Things have been frantic since October and seem to be starting to settle a little for a little.

The book editing is done. It was done too fast and it really should have had more time. The book is now published and there are many errors but they are irritating more than crippling. The book is readable.

With all of the political turmoil here, the conference was postponed. We met last week and have decided to reschedule for April 9-11.

This was/is problematic for me. My promotion and my contract to teach next year were deep-sixed for ridiculous and counter-able reasons. I had initially said to just forget it all as it was clear that there was a faction of people here who do not want me here and I was just tired. I was planning to return home and just forget my PhD work. My current contract ends March 1. This would have meant that I could not be here for the conference. This was problematic for the conference because if I am not here, I am sad to say, the conference will not happen. Apichai suggested that I allow him to reopen my contract and promotion negotiations and kind of let them know that without it, the conference dies. With that, I asked him if it would be possible for me to have a one year, unpaid leave of absence to go home and do research for the PhD. He agreed.

I think what this means (note that this is Thailand and anything can change at anytime) I will be going back to the States in May sometime. I will stay in the states for a year and spend time doing the research for my PhD focusing on a comparative analysis of faith based economics and determining if they can be integrated to a whole that augments each of them and allows for cross communications. It might also provide me time to work on writing a basic text book for Buddhist Economics. (The one course I am needed for here is Buddhist Economics and it will not be offered again until June of 2010.)

This would allow me to go back to the States and talk with people there like David Loy at Xavier U in Cincinnati, Bernard Leitar (and the Marpa Center for Business and Economics at Naropa U. in Colorado), easily access English literature and be able to bounce ideas and discuss in English.

I also need to look into the possibility of having the ligament in my knee repaired. When I was in Uganda last year, I tore the ACL in my right knee and it needs to be repaired. There is no one here in Thailand who does the surgery. I don't have a clue as to the cost or where I can get the money to do the surgery but I need to do something because it is crippling me. I have discovered here in Thailand that life is lots of interrelated spirals and my health spiral includes bone spurs in my heals, the bad knee, the opposite hip, an injured rotator cuff, my weight and high blood pressure. And one changes and it affects all of the other ones. I need to get this taken care of because my way of dealing with it all for the last year has been to meditation and control the pain. In the meditation retreat we did this week with the students, my concentration got diverted from dealing with that pain and I discovered how much effort I have been expending pushing this pain away. I want that energy (and the years it has to be taking from my life) back.

So, Bronwen and I will finish up the work with Buddhism, meditation, ethics and sustainable business this week and she will be returning to England and then I just have to finish out the semester and settle down to getting the "newly reborn" conference back on track. Two or three of us are talking about using the papers from the conference to write a more accessible book on mindful economics.

OK. Off to do some work after 24 hours of forced bed rest for the knee.

A quick note to explain my absence.

Last week I was "dubbed" to edit Aj. Apichai's book on Buddhist Economics for its English publication. It is a huge task and needs to be done very quickly at an inopportune time (the new semester starts on the 3rd and the book needs to be done no later than the 7th. I only found out my teaching schedule for next semester yesterday and it is 20 contact hours a week of course I have never taught before!).

I am about 20% done and have found this particular job to be exhilarating. It is a challenge of my English, my knowledge of economics, philosophy, history, Christianity and Buddhism. I finished the long introductory first chapter that overviews and summarizes each chapter in the book yesterday and as I was reviewing it for print, I sat back knowing that I was the only person who could have done what I did in 5 days. It felt good.

OK...its 4:53 am here and I promised myself I would be editing by 5...tata

Some of you know that I have been fighting a long term battle with cheating in my classes. It's not just me. All of the foreign teachers have had problems with it. And it's not just that the students only cheat in classes taught by foreigners. It is a complex cultural issue. In many ways, the children are taught to cheat from the day they are born.

Thailand is well known for her corruption and general lack of respect for intellectual property rights. Just about every computer in Thailand has a windows operating system but I would be surprised if there were more than 1% that were legitimate. They even sell fake certification stickers. DVDs are pirated, bribes are paid to every level of public official and much of it quite out in the open. In all of the current political turmoil in the country, cheating and vote buying is at the center. The people do not see the connection between the case where they are stopped by a police officer and pay him a bribe and the politician who wants to get elected paying a farmer for his vote.

