Get the latest delivered to your inbox
Privacy Policy

Now Reading

The Mountain House Statement

Repairing Our Stewardship of Creation: Abrahamic Social Thought and the Global Economic Crisis

The Mountain House Statement

Repairing Our Stewardship of Creation: Abrahamic Social Thought and the Global Economic Crisis

Published 10-11-10

Submitted by Caux Round Table, The

The Caux Round Table today announces the release of The Mountain House Statement setting forth a common position among the Jewish, Christian, and Islamic traditions of social thought on sound ethical values to be used in management of the global economy. The Mountain House Statement offers hope for the world. The Statement can be found at www.cauxroundtable.org.

This Mountain House Statement is significant because it derives from the Abrahamic traditions very practical lessons for the conduct of finance and business. The Statement provides express support from the common social teachings of these religions for the necessity of taking a CSR/Stakeholder approach to business decision-making. These lessons align religious conscience with appropriate risk-taking in private markets.

These lessons are:

    1) Acceptance of limitations - that whatsoever we seek to do must be approached with humility.

    2) Acting always as a fiduciary - we are, each one of us, stewards of creation, duty bound to be constructive and not selfishly exploitative.

    3) Since power and wealth divert us from responsible conduct, great power and great wealth dramatically increase the risks of business and financial failure from cupidity, negligence, and arrogance.

    4) Religious conscience offsets the risks attendant upon power and wealth so religious faith should be present in economic and financial undertakings to ensure their long-term success.

Exactly two years ago, the global economy was brought to crisis by a collapse of credit markets upon the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers investment banking house in New York City. Public funds and guarantees in the rough amount of 14 trillion US dollars contributed primarily by national governments were needed to prevent a global depression brought about by failures in private credit markets.

The depression was thus avoided, but the debt hangs on to restrain the resumption of economic growth in many economies. Reforms in laws and regulatory practices have been suggested, and some have been adopted, to prevent a recurrence of such a collapse of confidence in credit markets.

From the perspective of the Caux Round Table, however, reforms in laws and regulatory policies will not be enough. A principal cause of the crisis lay in poor judgment and lack of elementary prudence, such failings in turn driven by a prior collapse of sound personal values.

If morality and ethics played a role in causing the crisis, then morality and ethics need to play a role in preventing future credit crises.

But whose morality and whose ethics may be advocated to change behaviors in financial markets? We live in a world of many cultures and many religions.

This Mountain House Statement is therefore significant because, for the first time, it brings together the resources of the Abrahamic religions in one common and constructive approach at a time when conflict and divisiveness among and within these faiths are so sadly prevalent.

The Caux Round Table is convinced that common to many religions are certain core principles of humility and responsibility with respect to risk that can be surely relied upon to fashion personal codes of conduct in financial intermediation. The Mountain House Statement reflects this truth and is an important step towards finding future expressions of a common moral truth for the human family.

The Mountain House Statement was collaboratively written by distinguished scholars from the Jewish, Christian and Islamic faith traditions. They were convened at Mountain House, in Caux, Switzerland, by the Caux Round Table, His Eminence Theodore Cardinal McCarrick, former Archbishop of Washington, DC, Ronald Thiemann, Bussey Professor of Theology and former Dean at the Harvard Divinity School and Ibrahim Zein, Professor of Islamic Studies and Comparative Religion and Dean of the International Institute of Islamic Thought and Civilization at the International Islamic University, Malaysia.

For questions and further information, please contact:

Stephen B. Young
Global Executive Director
Caux Round Table
6 West Fifth Street, 3rd Floor
St. Paul, Minnesota 55102
Phone: (651) 223-2852
Cell: (651) 336-4812
Email: steve@cauxroundtable.net

Rabbi Aaron D. Panken, Ph.D
Assistant Professor of Rabbinic and Second Temple Literature
Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion
1 West 4th Street
New York, NY 10012
Phone: (212) 824-2219
Fax: (212) 674-5179
Email: apanken@huc.edu

Irfan Ahmad Khan, Ph.D
Director
Association for Quranic Understanding
3244 West 167th Street
Markham, IL 60428
Phone: (708) 596-5412
Fax: (708) 724-5009
Email: irfanakhan7@yahoo.com

David W. Miller, Ph.D
Director
Princeton Faith & Work Initiative
Associate Research Scholar and Lecturer
Princeton University
5 Ivy Lane
Princeton, NJ 08540
Phone: (609) 258-6956
Email: dwm@princeton.edu

Caux Round Table, The logo

Caux Round Table, The

Caux Round Table, The

Vision: Our VISION is for a world with - Rising Living Standards, Social Justice and Human Dignity for All Our vision is all about being obsessed with better possibilities for all. This vision is not small; to facilitate change for the better in humanity's ability to raise living standards, provide for social justice and realize the fullness of individual human dignity in all our days is a challenge of massive proportions but it is a challenge we readily accept. To achieve it, we will have to inspire and lead with inspiration and courage.

Mission: Our MISSION is twofold:

* To promote moral capitalism and responsible government

* To ensure greater prosperity, sustainability and fairness in a global economy.

These are our overarching goals and priorities. They translate our vision into a concrete view of our direction and purpose.

We believe Moral Capitalism is the only system with the potential to reduce global poverty and tyranny and address the needs and aspirations of individuals, societies, and nations.

As Stephen Young, the Executive Director of the Caux Round Table has written, "the challenge of moral capitalism is to tip the balance of wealth creation toward humanity's more noble possibilities and away from the dynamics of more brutish behavior."

The Caux Round Table stands for movement from aspiration to action. We straddle the ideals of principles and of ethical concern for the common good and the practical needs of businesses and governments to "get it right" in their actions and decisions. To facilitate implementation of a more moral capitalism, the Caux Round Table provides decision-making guidelines in the form of principles for business, principles for governments, principles for NGOs, and principles for the owners of wealth. The Caux Round Table futher provides a comprehensive risk assessment approach to CSR and stakeholder relationships, Arcturus, and a way of encourageing individuals to reflect on their decision-making styles to move from self-centered frameworks to stakeholder frameworks in business and public policy decision-making. We also provide educational programs for company directors, CSR certificates, and handbooks on CSRT for small and medium size enterprises and on the practice of moral government.

More from Caux Round Table, The

Join today and get the latest delivered to your inbox