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A Comparative Analysis of the Philosophical Views on the Existence of God and Evil.
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A Comparative Analysis of the Philosophical Views on the Existence of God and Evil.
The concept of evil and morality has been one of the most pivotal in the history of humanity. Evil is a moral concept covering all forms of pain, misfortunes and suffering. Morality, on the other hand, is a binary system of determining good and evil. Evil and morality traverse through philosophy, religion, governance, culture and to some extent science. Wars have been fought over differences in schools of thought concerning evil. For religion, the concept is even more crucial. Many traditional religions believe in an omnipotent, omniscient and perfectly moral deity. This being said, the concept of evil has always threatened the collapse of religions that believe in such a god. Epicurious raised the “unanswered” question that questioned the concurrent existence of such a god and evil within the same reality ADDIN CSL_CITATION {“citationItems”:[{“id”:”ITEM-1″,”itemData”:{“DOI”:”10.1017/S0034412509990369″,”ISSN”:”00344125″,”abstract”:”This paper develops a challenge to theism. The challenge is to explain why the hypothesis that there exists an omnipotent, omniscient and all-good god should be considered significantly more reasonable than the hypothesis that there exists an omnipotent, omniscient and all-evil god. Theists typically dismiss the evil-god hypothesis out of hand because of the problem of good – there is surely too much good in the world for it to be the creation of such a being. But then why doesn’t the problem of evil provide equally good grounds for dismissing belief in a good god? I develop this evil-god challenge in detail, anticipate several replies, and correct errors made in earlier discussions of the problem of good. Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2010.”,”author”:[{“dropping-particle”:””,”family”:”Law”,”given”:”Stephen”,”non-dropping-particle”:””,”parse-names”:false,”suffix”:””}],”container-title”:”Religious Studies”,”id”:”ITEM-1″,”issue”:”3″,”issued”:{“date-parts”:[[“2010″,”9″]]},”page”:”353-373″,”publisher”:”Cambridge University Press”,”title”:”The evil-god challenge”,”type”:”article”,”volume”:”46″},”uris”:[“http://www.mendeley.com/documents/?uuid=5a27d49a-7deb-34cf-aa56-5ef99c03fefc”]}],”mendeley”:{“formattedCitation”:”(Law)”,”plainTextFormattedCitation”:”(Law)”,”previouslyFormattedCitation”:”(Law)”},”properties”:{“noteIndex”:0},”schema”:”https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json”}(Law). Many arguments have been raised throughout the years to explain or to dispute the existence of god. In this brief review, the beliefs of Hume, Kant, James and Augustine are discussed in contrast and comparison to one another.
David Hume was a Scottish philosopher in the 1700s. In his writings, Dialogues, Humes considered Epicrious’s question and raises many views concerning it. He argues not from the view of an atheist but as a sceptic. He considers all the unnecessary forms of evil within our reality in the juxtaposition of a provident God. He challenges the view held by some that perhaps what we consider as evil is just apparent evil or “evil” whose eventuality will lead to good. Hume reasons out that the human’s view of morality and evil is determined by how his mind perceives reality and not by any philosophical arguments. Therefore, such a philosophical belief, that evil does not exist, cannot be a fathomable reality for an individual. Hume questions the provident God he believes in. He wonders why such a God would not provide fully for his creation despite his infinite ability to do so. Hume does not see the presence of evil as evidence for the absence of a god. Instead, he sees that we not only have no reason to argue for his existence but we also have none to dispute it. Overall, Hume believes that unnecessary evil exists concurrently with God. He also believes that God exists, is all-powerful, can end and prevent evil but chooses not to ADDIN CSL_CITATION {“citationItems”:[{“id”:”ITEM-1″,”itemData”:{“DOI”:”10.1017/S0031819114000229″,”ISSN”:”1469817X”,”abstract”:”The problem of evil for theists was how to reconcile suffering with a benevolent God. Hume solved the problem of evil by claiming that the divine was amoral but not by denying God’s existence which he needed in order to advocate his favoured notion of a general providence. Indeed, Hume’s treatment of the problem of evil showed that his quarrel in the Natural History of Religion 1and the Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, 2 Section XI, was with a particular providence rather than the possibility of a divine orderer. The fundamental problem of evil for Hume, was evil’s potential to drive people to the notion of a particular providence with its attendant damaging passions. In considering his alternative of the general providence Hume is shown to be closer to theism than has often been thought.”,”author”:[{“dropping-particle”:””,”family”:”Tarrant”,”given”:”James”,”non-dropping-particle”:””,”parse-names”:false,”suffix”:””}],”container-title”:”Philosophy”,”id”:”ITEM-1″,”issue”:”4″,”issued”:{“date-parts”:[[“2014″,”10″,”17″]]},”page”:”603-620″,”publisher”:”Cambridge University Press”,”title”:”Hume’s fundamental problem of evil”,”type”:”article”,”volume”:”89″},”uris”:[“http://www.mendeley.com/documents/?uuid=52e8a7e3-456e-35f0-9676-c18e2e016808″]}],”mendeley”:{“formattedCitation”:”(Tarrant)”,”plainTextFormattedCitation”:”(Tarrant)”,”previouslyFormattedCitation”:”(Tarrant)”},”properties”:{“noteIndex”:0},”schema”:”https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json”}(Tarrant).
