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On 7/12/15 5:50 PM, Michael Yates via Marxism wrote:
Louis, you say that the turn toward the market in Vietnam in the
mid-1980s embraced an economic program similar to that of the
Thieu-Ky government in power in the South at the end of the war. This
seems pretty hyperbolic to me. What was the program of the last
government in South Vietnam? Development through theft, corruption,
and murder? Military Keynesianism? Growth through enforced
urbanization?
You're right. I was too hasty. The reforms were not in themselves like
the puppet government's economic approach. They were more like what
China attempted in the early days when the Iron Rice Bowl was still
guaranteed.
It took Vietnam about 15 years before it caught up to China:
NY Times, Sept. 1 2012
In Vietnam, Message of Equality Is Challenged by Widening Wealth Gap
By THOMAS FULLER
HANOI, Vietnam — She wore a pink outfit and matching high heels as she
toured the dusty construction site. Soon after To Linh Huong’s visit in
April, photos that captured the moment went viral on the Internet, but
not because of Ms. Huong’s sense of style.
The daughter of a member of the Vietnamese Communist Party’s Politburo,
the country’s most powerful political body, Ms. Huong had only days
before been appointed the head of a state-owned construction company.
Commentators on the Internet expressed outrage that someone so young —
she is reported to be 24 — held such a senior corporate post.
“Taking a little girl who just graduated from journalism school and
making her the director general of a construction company is no
different than making a one-legged man a soccer goalie,” read a comment
on Pham Viet Dao, a popular blog by a Vietnamese writer of the same
name. “Sorry to say — this is so stupid.”
Like the Communist Party leaders in China, Vietnam’s political mandarins
are struggling to reconcile their party’s message of social justice and
equality with the realities of an elite awash in wealth and privilege.
The yawning divide between rural poverty and urban wealth has become
especially jarring, now that a decade of breakneck growth has come to an
end, dimming the prospects for the poor and middle class to fight their
way up the social ladder.
“Up until now, growth has been wonderful, and to be rich was great,”
said Carlyle A. Thayer, a leading expert on Vietnamese politics who has
a database of Vietnamese leaders and their family members. “There’s a
growing resentment, particularly among the have-nots, toward the wealthy.”
Much of the ire has been focused on Vietnam’s version of crony
capitalism — the close links between tycoons and top Communist Party
officials. This criticism has been able to flourish partly because news
of abuses has leaked out as state companies, which remain a central part
of the economy, have floundered, helping precipitate Vietnam’s serious
financial woes. Activists and critics have also been able to use the
anonymity of the Web to skirt tight media controls that had kept many
scandals out of public view.
As criticism has mounted, some of the relatives of Communist Party
officials have stepped back from high profile roles.
Ms. Huong left her state-run company in June, three months after her
appointment, and the daughter of the prime minister recently left one of
her posts, at a private bank.
Government officials, meanwhile, are sounding defensive.
Vietnam’s president, Truong Tan Sang, issued a blunt self-criticism in a
recent article in the state-run media, writing about the “failures and
ineffectiveness of state-owned companies, the decay of political
ideology and morality.” He also blamed the “lifestyle of a group of
party members and officials” for the country’s problems.
“We should be proud about what we have done,” he wrote, speaking of the
economic boom under Communist leadership, “but in the eyes of our
ancestors, we should also feel ashamed for our weakness and failures,
which have been preventing the growth of the nation.”
On the Internet and social networks, much of the anger about nepotism
and poor economic management has been directed at Prime Minister Nguyen
Tan Dung, who was re-elected to a five-year term last year amid the
turmoil of failing state-owned companies.
“People are concerned that he has too much power — they feel he needs to
be reined in,” said Mr. Thayer, who is emeritus professor at the
University of New South Wales in Canberra, Australia.
Mr. Dung’s family was the focus of a diplomatic cable in 2006, the year
he became prime minister, written by Seth Winnick, who at the time was
United States consul general in Ho Chi Minh City.
