The Pope takes on capitalism

Thanks to this article in Salon, I became aware of the Pope's new statement on the evil of free market capitalism. It turns out that each pope issues an apostolic exhortation (multiple?) that elucidates his policy platform. Pope Francis just released his Evangelii Gaudium. It mainly seems to provide guidance for prosyletizing, but there is one section that directly addresses free market capitalism. In essence, it argues that free market policies are evil and that governments have a responsibility to intervene in markets to reduce inequality.

He describes the current economic order as an "economy of exclusion and inequality" that "kills". By excluding individuals from the benefits of economic growth, by turning them into outcasts and leftovers, it literally starves and kills them. And this is driven, he argues, by an attitude that privileges profits over people.

In this system, which tends to devour everything which stands in the way of increased profits, whatever is fragile, like the environment, is defenseless before the interests of a deified market, which become[sic] the only rule.

The result is an "impersonal economy" that abstracts from the personal, reducing men and women to consumers and "globalizing indifference". Such indifference is characteristic of those who have rejected ethics (and, of course, God) and rule society in a somewhat anonymous manner.

To those who believe economic growth is the solution, he says:

Some people continue to defend trickle-down theories which assume that economic growth, encouraged by a free market, will inevitably succeed in bringing about greater justice and inclusiveness in the world. This opinion, which has never been confirmed by the facts, expresses a crude and naïve trust in the goodness of those wielding economic power and in the sacralized workings of the prevailing economic system. Meanwhile, the excluded are still waiting.

He clearly recognizes that this system generates intolerable inequality and that inequality in turn generates violence. The solution is not policies and systems of surveillance, not police security, but economic security and greater equality.

This is not the case simply because inequality provokes a violent reaction from those excluded from the system, but because the socioeconomic system is unjust at its root.

Therefore, there is a role for the state in addressing the weaknesses of the system, if not in replacing an unjust, evil socioeconomic system. The Pope exhorts:

Ethics – a non-ideological ethics – would make it possible to bring about balance and a more humane social order. With this in mind, I encourage financial experts and political leaders to ponder the words of one of the sages of antiquity: “Not to share one’s wealth with the poor is to steal from them and to take away their livelihood. It is not our own goods which we hold, but theirs”.

Overall this position seems to represent a renewed acceptance of liberation theology, which basically unites Marxism with Catholicism. This is supported by the Pope's meeting with and increased positive coverage of Father Gutierrez, who was a pioneer of the approach. And I'm no longer Catholic, but this still excites me very much.

My only concern is that the dichotomy established between "included" and "excluded" creates and defines a group of people "outside" the system that are thereby directly converted to a constituency of "outcasts", a constituency that the Church has traditionally sought to attract and serve. The first problem is that the excluded cannot really be excluded from the economic system if that very system is what produces them; they are inherently part of that system. The second issue for me is the use of political rhetoric to attract adherents. Obviously, on one level, one cannot blame the Church for working to maintain and strengthen its organization and influence. But I fear that the Church will mobilize the masses behind it and neglect the political activism needed to address their needs.