EL LADINO GLOBAL XII

Jesús le dijo: Si puedes creer, 

al que cree todo le es posible.

Marcos 9:23 (Casiodoro de Reina, 1569)

Yo no sé si la verdad, pero de que más sustanciosa información se puede pescar en las grassroots es una realidad. Así me lo corroboraron quienes están en el compás de espera de las leyes (o reglamentación, creo, pa' que no se vaya a dejar venir la hambrienta jauría digital) secundarias, "chambiando" pa'l sector que todavía nos da pa' la papa de todos los días y mucho más. Yo estoy en otro; esta vez aunque no me agradaría para nada, estaría más que satisfecho de -en buena lid- capitular con honor contra un heavyweight alemán.

"A mí se me da muy bien "el escaneo", ¿verdad?. Con una barrida de pies a cabeza la hago y te puedo decir cómo la persona realmente es" -le dijo una vez una amiga mutua a un carnal. No, eso le cuesta mucho trabajo a su servidor, y por eso cada frentazo que me doy, caray. Es así que, aunque se lo ganó con todo merecimiento desde el primer post; como el kimchi, dejé fermentar mis percepciones del país ajeno que recientemente visité, antes de compartirlas con todos ustedes, no edulcoradas, pero sí carentes de la honestidad brutal de la primera impresión.

El futuro... económico ciertamente está en el lejano oriente. Y para ser más específicos estamos hablando de "los tigres asiáticos", no los etiquetamos dentro de la difusa "Cuenca del Pacífico" para que no se apunten los que ni al caso van. Sin embargo, tienen un muy serio "handicap energético" -que podría darle al traste a mi predicción también- que pronto, de ser posible en forma pacífica, tendrán que solucionar. Y sí, de hecho dije: ¡rana!, así que los clásicos de "mecha corta" ya pueden saltar.

Tres años y cachito pasaron desde que estuve allá en 2010, esta vez me tocó experimentar la temporada de lluvias in full. Podría fácilmente platicarles de ese maravilloso "knee-friendly" running-track; tal vez les entusiasmaría saber del transporte público aclimatizado que me sedaba mucho mejor que el Dalay. Seguramente algunos de ustedes querrán escuchar la historia del velocísimo bullet-train que en un santiamén devoró una distancia comparable a la que separa Matamoros y Tampico acá. Otros más desearían soñar que el trato, eficiencia y probidad de los social services es muy similar a los nuestros. En fin, todo eso que todavía que añoran los "inadaptados yuppies" que jamás han superado el in-home-again "cultural clash". No, intentaremos extraer unos ejemplos que nos den pistas sobre cómo el patrón de prosperidad (de la verdadera, se esté o no de acuerdo con el esquema, no los cuentos chinos que aún hoy nos intentan presentar) de ese país lejano del nuestro se separó.

Llamó poderosamente mi atención que cerca de este hermoso parque se encontraba una planta de generación de energía que utiliza gas natural para su combustión. Uno tiene que dejar jirones de dignidad cuando se tiene una urgente necesidad nacional. Por ello, ese lejano país ha apostado en serio a la transferencia de tecnología (entre otras estrategias a largo plazo) como en la eólica (de algo sirvieron mis visitas a Santa Fe, ¿verdad?) donde tienen un fructífero partnership con los daneses. Otra de ellas es obviamente la inversión en el valor agregado que producen los recursos humanos altamente calificados, por eso vemos que la tecnología de punta para la refinación de petróleo (para un territorio que casi carece de él en su totalidad, no gimmicks; espero que no se publique en el FT un milagroso estudio reciente que verse sobre la posibilidad de que la maremotriz suplirá su creciente demanda al cien allí) se aplica tanto en los Emiratos Árabes como en Cadereyta, perros bravos, Nuevo León. Mi cuaderno sudcoreano aparte de dos retoños es ahora jefe de un departamento, por haber mejorado un importante método en su campo de investigación. Aunque no vive precisamente en una mansión, en su país se repuso rapidísimo del trago amargo de la no autorizada apropiación de la base de datos de su doctoral investigación, ¿se acuerdan?, yo sí, como si hubiera ocurrido ayer.

Más no todo es idílico en ese país; aunque no tienen como fin destruirse como aquí, a ellas tampoco les va tan bien. Un par nos bastará para que se den una idea del panorama, obvio se les recomienda abonar a la casuística para que a la supuesta verdad nos podamos acercar. La primera de ellas, harto "eficiente" (de hecho fue una de las que visitó mi cubo en mi antigua torre de marfil también, y me referenció el libro cuyo extracto casi vamos a finalizar), pero bajo la férula de su importado boss, que se ha cómodamente montado en su valiosa labor, así que de plano, ésta ya mejor apostó por llevársela de a muertito y esperar su jubilación. Pero, la segunda tiene un porvenir, hasta hoy, peor. Bien que se ha sobado el lomo (dirían nuestros antepasados) esta mujer. Impartiendo clases aquí y allá, se ha dado tiempo para seguir estudiando nuestra heroína (neta que esta pobre parece fabricada de titanio). Ella le ha dado con todo para obtener un posgrado más, pero para su asesora, educada en los "esteits", no es suficiente aún. Tan dura ha sido la carga que, según ella, por lo menos un par de veces se ha escapado por un pelito de un "mental breakdown". Afortunadamente, como el objetivo no es despedazarla, seguro al puerto de la fama no va, pero ciertamente al crecimiento nacional sí va a contribuir, pero sobre todo, contra todos los pronósticos, de pie nuestra cuata habrá de sobrevivir.

La otra cara de la moneda la representan muy bien los cuates de mi mujer. Desde sus amigos de toda la vida hasta sus compañeros de trabajo, todos se mostraron dispuestos a complacer. Estos últimos conocían al dedillo tanto sus responsabilidades como, de mi conyuge, el papel, lo cual dejaba casi nulo espacio para el bloqueo laboral o, entre otras mañosas técnicas, la discrecionalidad. Es así que: un día nos llevaron al 'business district' que efímeramente fue el más famoso de este mundo; y otro a un tris estuve de conocer su versión de una ecociudad (pero tuve que quedarme para ser solidario con nuestro plan original); pero sobre todo nos invitaron a la actividad que para ellos mejor show their affection... el comer. En la sobremesa, tiempo perfecto en que los hombres nos desatamos en temas que aburren a más de una fémina, que llegamos a uno que es tabú aquí y alla: la polaca. Me enteró entonces que no sólo han copiado lo mejor para sobresalir, sino que ahora han tomado también, de nosotros, lo peor. "Sí, utilizaron a las oficinas de inteligencia para inducir la elección; eso no se vale, Marco". Ya hemos visto que no hay un estudio concluyente que relacione un sistema específico de gobierno y el crecimiento económico, más lo que sí sabemos es que en nuestro mundo Shalalá, en el que la economía no es la única reina, INExcusable esa chicanada es.

"La globalización es una fantasía que permite a los mafiosos esconderse en las entretelas de su apariencia, y que ha convencido a la clase media e ilustrada de que estamos en un mundo interconectado donde podemos compartir intereses comunes. Si esta percepción prevalece, será imposible desentrañar el recalcitrante racismo, clasismo y sexismo que las políticas neoliberales han provocado desde hace muchos años..." ('Esclavas del Poder'. Lydia Cacho. Grijalbo-Proceso. 2010).

