________________
18
APARIGRAHA - THE HUMANE SOLUTION
would realise how futile such ventures are socially, and would perforce ask what we are heading towards? Day-to-day changes in fashion design is a wasteful exploitation of human imagination and at such cost ! How do such choices help mankind ? When one sees a number of things instantly, one experiences instant thrill. Soon, however, this thrill changes into confusion as to what to choose. When the choice is finally made it gives immediate satisfaction, but in no time it changes into an unending dissatisfaction. Is there any link then between 'too much choice' and welfare ?
Though choice is fundamental to human nature, but it means making choices between good and bad, beautiful and ugly, right and wrong. The choices that we are facing now, are between one irrelevant object and another, and from one dissatisfaction to another dissatisfaction. 'Obsolescence is artifically created in otherwise perfectly satisfactory goods'. A critic of this analysis would say that this has always been so, there have always been fashions and changes in fashions, so why do we protest so much about this now? It is the rapidity or rate of change and globalisation of the concept due to hi-tech publicity reaching the masses too soon which is disturbing. It disturbs a large number of people in society for whom these things are absolutely beyond reach. It does not just create ripples but creates a commotion and a storm in the minds of all and sundry. Such a social environment leads to antisocial activities and even crime. This would be accepted as an outcome of economic growth. But does this anywhere match the older definition of economics as a science of human welfare ? Can we afford to be so indifferent to value-based economics ?
Some measure of constraint would improve social welfare. The literal meaning of the term 'economy' is well exemplified in constraint. It means managing one's resources in such a way that one gets maximum satisfaction. It is this alone that will reduce the craving for more and more, and with this a more durable satisfaction will be experienced, a satisfaction much closer to social welfare. The conventional economic growth rationale is not so much for increase in welfare as for the increase in one's relative status in the economic hierarchy. The more affluent the
Jain Education International
For Private & Personal Use Only
www.jainelibrary.org
