The Bottom of the Economic Development Ladder

Here is my Saipan Tribune column from Friday.

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How do we, who are having such bad economic times here, stack up compared to the rest of the world? Where are we on the world's economic development ladder? I don’t know much about economics, but these questions were recently asked of me, so I thought I’d find out. Economic development, as it turns out has a fascinating history. Economist, Jeffrey Sachs, describes a four step ladder, as a way of viewing the world in terms of economic development. The first step, which I’ll describe today, is not really a “step” because it’s not even on the ladder. It is “extreme poverty.”

Today one billion people – one sixth of the earth’s population – live in extreme poverty. This "bottom billion" is so economically destitute, that their very survival is at risk on a daily basis. Their lives are fragile. They live with drought, famine, starvation. Any small change can make the difference between life and death – a storm that wipes out meager crops, being struck with a simple disease, but having no access to medicine to treat it, late delivery of food – all of theses sorts of threats are very real, and can mean death to entire populations living in extreme poverty. If there is any income that comes into the hands of those in extreme poverty, it is counted in pennies per day.

For much of human history, the vast majority of the world’s population has lived in extreme poverty. Our ancestors struggled for their very survival, in a harsh world, with a fragile existence. Wealth, above extreme poverty, did not become accessible to common people until the mid 1700’s. It is only since about 1750 that humanity has climbed onto the first rungs of the economic development ladder.

Extreme poverty does not exist in developed countries. It is a condition that afflicts swaths of the developing world. Seventy percent of the extreme poor live in Africa. Ten to fifteen thousand of them die of preventable causes, like hunger, malaria, and dysentery every single day, day after day, year after year.

The tragedy of our times is that such dire circumstances affect one billion of our fellow men, women and children, in a world with such vast resources.

One of the goals of the United Nations is to wipe out extreme poverty by the year 2025, and to cut it in half by 2015. It requires commitment from wealthy nations, but I think it also requires awareness by the rest of humanity that such conditions exist and that solutions are available. The bottom billion require assistance to get on the economic ladder, to move from extreme poverty to just regular poverty. It is a small step, but the most important one in terms of the survival.

The CNMI's Untapped Resource

Here's my column from today's Saipan Tribune.

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A friend of mine recently asked me to think into the future and come up with a vivid image of the “ideal” CNMI. What will be the Saipan that will emerge from the crucible of changes we are going through? Vision helps define our path, and the more clearly we can define our vision, the more chance we have of actually getting there. One of humanity’s guiding pieces of literature, the Book of Proverbs, states, “Where there is no vision, the people perish.”

As I began to think about the ideal CNMI, I realized that my initial thoughts are not related to our industries or our economy or our landscape. My primary thoughts focus on our most important resource, a largely untapped and latent resource: the human beings that populate this land. It’s far more important for me to live in a place where the people are vibrant than to live in a land where all the infrastructure is developed, and the economy is booming, but the people are not.

I realized that I had gone through a similar exercise about seven years ago. At that time, I was involved in creating what we hoped would become a world-class school. We sat down and defined the vision of the institution. We didn’t focus on the buildings and grounds and income. Our vision was focused on imagining the type of people we wanted to emerge from the school. And even then, we didn’t ask, “What do we want our kids to be when they grow up?” We asked “What do we want our kids to be like when they grow up?”

And so again, as I ponder the future of the Commonwealth, I think that we need to focus our vision on the people. What do we want to be like? As I sat at a table defining the vision of Brilliant Star School, we all tried to imagine our children as adults, in a room with other people, and we imagined what we hoped they would be like. We distilled all the thoughts and images into four key qualities.

As I thought about my friend’s challenge to imagine the ideal CNMI, I realized that in my mind these same four qualities will define the vibrant person of the Commonwealth. There really is nothing to prevent us from excelling as a community, to be a global showcase of vibrant people. We have developed many vibrant individuals who personify these four qualities, but the untapped potential is vast. The only limitation placed upon us is in our own minds, and our failure to visualize the possibilities. Now, as we are swept up in profound changes, we have the opportunity to define our vision for the one resource that will define the future of the Commonwealth more than any other – the people. A vibrant people will naturally develop an economically and ecologically vibrant community. But by focusing first and foremost on economic fixes, we are placing the cart before the ox. It’s time to think primarily of the people, and to define a vision of what we will be like as individuals and as a society.

Here is my vision of the four defining qualities of the people of the future Commonwealth. They are the same four qualities that define the vision of Brilliant Star School.

• Global understanding. We recognize that the world of the 21^st century is one of increasing interdependence among peoples and nations of the world. We recognize the fundamental truth of the oneness of humanity – that all people are one. Our policies derive from this reality. We are comfortable as “world citizens”, with a global perspective and understanding of issues. We are free from all forms of prejudices -- race, national origin, ethnicity, language, economic status and religion. We recognize the equality of the sexes, and we celebrate the diversity of the world’s peoples and cultures. We are promoters of unity.
• Exemplary Character. We recognize that ultimately, the strength of ones character is the essence of ones self. Character is that set of virtues that are developed in an individual. We have developed, foremost among our virtues, truthfulness, trustworthiness, kindness, courtesy, compassion, confidence, joyfulness and humility. We are emotionally and spiritually well-developed.
• Service to humanity. We recognize that meaning and happiness come from selfless service to others. We strive to find ways to serve others – our friends, families, neighbors and co-workers; our community; and humanity as a whole.
• Creative minds. The creative mind is one that can bring knowledge to bear on new situations and challenges. To this end, we are well versed in the branches of knowledge, with emphasis on mathematics, literature, science, history and arts. We have learned to independently investigate reality, to seek intelligently, and to discover things for ourselves. We practice applying this body of knowledge and this set of skills to the challenges around us. We use our minds to become agents of meaningful change in our communities.

It is not only possible to move in this direction. In my mind it is imperative. What is your vision of the people of the future Commonwealth?