Well here is a thesis that sets the record straight
Cereal crisis: causes and consequences
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martien007
- I posted 500 messages!
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- Registration: 25/03/08, 00:28
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According to this philosophy, widely shared by the natives of Latin America, the human being cannot, as some of our European philosophers think, "dominate nature" ... because he is an integral part of it. To seriously harm other living beings would amount, in a way, to destroying one's own house!
That he cannot dominate nature is clear.
+ several examples:
- droughts in Australia in recent years which have caused a collapse in cereal production + water shortage ....
- cyclone in Burma: apart from the dead who do not count for the regime in place (the inhabitants of the affected region is hated by power because they are rebels), so nature has done the job for them but what is abnormal it is the poor, not the dictators, toast.
- earthquake in China: ... there is a lot to say. Parents who have lost their only child are in despair because they lost their RETIREMENT at the same time
0 x
Martien007:
Thank you for these particularly flattering appreciations. I do not pretend to know all the details of the African problem at all, which is of little interest to me. The main thing for me is to understand the fairly general mechanisms that are involved. This involves pruning the insignificant elements to better focus on the structural aspects: the real must be simplified to be readable, otherwise we cannot establish that a catalog of facts.
Essentially a classic training, but above all a great curiosity. I began to take an interest in Africa particularly after reading the book, alas premonitory, by René DUMONT: "Black Africa is off to a bad start". Meetings with Africans allow us to understand what the term "underdeveloped" has inappropriate and insulting.
On Kenya, you should read Wangari Maathai's biography.
As for technical training, necessary but insufficient to understand the current world, it is self-taught.
I recommend this little elementary physics experiment: refrain from watching your TV for 15 days: at the end of this short time things will start to appear differently to you. Remember, as I like to repeat, libraries are "arsenals of weapons of mass instruction."
Remundo:
Curious mixture! Are you absolutely sure that the increase in obesity is a positive sign? Can you say that the increase in size and a longer average lifespan are linked only to food?
For my part, I consider that the increase in size is mainly the result of the decrease in intense physical work of young adolescents which once blocked their growth. The opposite excess, linked to an excessively rich diet causes obesity. Advances in medicine and better access to care have made it possible to combat or control pathologies that used to be fatal, positively influencing the average lifespan (but more or less the maximum duration).
Perhaps, therefore, it would be wiser to reverse your proposal and write that this average lifespan has increased despite a diet too rich in fats, sugar, salt and residual products of industrial agriculture. I would add that we do not yet know all the consequences of this diet, because its effects being cumulative, we can think that the curve of increase in average lifespan may soon turn around.
Leave to repeat myself, I think you are perfectly capable of making the distinction between the legitimate profit of the one who provides a service to the community and a system whose only logic and the only criterion is profit whatever the means implemented , and therefore without concern for the social effectiveness or the harmlessness of the products (except in the latter case, when it is favorable to the sole aim pursued).
Even if it means repeating myself (but it's educational!), I have to re-explain the main rules that govern north-south relationships.
The main idea of the economic institutions (World Bank, IMF, WTO) after the second world war is a specialization of the countries according to their specific advantages and this, within the framework of a liberal (economic) vision of free trade. Thus, one African country, such as Senegal, will produce coffee, another such as Kenya, green beans, all for export to the north. In return, the northern countries will supply them with cereals and manufactured products. It is a specialization on a global scale assuming cross-traffic.
Where the rub is the inequality of the terms of trade, something that does not bother you too much Remundo, but which is nevertheless fundamental: complementarity, but in inequality. In other words, for the south, it is to favor the economy of the north to the detriment of its own, hence the underdevelopment.
It is also the intrinsic danger of this interdependence, as we can clearly see today. The President of Senegal, Abdoulaye Wade, recently declared that coffee cannot be eaten, he wanted to reorient the agriculture of his country towards food production. He fully realizes that his power will eventually be shaken if the situation continues. What we quickly call "hunger riots" are not demonstrations as spontaneous as one would like to believe, but testify to organized and conscious struggles.
The main vice of these organizations set up by the northern countries for their benefit is that they only institutionalize simple power relations between countries of unequal powers according to the famous definition: "Liberalism ( economic), it is the free fox in the free henhouse ".
