we believe in the pledge they are going to. spotlight is coming up here in our team but first our top stories the u.s. is trying to speed up the process of extraditing the less russian arms dealer viktor boot from bangkok and has already dispatched a special plane to collect him but new charges the u.s. brought before the extradition was approved could now delay his departure. women's rights campaigners sound the alarm over the wise in the number of female genital mutilation cases in the u.k. although the practice is illegal in the country no one's ever been convicted of the crime and thousands are considered to be at risk eighteen year. old russian warships could save the unique underwater world of the black sea the great

hopes to sink decommissioned vessels in order to create artificial reefs in the crimea. spotlight is coming up next this time al gore nov talk to the founder of the world values study ronald engel hard to find out if human values are changing and his views on russians in particular. hello again and welcome to the show on r.t. i'm al going on and today my guest in the studio is ronald. he made his name and sociology back in the nineteen seventies by discovering a major cultural shift in the western society to describe the new reality here introduce the word post materialist for thirty years he has been conducting the influential world values survey and wished directions human values changing

we the people become a half year and why all the nations. ronald hart is on spotlight today to answer mine and your questions. in doha is a political scientist who developed the social theory of materialism the theory is a useful tool in understanding modern culture used in the arts research focuses on cultural change and its consequences he discovered the values of people in boston dust real contraries remarkably his other interests carb a vast field of knowledge and use words have been translated into sixty languages professor han founded unpadded the global network of social scientists called the world values celebrate but only in your heart is the guest today to talk about those changes well.

hello and welcome to the show thank you very much for being with us nice to be with us first of all you say in your research that in the west the transition from the society with material values to a post material society has happened in the sixty's one exact. the sixty's why are you sure it didn't happen earlier later or why do you think the sixties began to happen in the sixty's you got it began to happen in sixty's because that was when the post-war generation began to surface and to be at all population it didn't happen over the whole world much of the world is still fairly materialist most of the world but the rich countries western europe japan north america australia etc began to surface as a new kind of basic value priorities that i call post materialist in the sixty's because this was twenty years after the end of world war two the economic miracles that western europe and japan and so on experience plus the welfare state made

people grow up for the first time most of the population these country was growing up under conditions where they took survival for granted this was unprecedented most people throughout most of history and most people still today grow up with survival being uncertain with starvation being a real possibility the germans the swedes the americans who grew up in that era. didn't they took survival for granted and that was a big big change it all went away for other things to take top priority so in the sixty's we started out with student protest this was the era when student protests from six hundred sixty four sixty eight they had pains you know you know anything always agreed rides on us. all the world or in many countries there were student protests because this was a generation that for the first time. the majority of them had post materialist values the older people all of the older people were had been experiencing world

war two the great depression world war one starvation had been very real they had they knew that this could happen and this was a different world in which imagination self-expression choosing your way of life personal freedom were more important than ever before and at that time interestingly there was this slogan in many countries don't trust anyone over thirty because there was this big generational divide everyone older was pre-war generations now things have changed they've moved on to the point where even the middle aged people have grown up after world war two ok i have a question for you well now now days many western countries well the best examples are greece greece portugal spain they are reducing their welfare programs they're cutting the programs the citizens have to obviously to tighten the belts. do you think it will have consequences on the people on the values of the people will they

from now on have to think once again about survival rather than self expression in the short run certainly the no one likes these measures they're very unpopular and the government agrees that you know is extremely unpopular to the point where some of them are hiding. it's a real crisis the values are another thing the immediate reaction is we hate it but the basic values don't change that fast mostly values change during your first twenty years use bit a basic personality that doesn't change very much afterwards so the basic values won't change overnight if what happens is the start of a decade or two decades of severe. severe poverty we would try to work in the opposite direction to build logic you're absolutely right here in the long run if we are now starting to great depression of the twenty first century then i would predict a turn back to all of use and tuesday in

a full more authoritarian government all kinds of things that were characteristic of the 1930's in the great depression. russia according to your survey russia is a country that really has very poor in terms of self-expression more or tends to to. clinch to material value on the other hand russia is not. a very traditional country today in all its favors it favors new values rather than the traditional values well does it really make a difference for russia may be russia's values is facilitate development towards a developed democracy. i think that there is a great emphasis on economic development that's highly desired high priority and in fact i would say depending on what stage of development your advice is something i

would give high priority to myself if i were even more so if i were governing a low income country economic development would be top priority at a higher level of development it has less payoff in terms of happiness quality of life beyond a certain point getting two cars in every garage is ok but a third car is not really doing much for you and it's adding to pollution and noise and driving all kinds of stuff is kind of diminishing return from economic growth rushes at a stage where they have experience as you know all. dreadful setbacks the. period from about the collapse of communism around one hundred ninety the breakup of the soviet union the gross national product went down to about forty percent of its former local life expectancy furrow order all kinds of very severe things happen and the the reaction of the russian people was reemphasizing survival

