Prime Minister BoJo It Is.

[Valmy]

I do not question the basic proposition that Islam, like most religions, can have deleterious effects on a nation's economic and scientific development.  it's relative contribution in particular instances, however, is very hard to measure.

Well then that was all I was getting at. The statement was that religion had nothing to do with it. Now was it everything? No. But we have ample documentation about how Islam played a role in how intellectual life eventually became stifled. It had something to do with it.

Also I am not sure economic growth is what I was really that measure here. Otherwise I guess Wahhabism is the greatest thing ever and we should all convert. But I think there are other measurements that we could use to describe its impact on Saudi Arabia, and I disagree that it would be that hard measure them.

[Oexmelin]

But I think there are other measurements that we could use to describe its impact on Saudi Arabia, and I disagree that it would be that hard measure them.

What would be your measure?

[Berkut]

My beef is not that religion should be seen as the primary factor, but just that there is this clearly ideologically motivated desire to pretend like it doesn't matter in some cases.

Like I said, we can, and should, argue about the relative impacts of various ideas on progress. And even what me mean by progress. And the world is a complex place, so there is rarely, if ever, singular causes.

But only Islam, now, gets some kind of demanded pass when it comes to specifically religious ideas that are clearly, well, terrible by any rational, objective measure.

And every time any of them are mentioned, immediately, the response is "Well, that isn't a religious idea! Look at all these other people who think that!" or "Well, in that case, it was actually some other reason other than religion that drove keeping women illiterate!" even while we can just look at the data and note that literacy rates by this particular religion at particular points are clearly segregated. You can play games with every single data point if you start with the goal of needing to make sure to find a reason not to find religion as being the driving factor.

But step back and talk about the power of ideas in general, and nobody is going to sit here and say "Oh yeah, I actually don't think mandating creationism has no effect" or "Yeah, <insert regressive religious idea here> in general is perfectly fine and has no effect".

ANd when it comes to specifically Islamic religious ideas, that just gets downright political. Suggesting that islam has any kind of ideas that are specifically religious and specifically damaging is met by immediate emotive hostility.

Tell me more how throwing gay people from buildings isn't really a negative on society.

Or is that not really a religious idea, because there are non-religious people who have killed gays as well?

[Razgovory]

What oppressive religious doctrine held China back?

[jimmy olsen]

Tokugawa Japan is a ket example - they had an empire that explicitly stifled progress in the name of social stability; the putative leaders of the nation recognized this policy as fundamentally unworkable when the Americans showed up in battleships, and all the Japanese had to counter them was a handful of obsolete cannon and a bunch of Samurai; they then discarded it (leading to both progress and disaster). Religion wasn't a big factor for them, except negatively ('keep Christianity out' being a major Tokugawa goal - because it was seen as the thin edge of the European dominance wedge).

This is a flawed analysis. Japan under the Tokugawa shogunate underwent significant population and economic growth, which naturally led to an increase in social and economic complexity that put the nation into position to quickly industrialize as soon as the country was opened.

Read this book to find out more
https://www.amazon.com/History-Japan-R-H-Mason/dp/080482097X

[Valmy]

But I think there are other measurements that we could use to describe its impact on Saudi Arabia, and I disagree that it would be that hard measure them.

What would be your measure?

Actually it might very well be that economic growth is a good measure. I think I was just a little frazzled by how bad Minsky's examples were.

First: British Colonial rule was not particularly enlightened. In fact they had this Burkean view that the organically developed institutions of the people should be preserved and worked through existing institutions all the time, even institutionalizing certain things like the caste system and blasphemy laws and morality laws and many things that are generally considered quite regressive. To the extent it was enlightened, by things like establishing universities in India which allowed Indians from different regions and groups to get together and explore ideas, kind of undermined the whole imperial system. And that was really an attempt to train midlevel bureaucrats, not really an attempt to create an enlightened India.

Secondly: I don't think India dramatically changes from a fundamentalist religious state to a secular one depending on whether the BJP or Indian National Congress is in charge at any given time.

