History

Weekly Wakeup 01-24-2014

Adam Magoon History, Liberty , , ,

Making this a quick copy paste job today.  It has been a busy week.

To make a long story short, read this.

Myth:  The Great Depression was caused by government inaction in the face of a failing economy.

Reality:  The Hoover administration was the most active interventionist of a non-war economy in American history.

To quote the man himself:

“[W]e might have done nothing. That would have been utter ruin. Instead, we met the situation with proposals to private business and to Congress of the most gigantic program of economic defense and counterattack ever evolved in the history of the Republic. We put it into action.

No government in Washington has hitherto considered that it held so broad a responsibility for leadership in such times. . . . For the first time in the history of depression, dividends, profits, and the cost of living have been reduced before wages have suffered.”

And to quote the Murray Rothbard about Hoover’s actions:

At St. Paul, at the end of his campaign, Hoover summarized the measures he had taken to combat the depression: higher tariffs, which had protected agriculture and prevented much unemployment, expansion of credit by the Federal Reserve, which Hoover somehow identified with ‘protection of the gold standard’; the Home Loan Bank system, providing long-term capital to building-and-loan associations and savings banks, and enabling them to expand credit and suspend foreclosures; agricultural credit banks which loaned to farmers; Reconstruction Finance Corporation (RFC) loans to banks, states, agriculture, and public works; spreading of work to prevent unemployment; the extension of construction and public works; strengthening Federal Land Banks; and, especially, inducing employers to maintain wage rates. Wage rates ‘were maintained until the cost of living had decreased and the profits had practically vanished. They are now the highest real wages in the world.’ But was there any causal link between this fact and the highest unemployment rate in American history? This question Hoover ignored.

Hoover had, indeed, “placed humanity before money, through the sacrifice of profits and dividends before wages,” but people found it difficult to subsist or prosper on “humanity.” Hoover noted that he had made work for the unemployed, prevented foreclosures, saved banks, and “fought to retard falling prices.” It is true that “for the first time” Hoover had prevented an “immediate attack upon wages as a basis of maintaining profits,” but the result of wiping out profits and maintaining artificial wage rates was chronic, unprecedented depression. On the RFC, Hoover proclaimed, as he did for the rest of his program, “Nothing has ever been devised in our history which has done more for those whom Mr. Coolidge has aptly called the ‘common run of men and women.'” Yet, after three years of this benevolent care, the common man was worse off than ever.

Hoover staunchly upheld a protective tariff during his campaign, and declared that his administration had successfully kept American farm prices above world prices, aided by tariffs on agricultural products. He did not seem to see that this price-raising reduced foreign demand for American farm products. He hailed work-sharing without seeing that it perpetuated unemployment, and spoke proudly of the artificial expansion by business of construction “beyond present needs” at his request in 1929-30, without seeing the resulting malinvestment and business losses.

While claiming to defend the gold standard, Hoover greatly shook public confidence in the dollar and helped foster the ensuing monetary crisis by revealing in his opening campaign speech that the government had almost decided to go off the gold standard in the crisis of November, 1931—an assertion heatedly denied by conservative Democratic Senator Carter Glass.

The spirit of the Hoover policy was perhaps best summed up in a public statement made in May, before the campaign began, when he sounded a note that was to become all too familiar to Americans in later years—the military metaphor:

The battle to set our economic machine in motion in this emergency takes new forms and requires new tactics from time to time. We used such emergency powers to win the war; we can use them to fight the depression (321-323).

Introducing the Weekly Wakeup

Adam Magoon History, Liberty , , ,

History is one of my passions and one I share with the late Murray Rothbard.  His examinations and refutations of the commonly accepted truth were one of my early inspirations into exploring libertarian thought.  I urge you to consider this quote from Plato’s Apology: “I am wiser than this man, for neither of us appears to know anything great and good; but he fancies he knows something, although he knows nothing; whereas I, as I do not know anything, so I do not fancy I do. In this trifling particular, then, I appear to be wiser than he, because I do not fancy I know what I do not know.”  This is the first in what should be a long series of weekly blurbs about common misconceptions and downright lies about history.  I will be looking forward to responses and suggestions for future topics in the comments.

Weekly Wakeup for 01-17-2014

Myth:  Early European colonists in North-America enacted a systemic genocide of native peoples from the start.

Reality: “The most hideous enemy of native Americans was not the white man and his weaponry, concludes Alfred Crosby,’but the invisible killers which those men brought in their blood and breath.’ It is thought that between 75 to 90 percent of all Indian deaths resulted from these killers.”

Another source confims:

“[B]ased on the data, the team estimates that the Native American population was at an all-time high about 5,000 years ago.

The population then reached a low point about 500 years ago—only a few years after Christopher Columbus arrived in the New World and before extensive European colonization began.

Study co-author Brendan O’Fallon, a population geneticist who conducted the research while at the University of Washington in Seattle, speculates that many of the early casualties may have been due to disease, which ‘would likely have traveled much faster than the European settlers themselves.’

