We are becoming better humans

Beware the illusion of moral decline telling you otherwise

After the publication of ‘Our Long Walk to Economic Freedom’, I am frequently invited to deliver talks. I typically commence with the book’s premise – that the average person is wealthier than two centuries ago and leads longer and healthier lives, an improvement in both the quantity and quality of life.

However, at times, I also put forth a more contentious proposition: that the innovation-driven economy of the past two centuries (some refer to it as capitalism) has also made us better individuals endowed with a stronger moral compass than our ancestors. I suggest that the rise of capitalism has led to a noticeable improvement in humanity's ethical standards.

Now, most of the audience is receptive to the notion that we are wealthier and healthier than before. After all, I can statistically substantiate it: the average person is 18 times wealthier than two centuries ago and lives at least 20 years longer.

But how does one prove a discernible enhancement in our ethical standards, that we, on average, are better individuals?

One option is to contemplate the actions of those with low ethical standards, such as crime. Our World in Data makes such data available. Here are three examples: a sharp decline over more than three centuries in the homicide rate. (Unfortunately, we only possess such an extensive series for Western European countries. Present-day South Africa’s rate stands considerably higher at 33 murders per 100,000 individuals, a figure equivalent to that of Italy and the Netherlands in the 1600s.)

Or consider war: the number of deaths per year due to international conflicts has significantly decreased in the past 80 years (a period where our statistics are reasonably accurate).

Or corruption. Although we lack long-term trajectory data, we can glean from a cross-sectional analysis of development and corruption that there is a positive correlation: wealthier countries exhibit higher corruption perception scores, indicating less corruption. And given that most countries' prosperity has been created in the last century, this implies that global corruption has significantly declined.

However, many readers will not be persuaded by these statistics. Stories help. One option is to examine how crime is punished. The death penalty was abolished in South Africa in 1995. While there may be readers who wonder if its reinstatement could solve our crime problem, most would undoubtedly agree that if it were to be brought back, it should be as swift and painless as possible. This was not the case a few centuries ago. Feel free to read historian Hans Heese’s ‘Reg en Onreg’ (published in 1994), but perhaps not on an empty stomach. (Sensitive readers may want to skip the following two paragraphs).

In 1700, soldier Jan Cramer from Utrecht was found guilty of assaulting a fellow soldier, Hendrik Arentsz from Lübeck. His punishment? He was publicly displayed under the gallows, flogged, branded, and sent to Robben Island in chains for 15 years. Five years later, another soldier, Hans Jurgen Luttie, stole money. He was flogged and held in chains on Robben Island for 18 years. Or consider the case of 19-year-old Frederik Wogge, arrested in 1729 for attempting to desert with his comrades to Mozambique. He was displayed, flogged, and sent to Robben Island for 15 years. More serious crimes were usually punished with hanging. In 1672, a group of sailors was collectively punished for ‘rebellious behaviour’. They had to draw lots, and the unfortunate winner, one Martin Clockenaer, was hanged.

Of course, enslaved and Khoe criminals had it far worse. In 1742, 28-year-old Fortuin from Bengal was arrested after setting a settler’s house on fire in a fit of rage because his mistress had found a new lover. He was chained to a pole, burned alive, and his remains were placed in an iron pot. Jacob from Bengal was found guilty of killing the servant Jan Lodewyk Leopold after the latter struck him first. He was impaled alive, and his body was placed on the wheel. In 1745, 25-year-old slave Tallard Boegies murdered his owner Godhard Ackerman. He was bound to a cross and squeezed with a glowing pair of tongs in ten places, his right hand was then severed, he was quartered, and his entrails were burned. The rest of his body parts were hung on a chain in a tub, with his head on a stick.

I’d like to think that today we have higher ethical standards.

But why are we better humans than our ancestors? In his 2005 book, ‘The Moral Consequences of Economic Growth’, Harvard economist Benjamin Friedman explains how economic growth helps us become better people. Friedman’s argument is deeply rooted in moral philosophy. He suggests that economic growth is more than just a matter of creating material prosperity; when economies grow, communities often become more democratic, tolerant, and open. These communal changes align with moral principles that promote human dignity, fairness, and equality. Therefore, economic growth grants us the ability to afford higher ethical standards.

As I listen to the typical reactions from the audience, however, most people still don’t buy this argument. Why are these assertions so difficult to believe?

Because, as psychologists Adam Mastroianni and Daniel Gilbert write in a new article in Nature, all people across the world and throughout history are susceptible to what they call the ‘psychological illusion of moral decline’. Just listen to one commentator: the ‘process of our moral decline’ has led to the ‘dark dawning of our modern day, in which we can neither bear our immoralities nor face the remedies needed to cure them’.

As fitting as this description may sound today, it was written over 2000 years ago by the historian Livy, who lamented the declining morality of his fellow Roman citizens. From ancient to modern times, people lament the decline of morality – in kindness, honesty, and basic human dignity.

Everyone believes things are getting worse. Mastroianni and Gilbert use surveys to demonstrate that people in 60 countries over the past 70 years believe that ethical values are in decline. Respondents attribute this decline to both the diminishing morality of individuals as they age and the declining morality of successive generations.

But it's an illusion formed by two other biases: the negativity bias and a recall bias. Firstly, evolution has taught us to focus on negative news, making us more prone to think the world is a worse place than it is. Secondly, evolution has taught us to forget the bad things of the past. Therefore, we remember the past more positively than it was. Combine these two biases, and you get the ‘illusion of moral decline’, where we mistakenly believe that the world is more unfriendly, dishonest, and unjust than in the ‘good old days’. But it simply isn’t true.

There’s a good chance that, two centuries from now, our great-grandchildren will complain about their generation’s decline in morality. But there’s also a good chance that our great-grandchildren will live with even higher ethical standards than we do.

The fact that we are better individuals than our ancestors is yet another thing we can thank the innovation-driven economy for. If we want our children and grandchildren to be even better individuals, we must ensure that we provide them with the economic freedoms necessary to build a wealthy society.

An edited version of this post appeared (in Afrikaans) in Rapport on 9 July 2023. The image was created using Midjourney v5.2. Data from Our World in Data.