Of course, in this story there are not only "awful" people, there are also NGOs which attack the consequences and not the causes, there are also policies which speak of "development", a vast pie to the cream, while ensuring the maintenance of dependence and poverty. When you speak of "co-development, I do not doubt your good intentions, however, as long as these power struggles prevail, they will remain as wishful thinking or will turn into a cosmetic coating. As for cultivating the desert, it is is to apply a strategy that the shaddocks would not deny: why solve simple problems when we can tackle more complicated ones?
A: your remarks are excellent. What training do you have? How do you know these subjects on Africa so precisely?
Thank you for these particularly flattering appreciations. I do not pretend to know all the details of the African problem at all, which is of little interest to me. The main thing for me is to understand the fairly general mechanisms that are involved. This involves pruning the insignificant elements to better focus on the structural aspects: the real must be simplified to be readable, otherwise we cannot establish that a catalog of facts.
Essentially a classic training, but above all a great curiosity. I began to take an interest in Africa particularly after reading the book, alas premonitory, by René DUMONT: "Black Africa is off to a bad start". Meetings with Africans allow us to understand what the term "underdeveloped" has inappropriate and insulting.
On Kenya, you should read Wangari Maathai's biography.
As for technical training, necessary but insufficient to understand the current world, it is self-taught.
I recommend this little elementary physics experiment: refrain from watching your TV for 15 days: at the end of this short time things will start to appear differently to you. Remember, as I like to repeat, libraries are "arsenals of weapons of mass instruction."
Remundo:
… If not, the corpulence and the size of the French would not progress, just like their lifespan (more than a quarter / year).
Curious mixture! Are you absolutely sure that the increase in obesity is a positive sign? Can you say that the increase in size and a longer average lifespan are linked only to food?
For my part, I consider that the increase in size is mainly the result of the decrease in intense physical work of young adolescents which once blocked their growth. The opposite excess, linked to an excessively rich diet causes obesity. Advances in medicine and better access to care have made it possible to combat or control pathologies that used to be fatal, positively influencing the average lifespan (but more or less the maximum duration).
Perhaps, therefore, it would be wiser to reverse your proposal and write that this average lifespan has increased despite a diet too rich in fats, sugar, salt and residual products of industrial agriculture. I would add that we do not yet know all the consequences of this diet, because its effects being cumulative, we can think that the curve of increase in average lifespan may soon turn around.
Leave to repeat myself, I think you are perfectly capable of making the distinction between the legitimate profit of the one who provides a service to the community and a system whose only logic and the only criterion is profit whatever the means implemented , and therefore without concern for the social effectiveness or the harmlessness of the products (except in the latter case, when it is favorable to the sole aim pursued).
Even if it means repeating myself (but it's educational!), I have to re-explain the main rules that govern north-south relationships.
The main idea of the economic institutions (World Bank, IMF, WTO) after the second world war is a specialization of the countries according to their specific advantages and this, within the framework of a liberal (economic) vision of free trade. Thus, one African country, such as Senegal, will produce coffee, another such as Kenya, green beans, all for export to the north. In return, the northern countries will supply them with cereals and manufactured products. It is a specialization on a global scale assuming cross-traffic.
Where the rub is the inequality of the terms of trade, something that does not bother you too much Remundo, but which is nevertheless fundamental: complementarity, but in inequality. In other words, for the south, it is to favor the economy of the north to the detriment of its own, hence the underdevelopment.
It is also the intrinsic danger of this interdependence, as we can clearly see today. The President of Senegal, Abdoulaye Wade, recently declared that coffee cannot be eaten, he wanted to reorient the agriculture of his country towards food production. He fully realizes that his power will eventually be shaken if the situation continues. What we quickly call "hunger riots" are not demonstrations as spontaneous as one would like to believe, but testify to organized and conscious struggles.
The main vice of these organizations set up by the northern countries for their benefit is that they only institutionalize simple power relations between countries of unequal powers according to the famous definition: "Liberalism ( economic), it is the free fox in the free henhouse ".