For instance, the Franciscan friar Toribio de Benavente—one of the first Spanish missionaries to arrive in the New World in the early 1500s—wrote that Mexico was initially ‘extremely full of people, and when the smallpox began to attack the Indians, it became so great a pestilence among them … that in most provinces more than half the population died.'”

Myth: This disease epidemic was directly caused by settlers through planned biological warfare.

Reality:

“Unfortunately for this thesis, we know of but a single instance of such warfare, and the documentary evidence is inconclusive. In 1763, [ed. Notably long after the “500 years ago” mark where the population was already markedly declined] a particularly serious uprising threatened the British garrisons west of the Allegheny mountains. Worried about his limited resources, and disgusted by what he saw as the Indians’ treacherous and savage modes of warfare, Sir Jeffrey Amherst, commander-in-chief of British forces in North America, wrote as follows to Colonel Henry Bouquet at Fort Pitt: ‘You will do well to try to inoculate the Indians [with smallpox] by means of blankets, as well as to try every other method, that can serve to extirpate this execrable race.'”

I would like to point out that this attack, if it ever did actually happen, was initiated not by individual settlers but instead by the military government in that region.  A group that I do not and would not defend under any circumstances.   I would also like to preemptively say that I am not attempting to justify the forced relocation of Native peoples later in history, wars waged by either side or the murder of civilians by either group.  Instead I merely wish to question the assertion that there was an intentional and premeditated genocide.  A fact that seems obvious when you consider up to 90% of the native population was already dead from disease before the first colonists even arrived.

From the Comments: Was Colonialism Good for the Natives?

Brandon Christensen Comments, History , , ,

NEO, in response to my musings on the rule of law in Africa, writes:

Thanks, Brandon. Like I said, I don’t know very much at all about Africa, right now I’m looking a bit more at the British in Egypt/Sudan. But currently I know mostly what I read and I suspect you know what I see, so I’m not about to argue with you on it.

Given what you know, I see really good things ahead for them. And that is very good, both for them and us. Somebody once said that prosperous folks try to avoid wars because its hard on the china. I know, it’s simplistic but, its also true.

I get the impression, and I could easily be wrong here, that it might have been better for everyone if the Empires had lasted a few more decades, it looks to me like the people learned the lessons but not the mechanics of creating the institutions.

Excellent point NEO, especially about wars being bad for the china.

Now, the colonial empires were bad for just about everybody (the factions that were able to capture the rent generated by imperial policies were excepted, of course). While European imperialism did open up the markets in Africa and Asia to their mercantile spheres of influence, these policies did not open up the markets to genuine world trade. This has had several ramifications for individual liberty in the post-colonial world.

In order to open up the economies of Africa and Asia to their mercantile systems, the Europeans created a great legal code for the mercantile systems. These legal codes helped reduce transaction costs and protected the private property of European citizens abroad, which helped to foster more trade within the mercantile systems. Unfortunately, the legal codes of both the British and the Dutch (I can’t speak for the Latin states, but judging by the state of affairs that these regions are now in, I assume that such policies were just as bad, if not worse) created a two-tiered system of justice: Europeans and a small number of local elites were able to count on the legal system to protect their private property, but everybody else was relegated to a second-class citizenship. This two-tiered system was not good for the populations of Africa and Asia, nor were they good for European citizens.

It goes without saying that the colonial apparatuses did not have to do much work in regards to grafting the indigenous legal and political systems of the African and Asian polities onto the mercantile system. Most of the African and Asian polities that the Europeans subdued were already protectionist and despotic, so colonial policy became a careful matter of picking the right factions to ally with. It is important to note that the policies of the polities in Africa and Asia were responsible for their weakened state, not any sort of cultural attributes. Up until the Napoleonic Wars, Europe was still pretty much on par with the rest of the world as far as living standards went. With the advent of peace on the continent, and new legal codes that extended private property rights (including rights to freer trade in the world) to a larger segment of its citizens, Europe became far too powerful for everybody else.

We could argue, of course, that certain cultural attributes of Europeans at that time contributed to successful implementation of such policies (and we would be right), but culture is always changing. It is our task to ensure that we continue to contribute to a culture that values individual liberty above all else.

Again, this is not say that African and Asian peoples have never known liberty. Private property has been around for a long time. The arrival of European states (not merchants) into these regions of the world created a burgeoning market for all things war, and as hostilities increased, so too did the health of these states.

The success of Kalashnikov? Still elusive

Brandon Christensen Economics, History , , , , , , ,

Before the New Year I asked why the recently-deceased inventor of the AK-47 was able to become so successful. There were a couple of good responses from Paul and Roman, but Jonathan Finegold’s response is worth highlighting:

Whatever I once knew about the process of military procurement in the Soviet Union, I’ve mostly now forgotten. But, the AK-47 is just one out of many Soviet military inventions that have become mainstays of global militaries: T-54 and T-72 tanks, MiG-29, et cetera. The USSR was generally head-to-head with the United States in military technology, although arguably the U.S. started to pull away during the late 1980s. This legacy of military technology follows back to the Second World War, and even before. It was the Soviets, under the leadership of Mikhail Tukhachevsky, who developed what is commonly known as “blitzkrieg” (typically associated with the Germans, who trained with the Soviets during the late 1920s and early 1930s). Their T-34 has become one of the emblem tanks of WWII.

