British Colonialism: 1898 Fashoda (Sudan)

At the end of the 19^th century the continent of Africa was already under European colonial siege, a race termed in history as the scramble for Africa.  The major European powers in Africa at the turn of the century were the British and the French, with Germany, Spain, Belgium, Portugal and Italy also engaged on the continent.   The incident of Fashoda (modern Sudan) was not only a ‘diplomatically’ resolved land conflict between Britain and France, it served as a very important evolution point in imperialism.

In July 1898, the French established a military presence at Fashoda under the command of Jean-Baptiste Marchand.  As a result, British forces based in the Upper Nile region moved military forces under Lord Herbert Kitchener southward into Sudan toward Fashoda. 

What was the importance of Fashoda?  The Importance of Fashoda is its position on the Nile, which is a Northern flowing river.  From a British perspective, French forces could put gunboats in the water or even erect a dam to completely cut off the flow of water, which would be disastrous on economic, health, military levels.

Kitchener won the battle of Omdurmam against Mahdist forces on the southward movement toward Fashoda.  Full scale conflict between British and French forces never erupted over Fashoda because “France stepped down” because “her ally, Russia, refused to become entangled in a dispute over a stretch of sand in the middle of Africa” [1].  The French also understood the naval superiority that the British possessed over them and did not wish to see their own foreign trade decimated again, as it had been in the 18th century, due to conflict  with Britain [2].

I offer two areas for contemplation and discussion:

The fact that Britain “had the Egyptian flag rather than the British flag hoisted over Fashoda” is very interesting.  Looking at this period of colonial history, we see Britain using Egypt, basically a British property yet proclaimed as an autonomous protectorate, as a puppet state for military and political actions (to achieve British economic interests).  I view this as an evolution in imperialism.  Just as the modern imperial actions of the United States and their allies remove regimes such as Iraq, Libya, and Afghanistan, only to replace them with puppet governments which they can utilize or exploit, we can look back at the British return to Egypt in 1882 and see that Britain controlled the finances, government and military of Egypt.

A few weeks back while studying Dr. Said’s orientalism, we reviewed an account of General Gordon’s evacuation mission to Khartoum (north of Fashoda).  I have to give consideration to the possibility of ‘under the table’ French support, in military or economic form, to the Mahdists in their opposition against British-Egyptian southern advancement.  Any thoughts on this possibility?

[1] James, Lawrence.  The Rise and Fall of the British Empire (New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 1996), 285.

[2] James, Lawrence.  The Rise and Fall of the British Empire (New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 1996), 285. 

Jamaica: State Stability and Security - Gangs

            After a long history of Spanish and British colonization, the state of Jamaica established independence in 1962.  Similar to other post-colonial states, Jamaica was a state that emerged with a native population suffering from extreme poverty after decades of foreign exploitation and left in a fragmented domestic political void.  As post-colonialism evolved to globalization, Jamaica remained stable enough for continued foreign capital investment-exploitation, and the newly independent island state did not find itself at war with surrounding states or threatened by further foreign occupation.  The threat to Jamaica’s security and stability, and the safety of the Jamaican people, emerged and continues from a domestic threat: gangs.

Post-Colonial Political Void

            Political voids were characteristic of emerging independent states after decades of colonial occupation by European powers, and the result was no different in Jamaica as domestic political groups vied for power.  Within ten years of Jamaica’s independence, the PNP (People's National Party) and JLP (Jamaican Labour Party) were locked into a grueling battle for domestic political dominance within the democratic parliamentary system left behind by their British occupiers.  After the 1972 election of the PNP’s Michael Manley, “Jamaica’s ruling elite and foreign backers waged a violent and debilitating assault on Manley’s government and party to prevent it from implementing reforms, combining paramilitary assaults on neighbourhoods supporting the PNP with sabotage of the country’s economy” [1]. 

The political gang warfare of the 1970s went both ways as “the two main parties helped organize and arm in Kingston's poor neighborhoods in the 1970s, gangs that controlled the streets at the behest of politicians and intimidated voters at election time”[2].  The PNP was ousted in the election of 1980 when “the political violence reached its height in 1980, when an estimated 700 people were killed in election-related fighting” and the JLP won the national vote and has held power since.  As a result, the gang problem in Jamaica had been born, nurtured and strengthened by political sponsorship and unofficial, and at times official, state support.

Poverty and Drugs

            Poverty in Jamaica has “been a persistent feature of the Jamaican landscape from the post-Emancipation period”[3].  After the dissolution of political party funding for gang activities, Jamaican gangs found an independent funding source in “the introduction of cocaine in the mid-1980s”, as youth amidst post-colonial poverty began to view “the easiest way to become ‘better off’ was to buy cocaine and sell it”[4]. 

As the amount of people living under the poverty level in Jamaica climbed to “an all-time high of 45% of the population, combined with an inflation rate of 80%” in 1991, and previous restraints on gang activities by their political affiliations that funded and armed them were deteriorating, Jamaican gang members, with no other viable options, began to violently position gang alliances throughout the Kingston garrison territories for power positions in the cocaine game [5].     

            The drug trade and violent crime in Jamaica were greatly impacted by the “significant use of the gun in the 1980’s and the illicit drug trans-shipment trade changed the country’s crime landscape from conflict between individuals to violent conflict over turf” and eventually became “anchored in institutionalized relations and occupational roles (subsequent development of extortion and racketeering) [6].