Of course, in this story there are not only "awful" people, there are also NGOs which attack the consequences and not the causes, there are also policies which speak of "development", a vast pie to the cream, while ensuring the maintenance of dependence and poverty. When you speak of "co-development, I do not doubt your good intentions, however, as long as these power struggles prevail, they will remain as wishful thinking or will turn into a cosmetic coating. As for cultivating the desert, it is is to apply a strategy that the shaddocks would not deny: why solve simple problems when we can tackle more complicated ones?
0 x
"Please don't believe what I'm telling you."
Chapeau!
This is pedagogy!
It reminds me of a professor of philosophy, who had each new idea, repeated it 3 times, the meaning, but each time, with a construction of different sentences, and always in the same tone.
Despite his phlegm and his pedagogical quality, that did not prevent some to never understand anything in his course.
This is pedagogy!
It reminds me of a professor of philosophy, who had each new idea, repeated it 3 times, the meaning, but each time, with a construction of different sentences, and always in the same tone.
Despite his phlegm and his pedagogical quality, that did not prevent some to never understand anything in his course.
0 x
Hi Ahmed
In terms of mix, yours is excellent: increase in size and build -> obesity ...
We are simply more costly in muscle and size. And at the margin, some make a lot of fat.
There is no doubt that the increase in height and average build (which is NOT in obesity) comes mainly from the quality of the diet.
This does not mean that the quantities should be exaggerated, but it is the other side of the coin, amplified by the sedentary and "tele-phage" behavior of the population. Studies show, moreover, that obesity rather affects the underprivileged social levels of the population.
In addition, for the lifetime, food is only one of the parameters as you explain it very well.
For intense work, there is a clear increase in height between 1970 and 2003 for the average French, 5,5 cm in humans in particular. These periods do not correspond to the archaic times (but not so distant) when everything was done by hand.
On the size, it is essentially the food which intervenes.
OK for the North South report and the profits, we are going in circles, you keep warm, very well written, but warm ... as I say, the countries of the South would be even more miserable without the current exchanges, as imperfect as can do we consider them.
This will not change as long as these countries remain as poorly nourished, educated, and therefore democratically and technologically developed.
This is why we must do co-development: I do not see it as the n-th way to take a dominant position on the Third World, but on the contrary as a means of giving it the tools necessary to master their destiny, thus solving a sacred bundle of problems for both the South and the North.
What you say is true about the "fox in the henhouse" precisely because the third world countries are unable to progress and thus defend themselves on an equal footing without a strong policy of co-development. We come to pay them their "coffee" or oil, which some oligarchs monopolize by leaving their population in the most total denial, in order to perpetuate the situation until the next bloodbath, sometimes genocidal and / or linked to beatings states who again pursue the same policy.
It is moreover not by chance that the (nasty polluting slavers and venal ...) developed nations of the North master their destiny ... it did not come from the sky. It was the combination of true democracy with successive technological breakthroughs that allowed their expansion.
Colonialism has been over for 40 years and we have not seen any improvement in the standard of living in decolonized countries, even rather the reverse. Perfectly logical because colonialism despite all its faults had the merit of injecting technology into the countries concerned, and therefore of organizing production, structuring the country (road, buildings, rails), educating the population (even if the Western culture had big hooves in this area), in short, to show another way than chronic underdevelopment. All this collapsed when Westerners left and many autoctones returned to the starting point.
You will then explain to me how you want to give an embryonic food self-sufficiency to African countries like Somalia (sea water resources ...), Chad, Darfur, Namibia ... You can even resort to Shadocks reasoning for this.
Libraries are a weapon of mass instruction, of course, but not a weapon of mass construction.
Would your educational qualities be as strong as your pessimism, dear Ahmed?
Ahmed wrote:Remundo:… If not, the corpulence and the size of the French would not progress, just like their lifespan (more than a quarter / year).
Curious mixture! Are you absolutely sure that the increase in obesity is a positive sign? Can you say that the increase in size and a longer average lifespan are linked only to food?
In terms of mix, yours is excellent: increase in size and build -> obesity ...
We are simply more costly in muscle and size. And at the margin, some make a lot of fat.