"Sí, a mi hermana le ha pegado mucho ese ambiente; es demasiada la exigencia y poca la satisfacción profesional para los que todavía no se han alineado con algún grupo en ese lugar. Eso la tiene un poco infeliz porque no ha podido combinar bien su vida privada y laboral. Afortunadamente, como ella tiene base, pues está protegida, por así decirlo" -me cuenta recientemente una de las amigas de mi mujer. Más in situ, a la hora de compartir la comida, escucho otra voz de insatisfacción (la que no es tan infrecuente oír en los pasillos, muy alejada de la suposición que cree que: el puesto hace a la institución): "No pus, nomás hubo el cambio y en nuestro centro hubo una revolución, nuestro grupo ya desapareció" -me dice una de las fuentes internas. "¿Cómo? No debería borrarse por las pistolas de nadie un departamento que es, para nuestro campo, vital" -le contesto incrédulo. "Pues así fue, y nos reasignaron como asociados con otro investigador" -ahonda resignado. "Bueno, honestamente pienso que uno de los problemas consiste en que, quien debió ser más que sólo director, un líder de verdad, escuela no dejó" -arriesgo mi comentario. "No lo creo, con los que quedaron es igual" -y terminamos con ese comentario, comida y conversación.

"Mi cuñado, es muy estimado, aún con su carrera sin terminar, como vendedor" -nos dice ahora la cuata de mi esposa. Why is like that? -pregunta a su vez la dueña de mis... fails. "Bueno, porque él es buena persona, y ayuda en lo posible a que crezcan los que están bajo su cargo, realmente lo aprecian mucho por como es, creo yo -nos dice sin titubear. Si en economía casi nada tiene la mínima certeza terrenal, de algo casi podemos estar seguros: no son los estirados quienes a esta república habrán de transformar. Not so longo ago, un ex compañero del exilio académico, de esos que afirman cosas sin meditar me dijo:"Este cuate si es trinchón, él sin tanto aspaviento rojillo ya está jalando en un laboratorio fuera de aquí" -me confesó muy ufano de contar con esa amistad. Ciertamente es un logro que vale la pena reconocer, pero ni él ni ningún otro (tampoco áquel que tenía una enferma fijación por cierto Pável de la UNAM, terminó leyendo un libro de título más o menos así: "Cómo transformar al mundo sin tomar el poder", y ahora es referente altermundista nacional, úchales, así de jodidos andamos aquí) se aventó el tiro de echarnos la mano para prevenir y contrarrestar la usurpación, ¿no? "Hace no mucho le pregunté a mi mujer: "Have you ever met people clever enough and socially-commited at the same time?" "Not many, but surely a couple of them" -she said. Así es, y en lo que respecta a México tampoco es muy normal, pero casi todos en nuestro bando están. Qué tanto esos podrán influir en las anestesiadas masas, ese es un cálculo imposible para ustedes de estimar (ahorrénse el rídiculo de siquiera intentarlo, por favor; a lo más que podrán llegar es a computar cuál es la probabilidad de traicionar nuestros ideales, right?). Imagínense ahora ustedes el reto que representa cambiar a nuestro país, tomando en cuenta las actuales enrarecidas condiciones, que hacen del nuestro un territorio desconocido. En corto: por más improbable que pueda parecer empujar y lograr el cambio; al final, alma, vida y corazón tenemos que en, sacrificio, ofrecer. AL TIEMPO.

"Lástima que terminó", but let's do our last push of this book review.

EPILOGUE

Sao Paulo, October 2037

Can things get better?

"Tha Bad Samaritans demand that developing countries should not be allowed to use extra policy tools for protection, subsidies and regulation, as these constitute unfair competition.

"Global economic competition is a game of unequal players. It pits against each other countries that range from, as we development economists like to say, Switzerland to Swaziland. Consequently, it is only fair that we 'tilt the playing field' in favour of the weaker countries. In practice, this means allowing them to protect and subsidize their producers more vigorously and to put stricter regulations on foreign investment.* These countries should also be allowed to protect intellectual property rights less stringently so that they can more actively 'borrow' ideas from more advanced countries. Rich countries can further help by transferring their technologies on favourable terms; this will have the added benefit of making economic growth in poor countries more compatible with the need to fight global warming as rich country technologies tend to be far more energy efficient.

* Quite a few developing countries have chosen not to use these tools. Some neoliberal economists have used this as 'evidence' that these countries do not want policy freedom - which means that the WTO rules are not, in fact, restricting the options for these countries. However, what may look like a voluntary choice is likely to have been shaped by past conditionalities attached to foreign aid and IMF-World Bank programmes, as well as the fear of future punishement by the rich countries. But, even ignoring this problem, it is not right for rich countries to make the choice for developing countries. It is actually quite curious how free-market economists who are so much in favour of choice and autonomy do not hesitate to ppose them when they are by developing countries.

"...tilting the playing field in favour of developing nations is not just a matter of fair treatment now. It is also about providing the economically less advanced countries with the tools to acquire new capabilities by sacrificing short-term gains. Indeed, allowing the poor countries to raise their capabilities more easily brings forward the day when the gap between the players is small and thus it becomes no longer necessary to tilt the playing field.

What is right and what is easy

"...Since neo-liberals policies are making developing countries grow more slowly than they would otherwise do, the Bad Samaritans themselves might be better off in the long run if they allowed alternative policies that would let developing countries grow faster. If 'per capita' income grows at only 1% a year, as it has in Latin America over the past two decades of neo-liberalism, it will take seven decades to double the income. But if it grows at 3%, as it did in Latin America during the period of import substitution industralization, income would increase by eight times during the same period of time, providing the Bad Samaritans rich countries with a vastly bigger market to exploit. So it is actually in the long-term interest of even the most selfish Bad Samaritans countries to accept those 'heretical' policies that would generate faster growth in developing countries."

... the END.

PILÓN:

Nomás pa' demostrar qué tanta 'plusvalía' han obtenido de toda 'la pasta' que ustedes amablemente han apostado en 'mi educación formal'; va uno más de mis 'famosos y certeros' escenarios climáticos estaciones pa' que le aprovechen a los contados lectores de mi blog. 

Dado el pronóstico de la actual actividad solar más el desarrollo en que se encuentra la fase del FENOS (Fenómeno de 'El Niño' Oscilación del Sur; ¿el primero controla al segundo también?, todavía no han llegado a un consenso sobre ello mis colegas), dos de los más importantes moduladores del Sistema Climático Terrestre, me parece probable que las temperaturas regionales estén por debajo de la normal a largo plazo, y que la lámina total para la temporada de lluvias tampoco supere su promedio estacional (May-Oct). De hecho estas lluvias tempranas por encima de lo regularmente visto y provocadas -parcialmente- por 'nortis' tardíos, ciertamente sí parecen anómalas (¿atípicas?, eso todavía no lo puedo saber sino hasta que termite -mañana- abril). Ahi está pues, espero que lo aprovechen, pa' que no les llegue de improviso la contingencia ni la limosna del FONDEN.

http://marcosalas.blogspot.com/2014/02/blog-post.html

EL LADINO GLOBAL XI

No se requiere tampoco demasiado tiempo para que ciertos compas olviden que son producto del (en su estado más puro) oportunismo, y al final lleguen realmente a creer que, de sus "logros", merecedores son. Espero no estar tomando conscientemente prestada una de más de las características de la personalidad "promedio" del mexicano, teoría que chance y ya necesita una actualización. Este rasgo anteriormente descrito en los que se creen "divinas garzas", algunos lo llaman sobrestimación, pero en lenguaje "ñero" porteño-norteño diríamos así: ese bato 'tá muy infla'o, caray.