Modern Gang Violence and Economic Growth

            Today, Jamaica boasts one of the highest murder rates in the world due to gang violence and drug trafficking.  As gang violence continued to develop after the turn of the century, Jamaica suffered from “1,674 murders in 2005, up from 1,471 murders” in 2004 amidst “gang related fights over drugs and turf” [7].  A 2004 World Bank report written on the violent crime epidemical erosion on possible economic growth in Jamaica states that “crime costs society at least 4 percent of GDP explicitly, including lost production, health expenses, and public and private spending” and that “Some 10-20 percent of firms in the business survey suggested that they may close down in the next three years because of crime.” [8]

            The gang violence epidemic is debilitating to the Jamaican state because the majority of gang action and violent crime takes place in densely populated urban areas trapped under heavy poverty such as Kingston where “in 2001, about 51 percent of reported violent crimes occurred” [9].  Jamaica has open borders for investment and foreign vulture capital is flowing into the state, but after natural resources and cheap labor are extracted by foreign investors, the Jamaican government is forced to spend her prostitution pay from foreign capital exploitation on reigning in gang violence and paying off international debt instead of maximum reinvestment into the social economy of the state.

Conclusion

            The origins of gang activity in Jamaica were a direct result of the political void and extreme poverty left by colonial oppression, and the violence was grossly accelerated by the political detachment of gangs and the emergence of cocaine, and later crack-cocaine, in the over-crowed cities suffering from mass poverty.  As crime and murder rates continue to expand as a result of bloody gang conflicts over drug territories, the government of Jamaica, which is already under extreme debt to the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, is unable to reinvest the foreign capital that is exploiting their domestic natural resources and cheap labor for profit, because crime stability drains a good portion of the GDP after the international debtors extract their payments.  In the case of Jamaican security and economic growth, it is no longer a foreign colonial master or a neighboring nation-state that threatens that security and development.  The largest threat to national security and development, Jamaican gangs, destroys from within.

Notes

1.  Annis, Roger.  Gangs and Violence in Jamaica and Haiti.  Center for Research on Globalization, June 14, 2010.  Accessed on March 9, 2013 from http://www.globalresearch.ca/gangs-and-violence-in-jamaica-and-haiti/19744

2. Rosenberg, Matthew.  Jamaica: 20 Dead in Political Violence.  ABC News, July 10, 2013.  Accessed on March 9, 2013 from http://abcnews.go.com/International/story?id=80803&page=1

3. Anderson, Patricia.  Poverty in Jamaica: Social Target or Social Crisis.  Columbia University.  Souls Journal, 2001, p. 39.  Accessed on March 9, 2013 from http://www.columbia.edu/cu/ccbh/souls/vol3no4/vol3num4art5.pdf

4.  Lolland, J & Moser, C.  Urban Poverty and Violence in Jamaica.  World Bank, Latin American and Caribbean Studies. Washington, D.C, 1997, p. 14-15.  Accessed on March 9, 2013 from http://books.google.com/books?id=wQ7Fie43Ld0C&pg=PA15&lpg=PA15&dq=emergence+of+cocaine+in+jamaica&source=bl&ots=1cImBi67my&sig=5daFkzlmhVcPlQPN-JzQIEL9BZ0&hl=en&sa=X&ei=_Z47UaaKHJD82gXDsIDIBw&ved=0CHcQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=emergence%20of%20cocaine%20in%20jamaica&f=false

5. Hughes, Wesley.  A Historical Perspective on Poverty, The Transformation of Jamaica Report.  Office of the Prime Minister, 2006.  Accessed on March 9, 2013 from  http://www.pioj.gov.jm/Portals/0/speeches/Poverty%20-%20OPM%20-%20Sept%202006.pdf

6. Gray, Sherrian.  Trends in Urban Crime and Violence in Kingston, Jamaica.  UN Habitat Global Report on Human Settlements 2007, p. 7.  Accessed on March 9, 2013 from  http://www.unhabitat.org/downloads/docs/GRHS.2007.CaseStudy.Crime.Kingston.pdf

7. Biswas, Soutik.  Jamaica Struggles to Fight Crime.  BBC News, May 16, 2007.  Accessed on March 9, 2013 from http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6657203.stm

8. The Road to Sustained Growth in Jamaica.  World Bank, Washington, D.C., 2004, p.18-19.  Accessed on March 9, 2013 from http://www-wds.worldbank.org/external/default/WDSContentServer/WDSP/IB/2004/05/28/000012009_20040528112811/Rendered/PDF/29101.pdf

9. The Road to Sustained Growth in Jamaica.  World Bank, Washington, D.C., 2004, p.18-19.  Accessed on March 9, 2013 from http://www-wds.worldbank.org/external/default/WDSContentServer/WDSP/IB/2004/05/28/000012009_20040528112811/Rendered/PDF/29101.pdf

 

 

 

Imperialism - Marxist Economic and Political Theories of J.A. Hobson and Vladimir Lenin

                The political theories of J. A. Hobson (1858-140) and Vladimir Lenin (1870-1924) concerning imperialism are both Marxist in nature, and held the basic widespread views that capital was consolidated within an elite group of holders which used the state as a mechanism for exploitation, but their base theories concerning imperialism were concentrated on different pillars of capital imperialism.  While Hobson focused his theories around the concept of aggressive imperialism of industrial capitalist elites utilizing the state actor for achieving profits on multiple international and domestic levels, Lenin concentrated on capitalist industrialization, capitalist monopolies, and viewed imperialism as the highest stage that capitalism could evolve to, that of parasitic exploitation.

J. A. Hobson

                Imperialism, as Hobson viewed it, was “bad business for the nation” while “good business for certain classes and certain trades within the nation” [1].  In essence, he states what every economist understands was the driving force for colonialism under British imperialism, and today can be seen from an international perspective with non-governmental organizations, such as private sector elements in the World Bank, and international corporations.  That driving force is the generation of capital, through high interest loans and exploitation of colonial natural resources, by the elite holders of capital and technology.  A golden rule of capitalism is that a person, or on a larger scale a nation-state, must have capital to generate capital.

