CounterPunch August 02, 2012
"Good Growth" at the World Bank? Dying for Capitalism by BRIAN McKENNA and HANS BAER “I want to eradicate poverty” announced Jim Yong Kim, the new World Bank President to The Guardian in an exclusive interview on July 25. “I think that there’s a tremendous passion for that inside the World Bank.” In March 2012, President Obama nominated anthropologist Kim, MD, a co-founder of the Haitian non-profit Partners in Health, to head the World Bank. Several sectors of the international community questioned Dr. Kim’s credentials and argued that the selection process was undemocratic and not based on merit. Kim was widely supported by U.S. liberals as well as prestigious publications like the Financial Times and the New York Times. Disregarding the international community’s call for transparency, Kim accepted the post and joined President Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner in Rose Garden ceremony. Kim began his new job on July 1, 2012. Kim’s nomination was strongly endorsed by his friend, Paul Farmer, his Partners in Health co-founder, also a physician-anthropologist. He argued, “Kim’s humility would serve World Bank well” in a Washington Post column on April 11, 2012. Both Drs. Kim and Farmer say that they are highly influenced by the radical educator Paulo Freire (author of Pedagogy of the Oppressed) in their work. At first glance this seems consistent with Kim’s excellent 2000 “Dying for Growth,” a book that Kim co-edited with several others from the Institute for Health and Social Justice Issues in Cambridge, Massachusetts. We have both used the book in our Medical Anthropology teaching and Hans Baer reviewed the book for the Medical Anthropology Quarterly in its March 2001 issue. We will argue that Drs. Kim and Farmer misrepresent the fiercely anti-capitalist Paulo Freire and make an astounding public reversal from their tone in Dying for Growth, which implied a strong anti-capitalist stance. In fact, one of Dr. Kim’s chief actions today is to vigorously promote capitalism, albeit a form of capitalism with a human face. In a recent BBC interview Jim Kim said that capitalist “market-based growth is a priority for every single country.” Kim said that this was the best way to create jobs and lift people out of poverty. In making this critique we argue for a resuscitation of Paulo Freire, Karl Marx, and the relentless questioning of the Frankfurt school philosopher Theodor Adorno. As renowned health experts and political appointees whose profiles rise higher and higher on the world stage, Drs. Kim and Farmer’s interpretations of Freire will likely influence millions. As such, they deserve increased critical attention for their work as public and engaged anthropologists. Astounding Reversal from “Dying for Growth” “The splinter in your eye is the best magnifying-glass.” Theodor Adorno In its various chapters, Dying for Growth explores the linkages between neoliberalism or late capitalism and health problems among the poor in various countries. In the concluding chapter, Millen, Irwin, and Kim advocate a program of “pragmatic solidarity” that calls for a collective effort that aims to counter the adverse effects of neoliberalism upon the health of the poor. While Baer wrote a generally positive review of Dying for Growth, he faulted the editors for failing to provide readers with a vision that will not simply ameliorate the worst effects of global capitalism upon the health of the poor. In his view, this would entail the creation of health for all that entails constructing an alternative global political economy oriented to meeting social needs rather than to profit making. full: http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/08/02/dying-for-capitalism/ August 02, 2012 "Good Growth" at the World Bank? Dying for Capitalism by BRIAN McKENNA and HANS BAER “I want to eradicate poverty” announced Jim Yong Kim, the new World Bank President to The Guardian in an exclusive interview on July 25. “I think that there’s a tremendous passion for that inside the World Bank.” In March 2012, President Obama nominated anthropologist Kim, MD, a co-founder of the Haitian non-profit Partners in Health, to head the World Bank. Several sectors of the international community questioned Dr. Kim’s credentials and argued that the selection process was undemocratic and not based on merit. Kim was widely supported by U.S. liberals as well as prestigious publications like the Financial Times and the New York Times. Disregarding the international community’s call for transparency, Kim accepted the post and joined President Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner in Rose Garden ceremony. Kim began his new job on July 1, 2012. Kim’s nomination was strongly endorsed by his friend, Paul Farmer, his Partners in Health co-founder, also a physician-anthropologist. He argued, “Kim’s humility would serve World Bank well” in a Washington Post column on April 11, 2012. Both Drs. Kim and Farmer say that they are highly influenced by the radical educator Paulo Freire (author of Pedagogy of the Oppressed) in their work. At first glance this seems consistent with Kim’s excellent 2000 “Dying for Growth,” a book that Kim co-edited with several others from the Institute for Health and Social Justice Issues in Cambridge, Massachusetts. We have both used the book in our Medical Anthropology teaching and Hans Baer reviewed the book for the Medical Anthropology Quarterly in its March 2001 issue. We will argue that Drs. Kim and Farmer misrepresent the fiercely anti-capitalist Paulo Freire and make an astounding public reversal from their tone in Dying for Growth, which implied a strong anti-capitalist stance. In fact, one of Dr. Kim’s chief actions today is to vigorously promote capitalism, albeit a form of capitalism with a human face. In a recent BBC interview Jim Kim said that capitalist “market-based growth is a priority for every single country.” Kim said that this was the best way to create jobs and lift people out of poverty. In making this critique we argue for a resuscitation of Paulo Freire, Karl Marx, and the relentless questioning of the Frankfurt school philosopher Theodor Adorno. As renowned health experts and political appointees whose profiles rise higher and higher on the world stage, Drs. Kim and Farmer’s interpretations of Freire will likely influence millions. As such, they deserve increased critical attention for their work as public and engaged anthropologists. Astounding Reversal from “Dying for Growth” “The splinter in your eye is the best magnifying-glass.” Theodor Adorno In its various chapters, Dying for Growth explores the linkages between neoliberalism or late capitalism and health problems among the poor in various countries. In the concluding chapter, Millen, Irwin, and Kim advocate a program of “pragmatic solidarity” that calls for a collective effort that aims to counter the adverse effects of neoliberalism upon the health of the poor. While Baer wrote a generally positive review of Dying for Growth, he faulted the editors for failing to provide readers with a vision that will not simply ameliorate the worst effects of global capitalism upon the health of the poor. In his view, this would entail the creation of health for all that entails constructing an alternative global political economy oriented to meeting social needs rather than to profit making. full: http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/08/02/dying-for-capitalism/
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