Book review: "Selling Spirituality"

Selling Spirituality

Jeremy Carrette and Richard King (2005)

ISBN 0-415-30208-0 (hbk); ISBN 0-415-30209-9 (pbk)

Abingdon: Routledge - 194pp

It is easy to believe in the existence of this book.  Someone was bound to write what is essentially a Marxist critique of the New Age.  But where Marx saw contradictions in capitalism which provided sources of hope for the future, the analysis of this book is unremittingly negative.

The authors demonstrate that the contrast between "religion" as a set of traditions, and "spirituality" as a "pick-and-mix" individually chosen collection of beliefs and practices assembled differently by each individual, corresponds very largely to the contrast between traditional societies and the contemporary West.

The authors then point out that Asian forms of religion have been particularly affected by the transition from "religion" to "spirituality" in the course of their reception in the West.  Yoga, for example, has become divorced for most of its practitioners in the West from its original context within Hinduism, and much the same process has taken place in the case of some forms of meditation, such as Transcendental Meditation (TM).  The result is that much of what passes for "eastern spirituality" in the West turns out to be very different from the traditions it derives from in Asia.

This transition brought about by modernity has been shaped very much by the world economic system - capitalism - and this shaping and reshaping is continuing today.  Since capitalism is a system of exploitation and waste, the things it shapes are inherently suspect and perhaps themselves inherently exploitative.

Put together, these points imply a "thumbs down" response to alternative and New Age spirituality.  The criticisms made apply particularly to what has been done with Asian religions in the West, which are the primary focus of the book, but the argument applies also to contemporary appropriations of Celtic, shamanic, and other forms of spirituality.

If the authors of the book had left their argument there, it could have been fairly persuasive, even though not telling the whole story, which must surely include the potential for ideas and movements shaped by capitalism nevertheless also to contain something which embodies different values and approaches to those contained in the capitalist system, perhaps even pointing eventually towards transcending that system.

In fact, very near to the end of the book, Carette and King express their hope that in the future there will be liberatory varieties of spirituality and interpretations of religion which can provide a source of alternative values and forms of society, even to the extent that they believe that this - rather than support for secular forms of socialism or other social movements - will in the future be the most important source of radical opposition to globalised capitalism.

But how do they get from their critique to that hope?  The answer must be that, in this book at least, they don't.  Their analysis is so negative that the liberatory potential they want is nowhere to be seen.  The simple reason for this is that they overstate their argument, because on top of their points about the shaping of "spirituality" by modernity and capitalism, they add an identification of capitalism with "individualism" and the individual which strikes me not only as historically implausible as an account of the past but also a serious misreading of where the potential for radical change lies today.

I don't doubt that there are some forms of New Age spirituality shaped very largely by capitalism, by the need not to frighten potential "customers" by talk of radical social change, and by the demand which exists amongst both management and some employees to find a form of spirituality which fits easily with the requirements of profit-orientated business.  "Prosperity consciousness" without ecological consciousness or compassion for human beings is an unattractive phenomenon.

Where the authors go much further than this, however, is in their often repeated view that capitalist tendencies are inevitably to be found in "individualism" and "the self".  Since "spirituality" - as distinct from religion, with its organisations, communities, and traditions - is all about individual experience and the development of the self, the authors argue that it is therefore inherently capitalist in a way which religion is not.  They do not, however, appear to be particularly concerned that religious organisations, communities, and traditions are often oppressively hierarchical or unjustly discriminatory: their strong preference is for anything social and communal against anything "individualistic".

This book draws attention to the emphasis on "self-realisation" to be found in alternative spirituality and the emphasis on the transcendence of the self to be found in much of the religious tradition which alternative spirituality supposedly derives from.  This "self-realisation" emphasis also opens the door to what they see as a poisonous fusion between alternative spirituality and ideas and practices from psychotherapy and psychoanalysis.

"Self-realisation" - "individualism" - capitalism.  According to the view elaborated in this book, it all goes together , and therefore the authors surprisingly manage to combine a Marxist critique of capitalism with a not-at-all Marxist defence of traditional Hindu, Buddhist, Taoist and other forms of religion.  It is an odd combination in view of Marxism's generally oppositionist and modernist attitude towards Asian religion, but nevertheless a combination of a stance of  "post-colonialism" with condemnation of "bourgeois" individualism holds the package together.