There is no doubt that the increase in height and average build (which is NOT in obesity) comes mainly from the quality of the diet.
This does not mean that the quantities should be exaggerated, but it is the other side of the coin, amplified by the sedentary and "tele-phage" behavior of the population. Studies show, moreover, that obesity rather affects the underprivileged social levels of the population.
For my part, I consider that the increase in size is mainly the result of the decrease in intense physical work of young adolescents which once blocked their growth. The opposite excess, linked to an excessively rich diet causes obesity. Advances in medicine and better access to care have made it possible to combat or control pathologies that used to be fatal, positively influencing the average lifespan (but more or less the maximum duration).
In addition, for the lifetime, food is only one of the parameters as you explain it very well.
For intense work, there is a clear increase in height between 1970 and 2003 for the average French, 5,5 cm in humans in particular. These periods do not correspond to the archaic times (but not so distant) when everything was done by hand.
On the size, it is essentially the food which intervenes.
OK for the North South report and the profits, we are going in circles, you keep warm, very well written, but warm ... as I say, the countries of the South would be even more miserable without the current exchanges, as imperfect as can do we consider them.
This will not change as long as these countries remain as poorly nourished, educated, and therefore democratically and technologically developed.
This is why we must do co-development: I do not see it as the n-th way to take a dominant position on the Third World, but on the contrary as a means of giving it the tools necessary to master their destiny, thus solving a sacred bundle of problems for both the South and the North.
What you say is true about the "fox in the henhouse" precisely because the third world countries are unable to progress and thus defend themselves on an equal footing without a strong policy of co-development. We come to pay them their "coffee" or oil, which some oligarchs monopolize by leaving their population in the most total denial, in order to perpetuate the situation until the next bloodbath, sometimes genocidal and / or linked to beatings states who again pursue the same policy.
It is moreover not by chance that the (nasty polluting slavers and venal ...) developed nations of the North master their destiny ... it did not come from the sky. It was the combination of true democracy with successive technological breakthroughs that allowed their expansion.
Colonialism has been over for 40 years and we have not seen any improvement in the standard of living in decolonized countries, even rather the reverse. Perfectly logical because colonialism despite all its faults had the merit of injecting technology into the countries concerned, and therefore of organizing production, structuring the country (road, buildings, rails), educating the population (even if the Western culture had big hooves in this area), in short, to show another way than chronic underdevelopment. All this collapsed when Westerners left and many autoctones returned to the starting point.
As for cultivating the desert, it is to apply a strategy that the shaddocks would not deny: why solve simple problems when we can tackle more complicated?
You will then explain to me how you want to give an embryonic food self-sufficiency to African countries like Somalia (sea water resources ...), Chad, Darfur, Namibia ... You can even resort to Shadocks reasoning for this.
Libraries are a weapon of mass instruction, of course, but not a weapon of mass construction.
Would your educational qualities be as strong as your pessimism, dear Ahmed?
0 x
Hi Gegyx,
My mother is a former philosophy teacher who reminds me of your description
.
In philosophy and in French, I was pretty good in having obtained the best mark of my establishment in the bac.
Real thing !
My mother is a former philosophy teacher who reminds me of your description
.
In philosophy and in French, I was pretty good in having obtained the best mark of my establishment in the bac.
Real thing !
gegyx wrote:Chapeau!
This is pedagogy!
It reminds me of a professor of philosophy, who had each new idea, repeated it 3 times, the meaning, but each time, with a construction of different sentences, and always in the same tone.
Despite his phlegm and his pedagogical quality, that did not prevent some to never understand anything in his course.
0 x
@Remundo:
Ok, I admit to having misinterpreted the term "corpulence", it is quite obvious that for the same body weight index, the weight increases when the height increases (I hope my interpretation is correct this time). I also recognize the influence of dietary diversity and the favorable effect of a moderate protein intake, however, the factor of physical exertion in adolescence deserves to be highlighted because it is neglected by some studies.
Regarding obesity, admit that it was tempting to compare a previous situation where a dietary imbalance prevailed by default, to the current period where the imbalance is reversed by excess and where we count among adults of + 15 years, 26% who are overweight and 8,3% who are downright obese (we should add the children of + in + affected by this phenomenon). A real public health problem which has / will have repercussions on the average lifespan.
