan.com/thecorporationbook.htm) the modern corporate entity as ‘an institutional psychopath’. Psychopathy is a mental disorder characterised (amongst other symptoms) by an inability to feel empathy. If we wanted to use a less psychologised language we could simply say that the corporate culture is completely dehumanised and has lost all traces of solidarity. The same lack of empathy/solidarity the protagonists of the recent London riots have been accused of, attacking not only the police but also damaging their own neighbourhoods. It all points to a wider problem. The criminalisation of poverty is a well tested strategy to create scapegoats that distract society from the real problems. And the problem is the system in which we live.
[Paul Mason](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/correspondents/paulmason/), BBC Newsnight’s Economics editor: “It is gradually dawning on the global political elite that the economics they believe in do not work. They do not work, in particular, in the current crisis and continued pursuance of present policy is threatening a double dip recession… Free market economics caused the crisis and the rough-hewn Keynesian stimulus policies improvised in 2009 are failing to get us out of it. So, not particularly gradually, but rather with the urgency of Gerard Depardieu on an airplane, there is a sudden rush towards more radical solutions. Haldane, in a Bank of England discussion paper today, compares the situation with the one facing Roosevelt in 1938, when Congress forced him to rein in stimulus, prompting a double dip: he ripped up bank regulations and forced banks to LEND. Policy “went macroprudential” and the recovery took off.”
Could it be that easy; somebody just ordering the financial institutions – now worldwide – to stop paying themselves higher salaries, bonuses and dividends, to stop speculating, and invest in the real economy?
Since 1938 the system has created more safeguards against political interference. A few days ago I was writing about the Credit Rating Agencies (CRA) and their role in the economic collapse of Argentina, now creating more instability in the already embattled economies that had to rescue the banks in 2007-9. [The Guardian]( http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/aug/22/ratings-agencies-conflict-of-interest). “A former credit-ratings agency executive has launched a stinging attack on the powerful organisations that can damage countries’ economies and wreak havoc in the markets with the stroke of a pen. William Harrington, a former senior president at Moody’s, claims the organisation’s senior management interfere with analysts’ independent assessments.” He goes on to remind us that it was the CRA that created the subprime mortgages crisis by giving high ratings to worthless assets. And they continue to work for their clients, whilst appearing as the only “objective” measure of countries’ economies and forcing them into ever increasing austerity measures that squeeze the bottom and the middle for the benefit of the top.
**Not so bleak, in fact quite hopeful**
At the same time interesting news is coming from the science quarters. Paul Zak, Director of the Center for Neuroeconomics Studies at Claremont University tells us that Oxytocin, a brain chemical that helps birth, lactation and orgasm, has been shown to increase people’s trust, generosity and empathy. So we only need to spray the nostrils of the corporate psychopaths and bankers with a little Oxytocin and they will stop concentrating wealth and allow a fairer redistribution of it. Whilst nobody is seriously proposing to force this chemical onto anybody – and we can be quite sure that the powerful would find the way to get ordinary people rather than themselves to take it, to become more “trusting” and “generous” in the face of austerity measures – the fact that we are now reaching a better understanding of how empathy works is a welcome development towards a better society. This is because this lovely substance increases in our bloodstream when we are being treated with affection and generosity. And this predisposes us to become more affectionate and generous. So, “the Golden Rule”, the age old invitation to treat others the way we would like to be treated is now being supported by these neurophysiologic/social studies.
On XIV century BCE Akhenaton was already pointing out that “If thou be industrious to procure wealth, be generous in the disposal of it. Man never is so happy as when he giveth happiness unto another.” This was followed by Confucius: “Never impose on others what you would not choose for yourself”, a number of Greek philosophers including Socrates, Plato and Pythagoras’ disciples, Buddha: “Hurt not others in ways that you yourself would find hurtful”, Judaism: “You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against your kinsfolk. Love your neighbour as yourself” and Christianity: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”. Similar precepts appear in the Bahá’í Faith, Hinduism, Jainism, Islam, Quakerism and the Native Americans’ tradition: “Before you judge a man, you must walk a mile in his shoes.” John Maynard Keynes introduced into economics the meaning of compassion and correctly predicted that harsh financial punishment against Germany for WWI would lead to another debacle.
Mario Rodriguez Cobos, aka [Silo](http://www.silo.net), introduces a further reinforcement to the Golden Rule in his “when you treat others as you would have them treat you, you liberate yourself”. And sure enough, “…those who release more Oxytocin when they’re trusted are happier, they report greater satisfaction with life…”[Paul Zak]( http://bigthink.com/ideas/24884). Not to mention the huge spiritual kick that derives from the register of doing something good for others attested by millions of people, both religious and secular, throughout history.
We can train ourselves into experiencing empathy and solidarity. They can also be inspired in certain moments of history when people feel connected, “in the same boat”. Then social change through nonviolence becomes possible, like in the Arab Spring, the Europeans camping on squares like the 15M in Spain, to demand real democracy and human dignity, [People’s Assemblies]( http://www.peoplesassemblies.org), the Chilean students, Wisconsin and Israel’s protests. Oxytocin is oozing in through the system’s cracks.
