365 Ways With Words

Come Back in Ten Years When It's Finished

Berlin is enjoyable. I'm sure it wasn't always like that, but the overall impression is of a dynamic brand new city where certain freedoms are cherished and a way of life promoted. This is abundantly clear to the visitor, even if the visit is a short one.

The main reason for the city-wide building site is two-fold: wartime damage and post-unification development. I have no idea what pre-war Berlin looked like, but can imagine it was a proud city of tree-lined boulevards, open parkland and grand and wide streets upon which the merry Berliners would go about their lawful business, that is if that had one that survived the depression years. The Nazi takeover of the country and the war that followed, however, heralded a complete destruction of the city (courtesy of RAF and USAAF night and day bombings). Examples of this can still be seen in the keyed masonry repairs to grand historic buildings, the Bunderstag being a perfect example. Its shell is all that remained from the magnificent Reichstag building of 1894, but upon the outside are scars from bombing and conflict. Post-unification, the somewhat neglected communist eastern part of the city required wholescale upgrading. Thus, finally, the unified dream of nearly two generations has become a reality. What is of more importance, perhaps, is that Germans everywhere no longer need the complicit approval of watchful 'allied' powers to set their course.

Freedom, German-style, comprises the personal and public. Sure, within reason Berliners are free to think, worship, dress, eat and drink and have sex with nearly anyone/thing they want, but there is also a social vibe – a responsibility that has emerged from a very clouded history. Germans, and Berliners in particular, simply cannot let things get out of hand again. Thus, common energies are focused on health and welfare, on the public good in terms of arts and culture, on green energy and recycling, on quality of life and a general functional positivity in all things. Sometimes this works, as in (largely) free university education, and I'm sure the columns of Die Zeit, Die Welt and Frankfurter Allemagne Zeitung gleefully report on those areas wherein it fails, perhaps in terms of immigration policies, Turkish integration, etc.

The Berlin way of life, as far as any city has a 'life', is highly animated. Although undoubtedly an important factor, for daily enjoyment the zeitgeist does not appear to be quite as reliant on money as London or Hong Kong, for example. A large proportion of the population also appears to be young – there is something of a party feel to the place. Much like London, food and drink are everywhere and a quick jaunt around the market at Winterfeldtplatz was enough to certify that quality in this regard is everything.

Without doubt, a city like Berlin will continue to grow and develop in it's own way. It looked like there were more construction cranes at work here than in any other European city visited in the past few years. This development is not on a par with anywhere you may care to mention in East Asia, but it demonstrates that things here are still moving. And where there's movement, there's change – in this case, it feels overwhelmingly positive.

Work + Misery = Success

We are daily bombarded with messages. In fact, we permit all sorts of proselytising groups with many axes to grind every opportunity to fill our heads with their ideas. They permeate through a mixed welter of communications – TV, radio, newspapers, internet and the like. These groups may be political, commercial and even religious in nature. Such is our popular bent at the beginning of the 21st century that we condemn some of these messages as being beyond the pail and view others as completely acceptable. We would condemn the ideology of woeful jihadis intent on overthrowing the detestable Syrian Government as hateful and religious bigotry, yet see as innocuous a McDonalds ad for cheap burgers even though the company promotes a low-wage culture, the mechanistic industrialisation of agriculture and the production of a food potentially hazardous to our very own health never mind it being injurious to the planet. It's a funny old world...

It could be argued that no man is an island and that we are influenced by the world in which we live like trees are influenced by the weather. That is partly so, but our communication is that much more sophisticated than the falling rain or a bit of blowy weather. These communications can radically direct our actions, even to our detriment – for example, a McDonalds Happy Meal. Some communications are now banned – videos from active terrorists, adverts from cigarette manufacturers. They are placed in the censored category because they are seen to be damaging to the public at large and to generally-accepted codes of behaviour. Maybe others should follow

As 21st century humans we are now inured to an astonishing amount of one-way communications through media. There are, however, subtler messages and subtler ways that messages can be delivered, and perhaps not beamed directly into our skulls whilst we sleep – I reserve the right to wear my tin foil hat. One of the most permeated messages, over time and space, is the Protestant work ethic. This message is not usually delivered through popular media or even from the pulpit – it comes through family, our closest friends, work colleagues and, even more effectively, through the conscience!

First outlined by renowned sociologist Max Weber back in 1904, the Protestant work ethic was thought to be the underlying social work ethos that enabled success in the societies of the north; the UK, the Scandinavian countries, the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, Canada and the United States. Weber's idea is that there's something honorific in the nature of Protestantism that promotes hard work, education, self-reliance and social responsibility.

Leaving aside the wider social aspect of this idea, this ethic emphasised a personal religious salvation through the grace of God and not by merely doing works, considered the characteristic of the Catholic areas of southern Europe. This salvation was understood to consist of approving blessings given by God in terms of physical and financial blessings. In other words, by faithfully waiting on God for salvation for the next world a Protestant was blessed and may even have become rich in this one.

Each Protestant had therefore to present an image of a hard-working soul, bent not on the pleasures of this life but on frugality. Work may have been a drudge, but that was perfectly acceptable because the focus of all Protestant endeavours was otherworldly in nature: work hard, save, be frugal and prepare for heaven. Weber argued that this work ethic is utterly ingrained in northern European and north American countries and has affected the spectacular flourishing of capitalism. The happies peoplet, therefore, are the richest men and women in the graveyard.

His general argument, however, is tempered if one considers this ethic as not being specifically Protestant or even religious at all but as a general human work ethic that can also be seen in other cultures and other times – think, for example, of the slavish work ethic of the Japanese salarymen. Detractors have questioned whether Weber really defined a separate philosophical entity or merely gave form to underlying religious prejudices.

My argument is that this ethical zeal for work regardless of its pleasure is still current: many are taught to earn and save money regardless of whether it is enjoyable. Whilst there may be good reasons for starting down that path, surely only the most attuned masochist would stick with it if it leads to the detriment of the overall quality of life. A commonly-held assumption about work is that work is an unfortunate hiatus that forms an uncomfortable interruption between blissful childhood and enjoyable retirement. Of course, some do not have the luxury of choice, but it must be argued that a life without choice is perhaps no life at all. In many places of work it is not the pleasurableness of work that is questioned, but the worker's attitude towards it, as if working per se is the reason for life and that a worker should smile and be jolly grateful. It is so all-pervasive that many of us have adopted this ethos, regardless of its true value, even boasting about hours committed to work, weekends taken up and other hand-wringing sanctimonious claptrap.

I believe work should not be merely the means to an end, nor an end in itself, but more the means by which one defines oneself. I would go further to recommend that the individual looks to the reasons first before seeking out work – money or status, self-discovery or merely food on the table? Without seeking a truer ethos for life's work then surely the end result can only be misery; work hard then die! Only when one understands work as an extension of the self can true satisfaction and meaning be found through it. Only then can we remove ourselves from someone else's work ethic.