                Much of what Hobson states about Imperialism relates both to the British Empire, as well as the modern United States.  Discussing the economic ramifications of imperialism, Hobson points out the result of economic drain on the imperial state, such as “a great expenditure of public money upon ships, guns, military and naval equipment and stores, growing and productive of enormous profits when a war, or an alarm of war, occurs; new public loans and important fluctuations in the home and foreign Bourses; more posts for soldiers and sailors and in the diplomatic and consular services; improvement of foreign investments” [2].  We clearly saw this with the British Empire in North America and India, and the United States has clearly felt the economic drain from a decade of military occupations in Iraq and Afghanistan, which did little for the people of those countries and provided the people of the United States with only ‘imperial’ debt.  While the American tax payer footed the bill, the private sector profited from the state sponsored imperial occupations that strived to stabilize foreign areas for international private sector capital infiltration.  In his writings, Hobson identified the transition of England in becoming a creditor state under what he called aggressive imperialism, which Lenin would cite decades later in his own political-economic theories. 

                One of the most interesting areas of Hobson’s economic ideologies is his theory on how the capitalist elites achieve their goals of imperialistic capital generation and accumulation through the manipulation of “the patriotic forces which politicians, soldiers, philanthropists, and traders” through propaganda, which media in a capitalist nation-state will always be predominantly owned by the capitalist elites" [3].  A nation of workers, soldiers, and tax payers would probably not support imperialism if they understood the in-debt economics of what was occurring, therefore propaganda serves to nationalize, and justify, the events from a patriotic slant where some facts are heavily concentrated on while others are ignored.  While this is not a new tactic by the consolidated owners of capital and is a quite evident tactic in the United States today, Hobson understood the process toward the end of the British Empire as “The direct influence exercised by great financial houses in “high politics” is supported by the control which they exercise over the body of public opinion through the Press, which, in every “civilised” country, is becoming more and more their obedient instrument. While the specifically financial newspaper imposes “facts” and “opinions” on the business classes, the general body of the Press comes more and more under the conscious or unconscious domination of financiers.” [4].    

Vladimir Lenin

                Lenin viewed “the enormous growth of industry and the remarkably rapid process of concentration of production in ever-larger enterprises are one of the most characteristic features of capitalism” and a driving point for imperialism [5].  What separates Lenin from Hobson is that Lenin distinguishes between capitalism and industrial capitalism, in which “imperialism is the monopoly stage of capitalism” where “finance capital is the bank capital of a few very big monopolist banks, merged with the capital of the monopolist associations of industrialists; and, on the other hand, the division of the world is the transition from a colonial policy which has extended without hindrance to territories unseized by any capitalist power, to a colonial policy of monopolist possession of the territory of the world, which has been completely divided up” [6].  Theorists such as Lenin understood national and colonial capitalism very well, and the exact thing that Lenin states here concerning the imperialism of his time is aligned in the exact same formula for modern international capitalist globalization.  Lenin’s depiction that imperial capitalism was the final stage of capitalism seems almost prophetic when looking at the international stage after World War I and II, and the Cold War, as the consolidations of international capital monopolies only intensified with “the formation of international monopolist capitalist associations which share the world among themselves” and “the territorial division of the whole world among the biggest capitalist powers” [7].

                While Lenin’s observations can be clearly seen today with international private sector monopolies or international loan machines, such as the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, during the British Empire era imperialism was more nation-state oriented with the “immense accumulation of money capital in a few countries” and “monopoly ownership of very extensive, rich or well situated colonies” [8].  This is also especially true of modern globalization with the exception that the power of states, which ruled the international stage during the time of the British Empire, has been replaced by unleashed international private sector capitalist powers.  Lenin makes a keen observation at the beginning of the 20^th century with the statement that “the income of the rentiers is five times greater than the income obtained from the foreign trade of the biggest "trading" country in the world. This is the essence of imperialism and imperialist parasitism.” [10]. Colonial trade derived from British imperialism was not the main profit producer; it was parasitic capitalist loans that generated the most income.  The same imperial exploitation exists today on the international stage, only there has been a global separation of state and private sector capital, and now struggling nation-states find themselves at the mercy of the unholy economic union of the IMF, World Bank, World Trade Organization and their political and military muscle, the economic power states of the United Nations Security Council.  An example of these capitalist parasitic loans in the British Empire can be seen with the military occupation of Egypt in 1882.

                The Earl of Cromer gave a poor explanation of why Britain moved on Egypt: “we don’t really want the damned place but if we don’t someone else will grab it and the whole balance of power will be mucked up” [8].  What the Earl failed to see, or perhaps only failed to mention, was the Egyptian debt to Britain and her banks, and the construction of the Suez Canal.  Egypt, under the leadership of Ismail from 1863-1879, saw that “government debt rose from £3 million to nearly £100 million, largely due to Ismail’s efforts to modernize Egypt. In addition to completing the Suez Canal” and “by 1875, even though Egypt had repaid £29 million on its loans, it still owed £46 million and the country was near bankruptcy.  British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli learned from private sources that the Egyptian shares in the Suez Canal were for sale. Acting without parliamentary authorization, he bought them for the British government and thereby greatly increased the British stake in Egyptian stability.” [9].  Stability was, and still is, paramount to aggressive imperialism and in 1882 Britain moved to provide that stability through military occupation.

Hobson and Lenin

                Hobson and Lenin are political theorists that develop Marx’s original domestic analyses of capital to an international level, and serve the academic world with a solid link to modern events occurring on the international stage today.  The theories on imperialism and capitalism by Hobson and Lenin have much more in common than in opposition, and they appear to complement each other instead of contradict each other.  As would be expected, neither of these political theorists are covered in American public school systems outside of a brief mention of Lenin’s involvement in World War I.

