Having completed several degrees in environmental science, Hannah Ritchie nearly left the field out of helplessness and frustration, worried she would never make a real difference. Today, she’s a passionate advocate for changing climate messaging, replacing what she believes are paralyzing–and often false–claims with empowering arguments that people can embrace. Listen as the head of […] The post Hannah Ritchie on Eating Local appeared first on Econlib.

Considering the trade-off between tradition and change, we would quite certainly be unable find two individuals in the world whose wish for the New Year and beyond would strike the exact same point in multidimensional choice space. And we are unlikely to find a single individual who wants everything to change or who wants nothing to change. If we adopt the classical liberal principle that all individuals are moral equals (a natural postulate for the economist who ventures in the ethical realm, as James Buchanan well illustrated), it logically follows that neither change nor tradition is a value per se. Whether change or tradition is preferable depends depends on the individual and his circumstances. The problem, then, is the following: How to reconcile the individuals’ different preferences and values? (I take individual values as personal preferences regarding the state of the social world.) It is a major scientific discovery of 20th-century economic analysis, from welfare economics to Kenneth Arrow’s Impossibility Theorem, that individual preferences and values cannot be aggregated to form some sort of social equivalent. They can only be reconciled. The best way ever discovered (by 18th-century economics) to reconcile the preferences and values of multiple individuals in society is individual liberty and voluntary relations; in other words, it is the market model (outside family, friendships, and such small-group relations). Theory and history show that this model is way superior to political authority both for peace and prosperity and for individual equality. The voluntary-relations model assures coordination without coercion. This is the central point of Friedrich Hayek’s thought (see, for example, my Econlib reviews of his Rules and Order and his The Mirage of Social Justice). At the limit, one may be led to the anarchist ideal of an Anthony de Jasay. Life in society is of course impossible without some constraints on individual action. It is important to understand that, in the market or voluntary model, the constraints on an individual’s actions are made of the consequences of everybody else’s equal freedom, instead of resulting from the diktats of some group of individuals—the ancients in the tribe, the dictator and his minions, the democratic majority and its whims, the mob and its violence. We may add that in a (true) liberal setup, those who prefer change and progress and those who prefer tradition and security can be accommodated as well as it is possible. To the extent that most individuals, and especially the less rich, prefer economic progress and prosperity, constant change and “creative destruction” are bound to occur. But individuals who prefer tradition are in many ways able to protect their own private domains against the winds of change, even while keeping many benefits of the technological and economic progress they do want. A cultural conservative is not obliged to own a smartphone, but he may if he wants to. “Ordered anarchy,” to use Buchanan’s expression, allows both lifestyles to coexist to the maximum extent possible. A free society allows you to voluntarily set up constraints on yourself; you may even become a monk if you want to. In an unfree society, you are not allowed to free yourself from the constraints imposed on you. Nothing is perfect, but some things are more imperfect than others. Happy New Year, with hopefully as much change or tradition as you want! (0 COMMENTS)

A commenter recently asked me this question: Curious, are you a fan of the term “stimulus”? In general, I’m not very picky about terminology.  I know what people mean when the use terms such as “monetary stimulus.”  But I do worry that others will be mislead into thinking that monetary policy is a sort of medicine, which is given to treat a sick economy.  If that’s the framework people are using, then monetary policy will probably end up destabilizing the economy.  In the wrong dose, any medicine becomes a poison. I favor a monetary regime where the central bank stabilizes some sort of price.  Prior to 1933, the Fed stabilized the price of gold.  Hong Kong’s government stabilizes the exchange rates between the Hong Kong and US dollars.  I’d like to see the Fed stabilize NGDP futures prices.  Under NGDP futures targeting, the term “stimulus” has no clear meaning.  What does it mean to “stimulate” the economy, if all you are doing is stabilizing NGDP futures prices? You might argue that under my proposed regime there would be periods when the monetary base would rise sharply, and that these periods could be called “stimulus”.  I don’t find that term to be particularly descriptive, and more importantly that’s not how most people define monetary stimulus.  Indeed, people often argue that the Fed is stimulating the economy during periods where the monetary base growth rate declines, as long as interest rates also decline (as in late 2007).  