Muy pilinqui, por otra parte me pareció la cifra de 0.23 que la "doitora" me mostró. "Nah, that sounds like a statistical miracle" -le dije a mi mujer, ninguneando su computación. El tiempo, sin embargo, a la galena le dio la razón. I guess it's very likely to be just like that with the simplistic explanations of the very harsh winter of 2013/14. Demostración del desprecio o nulo acercamiento al enfoque multifactorial de las condiciones climáticas actuales. Un colega culparía casi enteramente al rebase del mítico nivel de las concentraciones del (teóricamente) más importante de los GEI a mitad del año pasado, creo yo; mientras (que) otro peer (quien, a la sorda, un estatus de amanuense me quiso asignar) se empecinaría en derribar el hoax del calentamiento global, y le designaría -éste sí- totalmente, a la actividad solar, la modulación. La intensidad del Niño en la cuenca del Pacífico podría (muy probablemente) influir en la posición del Jet Stream, eso no les dijo el entrevistado investigador, ¿verdad? Se les olvidó también mencionar al efecto en el clima planetario que tiene ese tipo de fenómeno geofísico que casi nos deja "grounded" antes de salir en nuestra travesía a Seúl, ¿no? Nosotros no vamos a recapitular en los componentes principales del sistema climático en este blog, tal vez en el otro sí. But there's one more thing I have to say: en quienes ustedes confían, así de corta tienen la... visión.

Con mucha anticipación lo habíamos mencionado ya, una de las más cruentas batallas ideológicas es aquella que se libra entre los escuadrones de lo virtual y lo real. For instance, siguen ustedes intentando encapsularnos en su "cultural framework", full of... sus insulsas aspiraciones, ¿no es cierto?; pues, les adelanto para aligerarles la carga (btw, 'Do you still read an official statement and believe it?', chales, not quite accurate, pero mejor consulten los expedientes de los míticos servicios secretos de su majestad; aunque, les doy un invaluable tip: apechúguense "una maid" y les certifico que consiguen mejor -y más fresca- información) que, muy probablemente quepamos dentro de esa ortodoxia rebelde que ha sido rebasada, ya sea por idealista o impráctica, or both, who knows?

Espero (que) recuerden a la -casi imbatible- ajedrecista, cuyo padre la preparó (para mí la palabra más adecuada sería condicionó) desde escuincla; pues poco más tarde comprobamos los riesgos de un entrenamiento (btw, can you screen spy games again, and again, and again, pls?) "hiperespecializado" en uno de sus agremiados, que andaba penando en unas estériles luchas democratizadoras. No soy tan radical como algunos piensan (another excellent try of psychological projection, mates) pero, otra vez, para mí, a mi compa le faltaba matizar, para ser capaz de observar la fulgurante resurrección de su país, acechado (para alimentarse de sus despojos, como los de nuestro territorio) por los más grandes de este planeta. Algo así podría pasarle a mi paisana "la nenita Jobs" (no, aquí ni referentes a la mano de "success" hay, ¿verdad?), si no se arrima a un buen árbol viejo que la guíe en su incipiente y ya abollado andar.

We are far beyond that pattern, aren't we? Let me develop my newest hypothesis then: los atípicos (a term that some climatologists love to drop every other day, especially those who haven't manipulated real data at all) ciertamente se distinguen por separarse de un grupo de su misma clase; las singularidades no tienen conjuntos, ellas son su propio universo en sí. De tal manera que, loable es el esfuerzo de los primeros por llegar a la punta, y de ahí ser canonizados, pero los atolondrados a la zaga se tragan todito el "harmless" objetivo de aspirar a ese pedestal. Las singularidades no, de hecho, la construcción de su sendero alternativo perennemente incierto es,fácil resulta distinguirlo por ser improvisable, readaptable, reestructurable, flexible, pues. Si usted se dedicara a rastrear en serio la vida de est@s camaradas, recopilando una muestra representativa, seguramente encontraría que comparten una azarosa economía doméstica, un involuntario peregrinar, un@ o vari@s incondicionales confidentes, un modesto (patrimonialmente hablando) final, un injustificado olvido, una pasiva aceptación de su desdicha, y tal vez, debido a que poseen el carisma de un tlacuache (¿no será que envidian que ése que odian a rabiar pueda mover multitudes cuando se le hinche y ustedes nomás no? Pues, la neta, yo sí. Espero que no llegue al extremo del Cid Campeador), asumen dócilmente un espacio segundón. Más, entre todas estos rasgos de su personalidad, uno destaca por sobre todos los demás: la obstinación. Generalmente ignoran el cuándo, pero jamás dudan que, más temprano que tarde, un destino colectivo han de forjar. Now, compañeros, ustedes remember:"respect is the ultimate currency", y "Nada tan hermoso como la verdad...". Así, although our "poetry is lousy... we don't keep our things vague", por lo que, en memoria de todos esos héroes desconocidos, una "moderna" oda a la patria intentaremos crear. AL TIEMPO. 

Lazy Japanese and thieving Germans

Are some cultures incapable of economic development?

"As the 19th century German economist-cum-sociologist Max Weber opined in his seminal work, 'The Protestant Work Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, there are some cultures, like Protestantism, that are simply better suited to economic development than others. 

"...Beatrice Webb, the famous leader of British Fabian socialism... described the Koreans as '12 millions of dirty, degraded, sullen, lazy and religionless savages who slouch about in dirty white garments of the most inept kind and who live in filthy mudhuts'. No wonder she thought that '(i)f anyone can raise the Koreans out of their present state of barbarism I think the Japanese will', despite her rather low opinion of the Japanese. 

"This was not just a western prejudice against eastern peoples. The British used to say similar things about the Germans. Before their economic take-off in the mid-19th century, the Germans were typically described by the British as 'a dull and heavy people'. 'Indolence' was a word that was frequently "associated" with the Germanic nature.

"...A century ago, the Japanese were lazy rather than hardworking; excessively independent-minded (even for a British socialist!) rather than loyal 'worker ants'; emotional rather than inscrutable; light-hearted rather than serious; living for today instead of considering the future (as manifested in their sky-high savings rates). A century and half ago, the Germans were indolent rather than efficient; individualistic rather than co-operative; emotional rather than rational; stupid rather than clever; dishonest and thieving rather than law-abiding; easy-going, rather than disciplined.

"These characterizations are puzzling for two reasons. First, if the Japanese and the Germans had such 'bad'cultures, how have they become so rich? Second, why were the Japanese and the Germans then so different from their descendants today? How could they have so completely changed their 'habits of national heritage'?" 

Does culture influence economic development?

"The view that cultural differences explain the variations in economic development across societies has been around for a long time. The underlying insight is obvious. Different cultures produces people with different values, which manifest themselves different forms of behaviour. As some of these forms of behaviour are more helpful for economic development than others, those countries with a culture that produces more pro-developmental forms of behaviour will do better than other economically.

"Cultural theorists... argue that these forms of behaviour are largely, or even entirely, fixed because they are determined by culture.

"Culture-based explanations... have come back into fashion just as the more dominant cultures (narrowly Anglo-American, more broadly European) have started to feel 'threatened' by other cultures - Confucianism in the economic sphere; Islam in the realm of politics and international relations. They also offered a very convenient excuse to Bad Samaritans - neo-liberal policies have not worked very well, not because of some inherent problems but because the people practising them had 'wrong' values that diminished their effectiveness.

"In the current renaissance of such views, some cultural theorists do 'not'actually talk about culture 'per se'. Recognising that culture is too broad and amorphous a concept, they try to isolate only those components that they think are more closely related to economic development".

What is culture?