 

Notes

1. Hobson, J.A.  Imperialism, A Study.  Public Domain.  Accessed on March 2, 2013 from http://www.marxists.org/archive/hobson/1902/imperialism/pt1ch4.htm

2. Hobson, J.A.  Imperialism, A Study.  Public Domain.  Accessed on March 2, 2013 from http://www.marxists.org/archive/hobson/1902/imperialism/pt1ch4.htm

3. . Hobson, J.A.  Imperialism, A Study.  Public Domain.  Accessed on March 2, 2013 from http://www.marxists.org/archive/hobson/1902/imperialism/pt1ch4.htm

4.  . Hobson, J.A.  Imperialism, A Study.  Public Domain.  Accessed on March 2, 2013 from http://www.marxists.org/archive/hobson/1902/imperialism/pt1ch4.htm

5. Lenin, Vladimir.  Imperialism, The Highest Stage of Capitalism, 1916.  Fordham University.  Public Doman.  Accessed on March 2, 2013 from http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1916lenin-imperialism.html

6.  Lenin, Vladimir.  Imperialism, The Highest Stage of Capitalism, 1916.  Fordham University.  Public Doman.  Accessed on March 2, 2013 from http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1916lenin-imperialism.html

7. Lenin, Vladimir.  Imperialism, The Highest Stage of Capitalism, 1916.  Fordham University.  Public Doman.  Accessed on March 2, 2013 from http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1916lenin-imperialism.html

8. Why Britain Acquired Egypt in 1882 (1908).  Modern History Sourcebook, Fordham University.  Accessed on March 2, 2013 from http://www.fordham.edu/Halsall/mod/1908cromer.asp

9.  Jones, Jim.  Egypt and Europe in the 19^th Century.  West Chester University, 2013.  Accessed on March 2, 2013 from http://courses.wcupa.edu/jones/his312/lectures/egypt.htm

10. Lenin, Vladimir.  Imperialism, The Highest Stage of Capitalism, 1916.  Fordham University.  Public Doman.  Accessed on March 2, 2013 from http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1916lenin-imperialism.html

Why Did The Poorest Countries Fail to Catch Up? Vulture Globalization.

“Why did the poorest countries fail to catch up?”  Before we can discuss development or failure through war and peace in so-called undeveloped nation-states, it is important to recap the history of the beast that places a slave collar on those so-called undeveloped nation-states.

The relationship between war and development, and peace and development correlate in the constant exploitation and generation of global capital profit under the banner of capitalism and globalization.  Free trade agreements between nation-state actors, from the era of the Treaty of Westphalia and the East India Company, birthed the original concept of international markets and early capitalism.  Anyone who has studied capitalism in an unbiased manner understands the basic pillar of capitalism: to generate capital, one must own capital, and eventually the available capital becomes consolidated within an elite group of owners until more paper capital is created and placed into circulation which eventually devaluates currency.  It is important to consider that, within modern global capitalism that a devaluated national currency can be profited on internationally, by those with capital, through the international currency exchange establish through the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

The development of world submission to vulture capitalism, or globalization and development in politically correct terms; occurred through two major international wars.

World War II

After the Allied victory of World War II, the fallacy of the League of Nations was rectified by the creation of the United Nations and a five permanent member security council with veto power.  Four of the five permanent members were open free markets supporting capitalism, with Russia being the sole exception (although Communist nation-states still import and export trade).  The world globalization process began after WWII with the creation of the IMF, which regulated currency values exchanges of capital across nation-state borders, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), which would become the World Trade Organization (WTO), and the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, which would become the World Bank. 

What was the first thing the free market economic powers did upon the creation of the GATT?  They generously provided their colonial possessions with membership.  At this point, through “regionalized economic systems that provide the main motors of the global economy”, capitalism began to outgrow nation-state borders into a regional international so-called free market (Beger & Weber, p. 8).  Just as the early days of capitalism within nation-state borders, capital unleashed on the international stage began a process of capital generation and a consolidation period was initiated as the market expanded to enhance exploitation of colonial property natural resources with increasing technologies.  With the establishment of the GATT/WTO, the IMF, and the IBRD/World Bank, it is easy to see how “rich countries tended to grow as a club” and that there has never been “negative-growth in the rich world” (Milanovic, p. 4).  Capital creates capital. 

It was only the balance of power created by the bi-polar Cold War between capitalism and communism that held capitalism and the international market from globalizing, yet even in a stalemate capital was generated and consolidated by international banks and private sector capital through a massive arms race.

Cold War

After the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War in the “1990s, the most economically significant post-communist nation-states that arose from the collapse of the Soviet power (including Russia itself), were reconfigured as part of the ‘emerging economies’ or ‘emerging markets’” (Berger & Weber, p. 9).  With no communist hegemon to balance against the rising capitalist behemoth of the United States which had moved “to a position of unrivaled global power”, capitalist globalization expanded Eastward and Southward with the backing of the UN Security Council, and the collective capital of the IMF and World Bank, in order to open previously communist states and post-colonial states to the free market and, more importantly, globalize the former communist and colonial state borders for the infiltration of foreign private sector investment capital.

Globalization and international capital consolidation had become complete and was illustrated by the “key characteristic of global development by the 1990s was the growing concentration of economic power in the hands of a small number of large oligopolistic corporations” (Berger & Weber, p. 8).

Why Did the Poorest Countries Fail to Catch up?

The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace report by Milanovic reminds me of a kid that watches somebody get beat down on the playground and when asked about it by teachers and adults, replies “Did something happen to Johnny?”

This report was almost offensive to read as Milanovic simply regurgitates twisted World Bank statistics and points out previous economic theories on globalization, while puzzling over the “disastrous performance of LDCs during the era of globalization” like someone who masters quantum physics, but doesn’t understand the basic concepts of capitalism (p.9).  What is worse is that the bulk of statistics and charts create an overall average (or mean) for multiple categories, when each so-called LDC has a specific history of political, economic, and social events that has shaped its current political and economic condition.  Category averages derived from all countries, the statistics offsetting each other because of the number of states being averaged, offer little meaning when dealing with post-colonial states, post-communist states, and states that didn’t even exist before World War II.  

Let’s look at how Milanovic attempts to discern the failure of LDC development.  In these areas, we can see the exploitative arm of international capitalist profiting during times of civil and international conflict, as well as during times of peace.