values and interestingly a tendency to traditional religious values more too so they're growing and expanding in russia it's a trend where the logic is if security makes you have these new values in security would push in the opposite direction well a russia actually has gone through a period of radical transformation in the in the last twenty years the ideals were changing together with the political and economic situation spotlighted in a d.v.d. that has more than that. ninety nine to one so russians intoxicated by the promise of democratic freedoms after more than seventy years off the telly to. no one could imagine then how hard the transition to when you society would be to shelves in. shops factory stand in still sell or is doing aid the previously on thought of idea of unemployment these were the side effects of saying goodbye to a state run economy and winding had first into capitalism many felt nostalgia for

the economic stability of the old times or the collapse of the u.s.s.r. russians or to reconcile themselves to the communist ideology afterwards they were truly had to learn to survive democratic values lost much of their in the shell charm accumulating wealth was more important the attitude was reflected in the russian pop culture which became obsessed with the phenomenon of grammar. that the last decade economic stability gradually returned to russia and civil society emerging after years of being quite passive politically russians are once again ready to go on to the street to defend their rights the latest example and moderates who lists over the use of flushing the rights on the horrors of moscow's b.a.p. . well you know twenty years is like like or are

developing like a trend of values well russia has been developing for the last twenty years we've changing at least rapidly what can you say about these twenty years in in russia's development do you think your survey has the values will change dramatically change radically to where russia along with russia and ukraine were among the very few countries in the world industrialized countries that were moving toward survival values and traditional religious values at a time when most of the world during the first decade after ninety nine years was moving toward self-expression secularization and so on. round two thousand russia began to get prosperous again and so that that really. severely prussian that had had brought russians to a feeling of one of happiness and dissatisfaction it was extreme the russia had added one hundred the lowest level of life satisfaction and happiness of any big

country and of with a handful of other goodies weighed on low people much poorer countries like pakistan india nigeria this was the reaction to the world that they knew the belief system they knew would be the whole world seem to come apart more recently order has been restored the country is getting more prosperous and we see signs of recovery of happiness and i think in the long run yes happens that's interesting you know you know that was one of the things that we measure is happiness and that has changed this was in general in the introduction you are asked about happiness russia was a country that had sharply declining ovals of happiness initially it was already in one hundred eighty one not very happy and then by the by the mid ninety's it was at the lowest level we've ever seen russia says sociologist professor ronald at the

heart spotlight will be back shortly right after the break we'll continue in less than a minute so then help. this is st still keeps its secrets but now it's time to reveal. the soviet songs and

honor to. welcome back to spotlight i'm all going off and just a reminder that my guest in the studio today is professor ronald angle hard director of the world values survey a global network of social scientists professor well i've read your surveys way you measure the level of happiness or rather the level. the measure the percentage

of people who feel themselves happy and certain kinds you know first of all one of the one of the best results are in countries like venezuela well which isn't the most prosperous country in the world you know well america is very. hi this may well italyan fronts are lower than that of the middle so does it mean really of the level of happiness of people who are the ability to propaganda that inside the country that charlize to to to to make people believe that they really are that what the life they live is a happy life you know where you flatter me i would like to believe that the american government was had a campaign to make the scores on my happiness skills come up i'm not sure that they're even aware that we're measuring happiness i think it's. i think that these are realistic measures and if you do we're going to make sense there are some

surprises one thing that you won't be surprised is rich countries are happier than poor countries a strong correlation a sort of steep increase as you go from starvation you mean by rich country russia is one of the richest countries in the world with a population that it's there that is by no means one of the richest in the world so when you say richard what is russia a rich country or a poor country money if you income of the every dollar of the income of india it's the income of the average person and how secure they are and russia of course is a really interesting case here they have had severe changes that devastated happiness in russia should people should what i ask you about propaganda i wanted to know is that should the people be. think that they are happy is it good is it healthy for a society or should the people rather say no we don't like the way we live because we want to live better what is more healthy well i think that being dissatisfied to a certain extent is good in terms of literal in terms of healthiness people who are

happy tend to be healthier it's like with less stress more relaxed feeling and also having good health contributes to happiness so the two work for each other but i would say this is a real measure it correlates with a lot of low. rather caters that you would expect my wife satisfaction job satisfaction having a family people who get divorced turn not to be happy people who get widowed tend not to be happy very correlates with interesting things like the political level. is correlated with democracy democratically living in a democracy is a happier experience generally they're living in a country russia had a very unusual transition to democracy so it whether the other way of mostly becoming more democratic contributes to happiness as well as spotlights card set a lady on the way she went out to the streets of moscow and try to find out if money can make people happy let's have a look. hi there well as the saying goes anybody that thinks money will make on

topic doesn't have any today i'll try to put out of line it really makes people happy it. made me think you're probably in many can give you freedom but it can't make you happy there's a saying that many can't make you happy i agree with it being the libyan government's money is fun freedom it gives you a lot of things what else any other reasons to separate money brings you joy you can do whatever you like whenever you want and if you have no money you can do whatever you want and if you have no money you can do what you want hence the conclusion that money's happiness. getting it love lives and there's still money is not the key thing in life you can't make all the money in the world and the money spoils people you know one historical books had that money and power corrupts