"... 'excessively broad'depends on the purpose of the categorisation. If we are comparing the human brain with that of, say, the dolphin, even the over-arching category of 'Homo sapiens'may be good enough. But if we are studying how culture makes a difference to economic development, even the relatively narrow category 'Korean'may be problematic. Broader categories, like 'Christian'or 'Muslim', obscure much more than they reveal.

"The culturalists may well retort that all we have to do is work with finer categories like Mormon or Japanese Confucian, rather than broader ones like Christian or Confucian. If only matters were that simple." 

Dr Jekyll vs Mr Hyde

"...which is an accurate portrait of Confucianism? A culture that values 'thrift, investment, hard work, education, organization, and discipline as Huntington put it in relation to South Korea, or a culture that disparages practical pursuits, discourages entrepreneurship and retards the rule of law?

"Both are right, except that the first singles out only those elements that are good for economic development and the second only the bad. In fact, creating a one-sided view of Confucianism does not even have to involve selecting different elements. The same cultural element can be interpreted as having positive or negative implications, depending on the result you seek.

"It is not just Confucianism, however, that has a split personality like the protagonist in Robert Louis Stevenson's Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. We can perform the same exercise with any culture's belief system. Take the case of Islam.

"Muslim culture is today considered by many to hold back economic development. Its tolerance of diversity discourages entrepreneurship and creativity. Its fixation on the afterlife makes believer less interested in the worldly things, like wealth accumulation and productivity growth. The limits of what women are allowed to do not only wastes the talents of half the population but also lowers the likely quality of the future labour force; poorly educated mothers provide poor nutrition and little educational help to their children, thereby diminishing their achievements at school. The 'militaristic'tendency (exemplified by the concept of 'jihad', or holy war, against the infidels) glorifies making war, not money. In short a perfect Mr Hyde. 

Alternatively, we could say that, unlike many other cultures, Muslim culture does not have a fixed social hierarchy (which is why many low caste Hindus have converted to Islam in South Asia). Therefore, people who work hard and creatively are rewarded. Moreover, unlike in the Confucian hierarchy, there is no disdain for industrial or business activities. Muhammad, the Prophet, was a merchant himself. And being a merchant's religion, Islam has a highly developed sense of contracts - even at wedding ceremonies, marriage contracts are signed. This orientation encourages the rule of law and justice - Muslim countries had trained judges hundreds of years before Christian countries. There is also an emphasis on rational thinking and learning - the Prophet famously said that 'the ink of the scholar is more sacred than the blood of a martyr'. This is one of the reasons why the Arab world led the world in mathematics, science and medicine. What is more, although there are conflicting interpretations of the Koran, there is no question that, in practice, most pre-modern Muslim societies were far more tolerant than Christian societies - after all, this is why many Iberian Jews escaped to the Ottoman Empire after the Christian 'reconquista' of Spain in 1492. 

"Such are the roots of the Dr Jekyll picture of Muslim culture: it encourages social mobility and entrepreneurship, respects commerce, has a contractual frame of mind, emphasizes rational thinking, and its tolerant of diversity and thus creativity.

"This Jekyll-and-Hyde exercise of ours shows that there is no culture that is either unequivocally good or bad for economic development. Everything depends on what people do with the 'raw material'of their culture. Positive elements may predominate, or negative ones. Two societies at different points in time or located in different geographical locations, and working with the same raw material (Islam, Confucianism or Christianity), can produce, and have produced markedly different behavioural patterns.

"Not being able to see this, culture-based explanations for economic development have usually been little more than 'ex post fact' justifications based on a 20/20 hindsight vision. So, in the early days of capitalism, when most economically successful countries happened to be Protestant Christian, many people argued that Protestantism was uniquely suited to economic development. When Catholic France, Italy, Austria and southern Germany developed rapidly, particularly after the Second World War, Christianity rather than Protestantism became the magic culture. Until Japan became rich, many people thought East Asia had not developed because of Confucianism. But when Japan succeeded, this thesis was revised to say that Japan was developing so fast because its unique form of Confucianism emphasized co-operation over individual edification, which Chinese and Korean versions allegedly valued more highly. And then Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan and Korea also started doing well, so this judgement about the different varieties of Confucianism was forgotten. Indeed, Confucianism as a whole suddenly became the best culture for development because it emphasized hard work, saving, education and submission to authority. Today, when we see Muslim Malaysia and Indonesia, Buddhist Thailand and even Hindu India doing well economically, we can soon expect to encounter new theories that will trumpet how uniquely all these cultures are suited for economic development (and how their authors have known about it all along)." 

Changing culture

"Culture can be changed deliberately through persuasion. This is a point rightly emphasized by those culturalists who are not fatalists (for the fatalists, culture is almost impossible to change, so it is destiny). 

"Changes in attitudes need to be supported by real changes - in economic activities, institutions and policies.

"Co-operation and loyalty came about only because Japanese workers were given institutions such as lifetime employment and company welfare schemes. Ideological campaigns (and governments bashing of militant communist trade unions) did play a role, but they would not have been enough on their own.

"When Korea started its industralization drive in the 1960s, the government tried to persuade people to abandon the traditional Confucian disdain for industrial professions. The country needed more engineers and scientists. But with a few decent engineers jobs, not many bright young people wanted to become engineers. So the government increased funding and the number of places in university for engineering and science departments, while doing the reverse (in relative terms) in humanities departments. In the 1960s there were only 0.6 engineering and science graduates for every humanities graduate, but the ratio became one-to-one by the early 1980s. Of course the policy worked ultimately because the economy was industralizing fast and, as a result, there were more and more well-paid jobs for engineers and scientists. It was thanks to the combination of ideological exhortation, educational policy and industrialization - and not just promotion of 'progressive values and attitudes'- that Korea has come to boast one of the best-trained armies of engineers in the world." 

Reinventing culture

"... a 'cultural revolution' will not take root unless there are complementary changes in the underlying economic structures and institutions... in order to promote behavioural traits that are helpful for economic development, we need a combination of ideological exhortation, policy measures to promote economic development and the institutional changes that foster the desired cultural changes. 

"No country is condemned to underdevelopment because of its culture. But at the same time we must not forget that culture cannot be reinvented at will -the failure to create the 'new man'under communism is a good proof of that. The cultural 'reformer'still has to work with existing cultural attitudes and symbols.

"Culture is complex and difficult to define. It does affect economic development, but economic development affects it more than the other way around. Culture is not immutable. It can be changed through: a mutually reinforcing interaction with economic development; ideological persuasion; and complementary policies and institutions that encourage certain forms of bevavoiur; which over time turn into cultural traits." 

http://marcosalas.blogspot.mx/2014/01/el-ladino-global-xi-no-se-requiere.html

EL LADINO GLOBAL X

Mezquindad es otra de las incontables características que comparten los mexicas de "arriba y adelante", que nos impiden, como país, descollar. A pesar de haber escuchado un: "It is useless, a total waste of time...", he aprendido que, no matter where I go... "siempre es mejor dar que recibir", por lo que le brindé su 'boxing day' a uno de esos que creen en el "win-wienie" deal; todavía espero sentado que las otra dos se dignen siquiera a restregarme en la face que eso no tiene la mínima calidad. A comentario sobre nuestra plática del 'publish or perish', le digo (probablemente en este blog eso ya lo comenté) al viejito de la UNAM: Mmm, doc; yo he detectado dos clases bien definidas de académicos: la primera, la forman aquellos genuinamente convencidos de lo que creen: (que) algún día ellos, depositarios de quién sabe qué, habrán de encontrar, de la ciencia, el 'holy grail', y así se la pasan, pavoneándose en los pasillos con actitud de perdonavidas a todo lo que se mueva por ahí; el segundo conjunto, lo forman quienes, a pesar de que conscientemente saben que están mintiendo, le dan como quiera pa'delante without meditating what the real consequences of their actions are, coz anyway they are ca$hing on the big leagues." Weno, se me olvidó mencionarle que, sin ser 'think tanks', el tercer grupo está "full" of... bodies, sorry, buddies, a los que les importa pura quesadilla usted o yo, ellos solo saben que sí han "Senado", y del billete (¡Ah!, btw, muy buenas las... credenciales de su 'barely legal' green activist pero, sorry, no puedo aceptar su amistosa petición, ya me vacuné contra esa enfermedad y, above all, en la movida, mi mujer me cayó) mejor ni hablar.