Cheating is defined by wikipedia as

Cheating (also called gulling) is an act of lying, deception, fraud, trickery, imposture, or imposition. Cheating characteristically is employed to create an unfair advantage, usually in one's own interest, and often at the expense of others. Cheating implies the breaking of rules. The term "cheating" is less applicable to the breaking of laws, as illegal activities are referred to by specific legal terminology such as fraud or corruption. Cheating is a primordial economic act: getting more for less

In a culture where there is little value placed on creativity and ingenuity, advancement is dependent on position and getting the position is dependent on either a hierarchical advantage or cheating.

If you combine this with the normal competition of succeeding in University, regardless of what culture, and the fact that these students are studying in a second language that they are not good in, you might be able to start to appreciate the problem we are facing.

As we look to establish a program preparing undergraduates to deal in the area of international business we are challenged with the task of teaching them how to look at other cultures and the differences that exist. The task of preparing them to be able to interact with people who are different than they are and who work under different rules is important. There are countries that will not work in Thailand because of the corruption problems. When you are in a country where a bribe is considered a requirement and you are from a country that views that act as an indictable offense, there is a tension that arises. Our task is to prepare these students to work with international companies in a way that does not put the international businessman at risk.

Last year an Academic Misconduct Policy was written, evaluated and translated into Thai. At the beginning of this academic year, the faculty in our program were told that it was the driving policy. There were fliers distributed declaring the faculty a "cheat free zone". The students were all presented with the policy on the first day of class and it was explained and discussed.

To make a long story short, I have had a serious problem with students violating the Academic Misconduct Policy. And I have had problems with the Thai faculty members supporting the policy. I have promised to resign. I have had students ask me not to.

I have thought about all of it. I said that I would resign because I really didn't want to be associated with a faculty that did not support ethics. I still don't.

I want to see these young adults grow.

I was afraid that I was imposing a culture that was not theirs. I didn't really know how to proceed. So yesterday I went to visit Shikamat Jinda, my Buddhist nun friend at Srisa Asoke.

Results?

My ethical expectations are no different than hers. Christian - Buddhist, both find this behavior objectionable. We share the same desire to see the students rise above this aberration of their culture.

I did not feel comfortable with the "Academic Misconduct Policy" because it is negative. It is nothing but punishment of behavior. In this case it also happens to be quick, drastic punishment of behavior that they have for more than 15 years of their short lives been taught is acceptable.

I will be proposing to the International BBA program faculty a new approach.

The Mission, Vision and Philosophy of the faculty lifts up that we graduate students who have good business basics and are diligent, ethical and socially responsible. We have a way to evaluate academics. This year we instituted a way to evaluate diligence. There is really no current program for social responsibility or way to evaluate it. I will propose that we institute a recommendation of community service and a special certificate for a minimum participation in community service projects either those organized by the university or even better, ones that the students or program come up with on their own. Then, regarding the ethics....

The University and the Faculty academic affairs committee are willing to fail a student for cheating on an in-class exam. (That is the only think they consider cheating.) I say, OK. Work with that. Then, in addition, in our program, we continue to cite and document ethics violations. If the student goes a semester without an ethics violation, one of the violation citations disappears. Two semesters free of violations and 2 more disappear. Etc. At the end of their academic career, we look at their progress in all of the areas. In ethics, if there remain no or some minimal number of violations, we issue a citation that the student has demonstrated an understanding of ethical behavior....in some suitably dignified language. Then, we look at all four areas and one student is selected as the best over-all graduate weighing all areas. Maybe it won't be the student with the highest GPA. But it will be a huge honor. Maybe we can even find a sponsor for it who will provide an award.

I have already set in motion a class next semester in Buddhism for the first year students (the ones who are studying only English, remedial maths and study skills) so that they can at the get-go understand the basis for what we are trying to do. Following that with a course in their first academic year on business ethics and 3 consecutive semesters in "ethical" economics.... Maybe instead of axing students who just haven't had the opportunity to learn to be ethical, we can provide the opportunity and incentive for them to change.

Where we start in life isn't nearly as important as where we land up.