But, rather than a success of the Soviet system, this should be interpreted as a failure. The criticism of socialism is not that it cannot achieve certain ends, or even that it cannot achieve these ends with success, in some sense of the word. The critique of socialism is that they cannot economize on the resources used towards achieving these ends, and that these ends are not representative of the general welfare of society. In other words, the capitalist system is the achievement of a plurality of ends; socialism is the opposite. The USSR put military success, especially in terms of “out-showing” their American rivals, over other ends, especially those of their people. Thus, despite the poverty of Soviet society, the USSR accomplished great military and scientific achievements. (This is why comments like “socialism works, because we were able to mobilize resources towards the war effort and mass produce more military equipment than any other country” is not a good response to the critique of socialism — it fails to grasp what the critique of socialism actually is.)

Contrast this with the United States, which achieved both great military and scientific achievements and improvements to the general welfare of society.

This helps to clarify a number of important concepts (including why socialism failed), but I’m still puzzled as to why Moscow allowed one of its products to be nicknamed after an individual at the height of the Cold War.

What’s Up with New Zealand?

Brandon Christensen History, Law , , , , , , , , , , ,

Economist Scott Sumner’s 2010 piece on the unacknowledged success of neoliberalism (which I linked to yesterday and you should definitely read or reread) poses an interesting question:

There are two obvious outliers [to aggressive neoliberal reforms]. Norway, the highest-income country, is much richer than other countries with similar levels of economic freedom, and New Zealand, at 80 on the economic freedom scale and only $27,260 in per capita income (US PPP dollars), is somewhat poorer than expected […] Perhaps New Zealand’s disappointing performance is due to its remote location and its comparative advantage in agriculture holding it back in an increasingly globalized economy in which many governments subsidize farming.

Rather than challenge Sumner’s thoughts as to why New Zealand is much poorer (I think his guess explains a lot), I think I can add to it: The Maori.

The Maori are the indigenous inhabitants of New Zealand, and can be compared – socially – to the Native Americans of the New World or the aborigines of Australia. Unfortunately I know next to nothing about the Maori (or other South Pacific cultures), but I do know how to draw rough inferences about things by using data!

The Maori comprise about 15% of New Zealand’s population, whereas in other states settled by Anglo colonies the population of the natives relative to the overall population of the country is minute (aborigines in Australia comprise 3% of the population, for example, and in Canada and the US the indigenous make up about 2%).

The relatively large percentage of indigenous citizens in New Zealand can better explain why New Zealand is an outlier among rich countries, but I also think it’s important to ask why the Maori (and other indigenous populations in Anglo-settled colonies) have failed to match the demographic trends of their European and Asian counterparts.

Institutions are, to me, the obvious answer, but I’m curious as to what the rest of you think. I’d also like to add that I don’t think enough of us think about the issue of land (as in ‘land, labor and capital’ when we discuss the huge demographic gaps found between – for lack of better terms – settlers and natives in Anglo-American countries).

Consumerism and Christmas

Tibor Machan Current Events, History, Religion , , , , , ,

You all may recall that after 9/11 Osama bin Laden explained his orchestration of the terrorist deed that murdered some 3000 innocent human beings as payback for America’s materialism. (His anti-materialist rant is routine – a good discussion of his views may be found here.)

Yet as the writer of the above piece notes, anti-materialism is a common theme among most religions. Sure, the idea that human life is about preparation for an after-life — a spiritual life superior to the mundane one we can lead here on Earth — is central to religions.

In the West, however, many religions have made peace with the mundane elements of human existence so there tends to be a less avid denunciation of materialism, which is how the idea of being seriously concerned with living prosperously here on Earth is usually designated. After all, the Christian God is both human and divine (in the person of Jesus).

Destruction of life is generally deemed to be a sin for Christians, whereas, as bin Laden has noted, the love of death is central in his version of Islam. As one account has it, “This originated at the Battle of Qadisiyya in the year 636, when the commander of the Muslim forces, Khalid ibn Al-Walid, sent an emissary with a message from Caliph Abu Bakr to the Persian commander, Khosru. The message stated: ‘You [Khosru and his people] should convert to Islam, and then you will be safe, for if you don’t, you should know that I have come to you with an army of men that love death, as you love life’.” This account is widely recited in contemporary Muslim literature.

Yet despite the Western theological tradition’s more friendly attitude toward the mundane, nearly every Christmas leaders of Christian denominations tend to revert to the original, anti-life doctrines by condemning commercialism. The latest Pope followed the previous one by lamenting the “materialist” approach to celebrating Christmas. They referred to “the dead-end streets of consumerism,” according to newspaper reports, chiding people everywhere for what the report calls “being caught up with consumerist pursuits.”