Estimé mal, pensé que ya íbamos a terminar, pero nos faltan tres posts para liquidar el extracto de este interesante texto. No nos adelantaremos pues a nuestra solución transitoria y alternativa para la nación (o lo que, hasta entonces, nos dejen de ella), porque actualmente, por lo que puedo resumirles, casi estoy seguro de que, mientras de humana naturaleza seamos, jamás habremos de alcanzar una solución final. AL TIEMPO. 

Zaire vs Indonesia

Should we turn our backs on corrupt and undemocratic countries?

"...there is no point in helping poor countries with corrupt leaders, because they will 'do a Mobutu'and waste the money. This view is reflected in the World Bank's recent anti-corruption drive, under the leadership of former US deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz, who declared: 'The fight against corruption is a part of the fight against poverty, not just because corruption is wrong and bad but because it really retards economic development'. During Wolfowitz leadership, from July 2005 to June 2007, the World Bank loan disbursements to several developing countries on grounds of corruption. 

"Corruption is a big problem in many developing countries. But the Bad Samaritans are using it as a convenient justification for the reduction in their aid commitments, despite the fact that cutting aid will hurt the poor more than it will a country's dishonest leaders, especially in the poorst (sic) countries (which tend to be more corrupt...). Moreover, they are increasingly using corruption as an 'explanation' for the failures of the neo-liberal policies that they have promoted over the past two and a half decades. Those policies have failed because they were wrong, not because they have been overwhelmed by local anti-developmental factors, like corruption or 'wrong' culture, contrary to what is becoming increasingly popular to argue among the Bad Samaritans. 

Does corruption hurt economic development?

"Corruption is a violation of the trust vested by its 'stakeholders' in the holders of offices in any organization, be it a government, a corporation, a trade union or even an NGO (non-governmental organization).

"Life would be a simpler if morally objectionable things like corruption also had unambiguously negative economic consequences. But the reality is a lot messier..."

"... corruption is not just a 20th-century phenomenon. Most of today's rich countries successfully industralised despite the fact that their public life was spectacularly corrupt.* In Britain and France, the open sale of public offices (not to speak of honours) was a common practice at least until the 18th century. In Britain, until the early 19th century, it was considered perfectly normal for ministers to 'borrow' their departmental funds for personal profit.

* Their corruption was such that the very definition of corruption was different from what prevails today. When he was accused of corruption in Parliament in 1730, Robert Walpole freely admitted that he had great estates and asked: 'having held the most lucrative offices for nearly 20 years, what could anyone expect, unless it was a crime to get estates by great office'. He turned the tables on his accusers by asking them, 'how much greater a crime it must be to get an estate out of lesser offices'. See Nield (2002), Public Corruption - The Dark Side of Social evolution (Anthem Press, London), p. 62.

"The electoral process was also spectacularly venal. In Britain, bribery, 'treating'(typically done by giving free drinks in party affiliated public houses), promises of jobs and threats to voters were widespread in elections until the Corrupt and Illegal Practices Act of 1883. Even after the Act, electoral corruption persisted well into the 20th century in local elections. In the US, public officials were often used for party political campaigns (including being forced to donate for electoral campaign funds).

"A bribe is a transfer of wealth from one person to another. It does not necessarily have negative effects on economic efficiency and growth...Whether or not the income transfer due to corruption results in a more (or less) productive use of the money paid out as bribes, corruption can create a variety of economic problems by 'distorting' government decisions...Corruption may also 'distort government decisions by hampering regulation...'

"...if the regulation was an 'unnecessary'one, corruption may increase economic efficiency... it has often been argued that bribery may enhance the economic efficiency of an over-regulated economy by re-introducing market forces, if through illegal means. This is what the American veteran political scientist Samuel Huntington meant in his classic passage: 'In terms of economic growth, the only thing worse than a society with a rigid, over-centralized dishonest bureaucracy is one with a rigid, over-centralized honest bureaucracy'. 

"So the economic consequences of corruption depend on which decision the corrupt act affects, how the bribes are used by the recipients and what would have been done with the money had there been no corruption. I could have also talked about things like predictability of corruption (e.g. is there a 'fixed price' for a certain kind of 'service' by the corrupt official?) or the degree of 'monopoly' in the bribery market (e.g. how many people do you have to bribe to get a licence?). But the point is that the combined result of all these factors is difficult to predict. This is why we observe such vast differences across countries in terms of the relationship between corruption and economic performance."

Prosperity and honesty

"If the impact of corruption on economic development is ambiguous, how about the latter's impact on the former? My answer is that economic development makes it easier to reduce corruption, but that there is no automatic relationship. Quite a lot depends on the conscious efforts made to reduce corruption.

"Economic activities in developing countries are mostly dispersed across a large number of small units (e.g., small peasant farms, corner shops, hawkers' stalls and backyard workshops). This provides a fertile ground for petty corruption, which may be too numerous to detect for under-resourced developing country governments.

"With better living conditions, people can achieve higher behavioural standards. Economic developments also increases the capacity of government to collect taxes -as economic activities become more 'visible' and as government administrative capacity rises. This, in turn, allows it to increase public salaries, expand the welfare state and spend more resources on detecting and punishing malfeasance among officials- all of which help reduce corruption.

"Having said all this, it is important to point out that economic development does not automatically create a more honest society."

Too many market forces

"The Bad Samaritans, basing their argument on neo-liberal economics, say that the best way to tackle corruption is to introduce more market forces into both the private and public sectors -a solution that neatly dovetails into their market-fundamentalist economic programme. They argue that freeing the market forces in the private sector - that is, deregulation - will not only increase economic efficiency but also reduce corruption by depriving politicians and bureaucrats of the very powers to allocate resources that give them the ability to extract bribes in the first place. In addition, the Bad Samaritans have implemented measures based on the so-called New Public Management (NPM), which tries to increase administrative efficiency to reduce corruption by introducing more market forces into the government itself - more frequent contracting out, a more active use of performance-related pay and short-term contracts and a more active exchange of personnel between the public and the private sectors. 

"... The increased flow of people between the public and private sectors has had an even more insidious effect. Once lucrative private-sector employment becomes a possibility, public officials may be tempted to befriend future employers by bending, or even breaking the rules for them. They may do this even without being paid for it right away. With no money changing hands, no law has been broken (and, therefore, no corruption has occurred) and, at most, the official can be accused of bad judgement. but the payoff is in the future. 

"...Private sector crookedness is often ignored in the economic literature because corruption is usually 'defined' as the abuse of public office for personal gain. But dishonesty exists in the private sector too. Financial deregulation and relaxation of accounting standards have led to insider trading and false accounting even in rich nations... Deregulation can also increase the power of private-sector monopolies, which expands the opportunities for their unscrupulous purchasing managers to take bribes from sub-contractors.