I suppose one could call falling interest rates “stimulus”, but in what sense would falling interest rates reflect monetary policy if the Fed were targeting NGDP futures prices?  Is the Hong Kong monetary authority stimulating the economy when it fixes the HK/US exchange rate during a period of falling US interest rates? Again, I’m not particularly picky about terms.  I only get annoyed when someone redefines a term in a way that causes outright confusion, as when Austrians claim “inflation” means a rising money supply or when MMTers define “saving” as the budget deficit.  Nonetheless, I don’t regard “stimulus” as an ideal term, as it is likely to confuse the public as to the proper role of monetary policy.  Monetary policy should not be aimed at fixing problems; it should refrain from creating problems. Our recent inflation problem was caused by the Fed trying to use “stimulus” to create jobs.  That sort of policy gimmick never ends well.  A healthy labor market is a byproduct of a stable monetary regime. (0 COMMENTS)

Can Nonpartisanship Quell Horsetrading?  The relevant difference between markets and politics does not lie in the kinds of values/interests that persons pursue, but in the conditions under which they pursue their values/interests.  James M. Buchanan Jr., 1986 Nobel Prize Lecture  Many pundits of Indian politics recently expressed their anxieties about ‘horse-trading,’ the phenomenon of sitting legislators switching their political affiliations. They decried the politicians’ craft as a form of apathy towards the values of democracy. The overarching fear expressed, however, was that the political process was becoming like a marketplace characterized by moral ambiguity and money-grubbing. Such analyses have become platitudes, though they raise valid concerns about political funding and its limits. In fact, commentaries on the ethics of undeclared political transactions always traverse murky waters. This is because representatives are but people like us, and no more altruistically driven than those who elect them. If we, as voters, do not display transparent, disciplined motivations in the first place, there is little to be said about the ‘moral’ relapse of the system downstream. Nor is this to label ethics itself as irrelevant, but to give a finer resolution to our view.  Ironically, we can paint a fuller picture of ‘horse-trading’ by probing the etymology of the phrase. The term came to be used in the United States sometime between 1870-1900 to describe the market for horses, which was rife with information asymmetry. In other words, because a horse’s condition was difficult to assess at the time of the transaction, there was great scope for sellers to be dishonest about the merits of their goods. This idea supposedly entered the mainstream through a bestselling novel of the time, the theme of which was that business thrives on such practices. That business thrives in these conditions is true, but not in the way this view suggests. It is the general asymmetry of information amongst participants in the market that encourages entrepreneurs to compete to fill these gaps to reap profits. Deceitful practices are simply violations of the contracts that govern trade and are more likely when competition is restricted. Thus, the market is a process that helps us interact reliably despite imperfect knowledge and uncertainty. It does not at all thrive on cheating. In the market, through the exchange of different kinds of goods and services over time, we learn to pick up the signals communicated to us by prices. An adjustment process is constantly in motion throughout the system so that this communication is constantly in sync with reality. So when we apply the metaphor of ‘trading under information asymmetry’ to opportunistic political exchanges, we are effectively making an economic argument about the incentives of that institution. In other words, in wondering why already elected representatives need to re-enter a transaction to meet their aims, we are pushed to think in terms of institutional reasons. These are primarily two-fold: the quasi-federalism of the Indian polity and the country’s partisan political system. The electoral system in India embeds candidates in two distinct political contests, each with its own incentives: one where they compete for votes and another where they compete for stability and strong backing. Conventionally, we assume that the latter will neatly supervene upon the former. But this is hardly the case.  Shruti Rajagopalan lays out the question of fiscal federalism in her assessment of the state of Indian cities. At a more basic level, however, the false federalism of India is set up to maintain the country’s multi-party system. Historically, citizens’ negotiations with the Indian state have been carried out through several (even if evolving) identity groups. The problem with this kind of politics is that it hides from view the individual, and its corresponding economic policy resembles an ideological contest for resource allocation among two or more central planning boards. Since the party system is tied to voting and legislation, it also shapes both into collectivist processes. Whenever a political party gains a majority hold over the center, the concentration of financial power with it threatens to supersede any diversity in voters’ choices. Furthermore, the centralized party high-command is overpowered and constantly geared towards elections at various levels. Thus, the switching of allegiances post-elections can be seen as a relatively inexpensive way for politicians to signal their strength and demand greater control.  