Ironically, the Pope issued his proclamations from St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican. If you have ever visited the Vatican, as I and millions of others have, you would know it to be one of the West’s, if not the world’s, most opulent places. And as to consumerism, the gift shop dominates the entrance to the Vatican, where one is invited to spend great sums of money on various small or sizable trinkets. Commerce flourishes there, believe me, as the Vatican cashes in on the desire of many of the visitors to take away some reminder of their having been to that historically and theologically significant place.

Of course, even apart from the Vatican, the Roman Catholic Church, as well as others within Christianity, often excel in ostentatious display of riches – one need but go to high mass on Christmas Eve to witness this.

And why not? That is how human beings tend to celebrate what they value highly, by honoring the occasion with gift-giving. And gift-giving necessarily involves commerce – most of us aren’t skilled at the crafts that it takes to create the various gifts we wish to bestow upon those we love and cherish. I personally bought airline tickets for some of my family members and a computer for another, in part because I have no airplane in which to fly them where they would like to go and no factory and expertise to make a modern, up-to-date computer. To obtain these gifts, I rely, as do billions of others, on commerce.

So why then would Popes besmirch consumerism and commerce? Beats me. (And remember, also, that “materialism” is ultimately a nonsense term – nothing we purchase is simply material but embodies the creative intelligence – indeed the creative spirit – of many human beings!)

So, I urge all Popes to change their message and to have a more generous understanding of all who make use of commerce in our celebration of Christmas!

Kalashnikov, hero and inventor, is dead, but how did he do it?

Brandon Christensen Current Events, Economics, History , , , , , , ,

Mikhail Kalashnikov is dead. From the LA Times:

Weapons designer Mikhail Kalashnikov, […] The creator of the legendary AK-47, which became widely known as the Kalashnikov, […] died Monday […]

Over six decades, Kalashnikov’s cheap, simple and rugged creation became the weapon of choice for more than 50 standing armies as well as drug lords, street gangs, revolutionaries, terrorists, pirates and thugs the world over.

Here is a great piece by CJ Maloney celebrating the AK-47. What I really want to know is this: How was such an invention able to be created in the Soviet Union?

The only option I can think of is that the military-industrial complex of the USSR was so powerful and influential that incentives actually drove innovation in that sector of the economy.

But even this doesn’t fully explain how Kalashnikov was able to invent the gun, patent it, put his name on it, and reap the benefits from creating it in the first place. How could any of this be possible in a command-and-control economy?

The Iranian Nuclear Deal: An Agreement for All

Brandon Christensen Current Events, History, Politics , , , , , , , , , ,

[Editor’s note: the following is a short essay by Payam Ghorbanian. Payam was born in Tehran, Iran. He got his bachelor of science in Engineering from Zanjan University in Zanjan, Iran. He has been participating in liberal political activities and he was involved with some think tanks in Iran. He is doing research in the field of international relations and Iran’s foreign policy as an independent activist. He is now living in San Jose, California.

I cannot endorse this essay, but I am excited to post it because of its potential as a conduit for intercultural dialogue and exchange. I have left his essay largely intact, but did break up some of his longer paragraphs for clarity’s sake. Thanks to Payam for taking the time to write this.]

On November 24, Iran and the P5+1 group have reached to a historical deal on Tehran’s nuclear program at talks in Geneva, Switzerland. We might have difficulty to understand this process, the process which turns out the agreement to be real, so we must particularly take a look around to the real position of this group of countries plus Iran. It’s one of the Iranian’s attitude and way of thinking to say what they wanted to get and what they really ended up to.

In Iran, Hassan Rouhani was elected as a president on Jun 15, 2013. He is also known as one of the three people who talked to McFarlane in the Iran-Contra affair in 1985 about buying weapons during war between Iran & Iraq. During campaign for presidency, he said an extremely hopeful statement about nuclear program. He said: “It is good for nuclear centrifuges to operate, but it is also important that the country operates as well and the wheels of industry are turning.”

After he got elected, he put his faith in the right person and chose Mr. Mohammad Javad Zarif to be the minister of foreign affairs with the complete authority in action. Mr. Zarif was the permanent representative of Iran to the United Nations from 2002 to 2007. He is really familiar with the international policy regulations and the United States’ policy. Therefore, he was chosen to precede Iran’s nuclear negotiations and it was decided that the entire process would be carried out solely within his team.

It was one of the toughest situations for Iranian policy even though the middle class, especially the people who are living in the large cities, are incredibly united and hopeful for solving this nuclear issue; however, the extremists criticized any approach to any kind of agreement. For several years people of Iran have been feeling how sanctions can really cripple their destiny, economy, and their society structure. As a result of these effects, the rates of unemployment, bankruptcy, addiction, divorce, and prostitution have increased without any official and governmental justification. Therefore, we can consider the November 24th, 2013 as a distinguished and remarkable day in Iran’s modern history.

With the above introduction, let’s go through the text of the agreement for some details. It has been said:

“ … from the existing uranium enriched to 20%, retain half as working stock of 20% oxide for fabrication of fuel for the TRR. Dilute the remaining 20% UF6 to no more than 5%. No reconversion line…Iran announces that it will not enrich uranium over 5% for the duration of the 6 months.”