1] Civil Wars and International Conflict.  Conflict and the banner of so-called reconstruction is the World Bank’s main capital maker.  The Bank, as it is often called in its own reports, gained its original calling during the reconstruction of Europe after WWII and has greatly expanded its international mandate and methods over the past half century.  Everywhere, meaning post-communist soviet satellite states and post-colonial LCDs, that the UN Security council has sent multi-national so-called peacekeeping forces to over the last thirty years, the World Bank has attempted to follow in their footsteps with reconstruction loan promises and foreign private sector capital actors ready for exploitive investment.  Behind some UN operations, states became stable enough for foreign private sector infiltration while in others, such as Somalia, stabilization was unsuccessful.  World Bank loans often come with conditions that open the flood gates for foreign capital investment that result in loan interest rate costs for the recipient state while “private capital flows in the past 20 to 30 years have generally gone from one rich country to another rich country” via the private sector exploitation of natural resources and cheap labor force exploitation in Lower Developed Countries (LDCs).

Even as the United Nations, and NATO for that matter, has continued to expand its role on the international stage, they contribute to enforcing hypocritical sanctions and eventual military ‘sticks’ that remove and rebuild state regimes that just will not accept the international free market ‘carrots’.  Each LCD nation-state that has been internationally ganged on, from Iraq to Libya and soon Iran, has an individual account that has ended the same way, with a new regime in place that opened to the global market and welcomed the World Bank and IMF.    

“Total disbursements from international financial institutions (IFIs) to the LDCs have grown from 2.75 percent of the recipient’s GDI in the first half of the 1980s to about 3 percent of their GDI in the first years of the new century.  The expansion was mostly due to an increase in World Bank loans to the LDCs”

2] Institutions, reform and policies.  When these terms are used to criticize a nation-state, it is usually because a domestic policy is barring maximum foreign private sector investment and profit in some way.  Institutions equal a stable government.  Private sector capital doesn’t generate profits well under politically unstable conditions.  In the cases of policy, requirements similar to deregulating energy or some other resource is usually the case.  Foreign private sector capital is unable to invest in domestic regulated resources.  In many cases with the World Bank, educational reforms (often technical) are an important issue.  This is an important condition because private sector capital needs a human work force on the ground in the LDC they are economically exploiting for profit.  These three terms, which can be attributed to many other areas outside of the simple examples I provided, are basically considered terms for World Bank and IMF loans.

  3] Lower trade (policies and outcomes) to Gross Domestic Product ratio.  The more debt a nation-state accrues under these international capitalist loans with conditions (which allow entry for the foreign private sector capitalist investors), the more slowed economic growth will be.  In 2011, Jamaica’s annual debt payments actually exceeded their annual GDP and the state defaulted from their 2010 IMF agreement (which, as I have mentioned in previous posts, the IMF loans capital in the strongest international currency while loan recipient states are required to pay back the loan in their own devaluated domestic currency).  In Jamaica’s case, the international economic community threatened to isolate them if they did not return to the IMF table for another loan, this one required a debt exchange at higher interest rates.

  4] Attracting foreign investment as a way to gain access to new technology.  If foreign investment owns the technology, they own the profits.  The foreign capital investment may create some temporary jobs, but when the foreign investment has exceeded its profiting, or a natural resource is depleted, the capital will again flow back to the rich nation-state or private sector international actor.  If the international loans are utilized to purchase technology, the loan repayment collects large amounts of interest (and if it is IMF, the currency difference adds to the total) while technologies have durations, and new technologies often replace older technologies making them obsolete in completing with new technologies. 

Closing Statement

There is no separate relationship between economic development during times of war and times of peace for developing nation-states on the international stage.  There is only the international caste of global capitalism.

Berger, M. T. & Weber H.  War, Peace and Progress: Conflict, Development, (in)security and Violence in the 21^st Century.  Third World Quarterly, 30(1), 2009. P. 1-16.

Milanovic, Branko.  Why Did The Poorest Countries Fail to Catch Up?  Trade, Equity and Development Project, Number 62, November 2005.  Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

 

 

17th-18th Century Propaganda - British Colonialism in India

Many of us with western society origins grew up under these state propagated misconceptions, and were quite shocked to begin studying international history, from an unbiased position, which equally represented the victim’s side of colonial exploitation.  These misconceptions, more precisely propaganda on undeveloped minds or diversions from the issues altogether, are often created and mass produced by controlling political forces.  Today, these elements are political, corporate, and state, most often in cooptation, while a combination of state and corporations during the age of British Empire, when technology of propaganda was basically limited to theatre and literature.  A good majority of those who reported from the colonial territories were either in the colonial territories on the dime of East India Company Shareholders, the British government or optimistic individuals, often in debt, present on behalf of their own private investments.  Prior to the technological expansion of the internet, even just twenty years ago, the information being taught in American and British schools were selective and state regulated.  It is no wonder that many of us, if we were lucky, heard about Martin Luther King once a year.  Even though the modern public school systems have been forced to expand certain areas of studies that the state would rather not reflect on, due to technologies that make researching historical documents instantaneous, the social shaping process is still the same today, only magnified tenfold, with the mass production of historical documentaries, books, and media.  One must own capital to mass produce information, and those entities that possess capital means of mass production are usually not eager to share unbiased information or accumulated capital, and usually utilize their capital toward the false glamorization, propagation of history or current politics, or, the current trend, diversion through mass production of meaningless entertainment.

The first example of colonial propaganda that we should take a look at is in the area of playwrights, as theater was a main form of entertainment, and social engagements, during the British Empire during the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries.  A play written for stage by Walter Mountfort in 1632, entitled ‘The Launching of the Mary’ is clear East India Company propaganda.  The play was “largely devoted to numerous speeches that are thinly veiled encomia extolling mercantilist philosophy” and was “focused on a singular objective: in the face of criticism from the general public and competitors, the play aims to defend and promote the ideology of its author’s parent company. The play is a text produced largely for its propaganda value”[1]. 

Of course, the political and economic positions, or more importantly the link to their source funding, which most often restricted or shaped written material created by playwrights, were not always obvious to a mind unfamiliar with current affairs, but often could be identified subconsciously, or naturally through the influences, experiences, acquired tastes, and second hand accounts related to the playwright.

