Lord of the Vineyard: A Parable for Seattle

Mennonite Central Committee
Saturday, 8 January 2000

LA CEIBA, El Salvador -- "For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire men to work in his vineyard. He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard." (Matt. 20: 1-2 NIV)

Since the harvest was plentiful and labor abundant, the landowner continued to hire new workers throughout the day. When evening came, he paid them each a denarius, beginning with those he had hired last. The workers who had toiled all day under the hot sun began to complain.

Understandably, you might say. Schooled in the laws of a free market economy, we understand justice in terms of maximum profits for maximum productivity. Productivity is ensured by unrestricted competition and free trade. These are the laws of globalization, policed by the World Trade Organization (WTO) since it was established in 1995.

But what if the denarius paid to the latecomers, to the economically unproductive, represents an absolute of life itself? What if the denarius represents the preservation of a sea turtle or the alleviation of poverty in El Salvador? What if the neoliberal justice that would deny the payment of that denarius is not justice after all?

Just competition would imply equal access to the means of production, technology and capital. A quick glance, however, suffices to illustrate that equal access is far from characteristic of the relationship between the economically powerful nations of the North and the developing nations of the South. The colonial powers developed their industrial strength under a coercive system of trade laws which maintained the colonies in conditions of strict economic dependence as suppliers of cheap raw materials and protected markets for valuable manufactured goods. The Spanish conquerors of Latin America had nothing of the modern day aversion to interventionism. With the consequent disparities firmly established, El Salvador and her neighbors are nevertheless expected to compete today on an equal footing with Spain's neo-colonial successors: American capital and big business. A blind eye turned to history, the WTO would give El Salvador a half day's wage for the exports turned out by her coffee plantations and clothing sweatshops.

My campesino neighbors in this rural community reap the consequences of a long day of exclusion from equal participation in the global marketplace.

Pablo, a former guerilla combatant who lost his left arm during Salvador's 12-year civil war, today works the land in a losing battle to ward off poverty. Year after year, the price of commercial fertilizer rises while that of corn and beans stagnates or drops. Mexican and Honduran exporters, backed by foreign capital and liberal trade policies, flood El Salvador's markets, forcing local farmers to drop prices simply to sell their corn and beans. Many despair of ever making a profit from agriculture. Youth choose to load trucks with sand and stone for the construction industry, preferring cash wages to the insecurity of agriculture.

"I don't have that luxury," Pablo explains. "I have six children to feed and clothe. The wages paid by truck owners don't go that far. Working the land at least gives me the security of knowing I can put food on the table."

In the 1980s, Berta fled to the refugee camps in Honduras. Since the end of the war, she has made her living as the community tailor. In recent years, however, the establishment of free trade zones in the capital San Salvador has opened the doors to a stream of maquilas. These are foreign-owned clothing assembly plants, renowned for their violation of worker rights and low wages. Clothing manufacturers flood local market with inexpensive clothing. Berta works hard, but work is scarce.

At Seattle, protesters loudly proclaimed their refusal to recognize the World Trade Organization as lord of the vineyard. Behind the marches and the smashed coffee shop windows lay a vision of a world that respects the right of all peoples to life, dignity and hope.

Now Seattle is picking up the pieces, getting back to business. Meanwhile, Pablo waits in the marketplace, dreaming of irrigation equipment for his vegetable farm. Berta waits too, hoping for an order that would provide work to the Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) supported embroidery cooperative she recently joined.

Despite the desperation around them, Pablo and Berta say they haven't lost their desire to work nor their faith in the Lord of the vineyard.

For more information, or to contact Mennonite Central Committee, see their website at: www.mcc.org