Populorum Progressio: Development and Law?

Abstract

In his Populorum Progressio Encyclical of 26 March 1967, Pope Paul VI raised the link between development and law as one of the most pressing matters for his and for future generations. This encyclical letter was preceded by the era of social teachings of the Church that had begun at the end of the 19th century with the Rerum novarum Encyclical. Pope John Paul II explained in Annus centisimus that Pope Leo XIII had already offered an initial conception of development to be applied to the juridical relations between masters and workmen. That doctrinal work was further extended by Pope John XXIII, in his 1961 Mater et magistra Encyclical, from social rights to the support of less developed areas, which was to be determined on the basis of justice and equity, and not by a mechanical application of the laws of the marketplace. Less than two years after the close of the Second Vatican Council, the advent of the Populorum Progressio Encyclical occurred within a global context marked by burgeoning prosperity in the West and by the often violent decolonisation process. Nations that had just gained independence were hopeful as to the prospects of improving their legal systems, of contributing to their own development, and of assuming their rightful place in the international community. Despite aid programmes, the disparities between developed and developing nations had increased dramatically. The study of the Encyclical Populorum Progressio may enable a better definition of the notion of development which, according to Pope Paul VI ought not be restricted to purely economic growth, but as ‘man’s complete development which should be understood and pursued in conformity with the dictates of moral law. The Encyclical may provide answers to questions as to the purpose of development, founded on social and legal equality, with the formula, ‘development: the new name for peace’.

2.1 Introduction

Just over 50 years ago, on 26 March 1967, during the celebration of the Resurrection, Pope Paul VI published the Encyclical Populorum Progressio, on the Development of Peoples, first written in French and translated—after the sta tutto bene (i.e., the endorsement) of the Pope¹—into Latin and other languages.² The announcement of this encyclical letter, which had aroused considerable interest, took place within the context of increasing disparity between the world’s nations with the gap widening between, on the one hand, the affluent and developed countries, and, the poor and less developed countries on the other, albeit in a world that had increasingly become closely interdependent. The opening words of the Encyclical are: ‘[t]oday it is most important for people to understand and appreciate that the social question ties all men together, in every part of the world’.³ Prior to the Populorum Progressio encyclical, Pope Paul VI had developed strong ideas concerning the globalisation of the social question that he had expressed through speeches he had made during his apostolic journey to India and his visit to the United Nations headquarters,⁴ the letter to the Director of UNESCO in August 1965,⁵ messages for the Social Weeks of France and for the celebration of Christmas 1966,⁶ and, lastly, through the Motu Proprio: Catholicam Christi Ecclesiam with which he created the Pontifical Council Justitia et Pace.⁷ Among the issues raised by the Encyclical of March 1967 is the question of the relationship between law and development in which the political and the spiritual are so obviously linked, with the express acknowledgement that both spheres are distinct, just as both powers—namely, the Church and the State—are sovereign, each with its own sphere of competence.⁸

In his speech of 20 April 1967, the Pope pointed out the links between the natural and the supernatural, the secular and the religious; he quoted the philosopher Nicolas Berdiaeff’s paradoxical formula: ‘[b]read for myself is a material issue, bread for my neighbour is a spiritual issue’.⁹ He was thus emphasising a proximity that ‘leaves intact—Paul VI notes in his speech to the Intergovernmental Committee of the World Food Programme—the clear distinction between a spiritual society, like the Church, and a temporal society constituted by the countries’.¹⁰ This issue, which maintains the distinction but at the same time establishes reciprocity between the two powers, has been studied through various sources rooted in the Lex Divina, that is to say, in the will to build the ‘Kingdom of Heaven’ on earth. As an introduction to the publication of the text, in April 1967, the French bishop, Monsignor Paul Poupard, from the Secretariat of State, presented the sources he had used, including Holy Scripture and Holy Tradition, along with other sources indicating the novelty of the doctrine. References to Holy Scripture can be found in Populorum Progressio, in particular verse 16:26, Matthew, applied to those who promote the supremacy of wealth: ‘[w]hat does it profit a man, if he gain the whole world but suffer the loss of his own soul?’,¹¹ then the verse 8:2, Mark: ‘I have compassion on the crowd’,¹² or the letter of James: ‘[i]f a brother or a sister be naked and in want of daily food, and one of you say to them, “Go in peace, be warm and filled” yet you do not give them what is necessary for the body, what does it profit?’.¹³

