Re: Re: Re: PK on A16
Brad, you are not missing anything! I was making a critical comment on Bates' approach to development. I am assuming we are talking about the same Bates here (Robert). Regarding his _Markets and States_, I don't completely disagree with the fact that state-led development had biases towards small agricultural producers in Africa. This is evident. What I don't agree is that Bates treats this problem as if it is simply state's choice to promote export strategy or behave in certain ways to disbenefit rural producers. Bates' method is methodologically individualistic. He treats states as individuals. Accordingly, he disregards world systemic dynamics, or the question of why Africa was left with promoting a "certain" type of development strategy. I think this methodological problem is more evident in his later book _Toward a political economy of development: a rational choice perspective_ that is what i meant... Mine Brad De Long wrote: Brad DeLong wrote: A strong bias against relatively small-scale rural producers has been one of the worst things about African state-led development over the past generation (see Robert Bates's _Markets and States in Tropical Africa_, or Dumont's _False Start in Africa_). And it does look like this Mozambiquan export tax is a remnant of that bias. which is why, probably, Prof. Bates wrote the book _ Toward a political economy of development: a rational choice perspective _ Publisher: Berkeley :University of California Press,c1988. -- Mine Aysen Doyran I'm missing something... -- Mine Aysen Doyran PhD Student Department of Political Science SUNY at Albany Nelson A. Rockefeller College 135 Western Ave.; Milne 102 Albany, NY 1
Re: BLS Daily Report
Thanks for this, I've forwarded it to the crashlist but without attribution: in future do you want me to forward it in your name, or would you like me to sub you to the List? Mark Jones http://www.egroups.com/group/CrashList - Original Message - From: "Richardson_D" [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, April 20, 2000 10:45 PM Subject: [PEN-L:18270] BLS Daily Report BLS DAILY REPORT, THURSDAY, APRIL 20, 2000 RELEASED TODAY: A total of 1.7 million injuries and illnesses that required recuperation away from work beyond the day of the incident were reported in private industry workplaces during 1998. The total number of these cases has declined in each year since 1992. In contrast, the number of injuries and illnesses reported with only restricted work activity rather than days away recuperating has increased during this same time period by nearly 70 percent to over 1,000,000 cases in 1998. ... Since 1993, truck drivers have experienced the largest number of injuries and illnesses with time away from work. The inflation adjusted weekly earnings of most U.S. workers climbed 3.7 percent over the year ended in the first quarter of 2000, according to BLS. In current dollars or without adjustment for inflation, the weekly pay of the nation's 98.2 million full-time wage and salary employees rose 6.9 percent between the first quarters of 1999 and 2000. The CPI-U increased 3.2 percent over the same period, making the real pay gain 3.7 percent. ... (Daily Labor Report, page D-25). Higher prices for oil imports and a Boeing strike that lowered aircraft exports helped widen the U.S. trade deficit to a record $29.2 billion in February, the Commerce Department says. ... The Secretary of Commerce says that about half the increase is due to higher petroleum prices. ... (Daily Labor Report, page D-1; Washington Post, page E3)_The United States trade deficit widened to a record in February, elevated by surging oil prices and growing demand for imports. The deficit in goods and services trade grew in February as imports climbed to a record and exports fell for a second consecutive month. ... (New York Times, page C14; USA Today, page 3B)_The U.S. trade deficit, continuing its record-breaking pace of last year, widened in February as high oil prices led a big jump in imports. Aside from oil prices and Boeing labor woes, economists said the underlying cause of the expanded deficit remains the same strong U.S. economic growth and consumer demand coupled with weak economic growth overseas, said a National Association of Manufacturers economist. ... (Wall Street Journal, page A2). Base salaries were expected to rise at about 4.4 percent this year, or about the same rate as last year, as more companies use stock options and profit sharing to supplement pay. An American Compensation Association survey showed that 63 percent of the companies offered stock-based plans to employees in 1999. Almost 57.2 percent extended stock options to hourly and nonunion employees (Washington Post, page E17). For years, antipoverty efforts have stressed work, education, and marriage as the way up the economic ladder for the single, jobless mothers who seemed to account for the bulk of urban poverty. Now a new analysis of census data shows that in New York City, in the midst of an economic boom, poverty rates rose sharply among just the kind of families with children that were supposed to be safe: those that include two parents, a worker, and a household head with more than a high school degree. Comparing three years ended in 1998 with the last comparable stretch of prosperity, in the late 1980's, the study found that the overall rate of poverty in New York City among families with children climbed to 32.3 percent, from 29.3 percent, despite a rise in education and employment that would have been expected to reduce poverty. The official