open Democracy News Analysis - Debtonation: how globalisation dies, Ann Pettifor - Comments

Alex Lennon on "Debtonation: how globalisation dies"

Alex Lennon — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 13:36:09 +0000

Did you pay your $50 Steven ?

MalcolmL on "Debtonation: how globalisation dies"

MalcolmL — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 15:31:45 +0100

I wonder how all those writers who lambasted this article are feeling today.
Suitably humbled I don't doubt.

hobby on "Debtonation: how globalisation dies"

hobby — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 21:33:56 +0000

joefranks69,

Quote:

..." It contains an implicit a priori assumption that all was well with China and India; socialism stagnated their economies for a long period of time; and now, after adopting "globalization", they are finally dragging their populations out of poverty. Let's look at China, to avoid some of India's complexities: for instance, India's post-war "socialism" was of a very unorthodox variety, and its adoption of neoliberal policies (which are commonly, if oddly, confounded with the term "globalization") has been far from doctrinaire; likewise, the success of this partial adoption is fiercely disputed (see e.g. P. Sainath's writing in The Hindu, or the reports of India's RUPE, Research Unit for Political Economy). "

India is hardly a good example of a country based on neoliberal or free marked policies. They still have a lot of state intervention, regulation, subsidies, restrictive foreign ownership laws and tradepolicy from their quasi socialist policy after their independence. They are only slowly reforming their economy (it`s political difficult to cut subsidies and trade protection when the companies and their workers are unable to compete on the open marked. And of cource, foreign ownership is dangerous!)

Quote:

..."After WWII, life expectancy in China was in the scandalously-low range of the 30s and 40s. China's experiment in socialist "stagnation" resulted in a truly remarkable increase in life expectancy, one of many improvements "stagnant" Chinese socialism recorded. "
What improvements ?

Yes, China under communsim was good for the population. Let`s forget about the lack of political freedom, the economic stagnation, mass deportation and killing under the culture revolution or the pollution from excessive heavy industry. It makes you wonder why they gradually ended this economic policy in the 80`s , if their government regulated and economic planninng was that successful ? And of course, lets forget about the collapse of the Soviet Union and their economic foundation.

Quote:

"China's experiment in socialist "stagnation" resulted in a truly remarkable increase in life expectancy, one of many improvements "stagnant" Chinese socialism recorded."

You make the false assumption that this wouldn`t be the case if China had adopted a marked based economy (Germany, Sweden or Japan.)

Quote:

Another of the achievements of China's stagnant period was the creation of state-owned industries; which, like the zaibatsu in Japan and the chaebol in Korea, were protected by the state from global competitors in order for them to grow and become more productive and efficient. Unlike the chaebol and zaibatsu, of course, China's companies were entirely state-owned and were not run on a profit-driven basis. During the period when China's rulers adopted elements of neoliberalism ("globalization"), unprofitable state-owned enterprises were chopped up and parceled out in a manner somewhat analogous to what often happens in a leveraged buy-out.

Yes, compared to the growth rate since the 80`s with the gradual adoption of markedeconomy or the growth they could have achieved with a free marked policy instead of state planning under communism, China did suffer under crushing stagnant socialism for over 40 years. The creation of state-owned industries are not achievemnts, but a gigantic waste of resources. Protection from competition don`t make companies more competetive in the global marked, quite the opposite. Most of the state run chinese companies were created based on government preferences, overreliance on heavy industry and would never be able to stand up to competion without restructuring under private ownership and competition.

You also make the same mistake in the belief that chinese companies would`t be able to compete on the global marked with a liberal trade policy in a marked based economy from the very beginning. If protective companies are able to compete in the marked, they would have been able to compete anyway in the first place, without wasteful govenment support or trade protection.

Quote:

"So in addition to the amount of capital generated by the foreign investment China has attracted - and attracted, mind you, due to the well-educated workforce and fundamental infrastructure that are also the products of "stagnant" Chinese socialism - much of what the successful, "globalized" Chinese economy comprises are remnants of state-owned enterprises, the legacy, again, of the crushing "stagnant" socialism China had to suffer under over 40 years."

Yes, "remnants" Under private ownership and under competive pressure. I also doubt that most foreign investment in China these days are directed towards the state-owned enterprises.

Quote:

" Latin America (which you also encompass in your exposition of the conventional economic wisdom) did not have to endure 40 crushing years of stagnant socialism. It's capitalist/social democratic development worked creditably well from the '50s to the '70s. It is precisely when neoliberal economic policies were adopted/rammed down their throats in the '80s that economic growth in Latin America - what was your word? - yes, stagnated. As for the dire economic consequences neoliberal economic policies have caused, let me expand on what I wrote before. "

They would be better off if they truly had adopted a free marked economy and open trade policy instead of the quasi capitalist policy with heavy state intervension, regulation, heavy public borrowing and wasteful spending.

Quote:

"In the U.S., average hours worked have skyrocketed while wages have stagnated;"

Really? Source? What time period are you talking about.

Quote:

in Latin America, growth has stagnated, while in Africa growth has actually, in many cases, been negative. Tens of thousands of people die daily from hunger and malnutrition, and tens of thousands more from easily preventable or curable diseases. These are dire consequences arising in countries that have adopted neoliberal policy prescriptions to the greatest extent. India has had mixed results, with great wealth having been generated for those at the top, appreciable gains for some in the middle, but widespread poverty and food insecurity unrelieved, particularly in rural areas; China has seen a more widespread reduction in poverty but likewise is experiencing severe wealth disparities that is worrying the present leadership. Regardless, India and China, it is essential to note, are not model students of neoliberal economics. China in particular intervenes heavily in industry and financial markets, which is a big no-no for neoliberal economists who believe that markets work best with minimal governmental interference (where the government plays only the role of a referee). Likewise, development success stories such as Korea, Taiwan and Japan, which are the obvious examples, were terribly poor pupils of neoliberal economics, as they relied heavily on state-led and -protected development.