On the other hand, Kant (an 18th-century metaphysical philosopher) offers a non-theistic view of evil. He claims that humans have free will and can be inclined to do either good or evil. He views evil as a “stain” in the human will and classifies it in degrees of severity. He starts with those who are not necessarily corrupted by evil but are too weak to do what is morally right. He then goes on to describe the impure who do good but fueled by impure intentions and ends with those that have a fully evil will. He explains that this last category of individuals converts what is morally right to self-serving interests. Kant’s views have been disputed by many philosophers because his view does not necessarily explain natural evils nor heinous morally wrong acts ADDIN CSL_CITATION {“citationItems”:[{“id”:”ITEM-1″,”itemData”:{“DOI”:”10.1080/09608788.2012.718860″,”ISSN”:”09608788″,”abstract”:”Kant proclaimed that all theodicies must fail in On the Miscarriage of All Philosophical Trials in Theodicy, but it is mysterious why he did so since he had developed a theodicy of his own during the critical period. In this paper, I offer an explanation of why Kant thought theodicies necessarily fail. In his theodicy, as well as in some of his works in ethics, Kant explained moral evil as resulting from unavoidable limitations in human beings. God could not create finite beings without such limitations and so could not have created humans that were not prone to committing immoral acts. However, the work of Carl Christian Eberhard Schmid showed Kant that given his own beliefs about freedom and the nature of responsibility one could not account for moral evil in this way without tacitly denying that human beings were responsible for their actions. This result is significant not only because it explains an otherwise puzzling shift in Kant’s philosophy of religion, but also because it shows that the theodicy essay provides powerful evidence that Kant’s thinking about moral evil and freedom underwent fundamental shifts between early works such as the Groundwork and later works like the Religion within the Limits of Mere Reason. © 2012 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.”,”author”:[{“dropping-particle”:””,”family”:”Duncan”,”given”:”Sam”,”non-dropping-particle”:””,”parse-names”:false,”suffix”:””}],”container-title”:”British Journal for the History of Philosophy”,”id”:”ITEM-1″,”issue”:”5″,”issued”:{“date-parts”:[[“2012″,”9″,”1″]]},”page”:”973-991″,”publisher”:” Routledge “,”title”:”Moral evil, freedom and the goodness of god: Why kant abandoned theodicy”,”type”:”article-journal”,”volume”:”20″},”uris”:[“http://www.mendeley.com/documents/?uuid=be59283e-30f1-3fcd-87d8-ef6c845aad52″]}],”mendeley”:{“formattedCitation”:”(Duncan)”,”plainTextFormattedCitation”:”(Duncan)”,”previouslyFormattedCitation”:”(Duncan)”},”properties”:{“noteIndex”:0},”schema”:”https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json”}(Duncan).