Although this is not reasoning, I cannot help symbolically comparing this morbid adiposity (morbid in the medical sense) individual and collective, to the bulimia of our economic model which at the same time as 'it creates the conditions for its expansion, generates the conditions for its loss. Even orthodox economists like Patrick ARTUS are starting to have serious doubts!
Certainly, there are several ways to accommodate a dish, but the basic ingredients will remain the same. It seems that for you, the colonial period being over, you are satisfied with formal independence and neglect what the notion of neo-colonialism implies.
What seems important to me is to note that states are waging an economic war, that it is violence that dominates geopolitical relations and that, under these conditions, it is not possible to speak of development or of co- development: there is a frontal contradiction. This contradiction results from what is called "development" is, by nature, inextensible since it is mainly done by parasitizing other countries. What shows it well is that what was proposed as an ideal for the whole planet did not work and even causes the effects of feedback negative in northern countries, which may be underdeveloped.
That's a lot of conditions to meet! I admit that I don't understand the meaning of your sentence…
There is a country where people have enough to eat (a little tight anyway!), Where the level of education is of a very good standard. Well, democracy question is not really that (but it's easy to find worse) and for "technology", we will surely have to wait a very, very long time: it is Cuba.
There are other examples, like Bhutan which has just passed from a (debonair) kingship to a republic, and which does not feel the urge or the need for "development".
A counterexample of development: in the post-war period, the United States financed the industrialization of the Philippines, then led by the dictator Marcos, to counterbalance communist expansion in Korea; once the Korean War ended and the situation stabilized, the World Bank began to deindustrialize the Philippines.
Another example: in Senegal there were many hulling (rice) factories; after the enthusiastic adhesion of the Senegalese authorities to liberalism and the application of the Structural Adjustment Program imposed by the IMF and the WB, there are only a few left. Another consequence was the resort to the massive importation of cereals, hence the gravity of the current economic situation. This political choice led to impoverishment of the countryside, but this is not what worries President Abdoulaye Wade (Cf my previous post): he knows that the peasants will not budge, but that the rise in the price of cereals will cause the dissatisfaction with city dwellers who have so far been relatively advantageous in importing cheap Asian rice. On second thought it may seem curious that in a situation of food shortage people in the countryside do not fare better than those in the city: to the previous reason is added the extreme destitution of peasants who do not have the bare minimum to cultivate (sometimes not even land!).
It is strange that in the declaration to which I alluded previously the president speaks of coffee, his country not producing it, probably a style effect?
In terms of feeding the countries you mention, I don't know exactly what can work, on the other hand I know very well what does not work: transfers of effective agricultural techniques to the north do not give anything there because the data agronomic are fundamentally different (climate, soils, etc.). In addition, this approach does not correspond to the socio-economic factors of the south. The debauchery of “technologies” ends in “white elephants”… They correspond neither to the possibilities of these countries nor to the will of the countries potentially providers… By admitting this possibility, and by admitting that it works, food autarky would be obtained in price of a technico-economic dependency.
A priori, the solutions, that are not just technical issues, must be above all local, modest, within the reach of the populations. It seems to me the only viable avenues for real autarky. NGOs could easily popularize methods invented or used by peasants from other countries, methods which allow cultivation in very dry conditions; for example varieties of plants resistant or not very greedy in water, or the use of BRF, as in Burkina-Faso ... Of course, we must not delude ourselves, all that I mention can only have an impact limited without the addition of structural reforms, but even with this reservation, humanly, it's worth it.
It reminds me of a quote from Audiard that one of my friends likes:
"Two idiots who walk go a long way than a seated intellectual", but understanding the danger, he takes care to add "but it is better to know where one is going". We will have the opportunity to come back to this in more detail.
As for my pessimism, I would describe it as substantial although reasonable, I even draw from it a certain optimism. Or then, with less modesty, lucidity (at least a certain dose)… Any problem generally corresponds (but not always!) To a quantity of possible solutions, most of which are downright bad and some (s) ) acceptable. The tragedy is that the latter are rarely easily discernible ...
