Social Innovations from the Global South

by Susan Singh (Ghana '63-'65)

It was suggested that we do a newsletter issue on inventions from Asia, Africa and Latin America that can benefit the whole world. This article will describe some of the social innovations that came to my mind in thinking about the topic. I hope it will stimulate some more thoughts in our readers and that through you we will be able to come up with a more complete list. Hazel Henderson, the futurist, has suggested that the rapid pace of technological development has created a great need for social innovations, that social innovations are much more desperately needed today than new technologies.

Nonviolence

Often it is difficult to trace the cultural origin of an idea, because it has been the product of intercultural dialogue. I was startled to read lately that Thoreau had studied Buddhism, even translated the Lotus sutra from French into English. Gandhi of course was inspired by Thoreau and transcendentalism was one of the strands he used to weave his philosophy of nonviolence. The cycle from India to Walden Pond and back to India being complete, it began again as Martin Luther King transformed Gandhian nonviolence into a form of nonviolence appropriate to the United States. So nonviolence as a crucial social innovation is multicultural in origin, comparable to reggae or salsa, products of centuries of cross-fertilization between Africa, the Caribbean, and Latin America.

In the same vein as nonviolence, South Africans are undertaking a unique experiment in making a peaceful transition from a severely segregated society into a multicultural democracy. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission, set up for two years, is charged with taking testimony from victims and perpetrators of human rights abuses and politically motivated torture and murder. It seeks to create an atmosphere of dialogue and open encounter between those who disagree.  It will leave an authentic historical record of the human rights abuses that occurred under apartheid, as well as those instigated by the liberation movements. Hopefully this open discussion will speed the healing of the whole society and avoid the extremes of either mass trials and imprisonments or turning a blind eye to the abuses of the past.

Development

In 1958 a young teacher began Sarvodaya Shramadana Sangamaya, a community development movement that is now active in 8000 villages in Sri Lanka. They define development as waking up to the true potential of individuals, particularly as they work cooperatively with others to meet the needs of their community. They ask villagers what they need, and when common goals emerge, they organize the community to attain them, largely through their own work together. They define 10 basic human needs: 1) a clean and beautiful environment 2) clean water 3) clothing - 6 sets 4) food 5) housing 6) health services 7) communication and transportation 8) fuel 9) education 10) cultural and spiritual development. We in North America could certainly benefit from remembering basic human needs and the unity that comes from working together to meet our community's needs.

Microlending

Microlending offers small loans to small business owners, often women, who use their profits to improve the lives of their families. It seems to have been independently developed in Bangladesh by Mohammed Yunus of the Grameen Bank, in India by Eli Bhatt of the Self-Employed Women's Association, and in Latin America by John Hatch, of FINCA. It proves itself successful over and over again in moving borrowers and their families out of poverty and is therefore rapidly expanding throughout the Global South. Attempts to adapt microlending to alleviating US poverty do not yet have a long enough track record to be able to say with assurance that the model works equally well in the North, though there are promising programs in existence.

The Chipko movement of the Himalayan foothills of India understood the ecological importance of trees before science demonstrated their significance. Although "tree huggers" has become a term of denigration, the women of Chipko knew their traditional livelihoods depended on trees, particularly species such as oaks that had been traditionally grown in the area. Too much logging or planting of single species led to floods, erosion, drought, and climate disturbances. In 1978 Saralal Behn wrote "We must remember that the main role of the hill forests should be not to yield revenue, but to maintain a balance in the climatic conditions of the whole of northern India and the fertility of the Gangetic Plain." The Chipko women sing "What do the forests bear? Soil, water and pure air. Soil, water and pure air. Sustain the earth and all she bears." They trace their inspiration back to 300 members of the Bishnoi community in Rajasthan who sacrificed their lives to save their sacred khejri trees by clinging in them.

Will Alexander, in a letter in this issue, draws attention to the success of Kerala. Although it is one of the poorest areas of India, it has accomplished miracles in terms of quality of life as evidenced by low birth rates, long life, widespread literacy and education, and gender equality. As it is not ecologically possible for everyone on Earth to live like Americans do, Kerala gives us hope that a high quality of life can be attained with a low level of consumption. Kerala has not received much press in the US, possibly because many of their social innovations were developed under elected Communist governments, but whatever their origins, Kerala is an inspiration to those looking for the tools humanity will need to meet the challenges of the future.

I'm sure the above innovations are just a few of the many gifts given to us by the many people who live in the Global South. Send us your examples.