federal poverty threshold is $13,133 for a family of three. The survey was released by the nonprofit Community Service Society of New York and suggests a collision of several trends: the growing gap between rich and poor, a surge in immigration, and, as welfare changes push recipients off the rolls, increasing competition for low-end jobs with eroding wages. ... (New York Times, page A25). The Labor Department commissioned a new survey to research the impact of the Family and Medical Leave Act, an effort that it hopes will be under way in the next couple of months. The survey will be conducted by Westat Inc., which released a survey in October 1995 that found approximately two-thirds of employers covered under the 1993 law had changed their personnel policies to comply with it, mostly by increasing the reasons for which leave can be taken. The new survey will include research into how family and medical leave can be made more accessible and affordable. It is intended to update the 1995 research on the law's
RE: Re: BLS Daily Report
Thanks for this, I've forwarded it to the crashlist but without attribution: in future do you want me to forward it in your name, or would you like me to sub you to the List? Mark Jones http://www.egroups.com/group/CrashList I have subbed you to my new list, LongWave2000, where we will discuss the reversion of the market indices to their pre-existing long run growth trends, notwithstanding the minor hiccups of the past ten days. mbs
Re: Re: Re: Re: PK on A16 (fwd)
I had written: Part of the ecological and human crisis is people's free-market responses to poverty. Mine Doyran writes: Are we left with no solutions _but_ free market responses to poverty and ecological crisis? If not, which is what I get from your post, what can be the alternative solutions accessible? Economists list three ways of dealing with "the economic problem" (scarcity), which would include problems such as the way in which the commercialization of agriculture drives the landless peasants to seek ways to survive that involve deforestation and farming on steep hills, encouraging erosion, floods, etc. I would add two more: Start with the official three. 1. The Market. Since the market doesn't deal with external costs and benefits well at all, other solutions are needed. Further, free market competition encourages -- and in some cases, imposes -- an opportunistic free-riding attitude (eschewing what Kenneth Arrow termed "social values") that pushes capitalists and the desperate poor to actively seek was to dump internal costs on others and the natural environment. The market is part of the problem, not the solution. (I'll refer people to discussions pen-l has had about the selling of licenses to pollute (market "solutions" to external costs).) 2. Central Command: this is the government and state imposing solutions on people, such as what the Environmental Protection Agency or the Bureau of Land Management. While this kind of thing should play a role in any effort to deal with environmental problems, excessive reliance on this technique is elitist and alienates the people at the grass-roots. Worse, organizations of this sort can be captured by the bureaucrats running the organization and/or the most powerful of the people being regulated. (The classic case is that of the US Interstate Commerce Commission (created about 100 years ago) was taken over by the railroad companies it was supposed to regulate, so that it ended up acting like a train cartel until the truckers took it over.) Usually, the bureaucrats are in cahoots with the most powerful of the regulated, as with the US Fed or the IMF, which represent coalitions of central bureaucracies with bankers. I would bet real money that the US Bureau of Land Management is in league with the biggest farmers, as is the Brazilian equivalent. (Unfortunately, I don't have information available here.) 3. Tradition (paging the fiddler on the roof!): many peoples -- like the American Indians -- developed ways to survive that do not end up fouling their own nest. These ways were enshrined in unwritten traditions. (For example, the anthropologist Marvin Harris argues that the Jewish and Moslem taboo on eating pork had a positive ecological effect.) But not only are many traditions disgusting, but capitalism tends to destroy or pervert the good ones. The ecological problem is a dynamic one, whereas tradition is backward-looking and static. Tradition can't handle global warming, for example. Here's where the economist's official list stops and I add two. The first one is familiar (at least to students of Douglass North or Oliver Williamson), but the last one is only rarely mentioned. Even a liberal like Robert Heilbroner leaves it off his list of solutions to the "economic problem." 4. Decentralized Command or Hierarchy: this includes those embodied in slavery, serfdom, mafias, political machines, or corporations. In modern capitalism, only the last is really relevant. As North and Lance Davis argue, such hierarchies actively seek to "internalize the external benefits," trying to capture as many profitable activities as possible. (Thus the town square is replaced by the commercial shopping mall.) They somehow ignore the fact that by exactly the same logic, such corporate hierarchies actively seek to turn internal costs (those that they have to pay for) into external costs (those that others have to pay for). Combining these hierarchies with markets produces the aggressive competition that Marx points to. This simply reinforces this point: cost-dumping on others is part of capitalist competition (one that is unfortunately ignored in arguments about the falling rate of profit theory). These organizations are not the solution to ecological problems. On the other hand, organizations of serfdom, mafias, and political machines might deal with local ecological problems (though not global ones). But capitalist corporations are mobile in their operations and thus care little about local problems (except to the extent they are tied down by the use of fixed capital). Simultaneously, they want to capture regulatory agencies to make sure that all regulations are profit-promoting. 5. Decentralized Democracy: I'm always surprised that economists so often ignore this one.[*] I don't expect neoclassical economists -- who are very individualistic and market-oriented and therefore anti-democratic (except