You are very selective in your facts and knowledge of history. Japan in the 19th century adopted a very liberal free marked economy (based on Britain) and grew extremely fast. It`s true that Japan (and Taiwan and Korea)after the war had an active industry policy with some protection and support for selected industries and companies, but they did not rely "heavily on state-led and -protected development". If anything, these trade protection and subsidies were wasteful and unnecessary, as these companies and industries would have been able to compete and grow without state support and protection. These countries adopted mainly a marked based economic policy and was able to compete very successfully in the the global marked.

Quote:

Japan Even Singapore is an odd choice for neoliberal economists to trot out as a success story, because despite its adoption of many neoliberal-approved policies, it too is marked by significant state economic intervention. (Additionally, as Jeffrey Sachs has noted with specific regard to Singapore, it is remarkable how the conventional economic wisdom does not consider highly influential factors such as geography in deriving policy prescriptions from examples in the history of economic development.) That government intervention in the economy is a sine qua non of successful development is borne out by a review of the developmental histories of virtually every now-developed country (the relevance of the arguable exceptions to this principle - the Netherlands, Switzerland, Singapore and Hong Kong - is directly proportional to their size, I would presume). The question we need to answer is what kind of government intervention is best suited to which goals? If our goal is a highly stratified world economy with 1% of the population doing extremely well, 10% doing well, and the rest either making it by with more or less comfort - or starving to death, depending on which area of the world we are talking about - then the current spread of neoliberal economic policies should continue apace.

So, no more than 11% of the population in , lets say, France or Japan are doing well. Few, if any country, is free from government regulation and intervension, but a free marked economy is the best way for countries to grow and increase wealth.
As for Singapore and its economic policy: (from Wikipedia)
"Singapore has a highly developed market-based economy, which historically revolves around extended entrepot trade. ...Singapore has been rated as the most business-friendly economy in the world,"

Quote:

If our goal were, for instance, to eliminate all deaths from hunger and easily preventable disease - even if the people dying are not light-skinned - then a radical economic reorganization is in order. Given the examples history has provided, a hybrid socialist/market-based system would seem to be most suitable. Democratically-controlled governments would lead efforts to refocus societal production on the dissemination of technologies and education throughout the world, would seek to provide a foundation of food, clothing, shelter, education and health care to everyone, whether through entirely government-run programs or through markets with government subsidies to ensure complete inclusivity, and unnecessary articles of consumption (which make up a sizable chuck of current industrialized economies) would be produced in a largely market-driven manner, with forms of government regulation and investment assistance in place that have proven effective in the past and are presently desired by the voting public.

Socialism have been tried. It didn`t turn out to be too effective. The world need less government intervention and more free marked.

Simon Breslaw on "Debtonation: how globalisation dies"

Simon Breslaw — Sat, 20 Oct 2007 20:28:49 +0100

Ann Pettifor writes: "In the real world, citizens and taxpayers are once again obliged to bear responsibility, and pay the costs incurred by the reckless and unrestrained greed of the world of high finance." I don't think this is an accurate description. The world of high finance is not being reckless or showing unrestrained greed. We are. That is, anyone who has a private pension, for example. Those working in the world of high finance are just doing their jobs, maximising the returns on the money we give them via our company pension schemes. We are the ones demanding the highest possible returns. We are the ones who don't care where our money is invested, as long as it provides the largest possible pension when we retire. Until we wake up and demand that the capital we supply to the financial markets should be invested in beneficial businesses and initiatives that operate in "the real world", society as a whole will continue to bear the burden of an overheated financial market that has lost its sense of purpose. Its purpose should be to capitalise new and existing initiatives that are of value to wider society. As investors, we may not get such high returns, if we make this demand. However, it would reduce the volatility in the capital markets while establishing a link between the benefit to the investor and the benefit to society. In terms of pensions, this is a real link and faith in the economy we work in when we are young, that will, hopefully, continue to support us when we are old. The financial markets are, in a sense, value neutral. We can either use them selfishly, or through enlightened self-interest, for the benefit of all. Out of enlightened self-interest therefore, each of us, not the central banks, not the government, becomes responsible for conducting monetary policy.

geoff tily on "Debtonation: how globalisation dies"

geoff tily — Fri, 24 Aug 2007 18:15:17 +0100

Roger Scruton (and others) seems to want to polarise the debate as between Keynesians / state spenders on one hand and free marketeers on the other. In doing so he avoids almost entirely tackling Ann Pettifor's main arguments and serves to confuse the issues at hand. Pettifor's argument does not concern the housing of the poor. (Even so, it does seem a strange time to celebrate the virtue of the market approach through sub-prime mortgages.) Pettifor's central argument concerns the management of money, not the management of economic activity more generally. Her position is that a laissez-faire approach to banking, international capital and exchange markets is incongruent with wider economic prosperity and is potentially disastrous. She is not the first to argue this, in particular, these matters were Keynes's central concern. A concern that is neglected by today's academics and policymakers alike, who, like Scruton, prefer to keep Keynes in a box marked 'state spender / meddler in market activities'. Ultimately the 'Keynes'/Pettifor argument is that an effective market economy depends on the state keeping a firm grip on money . Perhaps a paradox for the likes of Scruton; and it is not good enough simply to ignore it.

