A New Road Map: Tawhid in the 21st century
And your Allah is One Allah. There is no god but He, Most Gracious, Most Merciful (Q2:163).Archive for responsibilities
Constraints and Restraints
The system of rights and responsibilities can be translated into concepts of constraints and restraints. A constraint is the state of being checked, restricted, or compelled to avoid or perform some action; it is externally applied. A restraint is a control over the expression of one’s emotions or thoughts; it is internally applied. An example of such would be Zakah and sadaqa. Zakah is a requirement on accumulated assets; it is a constraint on wealth, and the extent of our spending (we cannot spend what which is owed to another). Sadaqa on the other hand is the recommendation from Allah regarding our consumption choices.
Some authors assert that neo-classical economics is about constraint optimization whereas Islamic economics is about restrained optimization. This is not completely valid as there are both constraints and restraints in the Islamic system. This extends to production, consumption and distribution. We have strict boundaries regarding means and ends, with much leeway and guidelines for all.
Rights and Responsibility
Allah is the Creator of all, and He has rights over His creation. Man has responsibilities towards Allah; this also translates into responsibilities that Man has towards the rest of humanity and also towards nature because of his relations with Allah.
As we know, needs change over time. A need for today might not be one for tomorrow, and might not have been one for yesterday either. The selection of needs, and the criteria for distinguishing between a need and a want is elusive and temporally dynamic. However, our objective in life does not change. Allah has rights over us, and has made us His vicegerent. His rights over us do not falter, and our responsibilities towards Him do not change either. The only changes that occur are the means that we use to attain our objective and fulfill our obligations.
This viewpoint of rights and responsibilities is a subtle but striking difference between the needs-wants approach because of its starting premise. This difference permeates everything else that follows, and also impacts the rewards/incentives and deterrence structures that would be embedded within the social system that is formed on this basis of Tawhid.
Inadequacy of Neo-classical Economics
Neo-classics economics is a field motivated by greed or pleasure. It allows for a single-end, however it also asserts that choices are consistent, and globally continuous. Stated simply, it asserts that there is no difference between needs[1] and wants[2], and the Willingness to Pay (WTP) is the same as the Willingness to Accept (WTA). Behavioral economics makes a further claim by allowing choices to be inconsistent, however in a contradictory manner would also claim that there is global continuity in choice theory.
These baseline assumptions are inadequate to describe the reality of the day. All humans make the distinction between needs and wants, sometimes willingly, and other times under the duress of circumstances. Such a distinction automatically inherently implies localized continuity, rather than global continuity, and also some system of values that would help people distinguish between needs and wants. This multi-utility relation is thus an integral part of the case that can be used to refute neo-classical economics. As we know, economics is a tool to describe human behavior, not to create it, though it certainly plays a role by indoctrinating society regarding what it claims “ought” to be their behavior.
[1] Needs: Needs are best thought of as physiological or biological requirements for maintaining life, such as the need for air, water, food, shelter, and sleep. www.amosweb.com
[2] Wants: Wants are then the psychological desires that are not essential for life but that make life just a little more enjoyable. www.amosweb.com