On the other hand, if we did away with the system of political parties, a substantial number of contradictions like horse-trading would cease to exist. In fact, nonpartisan democracy would approximate a competitive market for governance to the greatest extent possible, and as a byproduct, free the economy of state control. It is precisely for this reason that the moral view on the problems of governance, from selection to implementation, is limiting. The institutional view offers a better analysis of how context shapes behavior. Hence, nonpartisanship can be viewed as the right institutional context for decentralized experimentation in governance. It distributes the party-based top-down incentives (abetted by the lack of federalism) into the bottom-up incentives of the population of an economic locale (a city/town/village). Furthermore, as a general practice, this form of representative governance does have roots in the socio-historical experience of the Indian subcontinent.  Parth Shah, for instance, has written about M K Gandhi’s vision of the self-governing Indian village and how the idea could serve as a template for ‘politics without political parties’. He also cites historical records of the kudovolai system of the Chola period in India, in which anyone could contest for governance, the result being decided randomly through a ritualistic lucky draw. The selected individual would then serve for a year, was subject to certain criteria for disqualification, and was barred from being a candidate for the next three years. What this shows us is that alongside the specific incentives directly tied to administrative performance, the broader environment in which they play out deeply shapes the process of representation. It might not be enough to call for greater autonomy at smaller levels as long as ideological factionalism bears upon it. Even James Madison grappled with this tension in Federalist No. 10. He was against direct democracy (among a relatively small, territorial populace) because the ease of political communication within such systems created the risk of majoritarianism.  Madison’s idea of extending the sphere of the political process sounds similar in principle to Adam Smith’s notion of the extent of the market. If the extent of the market spurred greater specialization, absorbing the polity within the market such that the true prices of all its transactions are reflected might hold the same potential. This would enable the specialization of not just several government services but of institutional decision-making itself. Political costs would not be decoupled from economic costs, thereby diluting the ‘difference in conditions’ pointed out by James Buchanan. Moreover, Virgil Storr has shown that the understanding of the market “as a social space” includes forms of extra-economic social activity. Clearly, this is an underexplored frontier. Lastly, it would be useful to go back to F. A. Hayek’s “nomos” approach to rule-making. The idea of a nonpartisan, market polity is not to return to historically given institutions or abandon intervention in all realms of social life, but to develop a system that best facilitates the competitive process. The nomos approach seeks to find an institutional framework that can strengthen the adaptive capacity of private initiative under conditions of asymmetric information. The services of representation and governance ought to be thought of in these terms.    Jayat Joshi is a Writing Fellow and a Prometheus Fellow at Students For Liberty. (0 COMMENTS)

It was all too much for Moore. Too clear. Moore instituted the ban on Cuban weather telegrams and halted all direct transmission of West Indies storm reports from the bureau’s Havana office to its New Orleans station. The bureau even sought the help of Western Union. On August 28, Willis Moore, then serving as acting secretary of agriculture, wrote to Gen. Thomas T. Eckert, president of Western Union. “The United States Weather Bureau in Cuba has been greatly annoyed by independent observatories securing a few scattered reports and then attempting to make weather predictions and issue hurricane warnings to the detriment of commerce and the embarrassment of the Government service.” This is from Erik Larson 1999 book, Isaac’s Storm: A Man, a Time, and the Deadliest Hurricane in History. The subtitle is inaccurate. The Galveston hurricane was the deadliest hurricane in U.S. history. “Isaac” refers to Isaac Monroe Cline, the head of the Signal Corps’ Galveston station. Although Cline was very good at his job, he missed this one. It was inconceivable to him that the storm would move in the direction it did and so he ignored contrary evidence. Some of the prominent Cuban forecasters, by contrast, were saying that the storm would hit the Texas coast. As we now know, they turned out to be right. Willis Moore was chief of the U.S. Weather Bureau. The above quote is one of many mentions in the book of Moore’s attempt to centralize information and brand other information as misleading. The term that he probably would have used today is “misinformation” or “disinformation.” August 28, the date mentioned in the above quote, was in 1900. it was only 13 days before the hurricane hit Galveston and killed somewhere between 6,000 and 8,000 people. This tendency to centralize seems endemic in government organizations. If Moore had dismissed the Cuban experts the way Francis Collins of the National Institutes for Health dismissed the authors of the Great Barrington Declaration, he might have called them “fringe meteorologists.” Why mention this now? I joined a book group and this is the book we discussed last week. I couldn’t help but notice the parallels between the federal government’s handling of conflict information in 1900 and its handling of conflicting information in 2020 and later.   (0 COMMENTS)

The global economy experienced an inflationary boom during 2022. Prices rose rapidly and unemployment fell close to historical lows. This is what happens when you get excessive demand stimulus—fast rising NGDP and high employment. So how did traditional models do in 2022? In a new Bloomberg column, Tyler Cowen points out that 2022 was a good year for traditional macroeconomic theory.  We saw a great deal of monetary inflation, and we saw that the old rules regarding opportunity cost still apply.  Here’s Tyler: Not long ago, economists insisted that demand shortfalls were perpetual and that stimulus was almost never excessive. That extreme version of the Keynesian view has been laid to rest, while a version of Milton Friedman’s monetarism is ascendant once again. Nonetheless, I see a few problems with Tyler’s analysis: One of the most classical of economic lessons is that supply constraints truly matter. Along these lines, energy price hikes, most of all in Europe, showed that downturns and recessions can be brought on by old-fashioned scarcity. Sadly, this was the year that Nobel Laureate Edward C. Prescott passed away. Critics mocked Prescott for emphasizing the supply side as a force behind business cycles, but this year showed that Prescott was right. If not for the war in Ukraine and its associated energy supply disruptions, the global economy would be in much better shape. In fact, Prescott’s “real business cycle theory” cannot explain the business cycle, and 2022 was another example of this failure.  Fluctuations in employment are driven by changes in NGDP growth, whereas real factors play only a minor role.  In both the US and the eurozone, the unemployment rate fell close to an all time low during 2022: An expansionary monetary policy in 2022 generated fast NGDP growth, and that’s why we saw such robust job creation.  Real business cycle theory has never provided a plausible explanation of fluctuations in the unemployment rate in highly developed economies such as the US.  (Developing countries are a different story.)  Notice that RBC theory doesn’t even explain the (booming) labor market in Europe, which was affected much more directly by the Ukraine War. Economists should focus on NGDP when explaining the business cycle, and real factors when explaining long run growth trends. It is possible that there will be a recession in 2023, but if there is it will be caused by a sharp slowdown in NGDP growth.  It is fluctuations in NGDP (i.e. monetary policy) that drive the business cycle.  Real shocks do affect living standards, but have little impact on the business cycle. I would also reject Tyler’s claim that RBC theory is part of traditional macroeconomics.  It is a contrarian theory that is rejected by most macroeconomists, at least as an explanation of business cycles.  So in that sense the recent failure of RBC fits in with Tyler’s broader claim that contrarian theories did poorly in 2022. Meanwhile, Tyler has this to say about the UK: As for the UK: Economists predicted that a move away from free trade with the EU would hurt the British economy. And it has. Tyler is 100% correct about Brexit.  But there is no discussion of the Liz Truss fiasco.  Truss’s proposed budget provided an almost textbook example of reckless fiscal stimulus.  After the markets reacted very negatively, the Conservative Party replaced her with a more orthodox figure—Rishi Sunak.  Perhaps this oversight is due to the fact that in this one area it was Tyler himself that was a contrarian: I know an unpopular economic policy when I see one. And the consensus among economists about the tax cuts and deregulations announced last week by UK Prime Minister Liz Truss is almost universally negative. Larry Summers noted: “I think Britain will be remembered for having pursued the worst macroeconomic policies of any major country in a long time.” Willem Buiter described it as “totally, totally nuts.” Paul Krugman is skeptical. As Jason Furman summed it up: “I’ve rarely seen an economic policy that is as uniformly panned by economic experts and financial markets.” The contrarian in me rebels against such harsh assessments — even as I remain unconvinced that Truss’s plan will materially boost the rate of economic growth in the UK. Allow me to explain why I am not in a state of panic. (0 COMMENTS)