joefranks69 on "Debtonation: how globalisation dies"

joefranks69 — Thu, 23 Aug 2007 21:49:10 +0100

Dayuhan, I'm afraid that your writing would be accurately described as an example of conventional wisdom; that is to say, popularly-believed falsehood. For instance, you mention China and India as successful examples of globalization (which, problematically, is not defined). Then you qualify their progress by noting that they first had to overcome "the crushing stagnation imposed by 40 years of socialism". This betrays an innocence of economic history that is all-too-commonly shared by proponents of the conventional economic wisdom. It contains an implicit a priori assumption that all was well with China and India; socialism stagnated their economies for a long period of time; and now, after adopting "globalization", they are finally dragging their populations out of poverty. Let's look at China, to avoid some of India's complexities: for instance, India's post-war "socialism" was of a very unorthodox variety, and its adoption of neoliberal policies (which are commonly, if oddly, confounded with the term "globalization") has been far from doctrinaire; likewise, the success of this partial adoption of neoliberal policies is fiercely disputed (see e.g. P. Sainath's writing in The Hindu, or the reports of India's RUPE, Research Unit for Political Economy). Prior to the "the crushing stagnation imposed by 40 years of socialism," China was an utter basket case, a former great power that had been largely destroyed by first British and then Japanese depredations (not to mention droughts and floods that killed millions in a society crippled by imperialist British intervention; see Mike Davis' Late Victorian Holocausts). Whereas Japan had considered Korea to be a land for future generations of the superior Japanese family/race to live, and invested in economic development accordingly, China was treated with the same Nazi-like brutality, but without any economic development. After WWII, life expectancy in China was in the scandalously-low range of the 30s and 40s. China's experiment in socialist "stagnation" resulted in a truly remarkable increase in life expectancy, one of many improvements "stagnant" Chinese socialism recorded. Another of the achievements of China's stagnant period was the creation of state-owned industries; which, like the zaibatsu in Japan and the chaebol in Korea, were protected by the state from global competitors in order for them to grow and become more productive and efficient. Unlike the chaebol and zaibatsu, of course, China's companies were entirely state-owned and were not run on a profit-driven basis. During the period when China's rulers adopted elements of neoliberalism ("globalization"), unprofitable state-owned enterprises were chopped up and parceled out in a manner somewhat analogous to what often happens in a leveraged buy-out. So in addition to the amount of capital generated by the foreign investment China has attracted - and attracted, mind you, due to the well-educated workforce and fundamental infrastructure that are also the products of "stagnant" Chinese socialism - much of what the successful, "globalized" Chinese economy comprises are remnants of state-owned enterprises, the legacy, again, of the crushing "stagnant" socialism China had to suffer under over 40 years. Latin America (which you also encompass in your exposition of the conventional economic wisdom) did not have to endure 40 crushing years of stagnant socialism. It's capitalist/social democratic development worked creditably well from the '50s to the '70s. It is precisely when neoliberal economic policies were adopted/rammed down their throats in the '80s that economic growth in Latin America - what was your word? - yes, stagnated. As for the dire economic consequences neoliberal economic policies have caused, let me expand on what I wrote before. In the U.S., average hours worked have skyrocketed while wages have stagnated; in Latin America, growth has stagnated, while in Africa growth has actually, in many cases, been negative. Tens of thousands of people die daily from hunger and malnutrition, and tens of thousands more from easily preventable or curable diseases. These are dire consequences arising in countries that have adopted neoliberal policy prescriptions to the greatest extent. India has had mixed results, with great wealth having been generated for those at the top, appreciable gains for some in the middle, but widespread poverty and food insecurity unrelieved, particularly in rural areas; China has seen a more widespread reduction in poverty but likewise is experiencing severe wealth disparities that is worrying the present leadership. Regardless, India and China, it is essential to note, are not model students of neoliberal economics. China in particular intervenes heavily in industry and financial markets, which is a big no-no for neoliberal economists who believe that markets work best with minimal governmental interference (where the government plays only the role of a referee). Likewise, development success stories such as Korea, Taiwan and Japan, which are the obvious examples, were terribly poor pupils of neoliberal economics, as they relied heavily on state-led and -protected development. Even Singapore is an odd choice for neoliberal economists to trot out as a success story, because despite its adoption of many neoliberal-approved policies, it too is marked by significant state economic intervention. (Additionally, as Jeffrey Sachs has noted with specific regard to Singapore, it is remarkable how the conventional economic wisdom does not consider highly influential factors such as geography in deriving policy prescriptions from examples in the history of economic development.) That government intervention in the economy is a sine qua non of successful development is borne out by a review of the developmental histories of virtually every now-developed country (the relevance of the arguable exceptions to this principle - the Netherlands, Switzerland, Singapore and Hong Kong - is directly proportional to their size, I would presume). The question we need to answer is what kind of government intervention is best suited to which goals? If our goal is a highly stratified world economy with 1% of the population doing extremely well, 10% doing well, and the rest either making it by with more or less comfort - or starving to death, depending on which area of the world we are talking about - then the current spread of neoliberal economic policies should continue apace. If our goal were, for instance, to eliminate all deaths from hunger and easily preventable disease - even if the people dying are not light-skinned - then a radical economic reorganization is in order. Given the examples history has provided, a hybrid socialist/market-based system would seem to be most suitable. Democratically-controlled governments would lead efforts to refocus societal production on the dissemination of technologies and education throughout the world, would seek to provide a foundation of food, clothing, shelter, education and health care to everyone, whether through entirely government-run programs or through markets with government subsidies to ensure complete inclusivity, and unnecessary articles of consumption (which make up a sizable chuck of current industrialized economies) would be produced in a largely market-driven manner, with forms of government regulation and investment assistance in place that have proven effective in the past and are presently desired by the voting public.

admin on "Debtonation: how globalisation dies"

admin — Thu, 23 Aug 2007 12:43:40 +0100

Roger's defense of capitalism against central control is quite right: the market works in a Darwinian way, by punishing bad "mutations", or "behaviours". The market allows for learning in the realm of production. Roger also points out that this Darwinian process works through the responsibility that actors have for their mistakes. This is a principle of good organisation and decentralisation which it would be very foolish for anyone, of whatever political persuasion, to doubt anymore. It was seriously contested by the apologists of central planning, and the victory, at the level of an organisational rule of thumb, of Hayekian decentralisation over Langian planning should be taken as given.