On the literary front, there were scores of literary collections that created exotic, “benign and sunlit” mental images of colonialism under the British Empire.  The many writers and poets that glamorized the British colonies had traveled to those colonies on the funding of state or corporate entities, especially in India where “East India Company poets, like William Jones, John Leyden and Thomas Medwin, were dependent on the Company for patronage of their scholarship and advancement in their careers [2].

I have searched in-depth for the full text of the poems “Calcutta: A Poem” and “India: A Poem in Four Cantos”, but regrettably, to this point have not been able to access the text anywhere for referencing.

Even after the death of the East India Company, literature at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20^th century continued to reflect British colonialism as a natural event of civilization.  Rudyard Kipling’s ‘Jungle Book’ collection, to use a piece of literature that most everyone is familiar with, is set in colonial India and, even though a children’ book aimed mostly animal characters, presents British colonialism as a very natural way of life for the British. 

An example of this is the setting for the story of Rikki-Tikki-Tavi which paints the vivid setting of a secure, upper class family environment:

1.) Rikki-tikki went out into the garden to see what was to be seen. It was a large garden, only half cultivated, with bushes, as big as summer-houses, of Marshal Niel roses, lime and orange trees, clumps of bamboos, and thickets of high grass.” 2.) “They gave him a little piece of raw meat. Rikki-tikki liked it immensely, and when it was finished he went out into the veranda and sat in the sunshine” 3.)  “Early in the morning Rikki-tikki came to early breakfast in the veranda riding on Teddy's shoulder, and they gave him banana and some boiled egg. He sat on all their laps one after the other” [3]

[1] Choi, Myungjin.  Social Money: Literary Engagements with Economics in Early Modern English Drama, p. 58-60. University of Western Ontario, 2011.  Accessed on February 26, 2013 from http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1391&context=etd

[2] Malhotra, Ashok.  The Making of British India Fictions: 1772-1823, p.35.  University of Edinburgh, 2009.  Accessed on February 26, 2013 from http://www.era.lib.ed.ac.uk/bitstream/1842/4504/1/Malhotra2009.pdf

Kipling, Rudyard.  The Jungle Book.  Public Domain.  Accessed on February 26, 2013 from http://www.online-literature.com/kipling/jungle_book/8/

Analysis of Dr. Edward Said's Orientalism: Imperial Media Influence

           The theory of Orientalism, derived by Dr. Edward Said, is centered on the stereotypical views of western civilization towards the cultures and people of the East, once under British Imperialism, from the regions of the Middle East to Africa, and India.  While negative stereotypes exist in western civilization towards people in Africa and India, and people of color in general, these two geographic regions take a backseat to the mental imagery of the Middle East within the minds of most westerners.  In modern Western society, especially the United States, the stereotypes that the mass population has subconsciously developed towards people in the Middle East, for example that Israeli Jews are often innocent victims and that all Arabs are raving terrorists  that are hell bent on murdering westerners, are predominantly consumed through the abundance of media and television entertainment.  During the era of British imperialism and military occupation just over a century ago, the equivalent of television media was the distributed printed written word.

Alfred Egmont Hake

                The Hake account of the General Gordon evacuation mission in Khartoum in 1885 is a prime example of skillfully bias reporting that paints the Arab people of Khartoum, in modern Sudan, as blood thirsty savages.  Without explaining that Sudan was under military occupation by the British Protectorate Egypt, and that General Gordon himself had previously held the Governor-Generalship of Sudan from 1876 to 1879 when he angered a good majority of the population by removing a pillar of the local economy by abolishing slavery, Hake opens his account by capturing his British audience by creating a British protagonist that must rescue “Europeans, civil servants, widows and orphans, and a garrison of one thousand men, one third of whom were disaffected” from troubled Khartoum [1] .  The Hake account is obviously pro-British imperialism in nature and portrays the foreign occupiers almost in a defensive light while portraying the indigenous uprising as an act of aggression.  This is a common media reporting tactic which is still in heavy utilization today.   Take for example the Hake account of the steamer that had a “volley was fired into her, wounding an officer and a soldier. The steamer returned the fire, killing five”.  Hake’s report here focuses on the volley being fired and the two injuries instead of the five Arabs killed by machine gun fire, reminiscent of modern news reports of stray missiles being fired from the Palestinian territories into Israeli fields, with an Israeli response of shelling the entire civilian infrastructure [2].  There is a pro-British political slant in Hake’s account that portrays all Arabs as barbarians, and these types of spins have been commonly used on citizens of imperialist empires and states as one of the heavy components of Said’s concept of orientalism.

Charles James Wills

                The same type of orientalism opinion shaping and stereotyping can be seen on a socio-cultural level within Wills’ account on the Persian Wedding in 1815.  Wills clearly plays on his British reader’s Christian indoctrination, and unfamiliarity of Islamic culture to paint an absurdly bizarre, and even twisted, perception of Islamic marriage and Islamic society.  There is no attempt at unveiling cultural relativity between Britain and Persia in Wills’ account, nor any attempt at understanding cultural history outside of Christian culture in Britain.  Wills reports the account from a view of complete British cultural superiority toward any colonial element that is different from that of the British Empire.

                Wills is quick to take subtle negative jabs at the modesty of the Islamic bride with his description of her dress “which hangs down like a long mask in front of the Persian woman's face, when clad in her hideous and purposely unbecoming outdoor costume: which costume, sad to say, is also an impenetrable disguise. In it all women are alike”[3].  I am certain that Wills, while recording his judgments on this wedding for future popular print, never considered that Muslim men and women in Persia may have regarded the immodest dress of British women in the same manner in which Wills was viewing their conservatism.  One interesting aspect of Wills’ account is his strong interest in the procedures of the marriage contract, and British readers must have viewed this process, through Wills’ descriptive opinions, to be exotic and barbaric economic bartering even though these types of marriage contracts are recorded as far back into history as the biblical Old Testament, a book regarded by British Christians as sacred.  Again, it is the printed report during this era in history, long before the technology of television, which shaped the minds of the British masses and created what Dr. Said would eventually term, a century later, Orientalism.

