Defeat Communism first, then push democratic reforms in these colonies.
Yes, that was the paradigm that was pushed in those days. It was a tragic error with ramifications that are still with us, something few Americans understand. I don’t think it was a problem of malice, just a mistake. A large part of the mistake was the failure to realize that democratic reforms were actually the most potent weapon against communism. Americans imposed a “left-vs-right” framework on developing countries, not realizing that the fundamental conflict within these countries was not communism against democracy, but freedom against either the old colonial masters or feudal domestic autocrats. All too often we sided with the dictators, many of whom manipulated us shamelessly, and we did the communists a lot more good than harm.
There was another enormous mistake we made – one of the problems of great power is that when you fuck up you fuck up big – that has yet to be acknowledged. That was what is now called the “structural adjustment era”, which overlapped with the cold war. This was a time in which the prime credential for a high position in the foreign aid world was an economics PhD from the U of Chicago. The leverage of debt, much of it incurred by profligate dictators, was used to impose disastrous and inappropriate policies, and also contributed to support for dictatorships, as democracies would never be able to impose the policies that the ivory tower economists deemed necessary. It was much later recognized that while the end goal of these policies was entirely desirable, many of the methods adopted were almost insanely inappropriate, simply because there were factors operating – lots of them – that the economists had failed to include in their equations and computer models. Many of the issues seem abstract now, but the consequences were not abstract at all. Virtually everyone in the aid community, conservative and liberal, now recognizes that these policies were wrong and hugely destructive, but that recognition has not spread.
A little example: back in the late ‘80s, the Philippines underwent a series of major currency devaluations. Since the economy was massively import-dependent, this naturally caused considerable inflation. The economic masterminds declared that the inflation was caused by “too much money chasing too few goods”. The prescribed remedy was to “mop up excess liquidity” by increasing interest rates and freezing wages. I’m not talking a few basis points or fractions of percents here: we were up over 30% for quite a while. That’s not a typo; I’m talking about base interest rates over thirty percent. The economy, of course, virtually shut down. Can you imagine what would happen if an economist were to suggest such a thing in the US, or if a politician were to actually consider acting on it? They had no choice, though: the Aquino government had carried over the entire debt incurred by Marcos, the country was virtually bankrupt, and they had to submit or be defaulted. So a country in which over half the people live below the poverty line was told that prices were rising because they were spending too much money, and the government had to make sure they spent less. Americans, meanwhile, went about with beatific smiles, convinced that these people needed to get their shops in order, and there was no better way to do that than to force them to submit to the dictates of the economists, who knew most about it.
Maybe a legitimate mistake, in retrospect, but how do you figure the Filipinos felt about it?
Widespread ignorance of these events is a major contributor, I think, to the frustration Americans feel at the reaction that American policies get it the developing world. We see ourselves as the guys in the white hats, the saviours of truth, justice, and democracy. The politically aware adults in much of today’s developing world, however, formed their political mindset in a day when American money was subsidizing the dictators that were murdering their friends, and policies imposed by American-dominated institutions were demolishing economies that were weak to begin with. A lot of the people who don’t trust us have reasons for their mistrust. That’s unfortunate, because a lot of those people are the progressive, educated, reform-minded class that should be our natural allies. We need to stop accusing them of being leftie terrorist dupes, and start acknowledging that they have real concerns, and trying to win them back.
IMO, of course. |