But that is not the end of the matter. There is still much to be said about how to organise ourselves to permit good lives. For example, with the current financial crisis, the real, and the worry about all such crises, is that the link of responsibility between action and punishment/reward is broken. Under systemic crisis, as in 1929, many people lose livelihoods without any link to "punishment". Moreover, most economists believe that crises like this can sometimes be avoided. It would be callous dogmatism to refuse regulation of financial flows, State intervention in the market in one form or other, in such cases. A worry with the current crisis is in some ways the opposite, but still points to a failure of responsibility.

The US Federal Reserve has been bailing out one financial sector after another since 1998. The famous "Greenspan put" is the view that assets are a one-way bet today, because the US Fed fears the effects on the real economy of letting asset prices fall. "The toothpaste is out of the tube", and the central banks are not quite sure how to get it back in without making a mess. But in this situation, lenders can lend in the knowledge that they are likely to be bailed out. Again, the link to responsibility is broken, and we face an aberration of the market, not a phenomenon to celebrate.

True, if such market aberrations allow some people to fulfil life goals such as owning a house, then that is to be counted in their favour. But it does not make the pattern of behaviour that created these anecdotally good outcomes itself a good outcome --- to accept that would be justify any populist economics, from Chavez and Putin to Blair or Chirac. There are many signs of the poor investment patterns that we have encouraged for 10 years. It would be surprising if they had not made _some_ people better off. But years of mis-investment, I fear, will lead to a very Marxist crisis in the profitability of capital. The social consequences of that will certainly not be the rosy ones anticipated in The Communist Manifesto. So a conservative, concerned with the preservation of order, ought to accept that financial markets need State intervention.

greatglobalist on "Debtonation: how globalisation dies"

greatglobalist — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 06:39:41 +0100

There is no financial crisis in the world.There are nations that are infested with civil wars and devastation of economic wealth by warlords and thier cronies the 'white bananas' .Who will go quite far to delay affairs.. the Western thought with some is to APPLY Debtonation merely to supress smaller economies that virtiously have begun to get greater too. West is in a political crisis and even indentity crisis like George bush told the Egyptian opposition 'he himself feels like 'desonant 'dissident' harf e haqrerer. West has no plans over Globalisation because west didnt fully create the concept. www.youtube.com/shahkhansher see movie 'jehangir'.. The british Parliment Lord of Exchquere Gordon Brown now The Prime Minister recorded as The Lord of exchequere that Britian haad lost control of the seas'thius is true because the ports have imminent integrity issue and sahips are bargained as they are sea bound ,west doesnt have businessmen like that ,the centres have re-integrated and bureacracy will control west instead of political thought .West is self sufficiently prosperous ,theres no Rome but they call themselves Greeks infact there are only Persians ... India! India is fast approaching positively towards all real Globalisation definitions and thier will be no death of Globalisation even when more institutions fail in the west.The western thought that Globalisation will depend on thier wealth is a fools dream. Globalisation is hard work and the tilt of exports from Indian Partnerships in Saarc and its Neigbor China. Although West is to be a big exporter in Globalisation but for once you must know that West is run with specific order and capitalist rules ,which means that private owners will bring western 'joints' into Southern Hemisphere. But the main emphasis has yet to be on Industrialisation and Improvement of Eastern Goods and Design . The west has for all the time of its modrenisation been using the flat designs and now the quest for East has begun : more Chiken Tikkas and Mughal cusuine are being invited .and even discuss bringing home the rule and it is all as a matter to unite amongst and co-operate efficiently under Global Leadership from within instead of rtelying any more on Western States. Indian/Chinese fashions and movies are taking over.The primary role however suggests that West is in no position to re-develop Africa and neither welcome and so India Pakistan nthat boast a great iunstitution/nation building organs like Civil service Police and Army have to combine effort and start building Countries in Africa... India has very efficiently worked in past two decedes and must shed out former dictations and co-relate to its modren text.Today India has worlds most efficient Marketing and allover it must realise that the countries we go out to build will buy our products because of thier prominence within modren day wages and production costs . the products like Electronic Goods,technotronics and Computers,Automibiles and Security equipment,Clothes[luxury goods] and Textiles are a very big privilidge to smarten prices in West and to supply to other countries that are ravished by Wars. The question of Countries that are looking towards India /Pakistan nthat have united International interests at South Asian Conference level must be politically tackled and wars be intervened by the same strength that India has used in the 60/70s to settle political affairs.Indias invasion of bangladesh can be discussed from many points ofd views and warped in conpiracies but the move to free a nation because it willed is a mark. Globalisation has simplestly been defined today... www.geocities.com/greatglobalist/sherzat.GIF The quest and ground for projecting Globalisation in standard to lend public enterprise and new develoipment is importantly to depend on Macro-Infrastrucure-ing of projects of large scale. Macro-Infratructure-ing itself needs support groups from Pakistan and India because their are also complains of neglect towards it from USA where at Roger williams University a project for Palestine awaits but wew have to look beyond Capitalist order to build ourselfs and support groups must emerge from within India Pakistan and China... http://greatglobalist.info/macro.htm And do visit my Website http://greatglobalist.info The world has to decide Globalisation as a active agent and support The Globalisation Revolution.

Steven Rogers on "Debtonation: how globalisation dies"

Steven Rogers — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 06:04:17 +0100