Who's Online:

• Linda Nowakowski
• David Bale
• Gayle Rogers
• John Powers
• Ray Brosseuk
• Mark Grimes
• Evvy Bryning

Makes me want to just hand around and enjoy the company rather than get into the faculty. I could spend a couple of minutes or a lifetime with that crowd of friends!

I will leave Ubon after the conference in December.

At the moment I am devastated.

These are our submitted papers so far:

Adel Daoud (Sweden)

• The Economic Ethic of Material Simplicity: Deflating Human Material Wants

Alex Kauffman (Thailand/US)

• In Search of Alternative Food Systems for Healthy Thai Communities

Alex Mavro (Thailand/US)

• CSR: The Road to the Sufficiency Economy

Georg Erber (Thailand/Germany)

• The Principle of Greatest Happiness in Western Economic Thought and its Relation to Buddhist Economics

Hans Luther Followed up 24 Aug (Thailand/Germany)

• Buddhist Economics & Niche Markets - Combining Two Concepts

Joel Magnuson - (USA)

• Mindful Ecology and Economy: Integrating Buddhism and Institutionalism into the Community Corporation for Sustainability

Laszlo Zsolnai (Hungary)

• Non-violence in Economic Activities

Marja-Leena Heikkilä-Horn (Thailand/Finland)

• Pyidawtha – The New Burma U Nu’s Plan On A Welfare Burma

Mate Janos (Hungary)

• On The Principles of Promotion of Buddhist Economics

Michel Bauwens (Thailand/Belgium)

• From Pre-Modern Immaterial Economics To Trans-Modern Peer To Peer Economics.

Michel Plaisant- Zieneb Ouni, Nirundon Tapachai and Prosper Bernard (Canada)

• Ethics for Buddhists and Christian managers: a first step

Mogden Buch-Hansen (Denmark)

• The Challenge of Buddhist Economics to Contribute to Sustainable Development

Muhammad Ajmal (Pakistan)

• Philosophical principles of Buddhist Economics and their application for Muslim Societies

Peter H. Calkins and Anh-Thu Ngo (Thailand/Canada)

• Theravada Macroeconomics

Peter Daniels (Australia)

• Climate change and Buddhist economic systems: A scientific, ethical response

Robert Biswas-Diener (USA/UK)

• The “What, Why, and How” of Happiness Measurement in Buddhist Economics”

Ruaysoongnern (Thailand)

• Development Situation and Constraints of Moral Organic Rice Network in Yasothon

Supawadee Khunthongjan (Thailand)

• A Study of the Entrepreneurial Characteristics that Fortify Sufficiency Economy: Case Study of the Enterprises Participating in the Sufficiency Economy Contest Organized by the Office of the Royal Development Projects Board

Tim Kasser (USA)

• How Materialistic Vs. Intrinsic Values Tie In With Economic Systems

Wanna Prayukvong (Thailand)

• Buddhist Economics Approach to Institutional Entrepreneur: A Case of Business Firm from Thailand.

There will be a few more stragglers.

Plus the Keynote speaker will be Phra Payutto the author of Buddhist Economics: A Middle Way for the Marketplace.

We will be starting off everything with a convening of the Conquiry - a group being built to support educators and participatory development.

There will be a Discussion group led by Aj Sulak Sivaraksa on theory to support practice in Buddhist Economics, another on Practice to Guide the development of Theory, and yet a third on Buddhism in the business place in Thailand.

There will be field trips to The international Forest Monastery, Rachathani Asoke Community and the experimental sufficiency economy community on campus.

The final day we will be doing Asian launches for a new Journal, *Interconnections* and I think for Mark Albion's new book, *More than Money: Questions Every MBA Needs to Answer* and a workshop on Gross National Happiness.

I got an email today from a woman in Laos who has a documentary film that she made on Buddhist Economic Development in Tibet that she would like to air at some point.

All sounds very interesting and very exciting. And it is all keeping me way too busy.

I will be there plus we will have Aj. Apichai, Jeab, Nat, Bill and Boy. Does that make it a <Ned> gathering?

EDIT for links

I have written a lot that referred to Buddhist Economics but I have never really defined it because I had never really seen a good definition. I have kind of convinced Aj. Apichai that a good definition is needed - in English- so that we know when we read an economics paper if it is really Buddhist Economics.