Augustine, a Christian philosopher, confesses his struggle with the origin of evil in his writings (Confessions). He goes through a journey of trying to balance out the paradox of the existence of God and evil all at once. Early on he reconciled the two by shedding his belief in God’s omnipotence. If God is not omnipotent, then he cannot stop evil. He then rejects this notion and comes to view evil not as a created entity on its own but distorted good. He further rationalizes this though by explaining that all that is created by God is inherently good, but at varying levels. Therefore, when morally evil acts occur, it is because of a corruption of the inherent good in a person and not an evil caused or allowed by God. He believes that the choice to do evil is based on the free will which God gave to humans ADDIN CSL_CITATION {“citationItems”:[{“id”:”ITEM-1″,”itemData”:{“DOI”:”10.1017/S0034412513000401″,”ISSN”:”00344125″,”abstract”:”The question of why humanity first chose to sin is an extension to the problem of evil to which the free-will defence does not easily apply. In De libero arbitrio and elsewhere Augustine argues that as an instance of evil, the fall is necessarily inexplicable. In this article, I identify the problems with this response and attempt to construct an alternative based on Peter van Inwagen’s free will ‘mysterianism’. I will argue that the origin of evil is inexplicable not because it is an instance of evil, but because it is an instance of free will. © 2013 Cambridge University Press.”,”author”:[{“dropping-particle”:””,”family”:”Willows”,”given”:”Adam M.”,”non-dropping-particle”:””,”parse-names”:false,”suffix”:””}],”container-title”:”Religious Studies”,”id”:”ITEM-1″,”issue”:”2″,”issued”:{“date-parts”:[[“2014″]]},”page”:”255-269″,”publisher”:”Cambridge University Press”,”title”:”Augustine, the origin of evil, and the mystery of free will”,”type”:”article-journal”,”volume”:”50″},”uris”:[“http://www.mendeley.com/documents/?uuid=0d814966-edd1-3e13-92ed-32bd1116caa0″]}],”mendeley”:{“formattedCitation”:”(Willows)”,”plainTextFormattedCitation”:”(Willows)”,”previouslyFormattedCitation”:”(Willows)”},”properties”:{“noteIndex”:0},”schema”:”https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json”}(Willows).
Lastly, the 19th-century pragmatic philosopher William James. From his writings, James did not believe in an omnipotent, omniscient and perfectly moral God. He instead viewed God as a being in the metaphysical realm whose knowledge has bounds and leaves humans to dictate their actions without the foreknowledge of what they might choose. Concerning evil and morality, James, unlike the three other philosophers, abandons the binary confines of good and evil. He proposes a pragmatic school of thought concerning morality. He sees morality as an intuition built through experiences in life. The societal norms within which one is raised determine their inner sense of right and wrong. Good and evil. A pragmatic society does not set morally right and wrong laws but rather considers the additive value of a series of moral action and chooses those which offer the least friction ADDIN CSL_CITATION {“citationItems”:[{“id”:”ITEM-1″,”itemData”:{“DOI”:”10.1017/S0025727300005457″,”ISSN”:”09505571″,”abstract”:”William James is often described as one of America’s foremost philosophers and the founder of American psychology. During the second half of the nineteenth century and the first decade of the twentieth century he published several key texts on a broad range of topics, including the psychology of religion, ethics, epistemology and metaphysics. Many are still in current use, and contemporary philosophers continue to pore over them. Biographers, meanwhile, happily speculate on everything from James’s parental relationships to the state of his marriage. However, there has been relatively little detailed exploration of how James’s published writings and his private life may have intersected. This article explores one such intersection: that between James’s protracted experience of ill health and the elaboration of the notion of evil in his writings. Any perusal, however perfunctory, of the thousands of letters written by James that are still in existence, cannot fail to miss his repeated references to his health, or lack of it. He certainly was not one to suffer in silence, and it is clear that, for much of his life from his early adulthood onward, he considered himself a confirmed invalid. His references to his health cover a variety of different ailments. In the 1860s, when James was in his twenties, he was plagued by everything from a bad back, to melancholy and constipation. These symptoms have not escaped the attention of his biographers; most, however, have brought to them Freudian-inspired schema. Daniel Bjork, for example, suggests that James’s ongoing problems with back pain had something to do with the unfulfilled sexual urges of a young man. He reminds us that once James was married, few such back complaints continued. 