What do you think of my signature?
Ok, I admit to having misinterpreted the term "corpulence", it is quite obvious that for the same body weight index, the weight increases when the height increases (I hope my interpretation is correct this time). I also recognize the influence of dietary diversity and the favorable effect of a moderate protein intake, however, the factor of physical exertion in adolescence deserves to be highlighted because it is neglected by some studies.
Regarding obesity, admit that it was tempting to compare a previous situation where a dietary imbalance prevailed by default, to the current period where the imbalance is reversed by excess and where we count among adults of + 15 years, 26% who are overweight and 8,3% who are downright obese (we should add the children of + in + affected by this phenomenon). A real public health problem which has / will have repercussions on the average lifespan.
Although this is not reasoning, I cannot help symbolically comparing this morbid adiposity (morbid in the medical sense) individual and collective, to the bulimia of our economic model which at the same time as 'it creates the conditions for its expansion, generates the conditions for its loss. Even orthodox economists like Patrick ARTUS are starting to have serious doubts!
"OK for the North-South relations and the profits, we go in circles, you rewarmed, very well written, but warmed ... as I say, the countries of the South would be even more miserable without current exchanges, however imperfect it may be do we consider them. "
Certainly, there are several ways to accommodate a dish, but the basic ingredients will remain the same. It seems that for you, the colonial period being over, you are satisfied with formal independence and neglect what the notion of neo-colonialism implies.
What seems important to me is to note that states are waging an economic war, that it is violence that dominates geopolitical relations and that, under these conditions, it is not possible to speak of development or of co- development: there is a frontal contradiction. This contradiction results from what is called "development" is, by nature, inextensible since it is mainly done by parasitizing other countries. What shows it well is that what was proposed as an ideal for the whole planet did not work and even causes the effects of feedback negative in northern countries, which may be underdeveloped.
"This will not change as long as these countries remain so poorly nourished, educated, and therefore democratically and technologically developed"
That's a lot of conditions to meet! I admit that I don't understand the meaning of your sentence…
There is a country where people have enough to eat (a little tight anyway!), Where the level of education is of a very good standard. Well, democracy question is not really that (but it's easy to find worse) and for "technology", we will surely have to wait a very, very long time: it is Cuba.
There are other examples, like Bhutan which has just passed from a (debonair) kingship to a republic, and which does not feel the urge or the need for "development".
A counterexample of development: in the post-war period, the United States financed the industrialization of the Philippines, then led by the dictator Marcos, to counterbalance communist expansion in Korea; once the Korean War ended and the situation stabilized, the World Bank began to deindustrialize the Philippines.
Another example: in Senegal there were many hulling (rice) factories; after the enthusiastic adhesion of the Senegalese authorities to liberalism and the application of the Structural Adjustment Program imposed by the IMF and the WB, there are only a few left. Another consequence was the resort to the massive importation of cereals, hence the gravity of the current economic situation. This political choice led to impoverishment of the countryside, but this is not what worries President Abdoulaye Wade (Cf my previous post): he knows that the peasants will not budge, but that the rise in the price of cereals will cause the dissatisfaction with city dwellers who have so far been relatively advantageous in importing cheap Asian rice. On second thought it may seem curious that in a situation of food shortage people in the countryside do not fare better than those in the city: to the previous reason is added the extreme destitution of peasants who do not have the bare minimum to cultivate (sometimes not even land!).
It is strange that in the declaration to which I alluded previously the president speaks of coffee, his country not producing it, probably a style effect?
In terms of feeding the countries you mention, I don't know exactly what can work, on the other hand I know very well what does not work: transfers of effective agricultural techniques to the north do not give anything there because the data agronomic are fundamentally different (climate, soils, etc.). In addition, this approach does not correspond to the socio-economic factors of the south. The debauchery of “technologies” ends in “white elephants”… They correspond neither to the possibilities of these countries nor to the will of the countries potentially providers… By admitting this possibility, and by admitting that it works, food autarky would be obtained in price of a technico-economic dependency.