It should not be difficult to understand that if a firm is prevented from realizing excess profits when the price of its product rises unexpectedly, while it will have to support excess losses when the price drops below expectations, its owners will not incur costs to make sure it has enough productive capacity to profit from a possible future emergency. So why is it precisely what the government of the European Union is doing an excess-profit tax on European energy producers after Russian supply cuts? (See “Exxon Sues EU Over Windfall Profit Levy,” Wall Street Journal, December 28, 2022; “Exxon Sues EU in Move to Block New Windfall Tax on Oil Companies,” Financial Times, December 28, 2022.) Is it because politicians, bureaucrats, and voters are so cognitively impaired that they cannot understand this simple case of incentives? It would be a too simple and ad hoc hypothesis. The reason instead is that political processes and especially democratic processes are myopic, biased toward the short term and often the very short term. The typical politician may not be in power when the detrimental consequences may be recognized years from now—while, on the other hand, they are strongly pressured to do something now, anything, and especially with somebody else’s money. Government bureaucrats are sure to get their salaries and pensions whatever happens, short of widespread destruction of capital or a revolution. The typical voter has no incentive to spend time and other resources on getting and analyzing information on public policy since his individual vote will not change anything in a collective choice; and even if he made inordinate efforts to understand, he would have to cast his single vote on bundles of complex measures whose intricate and interrelated consequences are typically impossible to forecast. In the current climate of public opinion, moreover, government rulers don’t really care if oil supply from private companies drops because their incentives have been undermined. The rulers know (or think) that they will be able to recreate new incentives through subsidies or tax preferences, or just boss the companies around through fear of further regulation or expropriation. In fact, the rulers will normally benefit from enhanced state powers and  many of them would anyway prefer private companies to be gradually replaced by state corporations. (3 COMMENTS)

“Learn to keep coding.” You’ve probably heard the line that various politicians have thrown as a bone to people put out of work in the non-tech industries: “learn to code.” Well, there’s good news for people who already do know how to code. When they get laid off, they find jobs quickly. And there’s even better news for people who have lost any kind of job, tech or non-tech. A headline in Wednesday’s (print edition) Wall Street Journal says “Axed Tech Workers Find Jobs Quickly.” The title in the on-line version is slightly different: “Laid Off Tech Workers Quickly Find New Jobs.” The news story is by Sarah Chaney Cambon and Gwynn Guilford. Here are the first 3 paragraphs: Most laid off tech workers are finding jobs shortly after beginning their search, a new survey shows, as employers continue to scoop up workers in a tight labor market. About 79% of workers recently hired after a tech-company layoff or termination landed their new job within three months of starting their search, according to a ZipRecruitersurvey of new hires. That was just below the 83% share of all laid-off workers who were re-employed in the same time frame. Nearly four in 10 previously laid off tech workers found jobs less than a month after they began searching, ZipRecruiter found in the survey.  Of course, the odds are that a substantial percentage of workers laid off by tech firms are not coders. Nevertheless, it’s good news for those of us who think that being unemployed for a long time is corrosive to one’s psyche. Notice also the last sentence of the second paragraph: Laid-off workers as a whole do even better. (0 COMMENTS)

Americans are really good at telling other countries what to do, how to run their affairs. For the past year, lots of American pundits have been ridiculing China’s Zero Covid policy. (I am one of those pundits.). There’s a general view that it’s long past time to move beyond Covid, to get back to normal. “Vaxxed and relaxed”. China has finally decided to take our advice and open up to foreign travel. So how did the US react? Did we celebrate their decision?  Here’s the Financial Times: US will require negative Covid tests for air passengers from China I predict that most of America’s media won’t even notice the hypocrisy.  We are much better at noticing China’s mistakes than our own. PS.  The fig leaf being provided is concern about a possible new mutation of the virus.  But there’s no evidence for that claim, and no plan to stop a new variant from circulating here if it did exist.   (0 COMMENTS)