Pope Paul VI went on to maintain the social teachings of the preceding Popes including those contained in the Rerum Novarum and Immortale Dei by Pope Leon XIII, Quadragesimo anno by Pope Pius XI, Fideidonum, and several broadcasts, by Pope Pius XII, and in Pope John XXIII’s apostolical letters Mater et Magistra and Pacem in Terris.¹⁴ Lastly, the Second Vatican Council is cited multiple times—seventeen, according to Monsignor Paul Poupard—with Lumen Gentium, the Decree Apostolicam actuositatem, and especially the Pastoral Constitution Gaudium et Spes, ‘because its teaching is serious and its application urgent’.¹⁵ The Encyclical goes on to deal with the doctrinal novelty; references are made to modern authors, theologians, philosophers, and economists. In the text, the writings of Jacques Maritain are cited (L’Humanisme intégral¹⁶ and Les conditions spirituelles du progrès et de la paix),¹⁷ as well as the writings of British economist, Colin Clark (The Conditions of Economic Progress).¹⁸ There are further references to the writings of the Jesuit, Henri de Lubac, (Le drame de l’humanisme athée), of the Dominican M-D Chenu, close to the worker-priests, with his publication, Pour une théologie du travail.¹⁹ We also find expressions of Oswald von Breuning’s Economics and Society Today,²⁰ of The Pastoral Letter on Development and Peace by Monsignor Larrain Errazuriz, the President of the Latin American Episcopal Council²¹ who, it must be remembered, had in 1962 distributed 180 acres of land to 18 peasant families.²² Among the experts consulted, it would be a grave omission not to mention the Dominican Louis-Joseph Lebret, founder of the ‘Catholic Association Economy and Humanism’²³ about whom Pope Paul VI had written that: ‘[h]is memory must be kept, his work must be continued, his dream of Christian civilisation must be fulfilled’.²⁴

Thus, the sources, cumulatively, make clear the intentions that underpin the Encyclical: they are reminders of ‘the duty for the Church—which was founded to establish the Kingdom of Heaven on earth and not to conquer an earthly power—to be in the service of man’.²⁵ The message of the Encyclical thus ranges from the denunciation of injustice to the aim of achieving justice and peace via the means of development; from ‘a cry in agony to an appeal for hope’.²⁶

2.2 The Denunciation of Injustices

The text of the Encyclical highlights the deep crises that, despite the general prosperity of Les Trente Glorieuses (i.e., ‘The Glorious Thirty’ [years of relative prosperity between 1945 and 1975]), have actually been greatly increasing and have become chronic and global. During his journeys to Latin America (1960), Africa (1962), the Holy Land, and to India, Pope Paul VI noted the blatant disparities at play: ‘[t]here We saw the perplexing problems that vex and besiege these continents, which are otherwise full of life and promise. We gained first-hand knowledge of the difficulties that these age-old civilizations must face in their struggle for further development’.²⁷ Those pathologies that mainly plague poor countries are analysed—in Aristotle’s and Saint Thomas Aquinas’s views—as consequences of a perversion of purpose that benefits only a few and serves particular or unfair interests, in total disregard of the collective good; they are the effects of degenerate political and economic laws, termed ‘inhuman principles’²⁸ in the French translation of the Encyclical.

First, the authors point at the failure of political systems, and blame oppressive structures for their pursuit of power. The Encyclical refers to how ‘a privileged minority enjoys the refinements of life, while the rest of the inhabitants, impoverished and disunited, are deprived of almost all possibility of acting on their own initiative and responsibility, and often subsist in living and working conditions unworthy of the human person’.²⁹ The Encyclical opposes all attempts to exercise hegemonic domination. The imperial dream throughout history of ruling over the world is being criticised. To illustrate its rejection of the dominium mundi, the authors of the Encyclical refer to the recent colonial past, along with the condemnation of its excesses by stating: ‘[i]t is true that colonising nations were sometimes concerned with nothing save their own interests, their own power and their own prestige’.³⁰ However, those abuses of power are far from over, and the Encyclical warns against the re-emergence of ‘a new form of colonialism that would threaten civil liberty, exert economic pressure or create a new power group with controlling influence’.³¹