I saw a paper that I wanted to read that was by a bloke (I can say that 'cause he is from Australia) that I met at the Conference last year in Budapest. His name is Peter Daniels and he is a <Ned> bloke too! The place I found it on the internet wanted me to pay an arm and a leg for the paper but I wrote to Peter and groveled and begged to see if he had an electronic copy he would share with me. He did and he sent it to me. I am not through the article yet but it is totally awesome.

I want to share a table in the paper:

Characteristic	Mainstream (neoclassical economics)	Buddhist economics
Main Actor	Individual as producer or consumer (rational economic man)	Individual on the path to enlightenment; (but inextricably tied to the social and natural environmental spheres)
Main motive for economic action	Material accumulation for satisfaction of endless wants for oneself or close social unit; typically solitary, asocial material gains	Provide and maintain basic material needs for higher order spiritual fulfillment; social need fulfillment; collective goals (personal happiness part of "other-regarding" goals)
Ultimate goal	Maximum individual profit or utility from income maximization, consumption capability and service from material accumulation (enhanced by relative reductions in resource use and costs)	Nirvana; liberation from material world attachment as the source of suffering (Samsara). In economic life, to maximize well-being with minimum levels of consumption.
Process of achieving ideal outcome	Free market mechanism, competition	Awareness, wisdom; Dharma teaching to adopt in all action
Ideal political system	Capitalist market economy	Uncertain; some compatibilities with social market models. Collective principles important; key behavioral and goal-setting role for informal institutions such as social norms, mores and habits.
View of nature,; material reality	Permanent; unlimited; subject to universal laws; collection of mainly free, productive resources; substitutable with human produced capital. Reduce exploitation usually has negative human welfare effects.	Illusory but important context (behavior in determines progress in next stage); universal natural order. Reverence for all life. Nonrenewable resource use as violence. Minimum exploitation/intervention brings greater happiness.
Explanation of the most important universal phenomena	Rationality	Rationality
Time-space relations	Euclidean; equilibrium forces	Impermanence; cyclical and recursive
Underlying ethical basis	Ignores analysis under claimed positive, value-free approach (legal resolution); in reality, market competition and acceptance of most means of profiting from exchange; maximum material accumulation = maximum happiness. Tolerance through pluralism and individual amorality	Strong ethical basis permeating all activity; morality based on the wisdom of the four Nobel truths
Desirable individual virtues	Self-interest, hard work, entrepreneurship; charity if successful	Compassion, kindness
Peace	Assumed unaffected by competitive interaction, loss and waste and conflict over scarce resources; enhanced by resulting wealth	A major goal based on compassion, empathy, trust, self-sufficiency; reverence for life above individual material fulfillment
Individual-society relations	Liberalism, freedom, individual competition	Freedom for enlightenment; collective concern; harmony; peace
Economic approach	neoclassical economics	Humanistic; shared features with institutional, post-Keynesian, ecological economics
System-wide measurement of 'economic' progress	GDP (per person)	Spiritual progress toward Nirvana; true happiness indicators; minimum natural environment demands; absence of poverty; low unemployment; high satisfaction with work; Gross National Happiness
Material consumption implications	Maximum material consumption based on constant marginal utility from total material consumption; higher levels always increase QOL and happiness	Moderation, basic consumption only; existence of optimal levels of consumption beyond which true welfare will fall; craving and attachment to wealth and material accumulation as major sources of suffering
Ideal determinant of the composition or structure of consumption or output	Consumer sovereignty	Societal assessment of karmic impact (on the three interconnected spheres (individual, society, nature)); avoid pleasure desire content (tanha); non-material pursuits important; low intervention
Logic for natural resource use	Cost minimization in relation to total output (that is, relative minimization only); marginal productivity or contribution to the value of output explains resource employment re other factor of production in short-trm but technology change and other measures for cost minimization in the long-term. Free market operation	Minimum intervention and non-violence; hence minimum impact and absolute use for source input and waste sink functions
Labor	To the producer, a factor of production employed and paid according to its marginal product; producer will accept monopsonistic advantages that drive down the cost of labor; labor treated as another factor of production (regardless of psychic or social impacts) in order to remain competitive and maximizing profit; to the worker, the opposite of leisure; a necessary evil for earning income for consumption; would prefer income with no work	Work as an end in itself and source of benefits to the supplier; a cooperative, creative process
Technology; appropriate technoeconomic paradigm	Capital-intensive; complex	Intermediate technology; self-sufficiency; simplicity; green techno-economic paradigm (pervasive socio-economic and related material and energy-saving technologies) -- high communication and service provision and low environmental inputs