people that means the more money you have the more you want it you want more and more and more and i know some people who went mad because of it people just break when they go broke. or stress the money doesn't make me happy because happiness is something. ells some people say it depends on how much you've got but in fact everything depends on the people that surround you and on your emotions and state of mind. yes that i feel like it's a good question i always try to make myself happy without it but i don't always succeed i try to do it this way. i've got daddy you've got a question again. because most of the with the i do happy countries have such a high suicide rate. professor that's a good question ok that's actually a myth yes it is not good but it will read it in the paper or sweden what why have

they one of the highest rate of suicides. has a more you has a surprisingly high suicide rate but hungary finland japan career a bunch of other countries have even higher suicide rates i think there are a couple things involved sweden does have a surprisingly high suicide rate for a country of israel happy norway denmark if you which are just as happy or happy or have low suicide rates i think that there is a historic tradition where suicide was acceptable in sweden more than in most societies the protestant countries in general religiously religiously protestant countries except suicide and i think in the norwegian tradition people sircar's were warriors who would go into battle planning to die then in jane japan they have had a key by that they had a bible that here that's how culture often look like honors suicide but but they do have a lower suicide rate than sweden did and it's about the same but the say yes it is

interesting but the. catholic countries of course stigmatize suicide you can be buried in a catholic cemetery you go to hell with a very bad thing so suicide is under reported in those countries. that's it's a very good question but i think by and large it's misleading because a tiny tiny tiny percentage of people people commit suicide we're measuring said representative sample of the population and the swedes and the danes in the norwegian is reliably in survey after survey by b. or by other people or a client happy let's talk about russia i see and hear you mention that russia russia is a weird. it is a strange situation you know i mean even in your survey you know we just heard it in this and this little pole in the streets of moscow we should which is one of the most expensive cities in the world and most of the people and we try to be objective when we do the service say that the money. it isn't what you really need

to be happy even in a city like moscow now if you move out like a hundred miles out of moscow i mean it will beat all of the sides so why is that happening because money is an illusion it is if you think more money will buy bring more happy lately has been the only ideology and russia for the last twenty years that you've been talking now what ideology is a make twenty well it'll make you happy and people down there don't buy it i wouldn't buy it either i would say it's part of happiness when you're starving getting enough money to survive on does contribute to happiness there's this very steep increase if you go forward to really desperately poor country to portugal or south korea there's a big increase in happiness above that a kind of levels off it brings you less and less and even no matter where you go it's not as important as having a happy family having good friends things like that it contributes i would not dismiss money as it's easier to be happy with money than without it but he is bill gates the happiest man in the world by no means i very much doubt it he is i have

no idea how happy he is but i would not expect him to be wildly happy either he's probably fairly satisfied with his life but. there's this diminishing returns in russia clearly is at this point where it's probably an illusion the reason why there's a solution is in the short run if you suddenly go from if you double your income suddenly you feel terrific in the short run and in six months or a year you get used to it and it does nothing for you so there's this illusion getting more big you happy and lonely doesn't much how does your rankings differ from other social logical surveys and is it meant to be different from the very beginning you know we were interned we use the same measures and they're very reliable for example i can show you a graph the gallup world pool has studied ninety seven of the same countries as we have studied and he's the per their rankings and i said as i do those are almost identical. it's a reliable thing these leads are measures that other organizations using similar

measures get similar results so i think it's very something real something we're not accustomed to measuring. it's a very complicated think we're going to happiness is a lot of different things different people value different things i would say having a happy family and. being in love with somebody who loves you is probably the biggest single thing i would recommend but you know money is something you can you can set out to be sure of getting so that's a goal many people have ok you were the one that introduced the term post man materialism right so now can we if we put it simple make it simple a post materialistic society is a society that would not ever never ever compromise freedom democracy to material values is that right now it's a little extreme people are flexible and everyone likes money it's not the bush who

pushes the list don't like but your goods would like them like everyone else to eat like everyone else too they need them they like them but they're not the top priority they give higher priority to freedom of speech of course if it was a question of living in desperate poverty they wouldn't like not listen in russia it's obvious that in russia today. money wealth personal wealth is a higher priority than reading the speech freedom of president what you write here but like in america after nine eleven the whole nation was ready and even eager to compromise these values to security to feel more secure you know which is which is again and there have been serial thing rather than like. i mean the security is a material thing and there was a huge. sense initially there was

a huge overreaction today because he's recovered from it but there was a huge reaction in one day washington d.c. and new york were attacked and we thought my god what's coming next week and next week and next week because feeling so this is what you mean by saying people are flexible yet people respond to their basic values in the long run but they also respond what happens today they're not real but the values persist a long time but what happens today also shapes you and you're absolutely right this is exactly the kind of reaction that you would get when security is certainly threatened there was a feeling who clamp down on civil rights and do anything to be safe again but it was a short term thing that can contribute to the rising popularity of george w. bush thank you thank you very much professor was a pleasure to have you with us and just a reminder that my guest in the studio today was famous sociologist professor ronald and behind director of the world values survey and that's it for now from

all of us here will be back tomorrow with more until then stay and hearty take care thank you you thank .

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