Re: PK on A16
BTW, is there anyone on this list who has more knowledge on Mozambique's cashews? * Africa Faith and Justice Network (AFJN), 401 Michigan Ave. NE, P.O. Box 29378 Washington, D.C. 20017 Tel. 202 832 3412; Fax. 202 832 9051; Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; Web: http://www.acad.cua.edu/afjn Can Mozambique Make the World Bank Pay for Its Mistakes? October 1997 By Joseph Hanlon, Maputo, Mozambique Cashew nut processors in Mozambique are demanding $15 million in compensation from the World Bank, in a ground-breaking attempt to force the World Bank to pay for its mistakes. The claim follows the release earlier this month (September) of a World Bank study which said that a policy the Bank imposed on Mozambique was totally wrong and should be "abandoned". More than 7000 people have been thrown out of work this year, and the newly privatised cashew industry virtually bankrupted. Kekobad Patel, head of the Mozambican Cashew Industry Association, warns that even if the policy is now reversed, most of the factories cannot be reopened without financial help. This will be a personal test for James Wolfensohn, president of the World Bank, and his efforts to make the bank less macho. The new study was carried out at his personal request after he visited Mozambique in February (this year) when he was met by objections to Bank policy on cashews from government, industry and trade unions. NOT JUST A SNACK To Mozambique, cashew nuts are not just nibbles that go with beer -- they are the country's second largest export. Tens of thousands of individual peasants cultivate cashew trees. But the cashew has a hard and acidic outer shell which must be hit with a hammer or cut with a saw to expose the kernel we eat. Mozambique developed a relatively sophisticated processing industry employing 9,000 people, mainly women, to take the kernels from the shells. At World Bank insistence, these state-owned factories were privatised in 1994-5. High bidders at US$ 9 million for the cashew factories were local businesses and not transnational corporations, as had been expected by the World Bank and many outside observers. But as soon as the local business people took over, the World Bank revealed a secret study which claimed the processing industry was so inefficient that the country lost money on every nut processed, and that peasants would earn a higher price for their cashews if raw nuts were exported. The Bank said that raw cashew nuts should be exported to India, where the kernels are removed from shells by families working at home in poor conditions. In particular, the shells contain an acid which damages the fingers of workers, which is why Mozambique has always used mechanical processing with large hammers or saws rather than Indian hand processing. Furthermore, India subsidises its industry. Mozambique had imposed an 20% export tax on unprocessed cashew nuts to compensate for Indian subsidies. Government and industry had already agreed a phased reduction down to 10% over five years, as the new owners repaired war damage and modernised their factories. But this was not enough for the World Bank, which demanded that the tax be removed over three years and exports of unprocessed nut be "liberalised". There was an outcry from the government, industry and trade unions, who demanded reconsideration. They said: 1. the study had been done without talking to people in the industry, and had fundamental flaws; 2. globalisation was forcing a lowering of standards of health and safety at work; 3. it was a myth that peasants would gain; and 4. buyers of the newly privatised factories had been cheated because they had an implicit (and in some cases explicit) promise that there would be protection until they got the industry back on its feet. CONDITIONALITY AND WORLD BANK REFUSAL TO TALK Despite the strong and detailed case put forward by the industry, the World Bank refused to discuss the subject. Instead, the Bank made it a test of strength. The 1995 World Bank "Country Assistance Strategy" made free export of cashew a "necessary condition" of its programme to Mozambique -- the only "necessary condition" linked to such a detailed policy point. The 1996 joint IMF-World Bank "Policy Framework Paper for Mozambique" also required the removal of the cashew export tax. According to the World Bank's "World Development Report 1997," Mozambique is the poorest and most aid dependent country in the world. This is because Mozambique was subject to a 12 year war waged by the old apartheid government in South Africa. This war killed 1 million people and did an estimated $30 billion in damage, which shattered the economy. As a result of this huge destruction, Mozambique is now receiving more than $500 mn per year in aid. But all of this aid is "conditional" on Mozambique having programmes with the IMF and World Bank. With no World Bank programme, there is no aid. So when the Bank makes