1 Similarly, Howard Feinstein ‘explains’ James’s constipation with reference to psychoanalytic theory, calling attention to the same condition suffered by his brother Henry, the novelist. According to Feinstein, the two brothers found it difficult to sever their suffocatingly close fraternal bond-an event that was reminiscent of their original ‘separation crisis’ from their parents. That ordeal, moreover, is held to be inherently linked to the brothers’ acquisition of sphincter control for the first time. Thus we should not be surprised that a later fraternal separation crisis was accompanied by a symbolic re-enactment of this bowel control process which manifested itself as constipation, concludes Feinstein. 2″,”author”:[{“dropping-particle”:””,”family”:”Sutton”,”given”:”Emma K.”,”non-dropping-particle”:””,”parse-names”:false,”suffix”:””}],”container-title”:”Medical History”,”id”:”ITEM-1″,”issue”:”3″,”issued”:{“date-parts”:[[“2011″]]},”page”:”389-392″,”publisher”:”Cambridge University Press”,”title”:”When misery and metaphysics collide: William James on ‘the problem of evil'”,”type”:”article-journal”,”volume”:”55″},”uris”:[“http://www.mendeley.com/documents/?uuid=49082bdb-24c4-3cbf-89d4-33e9b7b4f2ba”]}],”mendeley”:{“formattedCitation”:”(Sutton)”,”plainTextFormattedCitation”:”(Sutton)”,”previouslyFormattedCitation”:”(Sutton)”},”properties”:{“noteIndex”:0},”schema”:”https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json”}(Sutton).
In my subjective opinion, God, to be a sovereign creator and one in control of the physical world has to be all-powerful, all-knowing and good in every sense. The existence of evil in such a reality is best explained by Augustine’s school of thought since it allows the existence of such a God in this harsh reality. The only shortcoming would be that Augustine’s rationale does not explain the reasons for the existence of natural evil under the reign of such a God. Objectively, James’ beliefs have a much better fit within our reality. Since God is not all-powerful, evil, a separate force within the metaphysical realm can exist and cause sheer unnecessary harm within the world.
Works Cited
ADDIN Mendeley Bibliography CSL_BIBLIOGRAPHY Duncan, Sam. “Moral Evil, Freedom and the Goodness of God: Why Kant Abandoned Theodicy.” British Journal for the History of Philosophy, vol. 20, no. 5, Routledge , Sept. 2012, pp. 973–91, doi:10.1080/09608788.2012.718860.
Law, Stephen. “The Evil-God Challenge.” Religious Studies, vol. 46, no. 3, Cambridge University Press, Sept. 2010, pp. 353–73, doi:10.1017/S0034412509990369.
Sutton, Emma K. “When Misery and Metaphysics Collide: William James on ‘the Problem of Evil.’” Medical History, vol. 55, no. 3, Cambridge University Press, 2011, pp. 389–92, doi:10.1017/S0025727300005457.
Tarrant, James. “Hume’s Fundamental Problem of Evil.” Philosophy, vol. 89, no. 4, Cambridge University Press, 17 Oct. 2014, pp. 603–20, doi:10.1017/S0031819114000229.
Willows, Adam M. “Augustine, the Origin of Evil, and the Mystery of Free Will.” Religious Studies, vol. 50, no. 2, Cambridge University Press, 2014, pp. 255–69, doi:10.1017/S0034412513000401.
A comparative analyses of the Japanese and Western perspective of indebtedness
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Title: A comparative analyses of the Japanese and Western perspective of indebtedness
Date: August 7th 2013
Introduction
This paper is based on an analysis from the book “The Chrysanthemum and the Sword” that was written by Ruth Benedict who is an anthropologist. The paper presents a comparative analysis with a guide from the text of the Japanese and western perspective of ineptness. The ideas presented in this paper have been researched and gathered from the book and personal interpretation and understanding of the book. The paper will present a description of different societies in the west and how they perceive debts and the issue of paying debts. The issue of indebtedness is closely associated with community believes, as different communities approach paying debt differently. This paper will also draw the close relationship between communities believes and actions in paying debt. Communities in Japan show very contrasting ideologies and all that is covered in this paper.