As far as this:

Pakistan has and does have very serious challenges to development in that it is still a significantly tribalized society with feudal rule still dominating the countryside and endemic corruption and crime problems in the cities. I believe this condition is not directly related to Islam and would hold regardless of what religion was commonly practiced. That said, it is impossible to fully disentangle religion from the broader culture in which it is embedded.

Well I guess I agree if they had a similarly restrictive religion being a constitutional basis they would probably be in the same place. Sunni Islam is not the only reason a country might have oppressive and restrictive thought crime legislation with the blasphemy laws and persecution of the Ahmadi minority. I am sure those things are not helping their situation.

[Valmy]

What oppressive religious doctrine held China back?

Being conquered and made second class citizens by foreign Manchu invaders? Confucianism?

[Monoriu]

What oppressive religious doctrine held China back?

Being conquered and made second class citizens by foreign Manchu invaders? Confucianism?

The Manchus didn't treat the Hans too badly.  Second class citizens, sure.  But lots of high ranking officials were Hans.  There was also an unspoken rule that the top three scorers in the imperial exams would not be Manchus (who already have much better ways to advance, no need to block all Hans). 

[The Minsky Moment]

First: British Colonial rule was not particularly enlightened.

That was sarcasm

I would also not consider Saudi Arabia an economic success story - despite sitting on massive wealth they have struggled for decades to diversify the economy, with minimal success.

Sunni Islam is not the only reason a country might have oppressive and restrictive thought crime legislation with the blasphemy laws and persecution of the Ahmadi minority.

Indeed - for example, Thailand's lese majeste laws. Or China's Great Internet Wall. Or Russian control and intimidation of their press.

[Agelastus]

Minsky, what do you think of Timur Kuran's ideas -

http://faculty.las.illinois.edu/esfahani/Courses/MENA%20Files/Papers/Kuran%20-%20Why%20the%20Middle%20East%20Is%20Economically%20Underdeveloped.pdf

He seems to have written a book with the same basic thesis -

https://press.princeton.edu/titles/9273.html

I've seen some reviews that suggest that he seems to have overlooked or misunderstood some aspects of Islamic law concerning commerce etc. (Plus that his vast list of sources only includes about 2 works in Arabic suggesting he could be being influenced by a reliance on secondary literature; a weakness common to many historical works, of course when writing in one language about an area with a different language.)

[Tonitrus]

Indeed - for example, Thailand's lese majeste laws. Or China's Great Internet Wall. Or Russian control and intimidation of their press.

Not Sunni Islam sure, but Putin and the Russian Orthodox Church have been happily jerking each other off in a very cynical play at dominating their respective realms of Russian society.

[Valmy]

Indeed - for example, Thailand's lese majeste laws. Or China's Great Internet Wall. Or Russian control and intimidation of their press.

Sure. It is not the case that Sunni Islam was the only oppressive system ever fashioned in the history of the world. Only that it was and is an oppressive system in Pakistan and other places.

[Malthus]

Tokugawa Japan is a ket example - they had an empire that explicitly stifled progress in the name of social stability; the putative leaders of the nation recognized this policy as fundamentally unworkable when the Americans showed up in battleships, and all the Japanese had to counter them was a handful of obsolete cannon and a bunch of Samurai; they then discarded it (leading to both progress and disaster). Religion wasn't a big factor for them, except negatively ('keep Christianity out' being a major Tokugawa goal - because it was seen as the thin edge of the European dominance wedge).

This is a flawed analysis. Japan under the Tokugawa shogunate underwent significant population and economic growth, which naturally led to an increase in social and economic complexity that put the nation into position to quickly industrialize as soon as the country was opened.

Read this book to find out more
https://www.amazon.com/History-Japan-R-H-Mason/dp/080482097X

No, both accounts are completely compatible.

Remember what I said above about power being a relative measure? Falling behind other nations doesn't mean no progress, it just means progressing more slowly than the competition.

Just because a nation undergoes "significant population and economic growth" and/or "an increase in social and economic complexity" does not mean it is capable of competing in great-power stakes with other nations. Tokugawa Japan realized this when it was forced to face the outside world, by American battleships it had no answer to.

[Malthus]

What oppressive religious doctrine held China back?