Re: PK on A16
* Subject: Mozambique cashew challenge to IMF From: Joe Hanlon ([EMAIL PROTECTED] ) Date: Sun 10 Oct 1999 - 23:24:45 BST MOZAMBIQUE CHALLENGES WORLD BANK, IMF WITH DECISION TO PROTECT CASHEW NUT INDUSTRY WILL BANK AND FUND BLOCK MOZAMBIQUE'S ADDITIONAL DEBT RELIEF? By Joseph Hanlon, Maputo, Mozambique 4 October 1999 Mozambique's parliament on 30 September passed a law to protect the cashew nut processing industry. This goes against one of the conditions set when Mozambique was given debt relief on 30 June, and raises the possibility that the World Bank or IMF might try to block the additional debt relief which Mozambique should receive under the "Cologne debt initiative" agreed by G7 leaders on 18 June. WORLD BANK INTERVENES The cashew saga is long and complex. Mozambique was once the world's largest producer of cashew nuts. The cashew kernels we eat are inside hard and acidic shells, and in Mozambique these nuts are shelled in large factories, which were Mozambique's largest industrial employer, with 10,000 workers. In 1994 the factories were privatised, and the government agreed to maintain a temporary export tax on unprocessed nuts to allow the new owners time to modernise their factories. But in 1995 the World Bank forced Mozambique to reverse this promise, and reduce the export tax from 26% to zero over 4 years -- to allow the free export of raw nuts to India where they shelled by hand by children. The World Bank argued that the free market will impose efficiency and if children in India will work for less than women in Mozambican factories, then the factories should close. The World Bank made cashew export liberalisation a "necessary condition" of its 1995 programme, which meant that if this condition was not met, all aid -- not just World Bank loans, but even essential food aid -- would be cut off, because all bi-lateral aid is conditional on having a World Bank programme. Mozambique was forced to comply, but there was a massive public outcry. World Bank president James Wolfensohn, on a visit to Maputo on 16 February 1997, personally intervened. He said the export tax could remain at 14%, and there should be a new study. That World Bank-funded study said that the competition was unfair because India subsidised cashew processing, and Mozambique should have a 20 per cent export duty to create a "level playing field". But the World Bank rejected its own study, duties were not increased, and all but one of the factories are now closed. The World Bank had argued that the free export of nuts would increase the prices paid to peasants, but this has not occurred. IMF MOVES TO BLOCK DEMOCRACY This year (1999), a bill was put before the Mozambican parliament to impose a 20 per cent duty or some other export restrictions and thus allow the factories to reopen. The IMF moved to pre-empt this as part of the HIPC (Heavily Indebted Poor Countries) Initiative debt relief. On 28 June, the IMF board met in Washington to approve debt relief. A condition of debt relief was that Mozambique have a new ESAF (Enhanced Structural Adjustment Facility) agreement, and this was approved by the IMF board on 28 June just before HIPC debt relief was approved. Part of the ESAF agreement (in the "Letter of Intent") says that "the government will not adopt new, or increase existing, general import surcharges or export taxes and restrictions." The only export tax is on unprocessed cashew nuts, and this was clearly intended to block parliament's plan to raise the tax. IN AN ELECTION YEAR Nevertheless, parliament went ahead and on 30 September approved a bill calling for the government to set the export duty at between 18% and 22% for the next five years. Prime Minister Pascoal Mocumbi told a press conference on 24 September that the government would approve the new law. The problem for the government is that there are national elections on 3-4 December and Frelimo only holds an eight seat majority. More than 9000 cashew factory workers are now unemployed, and this has had a devastating impact on the economies of several small cities. If the cashew workers and their friends and neighbours vote against Frelimo, that will be enough to swing the election. WILL THE IMF ACCEPT? "We have to explain to the IMF that a sovereign parliament decided this," Prime Minister Mocumbi said. But he went on to admit that "if the IMF refuses, we will have to go back to parliament." Privately, government officials say they think the IMF and World Bank will accept an increase in the export tax to 20%, but would not accept a ban on exports as called for by the industry, trade unions and opposition Renamo party. The issue could be tested soon. Mozambique will be one of the first of the HIPCs to go back to the Bank and Fund to request the extra debt relief promised by the G7 at Cologne (Koln). But that extra debt relief is conditional on a country faithfully following its IMF
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: PK on A16