"Corruption often exists because there are too many market forces not too few. Corrupt countries have shadow markets in the wrong things, such as government contracts, jobs and licences. Indeed, it is only after they made the sale of things like government offices illegal that today's rich countries could significantly reduce profiteering through the abuse of public office. Unleashing more market forces through deregulation, as the neo-liberal orthodoxy constantly pushes for, may worsen the situation. This is why corruption has often increased, rather than decreased, in many developing countries following the liberalization pushed by the Bad Samaritans.

Democracy and the free market

"Some (Bad Samaritans) suggest that democracy is essential for economic development, as it protects citizens from arbitrary expropriation by the rulers; without such protection, there will be no incentive to accumulate wealth..."

"Others think that democracy may be sacrificed if it becomes necessary in defence of a free market, as evidenced by the strong support offered by some neo-liberal economists to the Pinochet dictatorship in Chile. Still others think that democracy will naturally develop once the economy develops (which, of course, can be best achieved by free trade, free-market policies), because it will produce an educated middle class that naturally wants democracy. Yet others sing the praises of democracy all the time but keep quiet when the undemocratic country in question is a 'friend'..."

"...there is a strong consensus among neo-liberals that democracy and economic development reinforce each other... what distinguishes them (neo-liberals) is their belief that this relationship is mainly, if not exclusively, mediated by the (free) market. They argue that democracy promotes free markets, which, in turn, promote economic development, which then promotes democracy: 'The market underpins democracy, just as democracy should normally strengthen the market', writes Martin Wolf, the British financial journalist, in his renowned book, 'Why Globalisation Works'.

"...under democracy, the predatory behaviour of the government is restrained and thus free markets can flourish, promoting economic development. In turn, free markets promote democracy because they lead to economic development, which produces wealth-holders independent of the government, who will demand a mechanism through which they can counter the arbitrary actions of the politicians-democracy.

"... can we at least say that democracy and (free) markets are, indeed, natural partners and reinforce each other?

"The answer is no. Unlike what the neo-liberals say, market and democracy clash at a fundamental level. Democracy runs on the principle of 'one man (one person), one vote'. The market runs on the principle of 'one dollar, one vote'. 

"...most 19th century liberals opposed democracy because they thought it 'was not'compatible with a free market. They argued that democracy would allow the poor majority to introduce policies that would exploit the rich minority (e.g., a progressive income tax, nationalization of private property), thus destroying the incentive for wealth creation.

"Influenced by such thinking, all of today's rich countries initially gave voting rights to those who owned more than a certain amount of property or earned enough income to pay more than a certain amount of tax..."

"...The economic qualification for suffrage was, then, the flip side of the famous colonial American slogan against the British, 'no taxation without representation'- there was also to be 'no representation without taxation'.

"...Under communism, total rejection of the 'one dollar, one vote'principle not only created economic inefficiency but also propagated inequities based on other criteria - political power, personal connections or ideological credentials. It should also be noted that money can be a greater leveller. It can work as a powerful solvent of undesirable prejudices against people of particular races, social castes or occupational groups.

"Democracy and markets are both fundamental building blocks for a decent society. But they clash at a fundamental level. We need to balance them. When we add the fact that free markets are not good at promoting economic development, it is difficult to say that there is a virtuous circle between democracy, the free market and economic development, contrary to what Bad Samaritans argue."

When democracies undermine democracy

"...The Bad Samaritans have recommended policies that actively seek to undermine democracy in developing countries (although they would never put them in those terms).

"The argument starts reasonably enough. Neo-liberal economists worry that politics open the door for perversions of market rationality: inefficient firms or farmers may lobby the parliamentarians to get tariffs and subsidies, imposing costs on the rest of the society that has to buy expensive domestic products; populist politicians may put pressure on the central bank to 'print money' in time for election campaign, which causes inflation and hurts people in the longer run. So far, so good.

"The neo-liberal solution to this problem is to 'depoliticize' the economy. They argue that the very scope of government should be reduce - through privatization and liberalization - to a minimal state. 

"For developing countries it is seen as particularly important to sign up to international agreements - for example, the WTO agreements, bilateral/regional free trade agreements or investments agreements - because their leaders are less responsible and thus more likely to stray from the righteous path of neo-liberal policy. 

"... in pushing for the depoliticization of the economy, the Bad Samaritans are undermining democracy. Depoliticization of policy decisions in a democratic polity means - let's not mince our words - weakening democracy. If all the really important decisions are taken away from democratically elected governments and put in the hands of unelected technocrats in the 'politically independent'agencies, what is the point of having democracy? In other words, democracy is acceptable to neo-liberals only in so far as it does not contradict the free market; this is why some of them saw no contradiction between supporting the Pinochet dictatorship and praising democracy. To put it bluntly, they want democracy only if it is largely powerless - like the title of the book published is (sic) 1987 by Ken Livingstone, the current left-wing major of London, 'If Voting Changed Anything They'd Abolish It.

"...neo-liberals live in an era when they cannot openly oppose democracy, so they try to do it by discrediting 'politics' in general. By discrediting politics in general, they gain legitimacy for their actions that take away decision powers from the democratically elected representatives. In doing so, neo-liberals have succeeded in diminishing the scope of democratic control without openly criticizing democracy itself." 

Democracy and economic development

"...given the fundamental tension between democracy and market, it is unlikely that democracy will promote economic development through promoting the free market. Indeed, the old liberals feared that democracy may discourage investment and thus growth (e.g., excessive taxation, nationalization of enterprises). On the other hand, democracy may promote development through other channels...Contrary to the popular perception, a well-designed welfare state, especially if combined with a good retraining programme can reduce the cost of unemployment to the workers and thus make them less resistant to automation that raises productivity (it is not a coincidence that Sweden has the world's highest number of industrial robots per worker).

"...there is no systematic evidence either for or against the proposition that democracy helps economic development. Studies that have tried to identify statistical regularities across countries in terms of the relationship between democracy and economic growth have failed to come up with a systematic result either way.

"...we don't need to show that democracy positively affects economic growth in order to be able to support it. As Amartya Sen, the Nobel Laureate economist, argues, democracy has an intrinsic value and should be a criterion in any reasonable definition of development. Democracy contributes to building a decent society by making certain things immune to the 'one dollar, one vote' rule of the market - public offices, judicial decisions, educational qualifications... Participation in democratic political processes has intrinsic values that may not be easily translated into monetary value... even if democracy negatively affected economic growh, we may still support it for its intrinsic values.

"If the impact of democracy on development is ambiguous, the impact of economic development on democracy seems more straight-forward. It seems fairly safe to say that, in the long run, economic development brings democracy. But this broad picture should not be obscure the fact that some countries have sustained democracy from when they are fairly poor, while many others have not become democracies until they are very rich. Without people actually fighting for it democracy does not automatically grow out of economic prosperity. 

"Only in 1965 did the Southern states in the US allow the African Americans to vote, thanks to the civil rights movement led by people like Martin Luther King, Jr." 

Politics and economic development

"Corruption and lack of democracy are big problems in many developing countries. But the relationships between them and economic development are far more complex than the Bad Samaritans suggest...When it comes to democracy, the neo-liberal view that democracy promotes a free market, which, in turn, promotes economic development, is highly problematic. There is a strong tension between democracy and a free market, while a free market is unlikely to promote economic development.