Although Mr. Zarif announced that according to the agreement, enriching uranium under the 5% is now acceptable and claimed it as a big win for Iran, the majority of the people in Iran really do not care about this subject. They expect the removal of all sanctions and this was the reason that they were following the negotiations and they remained awake up until the agreement came out, which at that time was really late at local time in Iran.

After all these trials and tribulations, now you can find out how hope for the future can make our nation more united. The people clearly understand that it is not the end of the negotiations and it is just the start of long way and they are looking forward to the next 6 month. For the people, it is not just about nuclear program; it is more about their life and their children’s future. President Rouhani is now in the right place and with the supports of Iranians. We hope his social policy would be more flexible as well and we can see more freedom in the society.

We are not going to discuss here the Europe United’s policy during this long term negotiation with Iran. They always want to reserve the important positions for themselves; however, they usually get to every negotiation which others have already accepted. For the people of Iran, the Europeans are best known as those trying to prolong every issue.

On the other hand The Europeans always push the solution to the curb and then try to get back to the first step and ultimately get to the agreement and to take one step further. With flopping back and forth, the conclusion usually would never come out. People of Iran had been disappointed of this kind of policy. From Iranian’s point of view, France should be responsible for the last unsuccessful talks on November 9th. Unfortunately they are unreliable partner for this region.

After all these, it is now time to shift our focus to the president Obama’s foreign policy about Middle East during the last year. Not that far ago, Syria used chemical weapons and crossed the red line, which was mentioned by president Obama before. Moreover, United Nation confirmed that there was no doubt of such use of chemical weapon from Syrians regime. However, instead of taking military action, president Obama decided to follow Russians in this crisis and he still tries to solve this issue through the UN. As a fact, it is clear that in order to go through the UN path to solve this crisis, United States has to deal with Russians and Chinese, since they have the authority to block international actions through the Security Council.

It is a fact that the Syrian’s people have been killed during the last three years. However, it seems that this fact is going to be ignored and denied. On the other side, Obama’s policy in this case would let the conservative countries like Qatar or Saudi Arabia to take part in this eternal disaster.  They can easily get rid of their extremist religious groups by allowing them to attend in this catastrophic war in Syria. Also due to the fact of this important unsolved problem in Syria, the pressure of human rights activities and other internal problems in their countries would be neglected. With this aspect of Syria’s crisis and also the failing of Arab spring, having an agreement with Iran is essential for Obama’s policy to get through these consecutive unsuccessful affairs. However, Israel’s prime minister tries to call this agreement as a historical mistake.

Great Britain has recently announced that they are concerned about total failure in Iran because of sanctions. After Great Britain evacuated all embassy staff from Iran in November 2011, now it seems that they are going to open relations with Iran following the election of President Rouhani. Undoubtedly they know the Middle East region much better than anyone else. They know this failure can affect Afghanistan, Iraq and the entire Middle East region. As a result, Britain has consecutively tried to help Iran and U.S. to approach to the final steps of negotiations.

On the other side, China is known as fatal mistake in economic partnership for Iranians during the last 10 years. Chinese took advantage of unjust situation of Iran and also destroyed industries in Iran are caused by importing cheap Chinese products. They have initially accepted the UN sanctions and have blocked about 50 billion dollars of Iran’s money in their banks; however, they ultimately should be happy of this agreement which definitely will moderate oil price and open up the gate of Iran’s market for Chinese investments.

Clearly with their foreign policy being so close to Iran, it is just a pose for Chinese in order to help them to precede their policy in southeast Asia using Iran’s threat for pushing away Chinese threat. Couple weeks ago they extended “air defense identification zones” which it seems will be accepted by United States. There is a common trend for all nations which can be written in this way that you are not going to consider as a powerful country if you just want to please yourself.

Finally, Russia should be indeed considered as the biggest winner of this agreement as well as the Middle East situation. Moreover, with the intent of being leader of the entire world, they forced other countries to accept their decisions on Syria’s crisis and by having this virtual confidence, now they really have plans to ruin all aspects of the free world. On September 12th, President Putin decisively took an issue with president Obama. His article was about United States people and he mentioned: “It is extremely dangerous to encourage people to see themselves as exceptional.”

However, president Obama decided to ignore this article and show respect to the new Russia. I believe working with Russia about Syria’s crisis and choosing non-interventionism for Ukraine crises would be one of the Obama’s failures in the U.S. foreign policy. Now this agreement would help Russia and obviously president Putin to take the rein of power more and more. At the end if Russia and China find out that there are not any obstacles around, they will never ever conceal their ambitious points.