Colonel L. du Couret

                Couret’s report on judicial procedures in Arabia continues the trend of stereotyping and orientalism within 19^th and early 20^th century British media with an outlandish printed account on two particular judicial cases he witnessed during an Arabian court session he was privileged enough to view.  Instead of actually describing the most common judicial procedurals “of the women who complained of ill treatment on the part of their husbands; men who accused their wives of frailty; divisions of inheritance to adjust; thefts and frauds to punish”[4], which would have provided a realistic estimate of justice, social trends, and judicial sentencing in Arabian society for the British people to understand, de Couret provides his audience of media consumption with accounts on the two most irregular and ridiculous events of the evening and provides no information at all on regular the judicial structure, trends or procedures.  Instead of portraying an unbiased view of this foreign justice system to the British people, Couret relates the 19^th century Arabian judicial court to “tales related to us in the ‘Arabian Nights’" which was originally written over five hundred years prior and enhancing the subconscious ideology of orientalism [5].

Closing

                Imperialist states often control the views of their subjects and people, through propagated media such as print in the 19^th century and satellite television in the 21^st century, in order to justify their own actions and create unfavorable images of the people being exploited or conquered.  Said’s concept of orientalism is a reality, but the term ‘orientalism’ is only applicable due to the historical power distribution of the geographic globe.  If certain historic events would have developed different results, power roles on the international stage could have been different and the same media instruments of imperialism might create cultural stereotypes that a person such as Dr. Said might term “Europeanism” or “Americanism”.   

 

Notes

1. Hake, Alfred.  The Death of General Gordon at Khartoum, 1885.  Islamic History Sourcebook, Fordham University.  Accessed on February 23, 2013 from  http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/islam/1885khartoum1.asp

2. Hake, Alfred.  The Death of General Gordon at Khartoum, 1885.  Islamic History Sourcebook, Fordham University.  Accessed on February 23, 2013 from  http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/islam/1885khartoum1.asp

3. Wills, Charles.  A Persian Wedding, 1885.  Islamic History Sourcebook, Fordham University. Accessed on February 23, 2013 from http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/islam/1885persianwedding.asp

4. Du Couret, L.  Justice in Arabia, 1890.  Islamic History Sourcebook, Fordham University. Accessed on February 23, 2013 from http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/islam/1898arabiajustice.asp

 5. Du Couret, L.  Justice in Arabia, 1890.  Islamic History Sourcebook, Fordham University. Accessed on February 23, 2013 from http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/islam/1898arabiajustice.asp

Jamaica - World Bank, IMF, UNDP, and UNCTAD

Jamaica, with an estimated population of 2, 709, 300 in 2011, has not succeeded in positive development, according to private sector dictated international standards, over the past four decades.  Currently, the largest challenge is Jamaica’s massive international debt “which is currently estimated at 139.7% of the Gross Domestic Product” (Work Bank, 2013). The Jamaican debt to GDP (Gross Domestic Product) ratio is third highest in the world.  The unemployment rate in Jamaica hovered at approximately 14.3% in 2012 with notably higher unemployment and crime rates among the youth.  Jamaica’s murder rate is one of the highest in the world today.

The World Bank

As would be expected, the World Bank has had its hands in Jamaica since its independence in 1962.  The World Bank currently boasts of seven ongoing projects in Jamaica: 1. Inner City Basic Services Project ($29.3 Million dollars), 2. Social Protection Project ($40 million dollars), 3. Jamaica Second HIV/AIDS Project (a meager $10 million), 4. Rural Economic Development Initiative ($15 million), 5. Early Childhoodhood Development Project ($15 million dollars), 6. Energy Security and Efficiency Project ($15 million dollars) and 7. Education Transformation Capacity Building ($16 million dollars).

The most recent activity of the World Bank in Jamaica is in the form of a Jamaica-World Bank Country Partnership Strategy (CPS), designated for the period of FY10 through FY13, with the goals of 1) supporting economic stability through fiscal and debt sustainability 2) promoting inclusive growth by supporting programs that strengthen human capital, prevent crime and violence and promote rural development, and 3) Promote sustained growth by improving competitiveness.  The Country Partnership Strategy is a joint effort between the World Bank, the Caribbean Development Bank and the Inter-American Bank.

Looking at these three goals in-depth, we see that the first pillar of supporting economic stability is where the two main policy-based loans are issued.  The second pillar of promoting inclusive growth and the third pillar to promote sustained growth are the areas where the private sector infiltrates the state, which will pay for these ‘contributions’ in development with conditional loan funding described in the first pillar of the World Bank agreement.  In order to illustrate these methods in most basic format: the field of crime prevention would entail the purchasing of new police technologies to battle crime, agricultural development would entail purchasing agricultural technologies, and battling diseases would entail purchasing technologies and medicines.

One of the major concerns contained in the Country Partnership Strategy between the World Bank and Jamaica was the issue that “35 percent of potential workers remained outside of the labor force and two-thirds of those have never passed a Grade 9 level test, which is a requirement to attain vocational certification” (World Bank, Country Partnership Strategy, 2010).  This is an issue because foreign investors can import their capital and detract natural resources, interest payments, and capital profits, but foreign capital requires technical workers on the ground.

The IMF

Jamaica recently agreed to terms with the IMF for a $750 million dollar loan with conditions, which could be finalized by the end of March 2013.  This comes after a 2010 IMF-Jamaica initiative (loan) became derailed (or default).  The current IMF loan to Jamaica comes with terms aimed toward a heavy push for a massive debt swap, the second debt swap that Jamaica has instituted since 2010, in which “860 billion Jamaican dollars ($9.1 billion) of higher interest local currency debt for lower-yielding bonds” (Rastello & Sabo, 2013).

