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Categories
| The value of values |
| Commentary | |||
| Written by Nik Mohd Hasyudeen Yusoff | |||
| Tuesday, 07 April 2009 11:41 | |||
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In addition to this, the group has also agreed to strengthen financial supervision and regulation with the aim of creating a globally consistent supervisory and regulatory framework for the future financial sector which will support sustainable growth. Among the initiatives would be the creation of a new Financial Stability Board which has a stronger mandate than its predecessor, the Financial Stability Forum. Regulation and oversight would also be extended to all important financial institutions, instruments, and markets including hedge funds and credit rating agencies. In an open capitalist economy, markets are assumed to be the best allocator of resources and regulation is only brought into the picture when there are “market failures”. The recent failure of the global financial markets not only demonstrates that markets can fail, but more apparently, it was caused by a failure of values of the players who were supposed to behave in the manner that would benefit mankind at large. The act of some irresponsible companies which took taxpayers’ money allocated for bailouts from self-created messes to pay themselves bonuses, spurred strong backlashes not only in developed countries but all across the globe. This shows how individual interests and greed can push people to go overboard to position their personal interests above others. The trillions of dollars to be spent in the US, Europe and other parts of the globe, in a small way, provides the indication of the value of the failures of values among the market players. Adding to this is the cost of human suffering due to job losses and the future cost to be borne by taxpayers to support the operations of new supervisory and regulatory bodies as envisioned by the G20, as an example, the cost of the failure in values is much more astronomical. For those who do not get it yet, there is value to values and yes, you have to pay from your pockets when values fail! How different would the world be, if the initiatives by the developed countries, particularly as outlined by the G20 are implemented? Certainly more money and resources would be spent, more institutions would be established and we have to live with more regulations. What about the values of people, who are entrusted to manage funds, create growth, provide returns to investors and supervise and regulate all of them? Nobody would disagree that self-interest and greed cannot be regulated. Then, what would be the real solutions? Nurturing values starts when a child is born. This should continue at kindergartens, schools, colleges, universities, all the way until the person hits the bucket. More importantly, the parents, family members and friends are very influential in shaping the values of a person. Of course, for those who believe in religion, faith matters as well. If we were to point fingers to those who failed to do their bit in ensuring good values are upheld by those who are trusted to do the right thing in running businesses, doing trade and regulating markets, we would be pointing to ourselves. Don’t current developments in our markets and economy reflect our own failure as a society to guide and nurture good values among us? Now, it has become our collective responsibility to put things right. We cannot blame the government because we put them there. We cannot blame the institutions because we, the people, set the tone for them. It is our indifference towards the erosion of values in ourselves, our children, friends and those that we trust to govern ourselves that shapes the values of our society. If we want a better tomorrow, to pass on a decent world to the next generation, we should start to re-calibrate our own values. Then we should try to influence the others who are close to us such as our children, employees and anybody upon whom we have the sphere of influence. Whenever we make decisions, values and ethics must be upheld. Sometimes this could be unpopular to those who believe the world is beyond repair and compromise is the order of the day but there is no excuse. Remember, failure in values is very costly and if we allow it to happen, the finger points at you and me. Nik Hasyudeen is the president of the Malaysian Institute of Accountants. He can be contacted at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it This article appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, April 7, 2009.
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