‘Just as much as totalitarian ideologies are criticised by Populorum Progressio, so are political systems which aim to isolate. The text denounces such systems to which it refers as ‘civilisations jealous of their own advantage alone’.³² and it also highlights the dangers of nationalism and racism. The Encyclical thus defines nationalism as an institutional system that ‘disunites nations and poses obstacles to their true welfare’,³³ and racism as ‘a cause of division and hatred within countries whenever individuals and families see the inviolable rights of the human person held in scorn, as they themselves are unjustly subjected to a regime of discrimination because of their race or their colour’.³⁴ Then comes the criticism of the economic norms considered unfair. Undoubtedly, due to the Cold War, Populorum Progressio barely mentions communism. That said, however, the Pope went so far as to state that ‘total collectivization and the dangers of a planned economy which might threaten human liberty and obstruct the exercise of man’s basic human rights’.³⁵ But the danger that the authors caution against at greater length is that of capitalism; Populorum Progressio condemns ‘unbridled liberalism’ which presents ‘free competition as the guiding norm of economics’ and ‘paves the way for a particular type of tyranny’.³⁶ According to Pope Paul VI, the law/rule of free trade alone must be rejected because it alone can no longer rule international relations. Moreover, concerned with the needs of the social collective, the Populorum Progressio encyclical refuses to endorse the right of property—enshrined by the French Declaration of 1789 and by the Civil Code—as absolute and unconditional.³⁷ A quote from Ambroise de Milan expresses this such communitarian sentiments in stating that: ‘[t]he earth belongs to everyone, not to the rich’,³⁸ which means, the encyclical goes on, to state that ‘the right of private property is not absolute and unconditional’.³⁹ In sum, ‘as the Fathers of the Church and other eminent theologians tell us, the right of private property may never be exercised to the detriment of the common good’,⁴⁰ and, thus, the Populorum Progressio places the fundamental needs of the collective above private rights per se.

But governments may also commit injustices. To prevent the political and economic abuses denounced in Populorum Progressio, the Holy See warns against violent popular reactions and ‘revolutionary uprisings that engender new injustices, introduce new inequities and bring new disasters’.⁴¹ Populorum Progressio adds that: ‘[e]vil may not be dealt with in such a way that an even worse situation results’.⁴² Nevertheless uprisings may be legitimate ‘where there is manifest, longstanding tyranny which would do great damage to fundamental personal rights and dangerous harm to the common good of the country’.⁴³ Intellectuals may see this as encouragement of Liberation theology, support for Jacques Maritain’s Neo-Thomism and Yves Congar, Marie-Dominique Chenu, and Louis-Joseph Lebret’s justifications. Furthermore, the encyclical put forward the notion of social sin—i.e., the sin of omission in the face of such disparities that may be rectified only by the practice of justice and peace.

2.3 A Development for Justice and Peace

Pope Paul VI, in emphasising the urgency to act, had stated: ‘[w]e must make haste. Too many people are suffering’.⁴⁴ To relieve the suffering of the people, the solutions proposed by atheistic and materialistic philosophy and above all, by liberal overconsumption, appear to be inappropriate. Populorum Progressio proposes a third way leading first to man’s integral development, and subsequently to mankind’s common development. Such intervention on the part of spiritual authority may be justified by the long presence of the Church in human affairs, ‘she [i.e., the Church] seeks but one solitary goal: to carry forward the work of Christ himself under the lead of the befriending Spirit. For Christ entered this world to bear witness to the truth, to save and not to sit in judgment, to serve and not to be served’.⁴⁵ First Pope Paul VI advocates the personal development of man Here the advice brings together tradition and modernity. The text is reminiscent of Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas’s thinking with the principle of distributive justice expressed by Roman jurists, in the suum cuique tribuere maxim, so as to guarantee their citizens their full human development, and to give them their rightful place in the community of nations.⁴⁶ But, above all, the authors apply the integral humanism of Jacques Maritain who proposes to the citizens to ensure their human fulfilment. It is a call for growth in humanity: each person can grow in humanity, enhance his/her personal worth, and perfect him-/herself. Self-development, however, is not left up to man’s option; the Encyclical refers to the duty of growth as: ‘[t]hus human self-fulfilment may be said to sum up our obligations’.⁴⁷ Man’s self-development, carried through by personal efforts and responsible activity, is destined for a higher state of perfection. And the authors list the areas of personal growth: education, freedom from poverty, health, adequate means of subsistence, job security, involvement in responsibilities, freedom from all forms of oppression—that is to say: to do more, to know more, to have more, so as to be more. On the other hand, in this vision of growth, the criticism of materialism is more nuanced. The authors make a distinction between the liberal law of profit, considered as harmful, and industrialisation whose contribution to humanity overall has been considerable.⁴⁸