Under a national debt so great, in conjunction to a barely surplus GDP (without loan payments included), is this not refinancing at the national level?  If there was any doubt, “Citigroup, which worked on the country's last debt swap, has also been mandated on this occasion.” (Kilby, 2013)  As a result of this second debt swap, which is basically considered a defaulted loan,  Fitch has “downgraded Jamaica's credit rating one notch further into highly speculative territory, to C, while Standard & Poor's Ratings Services lowered the country's ratings to selective default” (Tadena, 2013)

Submerged in such debt, yet capable of making a surplus, why would a state take on another international loan from the IMF after the first failure in 2010, when annual debt payments outweigh their entire annual GDP?  The following passages from a 2012 report on the Jamaican Economy by the Center for Economic and Policy Research provides an answer and paints a broader image:

“In the original IMF agreement, the Fund notes that, “[t]he [Jamaican] authorities anticipate that financial support from the Fund will also help unlock critical financing from other multilateral institutions.”  This likely was a driving factor for Jamaica’s reengagement with the Fund.” (Johnston & Montecino, p. 4)

Unlock critical funding from other multilateral institutions?

“….citing the direct economic benefits, Shaw cites the “positive signal” it would send to their international partners, the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), World Bank, European Union (EU) and Caribbean Development Bank” (Johnston & Montecino, p. 4)

“While the IDB and World Bank are important sources of funding for the Jamaican government, they also hold a significant portion of Jamaica’s external debt, accounting for 15.0 percent and 7.7 percent respectively.  Repayments and interest paid to the IDB and World Bank partially offset the positive impact of their expenditures in Jamaica. In 2010, 1.2 percent of GDP ($159 million) went to repayments and interest to the two multilaterals. This number is anticipated to rise to $173.7 million in the current fiscal year.” (Johnston & Montecino, p. 5)

“The EU, which provides direct budget support, stopped disbursing, funds altogether after the ceasing of IMF reviews. In September 2011, the EU Ambassador told the Jamaican press, “We have already declared that we have to wait for Jamaica to re-engage with the IMF in order to continue disbursing our own funds,” adding, “We have a considerable amount of funding between now and the end of the financial year in the vicinity of US$70 million in grants for the budget, and part of the funds are quite ready to disburse as soon as the IMF issue is settled.”” (Johnston & Montecino, p. 5)

UNDP (United Nations Development Programme) and UNCTAD (United Nations Conference on Trade and Development)

I believe that the main problematic issue of ‘accepting continued international private capital credit or being completely cut-off by the international trade community’ that is facing Jamaica is evident at this point.  In closing, we will briefly look at the useless organizational tentacles of the United Nations. 

The last so-called contribution to Jamaica that was advertised by the UNDP was a series of Energy Conservation training courses conducted in Kingston at the end of 2012.  Energy conservation is one of Jamaica’s focus areas for attempting to reduce domestic spending as they go forward against insurmountable odds of attempting to gain a second independence, this time from international capital debt. (UNDP, 2013)

The Secretary-General  of the UNCTAD, Supachai Panitchpakdi, visited Jamaica in 2012 on a three day trip to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of Jamaican foreign trade.  Meeting with political leaders, Panitchpakdi stated that “Jamaica has important economic capital upon which to build its development strategies in a manner ensuring greater inclusiveness, resilience and sustainability. Among these are a competitive labour force, strong export potential in tourism and other services, including the creative industries, and the existence of a large Jamaican diaspora community and its geographical proximity to the world's largest market - the United States.” (UNCTAD, 2012)  Seeing how Panitchpakdi’s visit to Jamaica was in November 2012 and Jamaica had derailed from the IMF in 2011, all this rhetoric about fifty years of foreign trade and new opportunities for development were an obvious public relation ploys encouraging a return to the international loan table, which has obviously occurred.

References

International Bank For Reconstruction and Development and the International Finance Corporation.  Country Partnership Strategy For Jamaica for the Period 2010-2013.  World Bank Report No. 52849-JM, February 23, 2010.  Accessed on February 20, 2013 from http://www-wds.worldbank.org/external/default/WDSContentServer/WDSP/IB/2010/09/13/000350881_20100913101116/Rendered/PDF/528490CAS0CORRIGENDUM0R20101001914.pdf

Jamaica Agrees $750m IMF Loan Terms.  BBC News, February 15, 2013.  Accessed on February 20, 2013 from http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-21478255

Johnston, Jake & Montecino, Juan.  Update on the Jamaican Economy.  Center for Economic and Policy Research, May 2012.  Accessed on February 20, 2013 from http://www.cepr.net/documents/publications/jamaica-2012-05.pdf

Kilby, Paul.  Investors Take Fresh Look at Jamaica After Deal.  Reuters, February 15, 2013.  Accessed February 20, 2013 from http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/02/15/jamaica-credit-idUSL1N0BF9KW20130215

Patterson, Chris.  Energy Conservation Critical to IMF Agreement – Minister Paulwell.  Jamaica Information Service, February 20, 2013.  Accessed on February 20, 2013 from http://www.jis.gov.jm/news/leads/33028

Rastello, Sandrine & Sabo, Eric.  IMF Agrees to $750 Million Jamaica Loan on Second Debt Swap.  Bloomberg News, February 15, 2013.  Accessed February 20, 2013 from http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-02-15/imf-agrees-to-750-million-jamaica-loan-on-second-debt-swap-1-.html

Tadena, Nathalie.  Moody’s Reviews Jamaica’s Rating for Possible Downgrade on Debt Exchange.  Wall Street Journal, February 14, 2013.  Accessed on February 20, 2013 from http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20130214-719384.html

United Nation Coference on Trade and Development.  Secretary-General Visits Jamaica on Fiftieth Anniversary of Country’s Independence, November 13, 2012.  Accessed on February 21, 2013 from http://unctad.org/en/pages/newsdetails.aspx?OriginalVersionID=352

United Nations Development Programme.  Energy Conservation and Efficiency Training, February 19 2013.  Accessed on February 21, 2013 from http://www.jm.undp.org/node/629