Globalizing the Common Good

Recently the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences meet to discuss a future assembly directed to how to reverse the negative effect of Globalization in the pursuit of the common good. This session will look at the social changes around the social principles: dignity of the human person, common good, subsidiarity, solidarity. This assembly will focus on how to increase the recognition of the dignity of the person and common good by seriously considering how Globalization should be guided by subsidiarity and solidarity. The goal of the assembly “is to give new meaning and application to the concept of common good in this age of globalization, which in certain fields is leading to growing inequalities and social injustice, laceration and fragmentation of the social fabric, in short, to the destruction of common goods throughout the world."

While Globalization allows for a network of communication between different areas of the world and can increase awareness and solidarity, the danger lies in using this network only for commercial advantage and economic efficiency. Subsidiarity and solidarity must work together and be guidelines to help realize how to act towards the common good, which is more important than financial gain. The social cohesion of a society will always be rooted in the family. Poor economic conditions that exploit individuals and forces people to emigrate and split the family have harmful effects on society. In his recent address to the United Nations Pope Benedict XVI made some comments about globalization and solidarity:

Indeed, questions of security, development goals, reduction of local and global inequalities, protection of the environment, of resources and of the climate, require all international leaders to act jointly and to show a readiness to work in good faith, respecting the law, and promoting solidarity with the weakest regions of the planet. I am thinking especially of those countries in Africa and other parts of the world which remain on the margins of authentic integral development, and are therefore at risk of experiencing only the negative effects of globalization. In the context of international relations, it is necessary to recognize the higher role played by rules and structures that are intrinsically ordered to promote the common good, and therefore to safeguard human freedom.

Unless we join and subsume the pursuit of globalizing the economy under the pursuit of justice and peace, inevitably some parts of the world will suffer, as has been the case. Even in the structure of international relations there needs to be a preferential option for the poor, weak, and marginalized areas that are unequipped to meet the economic demands placed upon it by the growing market and globalization.

Solidarity means that we must consider the dignity of other as a fundamental part of our own interest. Any action that seeks primarily to exploit another group or has the direct consequence of exploiting other people, regardless of their proximity, is in contradiction with solidarity. The implication is simple: we must have a greater social awareness as to the effects of our actions and actively seek ways to prevent this social evil. We must live socially responsible in hopes to safeguard the dignity of our neighbors.

Subsidiarity promotes social responsibility by those participating in society. Attached to the dignity of a person is the ability to work and participate in family, local government, and society. Subsidiarity insures that individuals can express ownership within their community by working for the common good. Our solidarity should not seek to unearth this dignity of family and community but to support it. Solidarity and subsidiarity are not two opposing principles but two irreducible principles that are interrelated. We cannot be united to the interest of others and insure their dignity unless we are united to their ability to participate meaningfully in society by encouraging them to bring their own gifts, talents, and individuality to the table. True solidarity encourages subsidiarity.

Once we acknowledge that the great deficit of modernity, which is nevertheless responsible for many social conquests, has been and still is social solidarity -- at all levels, from local to global -- it is a matter of seeing whether and how this deficit can be overcome by a new way of intending and practicing subsidiarity as a proactive, promotional principle, not only as a defensive, protective one.

The hope is to work towards a vision that can reverse the negative effects of globalization. We cannot only seek to defend our own interest but must work with others so that we do not ignorantly promote the economic destruction of other areas by participating in structures that unjustly exploit the resources and labor of found there. How we live has consequences on how others live.

In short the challenge is for a new combination of subsidiarity and solidarity to become the key to activate those social circuits on which common goods depend, the key to turn globalization into a 'civilization of the common good.'