Concerning colonisation, there is similar nuance at play. The Encyclical honours ‘those colonizers whose skills and technical know-how brought benefits to many untamed hands, and whose work survives to this day’.⁴⁹ Here we get a glimpse of the work conducted by missionaries, such as the work of Charles de Foucault who compiled a dictionary of the Tuareg language.⁵⁰ This contribution of missionaries demonstrates how the final goal of integral humanism may be directed only towards God. The encyclical reads: ‘it is a transcendent humanism which is the highest goal of human self-fulfilment’.⁵¹ The term integral humanism contrasts with that of a closed or horizontal humanism—i.e., that which is deprived of a vertical dimension—that is better suited to communist and capitalist materialisms. Pope Paul VI does not seek for opposites to converge; he blames materialism for remaining an incomplete, ambiguous, purely formal and even distorted form of humanism. In Populorum Progressio, one can read: ‘man can set about organizing terrestrial realities without God. But closed off from God, they will end up being directed against man. A humanism closed off from other realities becomes inhuman’.⁵² Conversely, growth, regarded as a vocation for each, enters the theology of History proposed by the Social Doctrine of the Church: ‘All men are called to this full development. Civilizations spring up, flourish and die. As the waves of the sea gradually creep farther and farther, so the human race inches its way forward through History’.⁵³

This vocation for growth leads to another aspect; that of the common development based on assistance to the needy. This duty of solidarity is accomplished through legal and technical measures that will prove difficult to apply. Faithful to Council Vatican II, Populorum Progressio resumes the tradition of the principle of the universal destination of goods as a limit to the right of property: ‘[a]ll other rights, whatever they may be, including the rights of property and free trade, are to be subordinated to that principle’. Pope Paul VI went on to list possible acts of solidarity, including the payment of higher taxes for development, paying more for imported goods, emigrating from one’s homeland to help emerging nations, protecting the natural family such as it is in God’s plan, and furthering ‘the nobility of work’, by personal and common efforts of every worker. For, ‘when work is done in common, it unites the wills, minds and hearts of men’.⁵⁴

The Encyclical also deals with the issue of the surplus of affluent nations that ought to be made available to poorer nations, and encourages the creation of a world fund requested by Pope Paul VI during his journey to Bombay. Then there is the part that collaborative programmes can play as they are necessary for ‘directing, stimulating, coordinating, supplying and integrating’⁵⁵ the work of individuals and intermediary organisations. For this collaboration, Pope Paul VI insists, in accordance with the Encyclical Ecclesiam Suam, on the necessity for dialogue between affluent and poor countries in favour of cooperation and against debt servitudes. By these practices of solidarity, the Holy See promotes not only the integral development of man but that of the whole of humanity, towards the fraternal goal of the common good. According to Populorum Progressio, such development is the new name for Peace.⁵⁶ On Christmas Day 1975, in his homily for the closing of the Holy Year, Paul VI announces the forthcoming civilisation of love as ‘the wisdom of fraternal love, which has characterized the historical journey of the Church’.⁵⁷ It is not hatred, struggle, or greed that will be its dialectic, but love, the love-generating love, and the love of man for fellow man.⁵⁸ And he declares that the civilisation of love may be ‘defenceless but it is invincible’.⁵⁹

2.4 Conclusions

Fifty years ago, the Encyclical Populorum Progressio on the development of peoples was issued to denounce the injustices of an increasingly interconnected world that was appearing increasingly more inhuman. The encyclical contains general instructions above all as to the proper path to development—i.e., that which aligns with the purposes of justice and peace—to fuller growth. This message was novel, mostly due to the fact that Pope Paul VI was addressing not only the Church, but also all of humanity. In June 2007, Cardinal Paul Poupard explained the consequence of this novelty, by recalling the visit of Pope Paul VI to the assembly of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) on 10 June 1969. The main aim is to prepare a common legislation ‘to express in rules of law that solidarity which is becoming ever more definite in the consciences of men’. In his speech at Geneva, the Pope had called for the development of an international law aimed at realising the quest to build a civilisation of love—in his address to the ILO assembly, the Pope had stated that ‘your legislative work must continue boldly and strike out resolutely along new paths, to guarantee the common right of peoples to their integral development and enable in each instance all peoples to become the artisans of their destiny’.