From the Comments: Iran, Nationalism and Satire

Brandon Christensen Comments, Current Events, History , , , , , , , , ,

Siamak helps to clarify some things about contemporary Iranian culture that have been mischaracterized or misunderstood in the West:

Great article. About Iran part I wanted to leave a comment about two things. Fernanda Lima’s facebook page issue was so insulting and shameful. But it’s not like that Iranians are really blaming her for not having hijab. It was a sarcasm of state-run media. It was like now that we don’t have any hope for state TV to stop censorship you why didn’t you wear a better clothes. State-run TV does show foreign eomen with no hijab in movies, news, etc. But those beautiful breasts…! :-)

You should recognize the Iranian culture to know what I mean. Although it was insulting and shameful but they’re not really blaming her. It was a sarcasm of Iranian media.

The second part goes to the Iranian Nationalism. You’re right. After the Islamic Revolution, Islamic republic was completely against nationalists. That time most of the political groups were Islamic groups or Radical communists and socialists. The only liberwl group were called Nezhat Azadi (Liberty Movement) which were Moderate Liberal Muslim Nationalists. After the revolution Ayatollah Khomeini and the Islamic groups were completrly against nationalism. They were thinking that Islam should be the common thing between all Iranians. After 1998 that president khatami came this was going to change and Nationalism was again advertised by the government. Extreme nationalism in Iran is sourced from these two events: showing disagreement with the Islamic Radicals and the great history of Iran which has made Iranians extremely illusory about themselves.

Me myself think I’m a nationalist. But there’s a bit difference. Nationalism is not a goal for me. It’ just a medium or instrument for me. I completely believe in globalization and Peter Singer’s globalization is one of my favourite books. But I think nationalism is a medium to get closer to modernism. That’s it.

I suspect Siamak’s nationalism is a lot like the American libertarian’s patriotism.

The Pope, Capitalism, and los Yanqis

Jacques Delacroix Current Events, Economics, History, Philosophy , , , , ,

Below is a comment that seems to me to be missing about Pope Francis’ current grasping for the Nobel in Economics. It’s beyond the simple observation that what he said recently about capitalism re-affirms the simple fact that princes of the church want to do good but have not understood simple economics, ever. And, by the way, there is nothing new to what the Pope said. I heard the same when I was growing up in a progressive Catholic parish in Paris, a long, long time ago. (And no, I was not molested, except by that older girl-scout, another story obviously.)

The current pope is a member of the Jesuit order. In the Catholic world, the Jesuits enjoy a reputation for intellectualism. It’s true that almost all have advanced degrees. (This pope appears to be an exception.) It’s also probably true that the many schools the Jesuits run, including universities, are not allowed to fall below a certain minimum level of competence. Beyond this, 25 years of close observation tell me that their good reputation only holds in a relative sense. Only the widespread ignorance of the Catholic church and of its other religious orders makes the Jesuits look good. They are quite tightly wrapped in their prevailing ideology and largely blinded by it. That ideology happens to be left wing right now. (Jesuits used to be fierce right-wingers of the most ignorant, closed-minded kind.) I don’t expect any Jesuit to be an intellectual giant although a few are.

The Pope is also an Argentinean, a provincial Argentinean. He did not suddenly free himself from the associated intellectual burdens upon his election. Like many, nearly all (I have not done a count, I confess, Your Holiness) of his compatriots he has had to struggle all his life with the following question:

Why isn’t Argentina Canada, with a constant high level of prosperity and political institutions that guarantee stability and peaceful alternance in power?

A subsidiary question: Why does Argentina become rich every thirty years only to plunge back into poverty?

Confounded by the brutal reality of the fact that there is no response that does not point straight at themselves, Argentinean intellectuals have developed a short, undemanding answer and a long-winded complicated one, both of which hold them innocent of their plight.

The short answer is this: It’s because of los Yanqis.

Of course, there is a problem in the fact that Canada with many more and tighter economic and political links to the US performs splendidly on any measure of economic or social welfare.

I spent a good deal of my scintillating youth debunking the second, long answer to the query described above. They came out of Argentina in the late fifties as a narrative production called “Teoría de la dependencia.” It later morphed into something called “World System Theory” under the influence of an excellent book by an American.

To make a long story short the theories’ main allegations about Third World poverty were that the more economically tied poor countries were to major developed economies, (such as the American economy) the poorer they became. Those allegations finally did not hold up under the scrutiny permitted by computers handling large amounts of archival data. (See my own co-authored piece for example: Delacroix, Jacques and Charles Ragin. 1981. “Structural blockage: a cross-national study of economic dependence, state efficacy and under-development.” American Journal of Sociology. 86-6:1311-1347.) The modern empirical research performed in the US and other part of the English-speaking world utterly destroyed Latin fantasizing in that area.

Pope Francis did not get the news apparently. Few Latin Americans did. Proudly innocent of any understanding of statistics, they cling to their beloved narrative as tightly as they did in 1965. They may cling to it even more tightly than they did then since they tasted the dust of South Korea’s and even of India’s economic development. (I am deliberately not mentioning China’s real development and its fake relationship to “socialism” because I don’t want to have to write another ten pages.) It’s not my fault; the Pope is older than me. He never sat in my classroom or in any of my former students’ classrooms. We never got a chance to straighten him out.