Jim wrote: Economists list three ways of dealing with "the economic problem" (scarcity), which would include problems such as the way in which the commercialization of agriculture drives the landless peasants to seek ways to survive that involve deforestation and farming on steep hills, encouraging erosion, floods, etc. How is it possible on "rational choice" premises (which conceive persons as calculating machines - i.e. which universalize the Ricardian vice ;-)) to reach without self-contradiction the conclusion that any outcome of the "decisions" of such machines is "inefficient"? Such outcomes include the institutional framework (e.g. the role assigned to markets), government policy in general and government policy with respect to small farmers and the natural environmental in particular. On such premises, the world must always be the best of all possible worlds no? Ted -- Ted WinslowE-MAIL: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Division of Social Science VOICE: (416) 736-5054 York UniversityFAX: (416) 736-5615 4700 Keele St. Toronto, Ontario CANADA M3J 1P3
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: PK on A16
I wrote: Economists list three ways of dealing with "the economic problem" (scarcity), which would include problems such as the way in which the commercialization of agriculture drives the landless peasants to seek ways to survive that involve deforestation and farming on steep hills, encouraging erosion, floods, etc. Ted asks: How is it possible on "rational choice" premises (which conceive persons as calculating machines ...) to reach without self-contradiction the conclusion that any outcome of the "decisions" of such machines is "inefficient"? Such outcomes include the institutional framework (e.g. the role assigned to markets), government policy in general and government policy with respect to small farmers and the natural environmental in particular. On such premises, the world must always be the best of all possible worlds no? No, since the rational calculating machines only take into account the costs and benefits to themselves. It's very common in economics to point to the difference between individual rationality and efficiency from a more social perspective. It's true that economists generally show a strong bias toward privileging individual rationality over social efficiency. (This is especially true of Chicago schoolmen.) But that arises because they avoid accepting the fact that production is socialized, i.e., that externalities (both technical and pecuniary ones) are ubiquitous. (In fact, the idea of pecuniary externalities is generally rejected in an _a priori_ way and usually not even mentioned. It's sort of a dirty secret...) The "calculating machine" image of individuals that Veblen criticized has been dropped by economists (even in some intro textbooks). Instead, the currently-dominant model is basically tautological: people choose what they choose and the only way one can figure out what their preferences are is by looking at what they choose (revealed preference). "Rationality" (consistency) is tautological, since people may have a taste for variety, so that revealed preferences need not be consistent. The parts that are not tautological is (1) the assumption that tastes are given exogenously and (2) the usual assumption that people are totally individualistic, not caring about the feelings of others besides their immediate families. The first is preserved because economists usually eschew reading sociology and psychology and usually sneer at these fields (especially the former). (Matt Rabin of UC-Berkeley (Brad's colleague) had a useful survey article on "economics and psychology," but I doubt that this will effect the dominant perspective of the orthodox economists.) The assumption that people are totally individualistic is contradicted by the fact that people actually being willing to vote in a representative election even though one's vote has absolutely no effect on the outcome. But at least in the U.S., economists are products of an extremely individualistic culture and so cling to the individualism assumption and seek to preserve their theory by adding epicycles. (Of course, economists usually ignore the role of the culture they're embedded in.) Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://liberalarts.lmu.edu/~JDevine
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: PK on A16
Jim wrote:
No, since the rational calculating machines only take into account the
costs and benefits to themselves. It's very common in economics to point to
the difference between individual rationality and efficiency from a more
social perspective. It's true that economists generally show a strong bias
toward privileging individual rationality over social efficiency. (This is
especially true of Chicago schoolmen.) But that arises because they avoid
accepting the fact that production is socialized, i.e., that externalities
(both technical and pecuniary ones) are ubiquitous. (In fact, the idea of
pecuniary externalities is generally rejected in an _a priori_ way and
usually not even mentioned. It's sort of a dirty secret...)
But the institutional environment (e.g. property rights, role of markets,
export taxes, pollution controls and taxes, etc.) in which individuals make
these decisions is itself the outcome of such decisions isn't it? How,
without self-contradiction, can this environment be conceived as having been
so constructed as to leave a "free lunch" in place?
The "calculating machine" image of individuals that Veblen criticized has
been dropped by economists (even in some intro textbooks). Instead, the
currently-dominant model is basically tautological: people choose what they
choose and the only way one can figure out what their preferences are is by
looking at what they choose (revealed preference). "Rationality"
(consistency) is tautological, since people may have a taste for variety,
so that revealed preferences need not be consistent.
