The Challenge of Climate Change
January 12, 2015
January 5, 2015
Responding To: Georgetown Faculty on the Greatest Development Challenge of the Next Decade
The Growing Wealth Divide and Its Implications for National Development
Fathali Moghaddam
I believe the world's greatest development challenge of the next decade is the growing wealth divide. Most people are now aware that the super-rich are getting richer, wealth is becoming increasingly concentrated in fewer hands, and this trend is evident across many countries around the world – including the United States and the UK. At the same time, social mobility – the likelihood that a person born into a lower income family will rise to join the middle or upper class – is low in America and many other Western societies. I strongly believe, based on empirical research evidence, that the growing wealth divide diminishes progress toward full democracy and healthy national development.
Most recently my research has focused on the psychological processes that underlie progress toward what I call actualized democracy, where there is full, informed, equal participation in decision making independent of financial investments and resources. No society has as yet become an actualized democracy. All societies began as dictatorships and some societies, particularly those of North America and Western Europe, have made progress toward greater democracy. However, we should not assume that historical change takes place in only one direction; there are important examples of societies, such as 1930s Germany, moving back from democracy to dictatorship. Dictatorships continue to thrive in different parts of the world, including in China, Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Belarus, Cuba, and North Korea. A hallmark of dictatorships is corruption and the violation of basic human rights. Dictatorships represent a huge obstacle on the path to actualized democracy.
The enormous gap in resource inequalities in the United States and other major Western societies also poses a grave danger to progress toward actualized democracy. Recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions have opened the floodgates to enormous campaign donations in political elections. Lower income Americans have very little opportunity to influence politics, so many of them are becoming apathetic. In the recent (2014) mid-term elections, the turnout was the lowest in almost 80 years. Those who vote are richer, more educated, and predominantly white. This matters a great deal because the United States is currently the sole superpower of the world and exerts tremendous influence on how development takes place around the world. The lack of progress toward actualized democracy in America results in a decline in healthy national development globally.
By focusing on the psychological changes that need to take place in order to bridge the growing wealth divide and make progress toward actualized democracy, my research lays out a science based roadmap for meeting the greatest development challenge of the next decade.
Fathali Moghaddam is a professor in the Department of Psychology and director of the Conflict Resolution Program in the Department of Government.
Moghaddam, F. M. (2013). The Psychology of Dictatorship. Washington, D.C.: American Psychological Association Press.
Moghaddam, F. M. (Sep. 2015). The Psychology of Democracy. Washington, D.C.: American Psychological Association Press.
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