Casting a discussion like this in absolutist terms does no service to anyone. Almost nobody outside of the most rarefied fundamentalist libertarian think-tanks is calling for total non-intervention, and almost nobody outside the most isolated fringe of the radical left fringe is calling for total state control. The question is not whether the state should intervene or not, but when, and how much, and with what priorities. There's no simple answer to that question: every situation is unique, and each must be assessed individually. Neither is it possible to isolate these questions from political influence. Every political party, regardless of ideological persuasion, will try to protect its friends and allies. Every party in power will try to eke every bit of mileage it can out of a bubble, and will try to provide gentle landings when bubbles break. That's not altogether a bad thing: while many interventions may be dismissed, often in rather haughty terms, as "welfare for the rich", the oscillations that can occur when intervention fails, is dismissed, or is poorly designed have their greatest impact on the poor. Every economy needs risk-takers. Every innovation and every investment is a risk. Every loan, every hire, involves risk. Keep people from taking risks, the economy flounders, and in the end the poor suffer more in a floundering economy than anyone. There are good reasons for policies aimed at mitigating risk - and good reasons not to encourage excessive risk. To make things work we walk a middle ground, which has to be constantly adjusted and refined. Every crisis is a lesson on how to manage old challenges, and every time we emerge from a crisis we encounter new challenges. The ideal role of government in the economy, once we set ideologically generated assumptions aside, is analogous to the role of the referee in a football match (real football, with a round ball). If the referee is too intrusive and too strict, the game sputters and dies. If the referee is out to lunch, the game becomes a brawl, and is won by the best street-fighters, not the best footballers. As every footballer knows, though, every game is different, and the referee has to constantly adjust. Every living, dynamic, economy will encounter problems. Sometimes those problems will be severe enough to be called crises. Often those crises will be blown out of proportion by those emotionally invested in the idea that the economic system is no good and should be abandoned in favor of one they personally prefer. When all of the shouting is done, though, crises have to be managed. There's always going to be criticism of those doing the managing - usually from those who don't have the responsibility of making such decisions - but the proof of the pudding is in the eating, and on balance I'd have to say those responsible for management over the last decade or so haven't done all that bad a job. I certainly don't think I'd have done any better.

Steven Rogers on "Debtonation: how globalisation dies"

Steven Rogers — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 05:39:21 +0100

Quote:

If this 'free market capitalism' results in consistent or worsening dire outcomes for the world's undeveloped countries...

If "this free market capitalism" was actually having this effect, it might justify "a call for a radical economic reorganization". I'd have to question, though, whether that effect actually exists. Look around you. Please. Look at Asia from India east, home to such a large percentage of the world's population. You see peace almost everywhere you look, with the only major security issue being North Korea, not coincidentally a nation that has set itself apart from the global economy. The conflict between China and Taiwan, once regarded as a flashpoint that could ignite world war 3, has degenerated to periodic and rather lethargic saber-rattling. That happened because of trade: as long as the two countries are making billions doing business with each other nobody wants to get fired up and rock the boat. Look at Asia some more. Taiwan, South Korea, and Singapore have used the opportunities provided by globalization to drive a transition from sweatshop economies to something approaching fully developed status. Thailand and Malaysia are not that far behind. Even in lagging countries like the Philippines and Indonesia, the last decade and a half has seen the emergence of an active and globally engaged middle class, a critical element in driving further economic and political reform. China and India, between them, have moved more people out of poverty in the last 15 years than the entire globe has ever done in a similar period. There's a lot more to be done, of course: the crushing stagnation imposed by 40 years of socialism is not going to be reversed overnight. As a start, though, the last 15 years are pretty damned impressive. Latin America is almost entirely at peace, and enjoys a degree of political stability that has not been present for a long, long, time. A private sector is emerging, and effective investment is starting to take hold. Again, there's a long way to go, but a start is better than nothing. Western Europeans are no longer killing each other, and they're no longer pirating resources from the developing world - now there's some real change. That's a consequence of globalization: in a global trading economy, you don't have to conquer resources, you just buy them from willing sellers. It's cheaper, and easier, for all concerned. Africa and the Middle East remain grim, largely because so many nations have elected to set themselves apart from the integrated economy. Still, there are bright spots, notably in the Arabian Gulf, where moderate Arab governments are investing billions in a fairly impressive attempt to diversify their economies and break the "oil curse". We do see a few really grim scenarios remaining, but these are almost invariably in places where nations or portions of nations have, either deliberately or through conflict, been isolated from the global economy. In the last 15 years the world has become a more peaceful and prosperous place than it ever has been in the past, largely because of global economic interconnectedness. There is still a great deal of work to be done, but that work won't be accomplished by discarding the tools that are working. If a call for "a radical economic reorganization" is going to be based on the "dire" effects of the current system, those effects must first be demonstrated, and a credible case must be made to support the idea that the proposed reorganization will improve matters. I haven't seen any convincing attempt to do either.

joefranks69 on "Debtonation: how globalisation dies"

joefranks69 — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 04:28:08 +0100

It certainly seems to me that the above writers' political orientation, or perhaps it is their school of thought within economics, or both, are intertwined with their economic forecasts. I wonder, however, how much the state of the international economy in the near future will end up vindicating the political or economic opinions attached to the writers' respective economic forecasts. Even if central bank liquidity injections eventually calm things down, it does not necessarily follow that greater government regulation of financial markets, or participation in the economy more generally, are bad things. Perhaps overzealous lenders and investors buying their loans may get spanked a bit, then government intervention may keep things from spiraling into a panic, and the economy may correct itself and get back on the track it has been on. For those of us on the left, the problem is the track it has been on. For those of us on the right, whose cultural evolutionary function is to preserve the status quo (which can be presumed to be at the very least a collection of practices that kept the population from going extinct in the past), there is only one desirable way to improve the lives of the mass of humanity. That is though what is called 'free market capitalism', though this is really a euphemism for a hybrid free market/socialist system (where 'socialist' means governmental participation in and regulation of the economy - an entirely socialist system would involve no private ownership and complete correlation between governmental and economic activity). If this 'free market capitalism' results in consistent or worsening dire outcomes for the world's undeveloped countries, and slack wage growth and a growing number of average hours worked for the majority in rich countries, then these are just defects in what (still) is the most desirable manner of economic organization. For those of us on the left, an economic system can manage to avoid self-destruction, and yet not be the most desirable system possible. Even if a "market correction" rather than a "debtonation" is indeed what the present disruption turns out to be, and the current fashion of globalization, that is to say neoliberal globalization, continues largely unperturbed on its current course - even then, the global state of emergency epitomized by the tens of thousands of daily hunger and hunger-related deaths, to say nothing of climate change theory, justifies a call for radical economic reorganization. Whether this, a la Aurelius 1, requires a reconsideration of liberal democracy depends on its definition. If the capitalism we see today in the U.S. and Europe for instance can still be called capitalism despite the fact that it would be considered anathema (and socialist) to a capitalist of a hundred years ago, I would imagine that the kind of liberal democracy required to implement a form of international economic organization capable of seriously tackling poverty and climate change could still be called "liberal democracy" in the future. God only knows how current liberal democracies can reinvent themselves to produce societies capable of solving world poverty and environmental degradation, what with the fortresses, machine gun nests, bombers and supply lines in the battle of ideas controlled by those profiting handsomely by the status quo system. Which is why those of us on the left are drawn towards predictions of systemic disruption requiring rebuilding, and those of us on the right are drawn towards predictions of systemic stability and recovery. What weight these predictions should, once proven correct or incorrect, have in a debate on the most desirable manner of organizing an economy is I think less than what is commonly supposed.