"...the Bad Samaritans have recommended in these areas have not solved the problems of corruption and lack of democracy. In fact, they often made them worse. Deregulation of the economy in general, and the introduction of greater market forces in the management of the government more specifically, has often increased, rather than reduced, corruption." 

http://marcosalas.blogspot.mx/2014/01/el-ladino-global-x-mezquindad-es-otra.html

EL LADINO GLOBAL IX

Ya está el tiro. Vayan a su casa de apuestas más cercana, weno pronósticos deportivos, pues. "Your favorite forecaster" tiene al próximo campeón del pámbol nacional. ¿Cuál equipo? Hay que demostrar que se es recíproco en el amor, ¿no?, 'tonz les voy a dar la clave. La vuelta olímpica en "topless" nos la va a brindar de manera altruista, la emula (soulmate del emulo, of course) de Caroline* Kennedy, perdón, Jackie Kennedy. ¿Doble o nada? ¿Quién da más?

¡Como México no hay dos! Este debe ser de los pocos países en los que uno puede "cashear" ad infinitum a partir de un logro o dos, no más. Y nada epítomiza (espero que ustedes no hayan salido, como mis colegas, corriendo tras el diccionario más cercano) tanto esta condición como el "Risitas Lili Ledy", que le sacateó al Reto IQ; terminando con otra familia real de petatiux, a la que le dimos la welta con todo y su "full expertise" en informática, o el writer wannabe, que apenas y puede hilar dos frases coherentes al hablar.

"Hay tipos que se montan a un... ladrillo y se marean" -en una entrevista nos recordó un intelectual, de polémica carrera política, al principio del sexenio anterior. He's back in our land. El año pasado apenas resurgiendo, en parte gracias a la balona ("si no creyera en lo que creo..."; ¿porqué habría de lapidar yo?) que le hicimos los (otrora) tercermundistas, creo yo; el arquetipo del flemático (*btw, como el inmenso Cortázar, en otra relajada plática, en alguna ocasión señaló: "me fascina el ácido humor de esa sociedad...", pero después en mi estancia yo noté que, 'los ladinos' de siempre lo han aprovechado recientemente para desactivar su utilidad como herramienta para afrontar este perro mundo e intentar cambiar esta cruda realidad), me confesó: "yo nunca lo pedí, Marco; nunca pensé llegar hasta aquí" (eso incluye el circo -así lo bautizó él, no yo- de la ceremonia inaugural); para matizar y ahondarlo este año en la meritita tierra del ahijado del Mossad: "mi abuelo fue minero, mi padre estuvo en la 2da. Guerra Mundial, fue ademásprisionero, logró escapar y casarse otra vez; de toda mi familia yo fui el primero en llegar a la universidad". The same old story of overcoming a troubled childhood to succeed in life (whatever that means), huh?

Refiriéndose a uno de esos inmensos poetas que perciben el mundo de manera diferente, cuenta -más o menos así- Chavela Vargas: "Fingía no saber qué estaba pasando, se dejaba llevar pero, hasta el desenlace sabía de antemano él". En una de las ediciones de "Los Presidentes" de Scherer se describe (de memoria también, porque yo tengo otra versión en la que ya no aparece tal) la siguiente anécdota de Daniel "El Travieso" (áquel que siempre anheló ser titular del ejecutivo, según el texto en cuestión): "...al periodista le solicitó unos minutos un norteamericano. Esperó a que se acomodara, y en el momento oportuno, Don Daniel sacó de su bolsillo y desdobló un pasquín al tiempo en que le soltó: 'this is coming from your office, right?'...". Después del "pitazo" de uno de mis colegas, me lancé a visitar el cubículo del viejito again. Regularmente no sucede así, por lo que me sorprendió encontrar a un par de chavillas (weno, ya no tan nenitas, I must say). Gentilmente me invitaron a una mesa de discusión sobre temas ambientales, campo en el que al parecer andan muy moviditas las dos. Después de escuchar sus inquietudes, las despido con un: "ya saben, atención con el mercado de créditos de carbono, porque esa burbuja no va a tardar demasiado en explotar, ¿eh?". Unos cuantos días más tarde me entero que "el candil de la calle" (a) México, se convierte en vanguardia mundial al inaugurar el (de forma voluntaria, sí, sí, cómo no) intercambio de estos "instrumentos bursátiles". ¡Cheetos, queso! Imagínense, la insoportable levedad del asunto, cuando el "chairman" de nuestro stock exchange es uno de los muchos engendros del chupacabras, quienes estelarizaron un pleito de comadres, tan subido de tono, que hasta las medias salieron rasgadas, ver para creer, comp@s. Nevermind, we predicted just that since 2010ish (I rather bet it was since 2008), and repeated over and over to the youngsters in UNAM and beyond. Well, while we were busy finishing all this year's pending cases, they have baked another perfect constitutional amendment, lidereados por el saco de plomo (a) cangrejito playero (btw, qué fácil se puede perder el... sentido del humor, cuando se trata de pesos y centavos -rather us dollars, I would say-, ¿verdad?; creo que de pronto escuchó una voz no tan interior que le sugirió: "stop the 'danm' bull s-h-i-t, and just 'speed it up'"). A propósito, rásquenle compadres, que algo todavía queda: ¿qué tal el agua, buddies? En lo que respecta a México: Is This It? Well, sólo nos queda honrar a quienes veneramos (en el sentido terrenal, y que los libros de historia nacional desdeñan, porque su descomunal peso específico no pueden soportar), porque somos parte del raquítico porcentaje de "indie observers" que continuamos vaticinando que, debido a las ocultas condiciones de su economía real, 'the falling empire' no está pa' dominar ni a los 'miaus' de su backyard. Si ustedes aguantan el 2014 apelmazados con sus servilletas, we certainly will survive, brodys. Al tiempo.

Mission impossible? 

Can financial prudence go too far?

"When developing countries get into the balance of payment crisis, as they often do, signing an agreement with the IMF is crucial. The money that the IMF itself lends is only a minor part of the story, for the IMF does not have much money of its own. More important is the agreement itself. It is seen as a guarantee that the country will mend its "profligate" ways to adopt a set of good policies that will ensure its future ability to repay its debts. Only when such agreement is made to other potential lenders -the World Bank, rich country governments and private sector lenders- agree to continue their supplies of finance to the country concerned. The agreement with the IMF involves accepting conditions on a wide range of economic policies from trade liberalization to the adoption of new company law. But the most important and feared of IMF conditions concern macroeconomic policies.

"Macroeconomic policies -monetary policy and fiscal policy- are intended to change the behaviour of the whole economy (as distinct from the sum total of the behaviours of the individual economic actors that make it up). The counter-intuitive idea that the whole economy may behave differently from the sum total of its parts comes from the famous Cambridge economist John Maynard Keynes. Keynes argued that what is rational for individual actors may not be rational for the entire economy... Keynes argued, the government, whose job is to manage the whole economy, cannot simply use scaled-up versions of the action plans that are rational for individual economic agents. It should always deliberately do the opposite of what other economic actors do. In an economic downturn, therefore, it should increase its spending to counter the tendency of the private sector firms and workers to reduce their spending. In an economic upturn, it should reduce its expenditure and increase taxes, so that it can prevent demand from outstripping supply.

"...since the rise of neo-liberalism, and its 'monetarist' approach to macroeconomics, in the 1980s, the focus of macroeconomic policies has radically changed. The 'monetarists' are called as such because they believe that prices rise when too much money is chasing after a given quantity of goods and services. They also argue that the price stability (i.e., keeping inflation low) is the foundation of prosperity and, therefore, that monetary discipline (that is required for price stability) should be the paramount goal of macroeconomic policy.

'Mugger, armed robber and hit man'

"Neo-liberals see inflation as public enemy number one... They believe that the lower the rate of inflation is, the better it is.Ideally, they want zero inflation. At most, they would accept a very low single-digit rate of inflation..."