Debt is viewed differently by both Americans and Japanese; this is majorly affected by the communal setting. Americans hold the view that they owe their existence to no person while Japanese pay allegiance and feel to be in debt of the people who lived before them. This presents different approaches to debt between two communities; Japanese view themselves as debtors to the ages. This means that they owe their existence to those who lived in the world before them. Americans take a different approach to this, viewing themselves as heirs of the age; we exist by our own right and have ourselves to thank.
Debtors to ages
This is an approach to debt in Japan, with great reasoning behind it. Those who existed and lived before us played a great role in maintaining a place that we would find. They took good care of the environment for us to find a better place, took part in research and inventions to make life easier. We enjoy life and go through our day to day activities more easily because of the efforts of those who lived before us. The ages are our ancestors and we are their debtors in this approach. Taking thought into this, it makes sense to be grateful for finding a wonderful place where we can call home. The fact cannot be stressed enough that we are somehow here because of those who lived before us, our ancestors and by this virtue we are debtors.
Heirs of ages
Our existence does not make us debtors by any virtue, not to our ancestors and not to those who live in our generation. We are free to take our actions just like those who came before us were free to live and exist. Our definition of debt is an obligation, which arises from a situation in which we take part in. this provides for free existence, naturals; we come into this world to inherit and by this fact we are heirs of ages. We inherit from those who lived before us and are free to make what we want of our existence.
The meaning of the word debt in Japanese context is of great importance in understanding the communal belief of debt. According to Japanese, debt is a duty and obligation of the debtor to a person who has done him/her well and contributed to their existence. There are two parties in the case; the debtor is a person who has a greater ability than the creditor. The debtor assists the creditor because of his/her high standing in society. An example of such a relationship is that between a child and his parents, a parent is a debtor to a child because of all that the parent does to maintain the welfare of the child. Being raised by your parents and given a good life in all that is within their abilities makes you owe your parents. This is a communal belief by Japanese, based on the definition and understanding of the word debt.
In the west, debt has a different meaning and communities approach it with a different perspective. There is a distinction between debt and moral duty; in Africa it is the moral duty of a child to obey the parents. The moral duty further extends to bind the child to take care of his parents when they get old, and to support them financially as a symbol of gratitude. Sometimes a child is not as successful or as prosperous as his parents and may not be able to support them financially but does not dishonor them. This is not seen as breaking the moral duty. This is a significant comparison between the definition and idea of debt as a word. What the Japanese see as debt, in the west is termed as a moral duty and responsibility.
In the battlefield, soldiers were served with many things including cigarettes and water here they were put in debt. This brings a new understanding to the word debt in a Japanese context; you can get into debt involuntarily. This shows that according to the definition of debt, aid can put you in debt, while you are working in the interests of your creditor. The scenario where soldiers are termed as creditors for receiving supplies form the king contrasts the initial understanding of the word debt. It is difficult to understand how one gets into debt for receiving what they require when in the battlefield. The soldiers are in the battlefield to defend their country, but Japanese have a different view on this. Soldiers are said to be working for the emperor and whatever they do in during the war is for the emperor.
The scenario is different for soldiers in the west. Soldiers go to battle to defend the borders of their nation and to fight the enemy of their nation. The act of going to war is not for the king of the land to take glory or vest his own interests but soldiers go to war to protect the interests of the entire country. During war, soldiers are entitled to getting supplies and this does not put them at debt. Debt is not something you can get into involuntarily; you have to consent to get into a debt. It is the duty of the country, whose interests are being protected to provide the soldiers in war with supplies. After the war and the soldier come back home with victory, the state rewards them to show appreciation. Rewards to soldiers are not to imply payment of any form of debt; they imply that the state appreciates the services of the soldiers and their bravery.
In Japanese a sign of help has to be reciprocated with words of appreciation, the debtor has to thank the creditor or his helper for any help received. However, the words that are used to express appreciation for kind action are quite contradicting and paint a different picture from that of being assisted. From a direct simple translation of the words used to express gratitude, the message passed by the debtor is that of receiving not help but a burden. This brings another understanding to the word debt in the Japanese context, a debt is a burden placed on you.