Anthony Barnett on "Debtonation: how globalisation dies"

Anthony Barnett — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 20:43:25 +0100

Doesn't it follow that he should support terminating all planning controls to allow capitalism to provide the opportunity for as many homes as possible at much more reasonable - indeed American level - prices across the whole of the south of England?

admin on "Debtonation: how globalisation dies"

admin — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 20:48:47 +0100

The current flutters on world markets, caused - so it is said - by the crisis in the American mortgage business due to "sub-prime" lending, has led to fairly predictable calls for "greater regulation" and a return to Keynesian policies, in which the flow of capital is managed by the state (as in Ann Pettifor's clever, though in my view unfounded, prediction of the coming "debtonation" of the world economy.) These calls are often accompanied by attacks on capitalist profiteers and a denunciation of "greed", by which is meant profits made by someone other than oneself. And yet they seldom stoop to making comparative judgments, or to examine the actual results of controlling markets in the way they recommend.

It is surely one of the strengths of capitalism that, when investors make mistakes, they pay for them. What Marx described as the "crisis of capitalism" is constantly occurring - and is a proof of capitalism's health. Bad debts get cancelled along with the fortunes of those foolish enough to supply them, bad businesses go bankrupt, thieves and fraudsters are exposed, since they are unable to shelter behind their state connections (as they do in Russia), and people with daft economic theories, like Marx, get dropped from the syllabus (alas all too slowly). In short malice and stupidity are punished, and people learn.

Surely that is what is happening now. Banks and private financiers, eager for quick profits, rushed in to the "sub-prime" market, seeing an easy way of putting money out at interest without the cost of supervising its use. And they paid the price. Fantastic! Another victory for reality over fantasy, and wisdom over stupidity.

The reply comes that it is not just the speculators who suffer: it is all those people who must lose their homes, the poorest of the community, those who precisely qualified as "sub-prime" for the purposes of loan security. Here, it seems to me, is where the real snobbery of the Keynesian position displays itself. At the start of the sub-prime lending craze those people had no hope of a home. They willingly undertook the risk of interest payments, in the hope of joining the class of home-owners. And 12 million of them have succeeded in America - half of them members of ethnic minorities. It seems that the Keynesians would prefer to keep those people in state-run accommodation or trailer-parks, in the condition of dependency from which they had been trying to escape. True, some of these borrowers must now pay the price for having made a risky deal with someone whose transparent stupidity ought to have impressed them rather more than his apparent liquidity. So what? To protect people from taking such risks is to despise both their freedom and their intelligence. And in any case, losing their home merely puts them back where they started.

When I and my then wife first tried to acquire a flat in London, my salary as a university lecturer was regarded as insufficient proof of my credit-worthiness. Strict controls made it virtually impossible to raise a mortgage, and no-one would look at you if you couldn't prove that you had a deposit equal to 10% of the price of the house. The house itself had to be in the kind of surveyor-proof condition that made it unaffordable. Interest rates were at 13%. If we were lucky in eventually acquiring somewhere and paying the exorbitant interest, it was because our jobs were secure and our salaries rising. Most people from the lower orders were far less lucky.

Americans don't like it when whole classes of their society have no chance to rise. Hence they welcomed the development of sub-prime lending as at last giving an opportunity to those at the bottom to join the American dream. Here was a new and untried financial instrument which no state would ever have developed, since states don't take that kind of risk; and its early use has been riddled with mistakes, the results of which we are now seeing. Isn't that good news? Those who have used the instrument wisely will be glad to see their more stupid competitors go bankrupt. And the instrument itself will be improved. Capitalism has taken a step further along its historical path, of providing opportunities for everyone.

tonycurzonprice on "Debtonation: how globalisation dies"

tonycurzonprice — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 20:14:56 +0100

Aurelius1, Maybe I can convince you that you'll have to argue your case more convincingly than appealing to well-worn laisser-faire versus interventionist generalities by pointing you to Righard Posner's comments on the recent crisis. Posner, a well-known conservative commentator, criticises the Fed's intervention with: "Studies in cognitive and social psychology have identified deep causes for the overoptimism, wishful thinking, herd behavior, short memory, complacency, and naive extrapolation that generate speculative bubbles--and that require heavy doses of reality to hold in check. Any efforts to soften the blow will set the stage for future bubbles. " This is the thinking, from the right, that opens up the possibility of a more psychologically and sociologically sophisticated position than the status quo apologetics you offer. If there are systematic tendencies to over-optimism (and over-pessimism), then policies that can broadly be called Keynesian - aimed at changing the "animal spirits" - have a place. Tony

aurelius1 on "Debtonation: how globalisation dies"