You have to think of every one of Pope Francis’ economic pronouncement with the understanding that he would probably not receive a B in the Econ. 101 class of a good public university. (In a good private university, in a Jesuit university for example, there is a good chance he would be made to achieve a B by any means necessary, including legitimate means.)

I don’t blame the Pope or the Catholic Church much. The old Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations (1776) is still esoteric reading to many of our contemporaries, including college graduates, including most college professors, I would guess, including many who tango on in the media. (Just listen to National Public Radio.)

Great (new?) resource for historical economic data

Brandon Christensen Economics, History, Links , , ,

UC Davis’s Global Price and Income History Group has a new website up (at least I think it’s new) and it’s got a lot of really, really good data. (h/t again goes to contributing editor Claudio Shikida)

Black Immigration: Taking Myself Behind the Barn*

Jacques Delacroix History , , , , ,

On December 5th 2013, I posted a blog entitled “Equality and Fairness” in which I stated off-handedly:

“(By the way, about half the people with African blood in the US have zero American slave ancestry. Yes, like the president. They are descendants of immigrants like me, people who volunteered to come tot his allegedly racist country.)”

Two people came down on me like white on rice demanding a source for this assertion. The first was Professor Terry because he hates good news. He was so foaming at the mouth that he even forgot for a while Harry Belafonte and other immigrants from the Caribbean obviously with African ancestry. Then he demonstrated his racial expertise on how various degrees of blood admixtures define or don’t define the category “black.” Brandon Christensen, the editor of Notes on Liberty, also challenged me for a source mostly because he pillages me every chance he gets.

I have to report that my fast and superficial search did not help me recover the relevant source. I am ninety per cent sure I read it in the Wall Street Journal sometimes since 2010. It could have been in the Oped pages. Trust me, my failure leaves me deeply ashamed.

At any rate, I cited this number to make a substantive point: Liberals who insist that the US is just about as racist as it was in the good old days of Bull O’Connor (when Martin Luther King was marching) have to deal with the disturbing fact of black immigration to the US. I mean by “black” people who come from Africa and people who would tell you they have some African ancestry. Such people come to this country legally and illegally and they come in large numbers.

I am guessing they come here for the same reason that there is no great exodus of people with African ancestry leaving this country. They come because this is very good country with an open heart and loosely enforced laws (Why, what do you know? The Supreme Court ruled recently that it’s illegal for states to enforce some federal laws.)

Let me cite a specialized website that does not address my still-unsourced assertion but something germane to it:

Black immigrants are a significant group in the United States—more than 3 million people comprising 8 percent of the U.S. foreign-born population. **

More than half come from the Caribbean, with the rest mostly coming from Northern and sub-Saharan Africa. A small number also come from Europe and Canada. Black immigrants account for more than one-quarter of the black population in New York, Boston, and Miami.

Now, the foreign born comprise about 13% of the general US population and African-Americans, in the broadest definition, are also about 13%. Yes, we are far from my original assertion. We don’t know how far exactly because we don’t know how many US-born children and grand-children foreign-born blacks have. But they would have to have on average something like 13 or 14 descendants per couple for their total to approximate half of people living in America who have African ancestry. Even if all black immigrants came from rural backgrounds, that might be too high a figure.

This is bad for for my credibility.

Still, I don’t know that the (unreferenced) estimate regarding immigrants and all their descendants for all times of half is too high, or much too high. This does not matter much from a substantive standpoint anyway. People with African ancestry, the very kind of people most likely to be victims of racism according to an obsolete, jaundiced view of this country come here in large numbers.

I know five personally, four Africans and a West Indian who is an executive chef. He hardly ever flies “home.” One African has a college degree and earns a lot of money right here. Another has an advanced degree and performs stellar scientific research of a nature he could only do in a handful of other countries, none in Africa or in the Caribbean. The third is an extraordinary musician, excellently trained in his country of origin, and whose creativity demonstrates that he has obviously overcome his training. The fourth is another musician, a very young man who may be leading a disreputable life as I write. All four are Africa-born, aliens; all four remain in this country at considerable cost and or risk to themselves. None of the Africans ever complains of American racism except sometimes in the presence of African-Americans, of black people born in the US of American parents (Go figure!)

Of course, they would not complain in my presence because they suspect I keep my robes in the back of my pickup truck. No, that couldn’t be, I am a Republican; the KKK was entirely Democrat!

PS : I used to enjoy occasionally at the gym listening to a mean, swarthy complexioned man on MSNBC. Alas Martin Bashir is gone! I wonder how long it will take MSNBC to find another dark-skinned man with an affected English accent and a potty mouth.

* Dear overseas readers: Feel free to ask questions about vocabulary and idioms. (The “idioms,” the idiot is someone else though.)

** The source for this number will remain a secret for the time being. The source for the other numbers is the US Census 2010.