A priori, the solutions, that are not just technical issues, must be above all local, modest, within the reach of the populations. It seems to me the only viable avenues for real autarky. NGOs could easily popularize methods invented or used by peasants from other countries, methods which allow cultivation in very dry conditions; for example varieties of plants resistant or not very greedy in water, or the use of BRF, as in Burkina-Faso ... Of course, we must not delude ourselves, all that I mention can only have an impact limited without the addition of structural reforms, but even with this reservation, humanly, it's worth it.
"Libraries are a weapon of mass education, certainly, but not a weapon of mass construction."
It reminds me of a quote from Audiard that one of my friends likes:
"Two idiots who walk go a long way than a seated intellectual", but understanding the danger, he takes care to add "but it is better to know where one is going". We will have the opportunity to come back to this in more detail.
As for my pessimism, I would describe it as substantial although reasonable, I even draw from it a certain optimism. Or then, with less modesty, lucidity (at least a certain dose)… Any problem generally corresponds (but not always!) To a quantity of possible solutions, most of which are downright bad and some (s) ) acceptable. The tragedy is that the latter are rarely easily discernible ...
What do you think of my signature?
0 x
"Please don't believe what I'm telling you."
First a small correction: I made a chronological error in my previous post about the Philippines. The dictator Marcos prevailed at a later time (1965-86), but that does not fundamentally change the analysis.
More importantly, concerning (economic) liberalism, it is necessary to understand that the metaphor of the fox and the hens only considers one aspect of things: that economic freedom for all is at the service of the most powerful.
However, this analysis is partial and an examination of the facts reveals the true nature of this dogma, tailor-made to serve the interests of the most powerful. In fact, this concept is a mere theoretical justification: it is pure rhetoric, a smokescreen for the practical exercise of domination. Because there is not, and there never has been, "free and undistorted competition".
Depending on whether the interest of a dominant country is for free trade or not, it will impose the abolition of customs barriers in countries in a weak position, or it will establish at home, for its benefit, direct or indirect protectionist measures (direct = customs tariff; indirect = subsidies to its producers). This is how the United States, champions of liberalism, subsidize American cotton and establish customs duties to protect its steel industry, for example. The same is true for Europe with the CAP.
England, which was the first to claim this doctrine in its day, built its development thanks to a skilful mixture of a lot of protectionism and a little liberalism, according to its interests.
Newspaper:
In the July issue of the weekly "Sciences Humaines" an article appeared on "The return of the hunger riots". It provides quite a bit of information on this question.
Finally this excellent article goes to the bottom of things without bothering the usual consensus speech:
http://www.cadtm.org/spip.php?article3435
There are, in particular, illustrations of the functioning of the free trade system as I described it above.
More importantly, concerning (economic) liberalism, it is necessary to understand that the metaphor of the fox and the hens only considers one aspect of things: that economic freedom for all is at the service of the most powerful.
However, this analysis is partial and an examination of the facts reveals the true nature of this dogma, tailor-made to serve the interests of the most powerful. In fact, this concept is a mere theoretical justification: it is pure rhetoric, a smokescreen for the practical exercise of domination. Because there is not, and there never has been, "free and undistorted competition".
Depending on whether the interest of a dominant country is for free trade or not, it will impose the abolition of customs barriers in countries in a weak position, or it will establish at home, for its benefit, direct or indirect protectionist measures (direct = customs tariff; indirect = subsidies to its producers). This is how the United States, champions of liberalism, subsidize American cotton and establish customs duties to protect its steel industry, for example. The same is true for Europe with the CAP.
England, which was the first to claim this doctrine in its day, built its development thanks to a skilful mixture of a lot of protectionism and a little liberalism, according to its interests.
Newspaper:
In the July issue of the weekly "Sciences Humaines" an article appeared on "The return of the hunger riots". It provides quite a bit of information on this question.
Finally this excellent article goes to the bottom of things without bothering the usual consensus speech:
http://www.cadtm.org/spip.php?article3435
There are, in particular, illustrations of the functioning of the free trade system as I described it above.
0 x
"Please don't believe what I'm telling you."
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27/02/16, 18:36A subject posted in the forum : Agriculture: problems and pollution, new technologies and solutions
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