Kino doku
This is one word that is used to express appreciation by the Japanese, this when translated is an expression of a bad feeling. The word, though an expression of gratitude is used only in specific scenarios for example when a stranger helps you and you are not able to pay them back or do a similar generous act. By saying Kino doku, you will be expression the situation that you find yourself in of being assisted but not in a position to do the same. This presents a feeling of self-pity, that you are more of a receiver than a giver.
Arigato and Sumimasen
These are other words that are used to express gratitude in Japanese; the translation of these words also would not bring out the meaning of appreciation to a person from the western world. Both terms are used in a business setting to compliment and show thankfulness to a store owner. When translated, they mean, a difficult feeling that a debtor will never forget. It is a never ending feeling of gratitude; this presents a different image of a burden and commitment. A debtor is burdened and should always remember his creditor. The words of appreciation indicate that the debtor knows that he may never have the chance to pay back or reciprocate the actions of kindness shown to him.
In the west, showing appreciation is quite different and the meaning is presented with the actual words. Thank you is a word used to show express gratitude for help for serviced rendered. A debt is not a burden and the debtor is not in any way committed to the creditor. A person who has been helped, though may not have a chance to go the same and help his debtor is not obliged to always remember. People tend to forget those who helped them when they were in needy situations and they move on with life. The intention of helping someone is not to make him always remember you but to remove him from the current situation to a better situation so that he can help himself in future and help others. The cause of helping people in Japanese is different from that in the West, in Japanese a difficult feeling is created after helping someone and may express regret while in the west an uplifted feeling is created and sincere gratitude is expressed.
On
This presents a relationship and the nature of the relationship between a debtor and a creditor. There is a relationship that is formed when a person helps another, in the Japanese context, on is the simple word that presents all the relationships that may emerge. On could represent, Loyalty, Love and Obligations from the debtor to the creditor. In an example, you have an on to your parents, you are a debtor and this could mean you have an obligation to love and be loyal to them. The on will show the relationship, this may be quite confusing as one word could stand for so many meanings.
On comes with many implications, which we from the West may call consequences and this is the reason why Japanese may not accept a kind offer from a stranger. It poses a demand for you to feel obligated to be loyal to a person who showed you kindness at one time, you may not remember all strangers who helped you while in a difficult situation. Remember, debt is a burden in Japan, and you have to carry this burden everywhere you go for this reason nobody wants to carry a burden from a stranger. A person is more likely to accept a favor or an action of kindness from a relative or a close neighbor because he can bear the burden and at one time will be close enough to reciprocate. This shows the fear of consequences of being in debt to the extent of refusing to accept help.
The expression of gratitude and saying thank you in Japanese is done with humility. A person who is saying thank you expresses humbleness in the words used to thank and at the same time is apologetic. This is the ultimate symbol of being grateful, being sorry that you have been helped. In the west a person may say thank you just to show courtesy and not necessarily humility. The feeling of being helped does not make a person feel sorry rather it makes them feel joyful. Thank you is not only used to show gratitude but also show courtesy in the west. Appreciation does not necessarily make you feel sorry for yourself rather it bring joy. This is a great difference between the two cultures, the expression of gratitude and the feeling of help on the debtor. Here two different situations express the same feeling.
Summary
We see two cultures with a similar feeling of debt but with different approaches, due to the difference in understanding. While the west debt and indebtedness is an obligation only if financial and entered to if both parties are in consent, the situation is different in Japanese. A debt can be entered into even when the debtor does not agree or is not in consent of the debt. Simple actions of kindness can make you debtor, once you accept the kindness. This creates a situation where people are resentful in receiving help, in fear of being in debt.
A child and parent scenario; in Japanese, a child is a debtor to his parents for being raised and receiving a good life. In the west, a child has a moral obligation to be loyal and hold a special place in his heart for his parents and being raised does not make him a debtor. Even when a parent single handedly raises his children, educating them and providing for them, he is performing his duty and not helping the child. However in Japanese, when a parent raises the children, it is not his duty but it is a debt being made.
