Introduction to IJWP June 2019

The authors of the four articles in this issue are contributing to the scientific study of political economy. Many contemporary political and economic policies are guided by beliefs, suppositions, passions, and interests, rather than historical analyses and scientific measurements that correlate policies and desired outcomes. In this environment there is endless partisan argumentation, name-calling, and attempts to use political or military force to impose the will and the opinions of one group on others.

Our first three articles are about measuring the impacts of different incentives on political economy. We are in a position today to move beyond the simplistic assumptions of Marxism, Capitalism, and other ideologies that describe political economy in terms of single assumptions, rather than a larger set of variables.

Today we can study the lived experiences of the United States, the USSR, Communist China, Norway, Venezuela, Saudi Arabia, and many other countries that have had different types of political and economic systems. Aristotle’s great treatise The Politics became a great classic because it comparatively analyzed the strengths and weaknesses of over 150 constitutions. But in Aristotle’s day, the economy was largely agricultural. Contemporary societies, whose economies include industrial, and information-age social institutions need comparative studies that will move us beyond ideological assumptions.

Our first three articles begin a discussion of comparative political economies based on four motives for production. These are:

• The administrative (A) motive, where people are told what to produce by a government or leader.
• The economic (E) motive, where people are given market incentives to produce for exchange or profit.
• The moral (M) motive, where people produce because they believe it is good and right to do so. And,
• The individual (I) motive, where people are driven by survival instinct to find or create something to satisfy biological needs.

Our first article is by Professor Akmal Gafurov, who developed the tools for quantifying, measuring, and mathematically analyzing the three social motives (A, E, and M). In his essay, he examines the history of the Soviet Union from this perspective with some insights about economic development solely on A- and M- motives that would surprise Westerners. He shows how this analysis can explain why the Soviet Union collapsed, while China’s adoption of E-motives enabled their dramatic growth.

Our second article, by Dr. Gordon L. Anderson, provides a response to Gafurov’s article suggesting that A, E, and M motives are all social motives and that an individual motive I-motive, grounded biological instinct that often leads to selfishness, should also be considered. And, he also suggested that hunter-gatherer societies, or kings that conquer, or political parties that try to ursurp power are rooted in this instinct to take rather than produce.

In his rejoinder, Gafurov argues that this “taking” which is the opposite of producing, can be quantified with a minus (-) number, since it is negative production. Anderson also explains how these different motives have operated differently in Western societies, oil-rich societies, the USSR, and China, indicating they provide a sound foundation for comparative scientific studies of political economy.

Our third article, by Chunjuan Nancy Wei, uses Gafurov’s method to describe the evolution of the political economy of China from classical China through Mao and Deng to Xi Jinping. China’s Communist Party, which adopted the e-motive (the strongest motive for production) led to the development of the Chinese economy by leaps and bounds, disconfirming the idea that one-party political rule is necessarily correlated with economic backwardness. However, China’s current economy, based on A- and E-motives is riddled with corruption (lack of the M (moral) motive).

While Wei does not raise the issue, there is a natural question this raises about the idea of China’s social credit score. Can, or should moral behavior (service to others vs. depending on others) be ranked by societies the way financial institutions rank credit worthiness? It appears that in China, one’s social credit score can be an important factor in choosing a marriage partner or membership in an organization, and not just a tool for the government to rank the quality of its citizens. However, people with a low social credit score are likely to be upset and attack such a system as discriminatory.

Our fourth article, by Professors Kunihiko Imai and Mariam Khawar place the study of politics in an even wider systems approach that includes the impacts of geography, culture, other social institutions, and economy on the governance system (democracy in particular). Democracy is not a political system that will exist simply by having a Constitution and a vote. Many countries that have tried democracy by simply having a constitution and election quickly degenerate into dictatorships or failed states.

One of Imai’s conclusions strongly supports Gafurov’s analysis. This is the idea the culture (values) has a direct influence on economic development, while geography and the form of social institutions have only an indirect impact. It appears that ultimately a moral motive, which encourages people to voluntarily produce, is required to replace the administrative motive, that forces people to produce, if a totalitarian or administrative state is to be replaced by a democracy.

Of particular interest to Imai and Khawar is whether Islam, as a set of cultural values inherited from the seventh-century a.d., is able to reconcile with democracy and economic development. Their results are inconclusive. Their analysis of many Islamic societies, which have a range of geographical conditions and institutional forms, neither confirms nor disconfirms any universal statements related to the compatibility of Islam with democracy or modern political economy.