aurelius1 — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 19:42:19 +0100

This article proves that old economic adage that you get what you pay for. If Open Democracy doesnt pay its contributors, then the only contributions it gets are from the same coterie of clapped out staff commentators and whoevers career is desperate enough that they have to write for free. If I follow Ann's argument, capitalism is in a systemic crisis because it allows companies and individuals to choose when and how much they borrow. so the systemic crisis is deep indeed - companies and individuals are not smart enough to know how much to borrow, so they must be told how much to borrow by the state. the state must control the credit markets, is her rather weird interpretation of Keynesian economics. Thats how I interpret this passage: "the finance sector had to be humbled, and restored to its role as servant of the global economy, not master. Governments had to take back powers to control flows of capital and the creation of credit - powers that the private sector had so recklessly deployed in the 1920s." But states can just as easily get into trouble with their borrowing. Surely Pettifor knows this - she campaigned previously for a international bankruptcy court where bankrupt governments could go through insolvency processes. so its certainly no protection against 'systemic crises' to put the state in charge of borrowing. in fact, you can imagine the room for serious mistakes, inefficiencies and corruption if a state bureaucracy was charged with controlling the credit markets and deciding who could borrow how much. Is that really what Pettifor is suggesting?! What does it mean, the finance sector should be 'restored to its role as servant of the global economy, not master'? I mean, what does that possibly mean, besides being lazy lefty rhetoric? Is she suggesting there should be some sort of global committee that sets global economic targets and then says precisely how much each government, corporation and individual can borrow? So when Joe Bloggs in the US tries to get a second mortgage, the global credit committee says 'Im sorry Joe, your mortgage is not in line with global interests'. is that it? yes, the stock markets fail. yes, they have booms and busts. humans are imperfect. they make stupid decisions. but my god, markets that are heavily controlled by the state work even less well. they are more corrupt, more inefficient, they support more authoritarian governments, they allow for less economic freedom of individuals and families, and crucially, they are much less good at correcting themselves when they get intro trouble, because economic decisions are controlled by a handful of people, the market information they get is often not reliable, and they are often highly corrupt, so dont care if their country goes to the dogs as long as they can put billions into their offshore account. western markets are not perfect, but they are better at correcting themselves, because they are transparent, there is good exchange of information, and they have strong and mature instiutions like the Fed which market participants trust. that means that market imbalances like consumers borrowing too much get naturally corrected - rates go up, credit gets more expensive, people save more. that is what will happen this time. has ann ever lived in an economy with a strong state presence? there are plenty around. try russia. i think it would be an eye-opener, experiencing the bureaucracy and authoritarianism of large and inefficient states at first hand. so many left wing commentators have very little direct experience of the alternative to open markets. theyve never lived beyond hampstead. im not saying the markets are perfect. global warming arguably IS a systemic failure of our economic and political system, though really its a failure of liberal democracy, not capitalism. and we couldnt criticize THAT, could we?

Debtonation: how globalisation dies, Ann Pettifor

Wed, 15 Aug 2007 17:05:06 +0100

A single day, 9 August 2007, will go down in history as "debtonation day" - the beginning of the end of the deregulation and privatisation of finance that marks the era of globalisation.

It is a moment that I (alongside many others) had long predicted, most notably in an article for openDemocracy written in 2003 (see "The coming first world debt crisis" [1 September 2003], and my book of the same title [Palgrave, 2006]). The problem, as with Cassandras in other areas of life, was to gauge the precise timing of the global financial crisis that we knew was approaching.

A vital piece of evidence emerged in June 2007, when news broke that the New York-based Blackstone Group LP - the world's largest private-equity fund - had decided to go public. In other words its private owners had resolved (to the puzzlement of many) to make some activities transparent, and offer the company (both assets and liabilities) to shareholders. Many attributed a charitable motive to the company - a desire to ensure that the "little people" as well as the rich few should share in Blackstone's wealth (little mention was made of its losses).

It was at that point that the timing of the "debtonation" appeared imminent. It took two more months.

Ann Pettifor is executive director of Advocacy International. In the 1990s she helped design and lead the international campaign Jubilee 2000. She is author of The Real World Economic OutlookThe Coming First World Debt Crisis is published by Palgrave in October 2006). Her blog on the Guardian’shere commentisfree site is (Palgrave Macmillan, 2003). Her book

Also by Ann Pettifor on openDemocracy:

“The coming first world debt crisis” (1 September 2003)

“Ethiopia: the price of indifference” (19 February 2004)

"Gleneagles, 7/7 and Africa" (4 July 2006)

The problems revealed by "debtonation day" amount to a "system-crisis" that goes to the heart of the financial model which underpins that ephemeral economic concept, "globalisation" (see Tony Curzon Price, "The end of gentlemanly capitalism", 13 August 2007). It is the deregulated finance sector that has undermined the power and effectiveness of governments, and forced open capital and trade markets. It is deregulated finance that has forced down the price of labour, demanded excessive returns both of labour and the ecosystem, and further benefited the already very rich, most notably private-equity and hedge-fund managers and investors. And it is deregulated finance that has drowned the world in debt, and now precipitated a worldwide market crisis.

The bitter truth of grand market failure on 9 August 2007 is that when the financial sector faced meltdown it had to rely on the state - in the form of central banks in United States, Europe and Japan alike - to intervene in order to restore a semblance of stability. In the real world, citizens and taxpayers are once again obliged to bear responsibility, and pay the costs incurred by the reckless and unrestrained greed of the world of high finance.

Blackstone itself reinforced this message in a richly revealing statement released on 13 August. The company announced record profits for 2006-07 - though (as Bloomberg notes) it reported "a net loss of $52.3 million, or 20 cents a share, from June 19 to June 30, the only days in the period it was structured as a public company" (my italics).

The blindness of orthodoxy

The result of the financial-market "debtonation" is that the world faces a lengthy, painful and borderless depression.

The institutions most susceptible to the siren voices of the finance sector are in immediate danger. They include banks that have gambled by lending recklessly (estimates range from $400 billion upwards) to finance huge leveraged buy-outs, mergers and acquisitions. They hoped to play "pass the parcel" with these debts, and forward them on to other investors - but suddenly there are no takers. The next in the chain of vulnerability are companies - from Manchester United to Boots - that have burdened their shareholders, employees and consumers with debt.