LEGAL DNA (WALL STREET
LEGAL DNA (WALL STREET JOURNAL 2002)
THE WORLD ECONOMY is putting modern capitalism through another stress test. Like tests that physicians do for people with heart disease, this one highlights the system’s weaknesses and brings forth various prescriptions for treating symptoms. But, just as with heart disease, the stress test raises intriguing questions about genetic advantages: Do some economies have institutions, laws and commonly accepted business norms that produce a stronger strain of capitalism, one better adapted to withstand shocks and improve its people’s prosperity?
Specifically, why do the U.S. and Britain have bigger stock markets and more shareholding citizens than Germany and France, and does that make their economies more flexible? Why do more companies go public in India than in Brazil? Why do American businesses use private arbitration more than others to resolve corporate disputes? Why are U.S. governments more comfortable settling trade disputes one case at a time than their Continental counterparts?
To a remarkable degree, the answers can be traced to the different legal traditions that emerged in England and France in the 12th century and spread through their colonies. Nine hundred years later, these traditions still influence business, investors and government. And as globalization steadily erodes national boundaries, the differences are causing unavoidable strains. WESTERN COMMERCIAL LAW comes from two traditions: the common law, with roots in England, and the civil law, rooted in ancient Rome and refined later by continental Europeans. Common-law countries, including the U.S. and other former British colonies, rely on independent judges and juries and legal principles supplemented by precedent-setting case law. In civil-law countries, which include much of Latin America, judges often are lifelong civil servants who administer legal codes packed with specific rules. Case law matters less. Civil-law countries distrust judges and arbitrators; common-law countries venerate and empower them. Rule-laden civil-law countries aren’t well-adapted to cope with change; the case-law approach makes common-law countries inherently more flexible. All this has long fascinated law professors. After the early failures at building capitalism in Russia following communism’s collapse, the issue also attracted a band of economists, led by Harvard’s Andrei Shleifer. They sought to identify conditions essential for functioning markets and private property. Whatever they were, Russia didn’t have them.
Examining 49 countries from Argentina to Zimbabwe, the economists discerned a distinct pattern in both rich and poor countries: “Civil-law countries exhibit heavier regulation, weaker property-right protection, more-corrupt and less-efficient governments and less political freedom than do common-law countries,” Mr. Shleifer puts it. As France well illustrates, civil law “more easily accommodates the expansion of government intervention in economic and social life.” Investors in civil-law countries, Mr. Shleifer and colleagues argue, are less certain that their property rights will be enforced. One symptomatic example: Civil-law countries more frequently require shareholders to attend meetings to vote instead of voting by mail. In these countries, few people own stock, bond and stock markets are smaller and more companies are controlled by a few big holders. In the past decade, this has proved a significant constraint on investment and economic growth. The law matters—and it matters a lot. AS FINANCIAL MARKETS outgrow national borders, economies built on different legal foundations are being forced to reconcile their differences. When shares of a French company are traded on the New York Stock Exchange by a Japanese brokerage house, there is pressure to agree on consistent accounting standards and a shared understanding of investor-protection rules. The trend is toward the U.S.-British approach, but the deep roots of the alternative explain the resistance in other countries.
Similar tensions appear in world trade disputes. The U.S. tends to be more willing to allow World Trade Organization arbitrators to make case law (particularly when decisions favor the U.S.) than Europe, which prefers clear rules. The old differences also inform some international environmental disputes: Civil-law countries, accustomed to well-articulated and rigid rules, are uneasy relying less on rules and more on tradable pollution permits. There remains a chicken-and-egg dispute about which came first: The law, as Mr. Shleifer and allies argue, or the rise of an independent business-investor class that demanded legal protection, as Columbia law professor John Coffee Jr. sees it. In either case, the lesson of history is sharp: Markets and the prosperity they can provide do not exist independent of the law and the institutions of government but are intertwined with them. Well-functioning financial markets, in particular, rest on clear and enforced protections for investors. And when a changing economy requires new rules—for auctioning radio spectrum, modernizing stock markets, regulating new financial products, enforcing intellectual property rights—it’s wise to remember that the economic impact is long-lived.