The position set out in "Selling Spirituality" raises interesting and important issues, both about the past and the future, and in both respects I believe the authors are wrong - though consistently interesting.

The supposed connection between the "individual" and capitalism is stated and restated in this book, rather than actually argued for.  It is taken for granted, in just the same way as it has also been taken for granted by liberal defenders of capitalism, who see it as the only economic system which can maintain individual liberty.  Yet historically, individualism is far older than capitalism.  It can be seen not only for a time in Ancient Greece, but on a longer-term continuing basis within Christianity, where the individual's sense of self and connection with God was cultivated for many centuries, particularly through monasticism, before capitalism came along. 

Capitalism took hold of the psyche and rhetoric of individuality and shaped it to its own purposes, creating its particular form of individualism, one geared towards profit-seeking through the mobilisation of more and more features of the world as "resources" and "inputs" to the production process.  This is capitalist individualism, but it is not individualism as such, and it is not all that individualism has to offer.  Liberalism became a philosophy of the defence of private property and property rights; yet it started off as a defence of religious freedom and the individual's freedom of conscience about what to believe. 

Alternative spirituality can be seen as an attempt to liberate individualism from the attempted and partially successful capture of "the individual" by capitalism; an attempt to explore individuality beyond the confines of the capitalist version of what it means to be "an individual".

Historically it should concern us that the condemnation of "individualism" as inherently capitalist has a pedigree which runs through Stalinism and the suppression of dissent by supposedly "socialist" authoritarian regimes.  If we ask whose interests were served by the concept of "bourgeois individualism", it has to be seen that it served the interests of the party bureaucrats pretty well, helping them to isolate and outlaw those who wanted a more libertarian form of socialism to develop as an alternative to both capitalism and Stalinism.

Turning to the future, the thesis of "Selling Spirituality" in my view completely undervalues the potential of alternative spirituality as a result of the hostility to the "individual self".  Some selves and types of self, and ways of conceiving of the self (such as the unpleasant "economic man" of neoclassical economic theory), can clearly be seen as capitalist in orientation, but it doesn't follow from this that all selves are.

In fact, there are good reasons for believing that the development and deepening of individual subjectivity might be a sort of contradiction of capitalism which alternative spirituality is helping to push further.  Capitalist business and government have a quieter life if employees and customers do as they are told and obey orders both in the workplace and the marketplace.  They don't particularly need people's authentic individuality.

If employees and consumers develop their sense of individual wishes and objectives "too much", they will want to shape the workplace and marketplace around their own interests, not those of their employers or the multinational corporations.  This "awkwardness" is a problem for capitalism, especially in its contemporary phase, as it more and more seeks to manipulate the psyches of its consumers and employees through intrusive marketing and management techniques.  A healthy individualism will resist all this - will skip the adverts on TV, demand extra time off from paid work to look after young children, for example - whereas a relatively passive population would accept it.

The deepening of individuality, and the battle for mental space and free time which it requires, very often leads people to the realisation that there is more to life than the acquisition of consumer goods and progression up the corporate career ladder.  In this sense, it contributes to a "post-materialism" which is potentially challenging to the existing economic system.  Alternative spiritualities are contributing to that deepening and exploration of individuality - something the authors of this book disapprove of.

One thing they particularly don't seem to like is people trying to cope with stress and pressure.  This is seen as bourgeois "accommodation" to the capitalist system.  Barefoot Doctor's books, for example [e.g. Russell 1998], are seen as inherently capitalist because they give people advice on ways to cope with life in the capitalist system.  Yet there is no evidence that people who get stressed out and fail to cope are more revolutionary and radical than those who manage to cope in their lives.  It is not wrong to be able to cope, nor is it wrong to write books which may help some people to cope better than they otherwise would.

Another thing the authors disapprove of is people making "individual" efforts to make their "individual" lives better, on the grounds that this undermines collective provision.  But do they seriously imagine that supporting a well-resourced National Health Service is incompatible with also accepting some responsibility for the maintenance of one's own health?  Or that wanting a good state-funded education system means that we never need to bother reading a book or watching an educational TV programme for ourselves?  The depth of their antipathy to "individualism" blinds them to the possibility that good and equitable collective provision is perfectly compatible with a sense of individual responsibility and the development of self-realisation.

