Bhutan and Happiness centered development
paradigm, Thimphu, Bhutan.
Bhutan coordinated a conference of Happiness
Experts from 30th January – to - 2nd February, 2013. They
were in search of the elusive path to a new development paradigm that could
replace the decades of GDP and GNP centered development goals. Ordinary Bhutanese had no role but the brief
news in the media provided a glimpse of the diversity within ( maybe confusion
and turmoil ) of views that prevailed amongst some 40 or more international
experts and Bhutanese proponents of Gross National Happiness.
Is it possible to work out a realistic and
practically meaningful framework, for a new development paradigm, centered on
human happiness that can be a viable substitute for the decades of GDP guided
economy that promoted materialism and consumption? Some experts felt that Bhutan
had advocated this business of happiness and therefore Bhutanese should show
the way whilst few shared an equal sense of responsibility and still for others
it was a forum to expound their individual or organizational agenda on democracy,
environment and social affairs.
One thing was clear, the Bhutanese nine
domains of happiness was adopted as the basis for conference to work upon
because the experts had no pre-prepared proposal nor could they agree on
alternate dimensions during the 1st
day of brain storming. And definitely they were hard pressed for time and
therefore condescended to work upon these nine domains with an escape clause to
add a 10th domain if called for.
From the few cursory articles in the media and
three interviews telecast by BBS, somehow it did not strike to me, that the
experts have had a realistic grasp of the task, ‘framing a conception for a new
development paradigm that would be focusing on human happiness, post the millennium
goal (2015)’. They were hopeful but not at all confident of going about the
task at hand. Few even were washing their hands off with such remarks as : “the
Bhutanese people should make clear how to go about this” ; “it is Bhutan’s call
and it is Bhutan’s show” ; “the report must go under the aegis of Bhutanese
government.” (reference: Kuensel)
If only Bhutan had the intellectual capacity
and financial resources, to frame a conceptual happiness centered road map (internationally
acceptable and workable diagram) for a new development paradigm on our own, the
Bhutanese person by now would be in the 7th heaven. We need outside
finance, experiences and intellectual inputs to find a trek-able path to
achieve the goal we have set, “being happy”. And if this path is discovered, it
will provide the highway for other nations to speed on.
Happiness should have been the very purpose of
life beginning from the 1st life and maybe like many ironies in
life, we the human beings realized this purpose only when we reached the end of
our lives. By then it’s too little of happiness and too late in time to again
revisit our life journey.
However, more than two centuries ago, a
founding-father of a nation wrote down his moenlam (prayer) for his nation, “Life,
Liberty and pursuit of Happiness…” Whether that nation pursued happiness or
domination, one must leave it to experts to debate and squabble and for
historians to write the epitaph. But what cannot be disputed is that a Buddha-like-nation-founding-father
realized that the happiness of its citizens must be the guiding goal of a great
nation.
Several decades ago, a young Buddhist King of
a little known Buddhist Kingdom of Bhutan resonated this very theme of happiness,
“Being happy is more important than being wealthy”. And this wisdom was fashioned
to relate to the acceptable jargon of development concepts such as GDP and GNP.
Thus the birth of Gross National Happiness (GNH).
His
Majesty King Jigmi Singye Wangchuck experienced what life was, absent of
happiness. By destiny he was born to be a King and by fate of life he was
pre-maturely crowned the King in 1972 at the age of 16. The young King was
faced with the titanic task of healing the agony and the wounds of the broken
royal families and at the same time provide anchor to a rudderless nation that
was at imminent danger of sovereignty risk. For a long time, happiness and
peace of mind was a scarcity beyond the grasp of His Majesty.
In being a King, he had the temporal powers
and by Bhutanese’s meager standard, the King could be considered wealthy. But happiness
was more elusive to him than to a yak herder in the mountains of his Kingdom.
Therefore, when he said, a few years later, that his priority was to secure
happiness for his people, he meant it from the bottom of his heart. It was not
a statement of political, economic or social definition of his reign. It was
what he missed most in his early reign and he did not want his people to be
also deprived of the true essence of life, “Being Happy”.
The foundation of happiness at national level
is achieving peace and security. And at family level it’s sharing love and pain
and at community level (village or world) it is sharing the burden and the
privilege. Joy, ecstasy and comfort contribute to sense of being happy but these
are not happiness in themselves. To a Caribbean lying on a white sandy beach
under a palm tree could be pure joy. A young couple in loving embrace may
experience ecstasy and there is comfort for elderly couples in sharing the same
bed. Being happy is more than just being religious, having food and shelter or
experiencing pleasure. It’s just not restricted to equal opportunity and
justice and freedom from fear and aggression. It is attaining the moral height
of accepting ownership and onus in equal proportion. It is respecting other’s
space without having to fight for one’s right. It is the ability to appreciate
the strength of the male and charm of the female ( law of nature ) and the
protection of the weak (mother’s instinct) and principles of community
co-existence ( sharing the burden and privilege ).
Unlike the fields of economics and science, happiness
has no set formulae. It is a conciliatory effort that needs to be constantly
energized at different levels and at various stages of life between persons,
communities, races and nations to make possible for the rich and the poor, the
strong and the weak to attain their level of satisfaction and harmony in life.
Pillars of happiness need to be grounded upon
the field of reasonableness. Being reasonable is accepting what belongs to
others to be theirs. Therefore it is not proper or decent to demand that the
fruits of other’s labour (wealth) be distributed. Rather the call must be for sharing
the burden and the privilege. The common desire must be to seek accommodation
with and not domination over neighbour, race or nation.
In co-existence of communities, lies group happiness
and in family harmony, lies individual member happiness. At individual level my
happiness must not be the root cause of your illness. And at international
level, your national supremacy must not subjugate my national aspiration. Only
then peace and harmony can prevail and thus provide the foundation of human
happiness at world level. Thus the new development paradigm must be based on selfless
investments and policies to promote national wellbeing and which fosters individual
and community happiness for the present as well as for the future.
GDP and GNP still have relevance to individual
and national pursuit of life but no longer in the pivotal way that had been
defined in the earlier decades because we now know that wellbeing is one level
above the economic comfort of food, shelter, health and education. Happiness
cannot be defined but it can be felt and seen. If Bhutanese truly achieve happiness
it will be noticed by others without the need of explanations and statistical
measurement of dominant scales.
In the far future, when the Nations of the UN
Family understand that their aspirations need to be in complementary with that
of their fellow neighbours, the seed of happiness would germinate. And the Kingdom
of Bhutan would then have truly contributed to the wellbeing of the human
being. Until then the Bhutanese leaders, the assorted pool of international
experts and UN Agencies need to keep juggling the dominos and weighing the
dominant factors in search of the path to the illusive plateau of happiness
even after the spring of 2014 that may see at the UN, a detailed and complete
report on the new development paradigm.