"...it is argued that inflation is a form of stealth tax that unjustly robs people of their hard-earned income. The late Milton Friedman, the guru of monetarism, argued that 'inflation is the one form of taxation that can be imposed without legislation'.

"Neo-liberals argue that inflation is bad for economic growth as well. Most of them would hold that the lower a country's rate of inflation, the higher its economic growth is likely to be. The thinking behind this is as follows: investment is essential for growth; investors do not like uncertainty; so we must keep the economy stable, which means keeping prices flat; thus low inflation is a prerequisite of investment and growth. This argument has had a particularly strong appeal in those Latin American countries, where memories of disastrous hyperinflation in the 1980s combined with the collapse in economic growth were strong (especially Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Nicaragua and Peru).

"Neo-liberals economists argue that two things are essential in achieving low inflation. First, there should be monetary discipline -the central bank should not increase the money supply over and above what is absolutely necessary to support real growth in the economy. Second, there should be financial prudence- no government should live beyond its means.

"... Stanley Fischer argues: 'A central bank given multiple and general goals may choose among them and will certainly be subject to political pressures to shift among its goals depending on the state of the electoral cycle'. The best way to prevent this from happening is to 'protect'the central bank from politicians (who do not understand economics very well and, more importantly, have short-time horizons) by making it 'politically independent'.

"In addition to monetary discipline, neo-liberals have traditionally emphasized the importance of government prudence -unless the government lives with its means, the resulting budget deficits would cause inflation by creating more demands than the economy can meet... an increasing emphasis has been put on the 'prudential regulations' of the banks and other financial-sector firms. the most important among these is the so-called capital adequacy ratio for banks, recommended by the BIS (Bank for International Settlements), the club of central banks based in the Swiss city of Bassel.

"Inflation is bad for growth -this has become one of the most widely accepted economic nostrums of our age.

"During the 1960s and the 1970s, Brazil's average inflation rate was 42% a year. Despite this, Brazil was one of the fastest growing economies in the world for those two decades -its per capita income grew at 4.5% a year during this period. In contrast, between 1996 and 2005, during which time Brazil embraced the neo-liberal orthodoxy, especially in relation to macroeconomic policy, its inflation rate averaged a much lower 7.1% a year. But during this period, per capita income in Brazil grew at only 1.3% a year.

"If you are not entirely persuaded by the Brazilian case -understandable, given that hyperinflation went side by side with low growth in the 1980s and the early 1990s -how about this? During its 'miracle' years, when its economy was growing at 7% a year in per capita terms, Korea had rate inflation rates close to 20%-17.4% in the 1960s and 19.8% in the 1970s. These were rates high than those found in several Latin American countries, and totally contrary to the cultural stereotypes of the hyper-saving prudent East Asian versus fun-loving, profligate Latinos. In the 1960s, Korea's inflation rates 'was much higher' than that of five Latin American countries (Venezuela, Bolivia, Mexico, Peru and Colombia) and not much lower than that infamous 'rebel teenager' Argentina. In the 1970s, the Korean inflation rate was higher than that found in Venezuela, Ecuador and Mexico, and much lower than that of Colombia and Bolivia. Are you still convinced that inflation is incompatible with economic success?

"... there is a big logical jump between acknowledging the destructive nature of hyperinflation and arguing that the lower the rate of inflation, the better... even many neo-liberal economists admit that, below 10%, inflation does not seem to have any adverse affect on economic growth.

"... a tough control on inflation is a two-edged sword for workers -it protects their existing incomes better, but it reduces their future incomes. It is only the pensioners and others (including significantly, the financial industry) whose incomes derive from financial assets with fixed returns for whom lower inflation is a pure blessing. Since they are outside the labor market, tough macroeconomic policies that lower inflation, cannot adversely affect their future employment opportunities and wages, while the incomes they already have are better protected.


The price of price stability

"In most countries, firms outside the financial sector make a 3-7% profit. Therefore, if real interest is above that level, it makes more sense for potential investors to put their money in the bank, or buy bonds, rather than invest it in a productive firm. Also taking into account all the trouble involved in managing productive enterprises -labour problems, problems with delivery of parts, trouble with payments by costumers, etc.- the threshold rate may be even lower. Given that firms in developing countries have little capital accumulated internally, making borrowing more difficult means that firms cannot invest much. This results in low investment, which, in turn, means low growth and scarce jobs. This is what happened in Brazil, South Africa and numerous other developing countries when they followed the Bad Samaritans' advice and pursued a very low rate of inflation.

"... the rich Bad Samaritan countries, which are so keen to preach to developing countries the importance of high real interest rates as a key to monetary discipline, themselves have resorted to lax monetary policies when they have needed to generate income and jobs.

"Monetary policy that is too tight lowers investment. Lower investment slown down growth and job creation... (that) is a disaster for developing countries that desperately need more income and jobs and often are trying to deal with a high degree of income inequality without resorting to a large-scale redistribution programme that, anyway, may create more problems than it solves.

When prudence isn't prudent

"Emphasis on fiscal prudence has been a central theme in the neoliberal macroeconomics promoted by the Bad Samaritans. They argue that government should not live beyond its means and must always balance its budget. Deficit spending, they argue, only leads to inflation and undermines economic stability, which, in turn, reduces growth and diminishes the living standards of people on fixed income.

"... The government budget may have to be balanced but this needs to be achieved over a business cycle, rather than every year. This year is an extremely artificial unit of time in economic terms, and there is nothing sacred about it... As Keynes central message had it, what is important is that, over the business cycle, the government acts as a counterweight to the behaviour of the private sector, engages in deficit spending during economic downturns and generates a budget surplus during economic upturns.

"...the IMF is obsessed with developing country governments balancing the books every year, regardless of business cycles or longer-term development strategy. So it imposes budget balancing conditions, or even the requirement to run a surplus on countries in macroeconomic crisis that could actually benefit from deficit spending by the government.

"... the rich Bad Samaritans countries would never do what they tell to the poor countries to do. Instead they would cut interest rates and increase government deficit spending in order to boost demand.

"... a big increase in government spending during an economic downturn makes it more likely that the spending goes into ill-prepared projects. On the other hand, making large cuts in government spending during an economic upturn is difficult due to political resistance.

Keynesianism for the rich, monetarism for the poor

"Gore Vidal, the american writer, once famously described the American system as 'free entreprise for the poor and socialism for the rich'. Macroeconomic policy on the global scale is a bit like that. It is Keynesianism for the rich countries and monetarism for the poor.

"When the rich countries get into recession they usually relax monetary policy and increase budget deficits. When the same thing happens in developing countries, the Bad Samaritans, through the IMF, force them to raise interest rates to absurd levels and balance their budgets, or even generate budget surplus -even if these actions treble unemployment and spark riots in the street.

"Ironically, when the citizen of developing countries voluntarily tighten their belts, they are derided for not understanding basic Keynesian economics.

"The Bad Samaritans have imposed macroeconomic policies on developing countries that seriously hamper their ability to invest, grow and create jobs in the long run. The categorical -and simplistic- denunciation of 'living beyond one's means' has made it impossible for them to 'borrow to invest' in order to accelerate economic growth. If we categorically denounce people for living beyond their means, we should, among other things, condemn youg people for borrowing to invest in their career development on their children's education. This cannot be right. Living beyond one's means may or may not be right; it all depends on the stage of the development that the country is in and the use ti which the borrowed money is put."

http://marcosalas.blogspot.mx/2013/11/el-ladino-global-ix.html