But it is not the leading backers and officials of these institutions, the hedge-fund managers or private-equity owners, who will be most hurt by the "debtonation". It will be everyday citizens, many of whom will have been persuaded to borrow far beyond their means to pay, who will lose their pensions, homes, jobs and livelihoods - and their hoped-for futures. In doing so, they have propped up the global economy for the last two decades - yet they, not the "guardians of the nation's finances" (central bankers, finance ministers and regulators) will be forced to carry the blame for the crisis.

The full extent of the pending financial collapse is dawning on regulators and central bankers, whose panic led them to reverse their anti-inflationary policies and instead pump liquidity into a financial system frozen by the fear and mistrust that now exists between banks. On 13 August, the European central bank made its third consecutive daily injection of cash into the European banking network, bringing to almost $280 billion (£140 billion) its aggregated support for eurozone banks. Comparable amounts of cash have been provided to financial institutions in the US and Japan.

Why have central bankers, all ideologically committed to the role of the "invisible hand" in financial markets, acted in this way? Because commercial banks no longer trust the solvency of other banks, and so on 9 August effectively went on strike; i.e. stopped lending to each other, forcing central bankers to step in to provide lending to those that needed it. The fact that central banks continue to do so today, indicates that regulators are in a bind: they have lost faith in the "invisible hand", but have not yet dealt with the solvency issue. As a result, fear still stalks the markets, and easy money continues to be passed around as if there were no tomorrow.

But while central bankers are no longer "asleep at the wheel" others remain in deep denial. Speculators in stock markets, politicians and economists - including International Monetary Fund (IMF) economists - continue to rely on flawed, ideologically-driven economic analyses.

The fund issued a statement on 10 August, saying: "We continue to believe that the systemic consequences of the reassessment of credit risk that is taking place will be manageable. The fundamentals supporting strong global growth remain in place."

IMF economists, like all those in thrall to the dominant orthodoxy, have a blindspot about finance. Economists conduct their analyses without reference to the creation of credit and debt, focusing instead on goods and services, supply and demand. They regard money as "neutral" and on the whole ignore the role of credit. As Joseph Schumpeter once wrote, economists treat the "phenomena of economic life ...in terms of goods and services, of decisions about them, and of relations between them. Money enters the picture only in the modest role of a technical device that has been adopted in order to facilitate transactions." So the Bank of England's model of the United Kingdom economy has no debt components. True, it is recognised that there are, every so often, monetary "disorders" - but money is "of secondary importance in the explanation of the economic process of reality."

This explains economic orthodoxy's blindspot and its continued indifference over the creation of today's gigantic credit/debt bubble. It also explains why the IMF believes that "underlying economic fundamentals" bear little relation to the collapse of confidence in a finance sector overburdened by debt, excessive gambling, speculation and profit-taking. A speech on 31 July 2007 by IMF deputy managing director, John Lipsky, was remarkable in this respect:

"The fundamental underpinnings of the current global expansion appear to be reasonably solid. If so, the current market strains most likely will help set the stage for both financial and fundamental adjustments. These, in turn, will help set the stage for a new leg of the global expansion."

In other words, the failure of the privatised financial system, the threatened collapse of banks, the bankruptcy of mortgage companies, the collapse of private-equity deals, the burden of unpayable corporate debts, the systemic effects of the sub-prime lending crisis, the repossession of private homes - all these "adjustments" do not threaten "fundamental underpinnings" but rather set "the stage for a new leg of global expansion".

This is delusional, a profound failure of economic analysis by establishment economists and by those charged to act as guardians of the finances of nations. As a result these policy-makers will weaken and delay the right policy responses - which will prolong the crisis further.

A politics for economics

Where are the politicians in all this, amid a crisis that affects the lives of millions of people who are also democratic citizens and voters?

Those in Britain who have backed the City of London in its role as financial centre, and overseen and cheered on the deregulation of the finance sector, seem to have been struck dumb. At the time of writing, there has been no word from the country's prime minister (and ex-chancellor) Gordon Brown, current chancellor Alistair Darling, or indeed the mayor of London, Ken Livingstone. However, even as concern about the financial markets pushed share prices worldwide into slump on 9 August, President Bush used his White House press conference to comment on the issue.

He said the US economy "remains ‘the envy of the world', enjoying low unemployment and inflation.......I am told there is enough liquidity in the system to allow markets to correct". Like the orchestrated statement from the IMF, these remarks were intended to restore confidence. They brought to mind the "spin" put on the great crash of 1929, when an earlier Republican president - Herbert Hoover - was encouraged not to refer to financial "panics" as this induced further panic, and so the word "depression" was invented to describe the collapse of the economy (spin-doctors today have devised an even more evasive phrase: "growth recession").

On 29 October 1929, the day when stock prices hit their lowest point and over $30 billion disappeared from the American economy, the elderly JD Rockefeller was encouraged (no doubt by another eager public-relations person) to issue a statement:

"These are days when many are discouraged. In the 93 years of my life, depressions have come and gone. Prosperity has always returned and will again."

Twenty economically destructive years and a world war later, prosperity began to return. But only because governments had learned, at the feet of John Maynard Keynes, that the finance sector had to be humbled, and restored to its role as servant of the global economy, not master. Governments had to take back powers to control flows of capital and the creation of credit - powers that the private sector had so recklessly deployed in the 1920s. A generation after they were learned, those lessons were deliberately abandoned: after President Richard Nixon precipitated the collapse of the Bretton Woods system in 1971, governments inspired by free-market ideology surrendered control over and regulation of the finance sector. A series of world leaders has refused to intervene, or to coordinate at G8 summits, to restore balance to a global economy suffering from excessive credit creation, asset-price inflation and severe trade and financial imbalances.

Now, after "debtonation day", the lessons Keynes taught will have to be relearned if stability and sustainable prosperity are to be restored to the global economy. The prolonged financial crisis in prospect guarantees that the process will be painful.

Also in openDemocracy on the global financial turmoil:

Tony Curzon Price, "The end of gentlemanly capitalism", 13 August 2007

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