Nothing personal with regard to Germans or Spaniards, but from a cultural perspective, it is interesting to me to consider the difference in "northern and "southern" cultures while I'm at it.... :-p
"The contagious nature of speed, and its intimate relationship to efficiency as a value in itself, is brought out clearly in a well-known story which exists in many versions. In the variant told by Heinrich Böll, a German tourist visits Spain and discovers, to his horror, a Spaniard dozing in the shade of a tree on the beach. The German approaches the man, a fisherman, and lectures him on the virtues of efficiency: 'If you had gone out fishing now in stead of wasting your time, he explains, you might have caught three times as much fish and bought yourself a better boat.' Eventually, he fantasises, the Spaniard might employ others and build a factory. He could become a rich man! 'What for?', asks the Spaniard. 'Well', says the German, 'you could have gone into early retirement, living off the profits and spend your days dozing on the beach.' 'That', says the Spaniard before turning over, 'is exactly what I'm doing.'
Something has run out of control. Time-saving technology has made time more scarce than ever. The wealth of available information has not made most of us more enlightened, but less enlightened." (Thomas Hylland Eriksen 2001, 77)
And I would like to add another quote and some of my own thoughts that relate to this:
"Speed is excellent where it belongs. But it is contagious, and it has possibly serious side-effects. Unless we understand how speed functions, what it adds and what it removes, we are deprived of the opportunity to retain slowness where necessary" (Thomas Hylland Eriksen 2001:59).
Now, I consider it among our tasks to 1) decide when speed and slowness are necessary and, 2) to consider what speed can add and remove from our lives and 3)take into account the consequences whenever we choose a fast or slow pace of life.
And I would like to add another quote and some of my own thoughts that relate to this:
"Speed is excellent where it belongs. But it is contagious, and it has possibly serious side-effects. Unless we understand how speed functions, what it adds and what it removes, we are deprived of the opportunity to retain slowness where necessary" (Thomas Hylland Eriksen 2001:59).
Now, I consider it among our tasks to 1) decide when speed and slowness are necessary and, 2) to consider what speed can add and remove from our lives and 3)take into account the consequences whenever we choose a fast or slow pace of life.
This reminds me of a story from "Global History" class at Uni, there it was told that the Dutch wished to increase production in their colonies (Indonesia). Their protestant-oriented mind was reasoning that if you offer people a better pay, they would work harder (this often seems still rather valid nowadays). So, they decided to pay their plantation workers a bit more, to encourage them to work a bit harder. What was the result? The workers worked a little less hard every day! :-p They had earned just as much, by working shorter! Since that was all they wanted and needed, they stopped work early and went home... This is much like the Spaniard in the quoted story... and I myself am quite fond of this aspect within that view of life, but of course, I do not know enough about it to judge it. I remember being thoroughly annoyed when travelling south in Europe as well because of things undoubtedly connected to this lifestyle... but it sure does inspire interesting reflections.
ReplyDeleteTheres a bit in david landes' book that shortly
ReplyDeleterefers to this difference in attitude and its
(supposed) economical consequence. I'll let you
know once i find it again -Flux
Thanks! :-) yes, it should be, that was the book we used in class ;-). Yes, let me know when you find it! Interesting stuff!
ReplyDeleteI have found the short reference in david landes' book.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately it is not similar enough to derive a
paralel:
it positions the "lazy" ( -from the efficient german's
perspective towards the spaniard in the example)
attitude in the countries seated close to the equator,
most of which were significantly less developed, as was
noted by john kenneth galbraith.
Landes does not link the lazyness to the character of
a people. If anything, he mildly attempts to refute it.
Hot and humid climates simply demand a more laid back
attitude towards work (as siesta's are very sensible
indeed) Nor does he attempt to establish a link
between the lazyness and the less developed states;
plenty of other strong effects related to tropical
climates that can single handedly explain why those
countries never had a chance to develop themselves
in such a way as to become or remain competitive
What the above example inspires me to is make the
following: striving for progression in your own work
is a healthy thing. if this even results in a
fundamental change (evolve from fisherman to running
a factory) other factors come into play. those effects
will stretch beyond your own needs (the need to have
-and enjoy- your own free time) and improve the
standards of living for all employees in the factory
as well as the population it supports. The increase
in efficiency would allow for excess resources to be
spent outside the factory and into the community.
sadly this spinoff would be missed if the fisherman
turns over and continues his dozing off on the beach.
Eriksen mentions "efficiency as a value in itself".
As i understand it, The German represents the extreme
advocate of this idea. The example is given to show
it for the imbalanced state that it is. I cant help
but ponder how much the spaniard would enjoy his time
at the beach, 10 years onward, after completing his
factory, and having it run by itself.. Indeed i have
an image in my mind of a restless man, not being able
to sit still, or remain in the moment. a succesful
man, a man of stature within his community, yes, but
a man left wanting.
If we are to remain economically competitive, to
colleagues, to other industries or nations, we
require efficiency. And we work it to perfection. In
doing so we safeguard our economic position. And risk
our connection to who we really are.
Thank you Flux for the elaborate and insightful reply!
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with your well-analysed dilemma here, between running for position in relation to others and/or connecting to ourselves.... this is a topic than concerns me much lately, and as you know, it is highly connected to (my perception of) time...
I have read Landes long ago, and it is interesting to be reminded of the relation between climate and character or attitude/different ways of development... to me this is rather all that there is to it: difference. The German the the afore mentioned example, seems to attach a high degree of judgement to his character and that of the Spaniard... and that is perhaps besides the point Eriksen wants to make, but it strikes me as important. It shows there are once again more factors in play then we deem obvious.
Becoming or remaining competetive is, I think, an attitude, fostered by a certain culture, the same way as perception and use of time may be influenced by culture, another big idea that hardly can be discussed here, but that nonetheless is interesting!
I follow your line of thought about the spinoff, and find it interesting, but I am not sure if I agree that it is sad that the spinoff does not reach the community... the big question here is: does the community need this spinoff? in other words: do we need all the crap factories produce in our society? you and I use rather little of the total of production, and sometimes I wonder who really needs to use much of it... Another point connected to larger production is: larger waste, more damage to the environment, less slow time (since you are encouraged by producers to buy their products even if you dont need them, so you "have to" work more to earn more to buy more... while you could have enjoyed the day dozing in the shade of a tree, that would still be there if it was not cut to build yet another factory...)... so... I dunno about this really....Then there is the point that the more is on offer, the more greed may be stimulated... another thing that I wonder we need....
Yes, Eriksen mentiones efficiency as a value, and I think he himself is very aware that this is a bad thing... efficiency is a virtue, when you perform a task, it is a means, to create something efficiently for example, this is a value, the ability to work efficiently, but regarding efficiency as a value in itself to me is a flat out danger, the same way as valuing money for itself is dangerous, in my opinion, it leads to loss of perspective and that is always regrettable.
In my opinion, it is all about the balance between the self and the other, but this is getting highly philosophical :-p
Thanks again for the comment! It's fun reflecting in it!