sources: Adapted and extended from Alexandrin (1993), Mendis (1994), Payutto (1993, 1994), Schumacher (1973) and Zazek (1993, 2003).
(Source of the above: Daniels, Peter. 2005. Economic systems and the Buddhist world view: the 21st century nexus. The Journal of Socio-Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(2), pages 245-268, March.)

EDIT: added the missing rows.

I am off on a whirlwind trip to Bangkok. I have to go into the office this morning to grade the huge stack of homework books on my desk. Then this afternoon I will head to the train station to take an overnight train (12 hours almost) to Bangkok. I will get in just in time to visit a friend and take a shower before I have to go to a 3 hour seminar on teaching and assessing Business English.

I will have a few hours to spend with Jeab (that's her in the picture!) and then onto a bus for the overnight trip home. (The train and plane were full) Monday I have 3 hours of lecture...yuck.

Sometimes all of my life feels like it is caught up in a whirlwind that I can't get out of! But, so far I am not dizzy.

I am about to go on a spending spree and inject my $300 tax rebate on books.

I would really appreciate your suggestions.

1. The Corporate Sufi: Azim Jamal ($12)
2. Sayings of the Buddha: William Wray ($8.25 + $3.99)
3. Progress and Poverty - edited and abridged for modern readers by Bob Drake: Henry George ($12.95)
4. Justice and the Social Contract: Essays on Rawlsian Political Philosophy: Samuel Freeman ($58.80 computer searchable)
5. A theory of Justice: Original Edition: John Rawls ($22.95)
6. AS and A Level Sociology Through Diagrams: Tony Lawson ($7.74 + $3.99)
7. Economics and Reality (Economics As Social Theory): Tony Lawson ($56.50)
8. Islam and Mammon: The Economic Predicaments of Islamism: Timur Kuran ($23.95)
9. Economics in Christian Perspective: Theory, Policy and Life Choices: Victor V. Claar ($14.96)
10. Creating the Commonwealth: The Economic Culture of Puritan New England (Hardcover): Stephen Innes ($25)
11. With All Your Possessions: Jewish Ethics and Economic Life (Hardcover): Meir Tamari ($35. + $3.99)
12. Teaching the Ethical Foundations of Economics: Martin Calkins (34.95)
13. Economic Parables: The Monetary Teachings of Jesus Christ: David Cowan ($10.19)
14. On Ethics and Economics: Amartya Sen ($26.96)
15. Challenge of Humanistic Economics: Mark A. Lutz ($4.95)
16. The Worldly Philosophers: The Lives, Times And Ideas Of The Great Economic Thinkers: Robert L. Heilbroner ($12.24)
17. Humanist Manifesto 2000: A Call for New Planetary Humanism: Paul Kurtz ($10.20)

Total = ..... $389.55

That pretty much eats up that $300 check from George and provides an addition REAL economics stimulus.

WISH LIST:

Handbook of Social Choice and Welfare Volume 1 (Handbooks in Economics) by Kenneth J. Arrow, A.K. Sen, and K. Suzumura ($140.00)

A History of Indian Economic Thought: Ajit K Dasgupta ($170)

EDIT: formatting. I am an idiot.

EDIT: Adding books

Development is a concern to each of us here, of that I am sure

Globalization is something that is happening, promoted by those in the developed world particularly the Big Three: The IMF, WTO and the World Bank. Maybe it is is self propelling by now.

Culture is (in many places) becoming an artifact to be found at the feet of globalization as the world becomes homogenized.

Well-being --- maybe the one thing that all of us are seeking but haven't a clue as to how to identify it or certainly can't agree on what it is.

The one thing that all of these have in common is economics, like it or not.

Let the discussion begin.