Fernando Alcoforado*
For our Greek ancestors and philosophers, the quest for happiness should be the central engine of our life. Individual happiness is achieved through self-education. Education is the medium through which people would be empowered to make the best choices in life. The purpose of education should be to enable the individual to acquire skills, to develop a critical sense, to take advantage of the scientific and cultural heritage historically constructed by mankind, but, above all, to be instrumental in promoting his and her happiness and of collective happiness. One of the purposes of Education, perhaps the most important one, is to offer people opportunities and means to be happy. The world is waiting for a revolution in education that has as its main objective to provide the conditions for the conquest of the happiness of human being.
Kant, the philosopher, thus understands education: “To develop in the individual all the perfection of which he is susceptible: such the end of education”. Pestalozzi, the educator, says: “To educate is to progressively develop the spiritual faculties of man”. John Locke expresses himself in this way on the subject: “To educate is to make upright spirits willing at all times to do nothing that is not in conformity with the dignity and excellence of a sensible creature”. Lessing, no less illustrious authority, compares the work of education to the work of revelation, and says: “Education determines and accelerates the progress and perfection of man”. Education must be supplemented by Positive Psychology on the basis of which it is possible to do more than resolve or alleviate psychological disturbances, that is, it intends to make us happy.
Positive Psychology works more on strengths than the weaknesses of the human being, more the pursuit of happiness than the study of mental illness. Positive Psychology is the medium through which people would conquer individual or collective happiness (community, region, country), which is ultimately the main goal that guides the choice of people in life. In short, while Education would act to empower people to make the best choices in life, Positive Psychology would reinforce the work of Education in pursuit of happiness. To be happy, the individual must therefore rely on Education and Positive Psychology. Happiness is an achievement that is achieved through self-education. And she will never be found out. To be happy, the individual must seek self-knowledge, even with the help of the psychologist.
Explaining what kind of projects actually make people happy, and what kinds of attitudes lead to happiness, or make it impossible, is the object of Positive Psychology which, as a descriptive and non-normative discipline, merely identifies what do effectively people happy. With the help of Education, Positive Psychology explores the importance of the individual being able to correctly interpret the world and himself. Some of the unhappiness of individuals results from wrong ways of interpreting things. What happens is that in certain situations we become unhappy because we enter into a self-destructive spiral of subtly wrong thoughts about life and about ourselves and the other thoughts that depress us more and more. To be able to detect and neutralize these thoughts, recognizing that they are simply exaggerations and misinterpretations of things, is a fundamental step for happiness, according to Positive Psychology [LOPES, Paulo. Psicologia Positiva (Positive Psychology). São Paulo: Matrix Editora, 2017].
The purpose of life is not only to satisfy one’s desires in order to be happy, but also what each of us has to give to the world. Happiness must be shared. Like many other species, humans are gregarious and having bonds of trust and friendship with other people is an important part of happiness. Regrettably, we live in an era of private and subjective life, for exacerbated individualism erected as an absolute value. Without wider concerns, which go beyond the immediate borders of self, family and close friends, one can hardly be genuinely happy. Happiness, after all, does not really come from within – it also comes from surrender to the world. Bertrand Russell has made it clear that “happiness should always be considered as a good pursued by all” [RUSSELL, Bertrand. A Conquista da Felicidade (The Conquest of Happiness). Rio: Editora Nova Fronteira, 2015].
Individual happiness will not be realized in its completeness without the collective happiness of the community where the individual lives that can only result from the political will of its leaders and its population. In antiquity, philosophers regarded happiness as a matter related to politics. It was the United States Constitution, which dates from 1787, which included the pursuit of happiness among human rights, based on philosophical reflections that originate in the thought of David Hume and Enlightenment ideas. This means that individual happiness is not complete without the realization of the collective happiness of the community where the individual lives. In all times, the conquest of happiness has been an objective pursued by all human beings. The achievement of individual happiness and of all the inhabitants of a nation is the necessary condition for the end of violence among its citizens within a country. The achievement of individual happiness and of all the citizens of the world is the necessary condition for universal fraternization and the realization of world peace.
An excellent example of countries that have traced the way of collective happiness of their nations is the Scandinavian countries (Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland and Iceland). The UN World Happiness Report 2019 shows that the world’s happiest nations are concentrated in Northern Europe, with Finland at the top of the list. The Nordics have the highest ranking in real GDP per capita, the highest healthy life expectancy, the greater freedom to make choices in life and the greatest generosity. Scandinavia is the cradle of the most egalitarian model of society the world has ever known. The so-called Scandinavian model is an important reference in the formulation of heterodox (progressive) economic policies across the globe. The success of this model was due to the combination of a broad welfare state with rigid mechanisms of regulation of market forces, capable of putting the economy in a dynamic trajectory, at the same time that it reached the best indicators of well-being between the countries of the world.
* Fernando Alcoforado, 79, awarded the medal of Engineering Merit of the CONFEA / CREA System, member of the Bahia Academy of Education, engineer and doctor in Territorial Planning and Regional Development by the University of Barcelona, university professor and consultant in the areas of strategic planning, business planning, regional planning and planning of energy systems, is author of the books Globalização (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 1997), De Collor a FHC- O Brasil e a Nova (Des)ordem Mundial (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 1998), Um Projeto para o Brasil (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 2000), Os condicionantes do desenvolvimento do Estado da Bahia (Tese de doutorado. Universidade de Barcelona,http://www.tesisenred.net/handle/10803/1944, 2003), Globalização e Desenvolvimento (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 2006), Bahia- Desenvolvimento do Século XVI ao Século XX e Objetivos Estratégicos na Era Contemporânea (EGBA, Salvador, 2008), The Necessary Conditions of the Economic and Social Development- The Case of the State of Bahia (VDM Verlag Dr. Müller Aktiengesellschaft & Co. KG, Saarbrücken, Germany, 2010), Aquecimento Global e Catástrofe Planetária (Viena- Editora e Gráfica, Santa Cruz do Rio Pardo, São Paulo, 2010), Amazônia Sustentável- Para o progresso do Brasil e combate ao aquecimento global (Viena- Editora e Gráfica, Santa Cruz do Rio Pardo, São Paulo, 2011), Os Fatores Condicionantes do Desenvolvimento Econômico e Social (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2012), Energia no Mundo e no Brasil- Energia e Mudança Climática Catastrófica no Século XXI (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2015), As Grandes Revoluções Científicas, Econômicas e Sociais que Mudaram o Mundo (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2016), A Invenção de um novo Brasil (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2017), Esquerda x Direita e a sua convergência (Associação Baiana de Imprensa, Salvador, 2018, em co-autoria) and Como inventar o futuro para mudar o mundo (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2019).
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