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900-1944) presents an interesting dichotomy.  I would wager that most readers of these pages have enjoyed his delightful little tale, The Little Prince, about 125,000 copies of which are sold per year in the US (compared to about 300,000 in France).  Those who haven’t yet read the short book have probably heard about it.   Yet the rest of his oeuvre is largely unknown in the US (and, interestingly, in France, where every town seems to have a street or school named for Saint-Exupéry, whose face adorned the last French 50-Franc bill, before the transition to the Euro). I remember devouring his aviation memoirs when I was in college.  Southern Mail (1929), Night Flight (1931), Wind, Sand, and Stars (1939), Flight to Arras (1942), and The Little Prince (1943), all captivated my imagination with larger-than-life tales of early aviation, desert and mountain crashes, and reflections on friendship and humanity.  Like my French mother when she was a teenager (something I found out later), I kept a diary of quotations, a good portion of which were from Saint-Exupéry.  Many came from The Little Prince: And now here is my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.   -I am looking for friends. What does that mean – tame? -It is an act too often neglected, said the fox. It means to establish ties. -To establish ties? -Just that, said the fox. To me, you are still nothing more than a little boy who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys. And I have no need of you. And you, on your part, have no need of me. To you I am nothing more than a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But if you tame me, then we shall need each other. To me, you will be unique in all the world. To you, I shall be unique in all the world….   Grown-ups never understand anything by themselves, and it is tiresome for children to be always and forever explaining things to them.   To love is not to look at one another, it is to look, together, in the same direction (from Wind, Sand, and Stars). After I had devoured all of his books (except for a posthumous novel), I somehow moved on. When my mother – a freelance teacher of French literature and French as a foreign language – died unexpectedly in 2007, I found her lectures on Saint-Exupéry.  I vowed to publish them as a posthumously co-authored academic paper – but I was then a first-year assistant professor, so I wisely focused on writing the economics papers required for tenure and promotion, and put the project in a drawer.  When I got COVID during a month-long stay in Paris in February 2022, I decided to revisit the project.  I re-read Wind, Sand, and Stars with adult eyes, then dug into the life of Saint-Exupéry, through an exhibit of Saint-Exupéry’s life and sketches at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, the memoir written by his friend Léon Werth, and Stacy Schiff’s magisterial biography (Saint Exupéry:  A Biography, Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1994).  I found myself especially intrigued by Saint-Exupéry’s odd 28-month exile in New York City, between the Fall of France in 1940 and the Allied invasion of North Africa in 1942.  I dedicate these reflections to my late mother.   Antoine Marie Jean-Baptiste Roger, count of Saint-Exupéry, was born in Lyon, France, in 1900.  He was tempted by a career as an illustrator or architect, but found his calling as a pilot when he was drafted into military service in the new field of aviation, in 1921.  He subsequently enjoyed a career as a mail pilot and test pilot, while writing and drawing on the side.  His first short story was published in 1926, and there followed his series of autobiographical (and philosophical) novels about life in the air, and his reflections on friendship, humanity, and life, from 30,000 feet. Flight to Arras is Saint-Exupéry’s personal recollection of the Battle of France, in which he participated as a pilot in a reconnaissance squadron.  He uses one particular flight as a synecdoche for his participation in the Battle of France, the disastrous defeat to Nazi Germany, and reflections on life, fate, war, death, and the ikigai of flying a plane.  I have chosen this book because it foreshadows the Fall of France and Saint-Exupéry’s wartime exile in New York City.  For this #ReadWithMe, I am using the 2015 edition, translated by Lewis Galantière, and published by Martino Publishing (Mansfield Centre, CT).   The book opens with the counsel of despair.  Amidst the French army’s retreat in May 1940, the observation squadrons are vastly outnumbered.  The entire French army counted a mere 50 observation crews of three men.  Of the 23 crews in Saint-Exupéry’s squadron, 17 had been decimated in the first three weeks of the war.  “Crew after crew was being offered up as sacrifice.  It was as if you dashed glassfuls of water into a forest fire in the hope of putting it out” (14).  As a professor, I have lived the absurdity of university bureaucracy:  I once wondered why we wasted precious time in monthly department meetings that could have been an email (and even that would have been a stretch) – until I realized that there was a meeting so the department chairman could report to the dean that there had been a meeting… in turn, the dean could report to the provost that all departments had held a meeting that month.  In the end, time is taken away from teaching, research, and substance – but nobody dies.  In a wartime rout, things are different:  “It’s not our fault that we feel none too cheerful.  Not the major’s fault that he is ill at ease with us.  Not the Staff’s fault that it gives orders.  The major is out of sorts because the orders are absurd.  We know that they are absurd; but the Staff knows that as well as we do.  It gives orders because orders have to be given.  Giving orders is its trade, in time of war” (18).  This is all part of a deadly dance in the theater of war.  “Handsome horsemen transmit the orders – or rather, to be modern about it, motorcyclists.  The orders ordain events, change the face of the world.  The handsome horsemen are like the stars – they bring tidings of the future.  In the midst of turmoil and despair, orders arrive, flung to the troops from the backs of steaming horses.  And then all is well – at least, so says the blueprint of war.  Everybody struggles as hard as he can to make war look like war.  Piously respects the rules of the game.  So that war may perhaps be good enough to agree to look like war” (ibid).  Observation crews are sent up to near-certain death, and for what?  “In all seriousness the Staffs issue orders that never reach anybody.  They ask us for intelligence impossible to provide.  But the air arm cannot undertake to explain war to the Staffs….Of course they take our intelligence into account, since the blueprint of war requires that intelligence officers make use of intelligence.  But even their war-by-blueprint had broken down.  We knew perfectly well that they would never be able to make use of our intelligence – luckily.  It might be brough back by us; but it would never be transmitted to the Staff.  The roads would be jammed.  The telephone lines would be cut.  The Staff would have moved in a hurry.  The really important intelligence – the enemy’s position – would have been furnished by the enemy himself” (19-20). Ever the poet and mystic, trained by Jesuits, Saint-Exupéry translates this futility into a beautiful religious experience of despair.  As he awaits another absurd and dangerous mission, he writes:  “I was for the moment like a Christian abandoned by grace.  I was about to do my job…honorably, that was certain.  But to do it as one honors ancient rites when they have no longer any significance.  When the god that lived in them has withdrawn from them” (24).  As he prepares for the mission, he laments:  “I can no longer see the cathedral in which I live.  I am dressing for the service of a dead god” (33). And then, something changes.  The pilot, through his equipment, literally becomes one with the plane: “I am attached to the plane by a rubber tube as indispensable as an umbilical cord.  The plane is plugged into the circulation of my blood.  Organs have been added to my being, and they seem to intervene between me and my heart” (38-39). “I am an organism integrated into the plane” (46).  Although the mission may be futile, the pilot’s ikigai is heavy with meaning.  “For me, piloting my plane, time has ceased to run sterile through my fingers.  Now, finally, I am installed in my function.  Time is no longer a thing apart from me.  I have stopped projecting myself into the future.  I am no longer he who may perhaps dive down the sky in a vortex of flame.  The future is no longer a haunting phantom, for from this moment on I shall myself crate the future by my own successive acts.  I am he who checks the course and holds the compass at 313*.  Who controls the revolutions of the propellor and the temperature of the oil  These are healthy and immediate cares.  These are household cares, the little duties of the day that take away the sense of growing older.  The day becomes a house brilliantly clean, a floor well waxed, oxygen prudently doled out…” (44).  The absurdity, futility, and despair in the briefing room have given way to the joy of a craft well practiced: “It came to this, that I was working at my trade.  All that I felt was the physical pleasure of going through gestures that meant something and were significant unto themselves.  I was conscious neither of great danger (it had been different while I was dressing) nor of performing a great duty” (48).  Naturally, Saint-Exupéry then turns back to mysticism:  “At this moment the battle between the Nazi and the Occident was reduced to the scale of my job, of my manipulation of certain switches, levers, taps.  This was as it should be.  The sexton’s love of his God becomes a love of lighting candles.  The sexton moves with deliberate step through a church of which he is barely conscious, happy to see the candlesticks bloom one after the other as the result of his ministrations.  When he has lighted them all, he rubs his hands.  He is proud of himself” (48-49).   Questions  What does moral philosophy dictate in a situation of absurdity, futility, and danger?  Are we still called to do our duty – and find meaning in it?  Do we trust the hierarchy, our superiors, and “the system”?  Or is it morally permissible to shirk a futile duty? I have often wondered if there was truly something different about World War II – or if this is my bias because it is more recent – or because my French grandparents lived through the Occupation of France (1940-1944), and my American grandfather was an officer in the Navy support teams for Operation Torch and Operation Neptune.  I wonder if, say, the Franco-Prussian War and World War I were just big-power geopolitical struggles – still war, with its horror and heroism, but not an existential struggle for Western values.  Saint-Exupéry refers to “the battle between the Nazi and the Occident” (48)   Nikolai G. Wenzel is the L.V. Hackley Chair for the Study of Capitalism and Free Enterprise, and Distinguished Professor of Economics, Broadwell College of Business and Economics, Fayetteville State University (Fayetteville, NC). (0 COMMENTS)