By "calculating machine" I meant the identification of reason with deductive
reasoning ("calculating") from fixed precisely defined axioms (e.g. the
axioms of rational choice theory).
The parts that are not tautological is (1) the assumption that tastes are
given exogenously and (2) the usual assumption that people are totally
individualistic, not caring about the feelings of others besides their
immediate families. The first is preserved because economists usually
eschew reading sociology and psychology and usually sneer at these fields
(especially the former). (Matt Rabin of UC-Berkeley (Brad's colleague) had
a useful survey article on "economics and psychology," but I doubt that
this will effect the dominant perspective of the orthodox economists.)
The assumption that people are totally individualistic is contradicted by
the fact that people actually being willing to vote in a representative
election even though one's vote has absolutely no effect on the outcome.
But at least in the U.S., economists are products of an extremely
individualistic culture and so cling to the individualism assumption and
seek to preserve their theory by adding epicycles. (Of course, economists
usually ignore the role of the culture they're embedded in.)
It seems to me there is more substance than this.
The elements that constitute the content of "preferences" are assumed to be
externally rather than internally related.
The values embodied in these preferences exclude those values which e.g.
Dante, Shakespeare, Kant, Goethe, Hegel, Marx, Marshall and Keynes claim are
the true ultimate values, values whose realization in an individual life
makes that individual's life "good". These are "love within the Highest
Sphere" (Dante) - i.e. relations of "mutual recognition" with others (as in
Marx's description of how we would produce if "carried out production as
human beings") - and "beauty".
"By far the most valuable things, which we can know or imagine, are certain
states of consciousness, which may be roughly described as the pleasures of
human intercourse and the enjoyment of beautiful objects." (G.E. Moore,
Principia Ethica, p. 237)
This are the values that would govern existence in the "realm of freedom".
"Individualism" in the general philosophical sense (which Keynes endorses in
the form expressed in "Paley's dictum that 'although we speak of communities
as of sentient beings and ascribe to them happiness and misery, desires,
interests and passions, nothing really exists or feels but individuals' "My
Early Beliefs", vol. X, p. 449) is mistakenly identified with possessive
individualism and atomism.
Ted
--
Ted WinslowE-MAIL: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Division of Social Science VOICE: (416) 736-5054
York UniversityFAX: (416) 736-5615
4700 Keele St.
Toronto, Ontario
CANADA M3J 1P3
Re: RE: Re: RE: Re: BLS Daily Report
Mark Jones wrote: Doug Henwood wrote: Hmm, well last I checked, which was year-end 1999, the SP 500 was at 2.9 times its long-term trend price (long-term defined as since 1871). So just going back to the trendline would take the index down by 2/3, to a Dow-equivalent of 3735. And, as any student of Robert Shiller knows, trend overshoots on the high end are usually followed by trend overshoots on the low end, Dow 2000 isn't an unlikely target. That's why you're calling it LongWave2000, right? But the other day you wrote that 'the worst is over', no? Short-term, I meant. I think the great bull market (1982-2000?) is basically over, though. Doug
RE: Re: RE: Re: RE: Re: BLS Daily Report
Doug Henwood wrote: I think the great bull market (1982-2000?) is basically over Bull markets aren't usually followed by plateaux, are they? My infamous bet with poor Max was also based on a back-of-envelope calculation that the Dow would logically fall to 3k. BTW, even that would not mean 'the end of capitalist civilisation as we know it', as other soi-disant marxists reproach me wrongly for arguing. I can't say I wouldn't get my pleasure from which the pain in the City though, not to speak of wall st. What _does_ interest me is to speculate about/analyse the consequences and implications for the world [dis]order. Mark Jones
Re: [What is happening to Samir Amin? regression to globalkeynesianism?] (fwd)
-- Forwarded message -- Date: Fri, 21 Apr 2000 11:34:29 -0600 (MDT) From: Abu Nasr [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [What is happening to Samir Amin? regression to global keynesianism?] Dear Mine I don't know why this article comes up for discussion now, five years after its publication. Samir Amin published a book, "Spectres of Capitalism" (Monthly Review Press, 1998), not to mention numerous articles here and there since 1995 and these might be important to look at if the real question is "where is Samir Amin going?" Anyway, I agree, by the way, Amin's thinking has changed or evolved since the late 1980s-early 1990s the period of the fall of the USSR. Where he used to emphasise "delinking" as a solution to third-world countries' problems, this notion seems to be deemphasizing this more recently. He mentions it in the Monthly Review article but seems to bring up the topic less and less these days. Aside from these changes, though, I think that what Amin is doing in the Monthly Review article is to present a series of reforms that would transform the world economy into a socialist one. I think he is trying to begin with the objective "where we are now" and proceed to set targets for attention and activity. Clearly the "reforms" he outlines are not going to be implemented any time soon