Middle Class and Psycho Economics

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Middle Class and Psycho-Economics

The field of psycho-economics.We combine a fundamental principle of psycho-economics with Prout's conceptof class to analyse the social struggle in Venezuela today.Traditional economics concentrates on the material motives for doing work.But people work hard for many reasons, including physical, mental andspiritual reasons. People's economy of Prout is designed to meet physicalneeds, but once physical needs are met people begin to discover that theyhave psychic and spiritual needs as well.Examples of the kinds of motivation that explain why people work so hard toperform are diverse and difficult task to correlate. A Nobel scientist oncesaid that in order to do well in science, a person must have a burning intheir tummy. Without a burning urge, it is unlikely that a person would putin the hard work and have the persistence to overcome all the emotional upsand downs of scientific research.The term 'psycho-economics' was invented by Sarkar and refers to one of thefour sub-disciplines of economics. (The other three are people's economy,commercial economy and general economy.) Psycho-economy includes the studyof the management and utilisation of psychic and spiritual resources.Perhaps you have not thought of a scientist's "burning in the tummy" as aform of wealth. But consider the tremendously valuable knowledge andtechnology that would be lost if a potential Nobel laureate had not beenborn with a burning in his/her tummy.Psycho-economics takes over when people's economy is functioning well and iscomfortably supplying people with the necessities of life. It is differentfrom traditional economics because there are no limits to growth. Oneperson's learning and spiritual insights do not deprive others of the same.This is a new field of study but Sarkar predicts that in futurepsycho-economics will be the glamour field of academic economics.A fundamental concept in psycho-economics is that no person likes to feelthat their life is stagnating. Every one wants to grow, expand, explore inat least one part if not several parts of their life at one time. Typicallyin human development, we grow physically first, then around the age of 7 or 8 our minds begin to blossom and we discover the intellectual urge. Thenaround 18 or so, we begin to appreciate the importance of wisdom and becomeattracted to it. Even in later life when our bodies begin to decline, wenever loose that internal urge for continued psychic and spiritual growth.It is a powerful motivator.Since psychic and spiritual motivations are so strong in human life, how canwe utilise them for the benefit of social and economic development? AProutist economy would endeavour to discover each person's healthymotivations and utilise them for the benefit of society. One idea promotedby Sarkar is that a person's incentive income could partly be in a form thatboth satisfies the person's desire and at the same time stimulates their capacity to perform more valuable work. For example, a scientist who isstrongly motivated for research, would like to accept new equipment and new

research facilities as part of their 'income'. An engineer would accept atrip to some of the engineering marvel's of the world as form of 'income'.The concept already exists in nascent form in modern corporations as "incomepackaging" and "fringe benefits". Prout would greatly expand this approach.As a generalisation, we may observe that psycho-economy is of particular importance to the middle class in any society. The physical needs of themiddle class are typically taken care of and they have sufficient educationso that psychic and spiritual expressions become powerful motivators.We can focus on the Venezuelan middle class and their role in the socialstruggles of their country. Perhaps a bold assertion that it is not possibleto place the middle class "on hold" (i.e. ignore the aspirations of themiddle class in Venezuela) while attempting to fight poverty. This can beamplified and there is a justification of this assertion.In order to proceed, we need some tools of social analysis. Prout has acomplete theory of social classes and social dynamics but it is beyond thescope of this brief discussion. For this analysis, it is sufficient todistinguish the three traditional classes, the poor, the middle class andthe upper class or elite. In addition, it is useful to distinguish threekinds of social power that can be exercised in any social conflict; peoplepower, financial power and cultural power.We can combine these concepts into a single diagram which displays thedifferent kinds of power exercised by the three classes.Consider people power. In this scenario, the poor are always in themajority, so typically people power expresses their concerns. People power is sometimes incredibly important in social struggle. For example, the rightwing coup which briefly removed President Chavez in April 2002, was defeatedwhen hundreds of thousands of the poor in Caracas came down from the slumsand surrounded the presidential palace. People power also defeated PresidentMarcos of the Philippines in 1986. However the primacy of people power isvery rare. If it were the norm, the democracies of the world would be run inthis way, but we know this is not the case.Financial power is the dominant force in the world today and of course thatis exercised by the wealthy elite. Hence in the diagram, this becomes thedominant colour - colour of financial power. In Marxist analysis, socialstruggle boils down to a struggle between people power and financial power.People power overcomes financial power only on rare occasions leading to aproletarian revolution. However Prout considers this analysis to beinadequate because it ignores the importance of cultural power.Cultural power is exercised predominantly by the middle class, and in Proutanalysis it is cultural power that is the deciding factor in socialstruggle.The middle class have a special relation to culture partly because of their education. But also the poor are usually too concerned about where their next meal is coming from to have the luxury of reflecting on culture. Andthe majority of the rich are more concerned about their overseas bankaccounts and tax havens. Therefore the responsibility for preserving andreproducing culture falls to the middle class.

According to Prout, many social struggles revolve around culture, hence theimportance of the middle class in social struggle. The dynamics of socialstruggle usually progress to a point where a community becomes polarisedbetween those who want to embrace socio-cultural change and those who do notwant change. Venezuelan society is in just such a condition.It is convenient to compare the two Venezuelan cultures, old and new, usinga few key words. You can certainly think of others.- The Old Culture: Privilege & Exploitation- The New Culture: Social Equality & CooperationWe now return to the consideration of the three kinds of power currently atplay in Venezuela's social struggle.Let us add a simplification. In order to accommodate the polarisation of Venezuelan society, we draw a line through the centre of the culturalrectangle. This signifies two almost equal but opposite cultural forces, theone for change, the other wishing to retain the culture (traditional for thelast 30 years or more) of privilege and exploitation. This is asimplification because it is clear that not all of the poor have embracedthe cause of change and perhaps there are also a few of the elite who cansee the need for change. But it is a useful simplification because itcontains enough truth to permit a clarity of thinking and in particular itallows one to plan appropriate social strategies.The strategy being pursued by the Venezuelan government at the present timeis to increase the social and cultural awareness of the poor, for examplethrough the establishment of the Bolivarian Circles. These are study circlesand crucibles for community planning. This is a useful and a worthystrategy. It would be pursued by any progressive government. In terms of our diagram, the effect is to increase the scope of the red colour (representingthe poor) in the bottom 'cultural power' rectangle and thus push the whitedividing line towards the right. But it is an insufficient strategy becauseit ignores the great danger posed by the disaffected middle class on theright side of the dividing line. The problem is that a large portion of theVenezuelan middle class apparently do not feel that the current changes inVenezuela offer them a future. This is a difficult and complex discussionbecause much of middle class thinking is dominated by the media and themedia is almost completely controlled by the elite who are totally committedto a culture of privilege and exploitation.The media like to create an impression that the Venezuelan middle class isopposed to the government of President Chavez. But clearly this is false. Alarge number of the middle class do support the cultural changes inVenezuela and for this reason it was possible for PDVSA (the Venezuelanstate-owned petroleum company) to recover rapidly from the cripplingmanagement strikes of early 2003. However it is clear there exists asignificant portion of the middle class opposed to the new Venezuelanagenda.The great challenge is how to convince more and more of this disaffectedgroup that change in Venezuela is to their long term advantage. The ideaoffered here is that an additional component could and should be added tothe government's programs - an attempt to win more of the middle class bydirect participation in its programs. This strategy appears as an additionalarrow in the diagram, situated on the divide within the middle class.

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