Being conquered and made second class citizens by foreign Manchu invaders? Confucianism?

The Manchus didn't treat the Hans too badly.  Second class citizens, sure.  But lots of high ranking officials were Hans.  There was also an unspoken rule that the top three scorers in the imperial exams would not be Manchus (who already have much better ways to advance, no need to block all Hans).

The decay of the exam system in China is a perfect example of how religion is not necessary to have an ideology that stifles innovation.

When the exam system was first developed, it was centuries ahead of anything in the West - a mostly impartial, merit-based system of choosing officials.

Over time, however, the *content* of the exams became increasingly standardized and ossified - the so-called "eight legged essay" format, in  which exam-takers were forced to repeat stale thoughts on the Confucian classics in an extremely rigid manner, success at which demonstrated the ability to learn by rote rather than to think independently. Since all that mattered was passing the exams, all teaching effort was put into crafting the perfect essay; teaching of knowledge for its own sake was not prioritized.

The Chinese at the time lamented the stifling effect of this system, but since worldly success depended on mastering it, nothing was done to change it.

Some scholars have made exaggerated claims about the deleterious effect of the exam system on Chinese innovation - I think it was as much a symptom as a cause.

As early as the 17th century, the form's adoption was blamed for the decline of classical poetry and prose during the Ming Dynasty.[citation needed] The critic Wu Qiao wrote that "people exhausted themselves on the eight-legged essay, and poetry was only composed with their spare energy."[citation needed] Writing at the same time, the political theorist and philosopher Huang Zongxi echoed these sentiments.[8][11] Also, the essay did not allow for any personal opinion and was completely impartial.[12] As a result, it led to the gradual narrowing of people's innovative thinking and consequently their minds, thus achieving a constraining effect on Chinese people and the nation.[2] The eight-legged essay has been associated with the "petrification in Chinese literature" and "China's cultural stagnation and economic backwardness."[1][12]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eight-legged_essay

[The Minsky Moment]

Minsky, what do you think of Timur Kuran's ideas -

http://faculty.las.illinois.edu/esfahani/Courses/MENA%20Files/Papers/Kuran%20-%20Why%20the%20Middle%20East%20Is%20Economically%20Underdeveloped.pdf

He seems to have written a book with the same basic thesis -

https://press.princeton.edu/titles/9273.html

I've seen some reviews that suggest that he seems to have overlooked or misunderstood some aspects of Islamic law concerning commerce etc. (Plus that his vast list of sources only includes about 2 works in Arabic suggesting he could be being influenced by a reliance on secondary literature; a weakness common to many historical works, of course when writing in one language about an area with a different language.)

I'm a huge fan of JEP - lots of digestible, layperson friendly articles on interesting subjects.

I can't speak to his characterization of medieval Islamic commercial law, but I don't entirely agree with the argument.  Both the Christian and Islamic traditions have a strong aversion to lending at interest.  Religion can't explain why those scruples were overcome more easily in one part of the world then another.

There is an assumption that corporate organization was a key factor in Western economic development which I think is questionable.  Medieval corporate bodies were communal, protective and generally anti-commercial in mentality.  Early modern corporations up to fairly deep into the 19th century tended to take the form of state-sponsored monopolies and concessions, often as a way for the state to extract revenue or to pay off favored elites.  In early American law, there is a strong strain of hostility to corporations for that reason.  The modern day private autonomous and "competitive" corporation is a late development.  [EDIT AND ASIDE - and perhaps is returning to its earlier troubled roots . . .]

I think the piece correctly identifies or alludes to commercial innovations in the West areas like bookkeeping, private commercial contracts, means of commercial communication, and financial innovations like bills of exchange.  I don't think religious law or institutions played much role here - canon law and Church vs. Islamic law and Islamic institutions.  believe the key driver here is what Malthus alluded to earlier - the high levels of political fragmentation in the West and the challenge of conducting transaction across a dizzying array of legal and political jurisdictions forced innovations to address those difficulties to allow people of different cultures and languages to make private commercial arrangements without assistance from - and often in the face of hostility from - such public authority as existed.