Mennonite
Central
Committee

Globalization and indigenous peoples

By Luis Acosta

It is certainly a challenge for those of us who will be presenting in the next few days to expound so complex a theme in so few minutes. But they just informed me that instead of the 10 minutes I thought I had, I can have 15.

The theme we have come together about is "economic globalization," and I would like to tell you that the most important lesson I ever learned about "political economics" I received from a fellow believer of Toba ethnicity – an indigenous people in northern Argentina. One day, shortly after meeting him, I was talking with Rafael, a pastor and Toba friend. I was trying to describe to him my roots and my history. At one point, I told him that I remembered how the Argentine peso used to be worth something, how one could buy many things then that are out of reach (not affordable) now. I asked him what he thought. In an quiet tone, without resentment, he told me, "I don’t know, Luis. I never had anything. For us, things are always the same."

This brief incident transformed the way I saw and understood economic reality. It is from this new standpoint of seeing and thinking that I would like to share these thoughts with you.

I am neither economist nor politician. My approach to the theme is essentially from a theological perspective. For this reason, I would like to base my reflections on a Biblical passage: the letter to the Romans, chapter 12, verses 1-3.

In the New International Version, this is what it says: "Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God – this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is – his good, pleasing and perfect will. For by the grace given me, I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you."

The point of departure for the Apostle Paul, that in which he grounds himself in order to make this demand of the believers in Rome, is God’s mercy. The capitalist economic system of today does not base itself on God’s mercy but on the value of capital. One’s value is determined by what one has, not by what one can give. In Paul’s thinking, personal surrender is key, and the believer can achieve it only if s/he takes into account God’s mercy.

Indigenous "hunter-gatherer" societies base their economy not on the accumulation of wealth, but on the imperative of sharing. Accumulation for its own sake is a fault and is socially punished. In our day, their way of life is usually considered primitive and not is not valued. Nonetheless, it is much closer than ours to what Paul is asking of the Christians living in Rome.

It is precisely the Christians who live in the capital of the Roman Empire that Paul asks to change their way of thinking, so that they can change their way of living.

The goal of the globalization of capitalism moves in exactly the opposite direction. From the core of political and economic power comes the message that it is we on the margins who need to change. Many citizens of the Third World have joined the chorus, saying that it is inevitable if we want to survive in these times.

This pressure is even stronger on indigenous hunter-gatherer communities, who seem to live completely contrary to neo-liberal thought. All policies and programs focused on them try to change their way of thinking so that they can live in the capitalist world. Even development and educational programs try, in many cases with good intentions, to get them to enter into the thoughts and lifestyle of "civilized" societies.

I personally think that it is these communities, who have survived because of God’s mercy, that have the solution to economic and ecological problems. They were systematically pursued, enslaved and killed by the empires of the Aztecs, the Mayas and the Incas. They found in the Amazon jungle and the wilds of the Gran Chaco a refuge where for centuries they developed ways of life based on non-accumulation, on non-exploitation of natural resources and on sharing. I believe that by the grace of God, I am evidence that it is possible to live in societies based on another foundation.

The basis for these societies is a spiritual "cosmic vision" where everything in the world, in nature and in human relationships is governed by spirits. The secret to survival is to know and be able to relate to the spiritual realm.

And so I believe that the great challenge of today is principally for the Christians who live in the United States, the capital of the empire. They, like the Christians of 1st century Rome, are challenged to change their way of thinking in order that they may change their way of living. I think that so long as Christians do not dare to seriously question capitalism, there is no hope for the present. And I’m not speaking from a Marxist perspective. I believe that capitalism as well as Marxism suffer from the same illness: they are based on a material view of life, and differ only in the way they distribute and administer wealth and power.

It is the indigenous peoples that currently, through different means, are beginning to lift their voices and explain to the world that a materialist view of the world is what destroys nature, marginalizes many people and condemns millions to live in poverty and social exclusion.

Paul called on the Romans to observe others and to evaluate them not based on what they possess but by the measure of faith that they have.

I can personally say that I have never seen any other people who live the faith and live by faith as do the majority of the indigenous believers to whom I have the privilege of relating. They have taught me much more about a life based on God’s grace than any theology book I might read. Day by day they live out the tremendous anguish of seeing their way of life destroyed, the land where they live gradually disappear. And they are condemned to live in the margins, spurned by the majority of non-indigenous society, who view them as inferior and unworthy of respect. Nevertheless, they are able to go to church to sing and praise God with great fervor.

The challenge of globalization is one of the biggest challenges to Christian thought since Constantine became a Christian. Today the empire also claims to be Christian and to trust in God. However few voices are raised questioning the "American way of life" and the capitalism that sustains it ideologically. Lamentably Christianity has once more served to legitimize the empire of this moment in history. Just as the Catholic church gave theological and ideological support to the European empires, I think that today the evangelical churches have become in most cases the apologists for the American empire and its ideology, especially through the theology of prosperity and the spiritual warfare movements.

In Argentina there is a very famous comic strip called "Mafalda," and a phrase that I always remember from it when thinking about this theme is: "We need to change the world before the world changes us." The proposal of globalization is to give up trying to change the world, and instead to change and adapt ourselves to the only visible truth: reality. This is the language of the ideologues of globalization.

I’ll also take advantage of this opportunity to comment about what I see with regard to the programs of some agencies from the North which come to the South with aid and development programs. Many times those same agencies are agents of globalization. I hope that is not the case with MCC, but many have turned into "multinational corporations of aid," imposing requirements of efficiency and profitability on those who work for them.

These agencies request more and more reports, evaluations and planning, requiring hours and hours seated in front of a computer from those who are in the field, trying to become acquainted with and relate to the people they seek to help.

Today we need to turn our eyes toward our indigenous hunter-gatherer brothers and sisters who humbly, but with great energy, maintain and defend a cosmic vision that is much more Christian and Biblical than that of the majority of Western Christians.

May God help us to change our way of thinking and thus change our way of life, so that materialism and individualism won’t be our life signature; so that, with humility, we can value people for their faith, and can at last, Christians of the North as well as the South, discern what is God's will for these times – discern that it is good, pleasing and perfect.

Amen.