In fact, most of the radical social movements of recent decades have drawn their strength from exactly this combination of the individual and the collective: feminist consciousness-raising groups in the 70s were about individual self-exploration as well as political analysis; the black civil rights movement was about self-respect and pride as well as about equal social rights; and the ecology movement has combined an emphasis on individual life-style and sensibility with a commitment to responsibility for the planet as a whole.  Radical and left-wing politics at its best has always been about the flowering of people's potential, with collective action and collective provision as a means of achieving that, not as something to replace and repress it.

Along the way, within their basic structure of argument, the authors make some other points which have the potential to irritate the reader.  Under the umbrella term of "capitalism", the local shiatsu practitioner struggling to make a living through charging clients rather than giving their time and effort for free is lumped together with vast multinational corporations.  Under the umbrella term of "imperialism", even what seem to me at the very least harmless, and at their best amusing and inspiring, Barefoot Doctor books are condemned as standing "in a long tradition of European colonialist attitudes towards Asia." [page 89]  There is also a great hostility shown towards apparently the whole of psychology because, of course, it deals with "individuals" and is therefore seen as inherently capitalist.

No consideration is ever given in the book to the possibility that modern Western adaptation (or "appropriation") of Asian traditions might ever constitute an improvement, even if only just a mutation better suited to a new terrain, the terrain of modern and postmodern Western culture, in which individual subjectivity has already become very important.  It would also be wrong to see Asian religious traditions within Asia itself as static, as they also seek to adapt themselves to dealing with new conditions.

Nor is there any consideration for the possibility that the distinction between "self-realisation" and transcendence of the self may not be as clear-cut as it appears at first sight, and that something interesting might be going on in the territory in between these two apparently opposed alternatives.  The idea that the development of individuality might be a necessary stage to be transcended later on has been put forward by Ken Wilber [Wilber 1996], and an argument for the importance of self-affirmation as a necessary part of feminist spirituality has been put forward within the Christian tradition by Mary Grey [Grey 1989]. 

Nor that individuals may face problems, such as old age and death, which no amount of social action and collective provision will ever do away with, despite the authors' claim that "Individual dis-ease is always in part a dis-ease of society" [page 85]. 

Is there anything good to be said about this book?  I think there definitely is, because it elaborates very clearly the implications of the basic position the authors take up.  That position is expressed with great clarity, the logic is impeccable, the assumptions are easy to spot, and some interesting factual information is presented along the way.  I see it as a sort of cautionary tale about what you would end up thinking if this was your starting point.

Secondly, despite my criticisms of the authors' position, I believe there is a need to be on our guard about what the functioning of the capitalist economy can do to spirituality, and that there are forms of New Age spirituality which are limited or distorted in the ways the authors are concerned about - even though I believe this to be less of a problem than they suggest.

It is surely right too to be careful to make distinctions between Asian spiritual traditions and developments of those traditions in the West.  This does not necessarily imply that there is anything wrong with these Western developments, but it is nevertheless helpful to point out where the differences lie, and to alert us to the fact by choosing a Western adaptation we are not guaranteed to get the original "authentic" version we might think we are having access to.

And there is also a positive hope put forward in this book, that there can be an emancipatory fusion of radical politics and spirituality.  That thought is hardly elaborated here at all, even though many examples could usefully be given of people and movements which have made important contributions in this area, and there is a great deal of interest to discuss [for some examples, see Roddick 2003].    

The last-but-one sentence of the book is provocative: "The emergence of new forms of engaged spirituality grounded in an awareness of our mutual interdependence, the need for social justice and economically sustainable lifestyles, may yet prove our best hope for resisting the capitalist excesses of neoliberalism and developing a sense of solidarity and global citizenship in an increasingly precarious world." [page 182] 

Maybe the authors could make that the first sentence of their next book, in which I hope they will elaborate the implications of that thought with as much thoroughness and persistence as they have employed in elaborating the more negative thoughts they presented in this one. 

                                                                                                                 Victor Anderson

References

Grey, Mary, 1989, Redeeming the Dream, London: SPCK.

Roddick, Anita, 2003, Brave Hearts Rebel Spirits, Chichester: Anita Roddick Rublications.

Russell, Stephen (Barefoot Doctor), 1998, Barefoot Doctor's Handbook for the Urban Warrior, London: Piatkus.

Wilber, Ken, 1996, A Brief History of Everything, Dublin: Gill & Macmillan.

17.8.05