Shintoists, Taoists and Hindus do not have similar beliefs. There is an ethical component to all these religions, and they also have a theological system of one sort or another.
Voodoo has nothing, and the African religions upon which it is based are also lacking in any ethical or philosophical framework. They are nothing but the most primitive form of religion, which is essentially an attempt to control or placate the things that people fear and provides no foundation for human social life.
Voodoo has avenging orishas, the Bible has an avenging god, Voodoo has compassionate orishas, the Bible has compassionate saints. Papa Doc Duvalier’s death squads maintained a reign of terror over Haiti through the use of Voodoo. They made it into an instrument of repression by adding strong elements of violence and retribution. Google Ton Ton Macoute. The only religious recourse for a beaten down populace within Haiti’sv historic paradigm was to oppose the Macoutes with a counter magic as they had no weapons or organizational skills or education or foreign support with which to overcome that regime.
How many times have you prayed for the destruction or correction of your enemies? How is that not spell casting?
You do know that Haitian voodoo is considered to be a syncretic religion -- based on a "mixture" of West African religious beliefs and Roman Catholicism? I'm not a Roman Catholic, but I'd be foolish to argue that it lacks an "ethical or philosophical content." Same goes for the West African religious traditions found in Haitian voodoo.
Because I believe a particular religious tradition to be in error, or to be false, doesn't entail that it is primitive or "lacking in any ethical or philosophical framework." The Aztecs, for example, had a religious tradition with a complex and detailed philosophical and ethical system -- one which was also vicious, inhumane and false.
For Harrison to claim that Haitian voodoo "is without ethical content" -- and then to argue for its direct effect on the work ethic of the average Haitian -- is the height of absurdity. The fact that in his brief essay he can't decide what's really to blame for Haiti's lack of progress -- 'cept to stress that culture is at fault, not race... especially not race -- makes me wonder what his real aim in the article is.