because they would totally undermine the US hegemony of the world, at least economically. But I think Amin is reluctant to state dogmatically and a priori that for this a violent revolution is necessary. One sets one's goals and then sees what is necessary to attain them. Amin, of course, is an economist, not a political activist. He has worked with several third-world governments and not, to my knowlege, as a member or supporter of any specific Communist or revolutionary Marxist party. In general his writing focuses on objective economic reality and on tasks that are objectively needed, not on how to go about mobilizing the political will to bring them about. If you are looking for that, I think Amin is not the writer to refer to. Another factor here is related to another development in Amin's thinking, or anyhow something he has written about in the last few years. He has maintained recently that the transition to socialism is not turning out to be a sudden all-at-once event but a process with many transitional stages along the way. He brought this out in, for example, a series of articles about China in Arabic in the Palestinian magazine al-Hadaf in the summer of 1997. In addressing the question, "is China capitalist or socialist?". He noted the presence in China of strong factors for both prospects. The struggle there would determine which way the country's development went. But more generally he suggested that the path to socialism would be longer than Marxists used to assume, that it would involve many half-way points, transitional stages, situations that could not be defined as entirely capitalist or as fully socialist, and so should not be looked at dogmatically with a priori criteria. Personally, I find that approach useful. The socialist movement has suffered greatly from dogmatism and the present juncture is one that requires a thorough re-examination. I don't think Amin is trying to impose a reformist limit on anti-imperialist action in his Monthly Review article (if he is, I certainly oppose that), I think what he is outling is a direction for work with the understanding that the struggle will most likely demand all sorts of strategies and tactics. As I see it, reformism -- i.e., demanding that socialism be attained "within the system" or else abandoned as "too destructive" -- is treason to socialism. The system must be smashed. At the same time, the great violent revolutions in Russia and China that smashed the old systems there did not secure the benefits of socialism to those countries either, at least not permanently and not so far. And it doesn't help much to say simply, "ok, we need a world-wide violent revolution, not one limited to one country." That statement is probably true, but if revolution in one country has proven extraordinarily difficult, world revolution is even more so. We must begin by understanding how the world system works, isolating its weak links and concentrating pressure there. That is the process, the revolution, that must continue and is continuing. I don't think that Amin intended his programme of "evolution" to be read as reformist, i.e., excluding violent revolution or qualitative transformative change (revolution). Even if he did, however, his desingnation of specific points for pressure is extremely useful for anti-imperialist revolutionary forces. After all the revolutionary forces are going to have to go beyond Amin's books and articles anyway and into the world of practical revolutionary action. Amin might point to useful targets, but it's up to the revolutionary fighters to figure out how to storm them.
Questioning free-market liberalism
The Nation Magazine, May 8, 2000 FREE-MARKET LIBERALISM IS NOW PROCLAIMED A UNIVERSAL MODEL FOR SUCCESS, BUT THIS BELIEF IS BASED ON A PARTIAL AND LIMITED WORLDVIEW. The American Ascendancy: Imposing a New World Order by BRUCE CUMINGS The turn of the millennium provided yet another occasion to celebrate a triumphant American Century. And given the unipolar pre-eminence and comprehensive economic advantage that the United States enjoys today, only a spoilsport can complain. Unemployment and inflation are both at thirty-year lows. The stock market remains strong, though volatile, and the monster federal budget deficit of a decade ago miraculously metamorphoses into a surplus that may soon reach more than $1 trillion. Meanwhile, President William Jefferson Clinton, not long after a humiliating impeachment, was rated in 1999 as the best of all postwar Presidents in conducting foreign policy (a dizzying ascent from eighth place in 1994), according to a nationwide poll by the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations. This surprising result might also, of course, bespeak inattention: When asked to name the two or three most important foreign policy issues facing the United States, fully 21 percent of the public couldn't think of one (they answered "don't know"), and a mere 7 percent thought foreign policy issues were important to the nation. But who cares, when all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds? If this intoxicating optimism is commonplace today, it would have seemed demented just a few short years ago: Back then, the scholars and popular pundits who are supposed to know the occult science of international affairs were full of dread about American decline and Japanese and German advance. The American Century looked like an unaccountably short one. Today it is disconcerting to recall the towering influence of work by "declinists" like Paul Kennedy (The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers) and Clyde Prestowitz (Trading Places); it is positively embarrassing to read recent accounts like Samuel Huntington's Clash of Civilization and the Remaking of the World Order and Donald White's The American Century, which still seem to assume an America on the road to ruin. Prestowitz thought Japan was ahead of the United States in nearly every important industry and argued that Japan was verging on hegemonic predominance in the world economy. Now it is difficult to find any American who takes Japan seriously--in 1990, 63 percent of foreign policy elites fretted about competition from Japan; that fell to 21 percent in 1994 and a mere 14 percent in 1998. Francis Fukuyama's The End of History and the Last Man had a different point to make: The end of the cold war marked the real millennial transition, leaving just one system standing--ours. Few could have imagined Fukuyama doing this through a reprise of the thought of Hegel--and perhaps least of all the great philosopher himself, who would roll over in his grave to see his dialectic grinding to a halt in the Valhalla of George Bush and Bill Clinton's philistine United States. But Fukuyama's argument had an unquestionable ingenuity, taking the thinker perhaps most alien to the pragmatic and unphilosophical American soul, Hegel, and using his thought to proclaim something quintessentially American: that the pot of gold at the end of History's rainbow is free-market liberalism. History just happened to culminate in the reigning orthodoxy of our era, the neoliberalism of Thatcher and Reagan. The United States has such a comprehensive advantage in the world that it could occupy itself for a full year with the Monica Lewinsky scandal, a year punctuated by the disastrous collapse of several of the world's important economies (South Korea, Thailand, Indonesia, Russia) and followed by a new war, and nothing happened except that the American economic lead lengthened. The stock market continued to go up in spite of the global financial crisis, which included a very expensive implosion of the Russian economy in August 1998; the market expanded all through the war in Kosovo. (More recently it appeared that the bull market might be coming to an end.) Economic growth in the last quarters of both 1998 and 1999 was so robust (6.1 and 6.9 percent, respectively) that in GNP terms it created a Spain overnight. This isn't to say that US diplomacy is winning friends and influencing people the world over, but so what? Former UN chief Boutros Boutros-Ghali put his finger on the deepest truth: "Like in Roman times," he said, the Americans "have no diplomacy; you don't need diplomacy if you are so powerful." Let me try to isolate four elements that I think account for the American ascendancy today, each of which has little to do with preponderant military strength (even though the United States has that, too): mass consumption and mass culture, the advantages of a continent, an unappreciated aspect of American technological prowess and the longevity of the global system that
North Korea
My mother's first cousin was a high-ranking doctor in the Army during the Korean War. He was also a close friend of John Eisenhower, the Dwight's son. He was part of the task force to determine whether or not to drop a nuclear bomb. The reason for not doing so was that the prevailing winds would have brought too much fallout on the American troops. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University [EMAIL PROTECTED] Chico, CA 95929 530-898-5321 fax 530-898-5901
Re: Re: Re: Re: PK on A16
Brad, you are not missing anything! I was making a critical comment on Bates' approach to development. I am assuming we are talking about the same Bates here (Robert). Regarding his _Markets and States_, I don't completely disagree with the fact that state-led development had biases towards small agricultural producers in Africa. This is evident. What I don't agree is that Bates treats this problem as if it is simply state's choice to promote export strategy or behave in certain ways to disbenefit rural producers. Bates' method is methodologically individualistic. He treats states as individuals. Accordingly, he disregards world systemic dynamics, or the question of why Africa was left with promoting a "certain" type of development strategy. I think this methodological problem is more evident in his later book _Toward a political economy of development: a rational choice perspective_ that is what i meant... Mine Actually I thought that in _Markets and States_ Bates treated holders of state power as actors constrained by politically-powerful classes, kind of like someone else did in _The Eighteenth Brumaire_... But I agree that more recently Bates's insights have seemed to me to be more obscured than sharpened by the "rational choice" methodology in political science... Brad DeLong
Re: Re: Re: Re: PK on A16 (fwd)
actually, true. Bates changed his position in his later works, but I don't know if dramatically though, to say that rational choice was already implicit in his early works, so the outcome is not suprising. I have to dig into pol.eco notes for this.. in any case, i agree on the basics.. Mine Actually I thought that in _Markets and States_ Bates treated holders of state power as actors constrained by politically-powerful classes, kind of like someone else did in _The Eighteenth Brumaire_... But I agree that more recently Bates's insights have seemed to me to be more obscured than sharpened by the "rational choice" methodology in political science... Brad DeLong