Free Trade in Asia

Brandon Christensen History, Links , , , , , , ,

When you get the chance, check out this working paper on market integration and Asia during the 19th and early 20th centuries by David Chilosi and Giovanni Federico. The abstract:

This paper contributes to the debate on globalization and the great divergence with a comprehensive analysis of trends, causes and effects of the integration of Asia in the world market from 1800 to the eve of World War Two, based on a newly compiled data-set. The analysis finds that: most price convergence occurred before 1870, with only little disintegration in the inter-war years; market integration was determined to a large extent by the fall of Western trading monopolies; it implied significant static welfare gains and emerges as a major cause of substantial improvements in the terms of trade.

Again. the whole paper is worth reading. I think I might be more interested in it because of my own work on Dutch colonialism in southeast Asia and the collapse of the Dutch East Indies Company (a state-sponsored monopoly). With that being said, the paper is one of those “big picture” reads that folks of all disciplines ought to be interested in.

One of the most interesting aspects I found in the paper had to do with foreign trade. It has become popular nowadays to focus on institutions within a society for explanations on why some nations are rich and others are poor. This paper suggests that while institutions may be important, it is just not institutions that are careful to include domestic factions that are important for prosperity. The institutions that are created to deal with foreign affairs (mostly trade and diplomacy) also play an important role in the health and wealth of societies. (h/t goes to co-blogger Claudio Shikida)

From the Comments: Federalism, Small States and Central Banks

Brandon Christensen History, Politics , , , , , , , , ,

Rick Searle asks the following question after reading my argument with George Ayittey on secession in Africa:

Brandon, how do you respond to the geopolitical and macro-economic arguments in favor of strong federalism rather than small-state nationalism? The experience of Central Europe after the First World War seems to offer a telling example of what happens when you break-up multi-national states along ethnic lines. The collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire created a power vacuum which Hitler and Stalin were only too glad to fill. All of the thriving national states you have named exist under the implied or real security guarantee of the US.

Secondly, whatever the attraction of economic integration without political integration seems to be coming apart at the seams with the example of the European Union as we speak.

Breaking up Africa’s multi-ethnic states- unless they were replaced with a robust form of federalism- would, thus, seem to condemn that continent to perpetual interference by the big powers, and economic weakness.

Rick,

Thanks for chiming in. Your question and comments are very good ones.

how do you respond to the geopolitical and macro-economic arguments in favor of strong federalism rather than small-state nationalism?

As far as strong federalism goes, it is actually my preferred system of governance for the withering away of the state. Unfortunately, strong federal republics are few and far between in history. There are very hard to maintain and even harder to govern effectively. The best way to achieve a strong federal state is to start small and work your way up to a confederation, and if all sides want more political integration, then it would be wise to start putting together a federal state.

As far as small-state nationalism goes, I don’t want that. At all. What I am in favor of is smaller states without the nationalism. Remember, of all the small states I’ve listed most are fairly multi-ethnic. Denmark isn’t (I blame the crappy weather), but is still very open to immigration and international firms, while South Korea is currently trying to push an immigration reform bill through its parliament. Small states are good, nationalism is bad. More on this just below, but first:

The experience of Central Europe after the First World War seems to offer a telling example of what happens when you break-up multi-national states along ethnic lines. The collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire created a power vacuum which Hitler and Stalin were only too glad to fill.

Ah, great example Rick. Just to be clear: I don’t want to go around breaking states up. That would be both pompous and disastrous. Playing god is something only Leftists do! All I am saying is this: if a region within a state wants to secede from another state, then the international community should recognize this secession. There are a couple of caveats, of course. Doing this in China or Russia’s backyard would be a bad idea, but in the post-colonial world I think this is something that we should be looking at as a policy option to stunt the violence and poverty in these areas.

Recognizing the legitimacy of the secession would have three effects that would stop the violence for a time: 1) it would require that the new states prove their worth in the international community in the form of not persecuting minorities in their new state, 2) it would deter the state that just lost the region to secession from attacking another sovereign state for fear of reprisals and 3) the recognition of independence would inevitably lead to talks by both sides. Perhaps they could figure out a way to re-federate a few years on down the line, or perhaps they could come to some sort of agreement on trade. Whatever they do, they would at least be talking instead of fighting.

Failure to build an international consensus to recognize the independence of regions seeking independence will lead to more of the wars we have seen in much of the post-colonial world, as well as in the Caucasus and the Balkans.

Back to the nationalism you brought up earlier. A lot of states that try to secede are actually very multi-ethnic. Azawad, in Mali, for example, is a good example of a multi-ethnic region trying to break free from Bamako’s inept rule. With the advent of the market economy throughout the world (see my reply to NEO above), nationalism will continue to decline in prominence, and the areas of the world where nationalism is prevalent will be the hottest ones on the planet. States that thrive on nationalism are going to have to struggle to assert their authority over their people, and where there is nationalist promotion in government, there we will see most of the violence. I am thinking of China, Russia, Israel, Palestine, North Korea, and India-Pakistan.

In other cases, secession has taken place within a state that is largely homogenous ethnically. Somaliland, a democratic, relatively prosperous, but unrecognized state in the north of Somalia is a case in point. They want out of Somalia until all the violence and competition for the center of power dies down. They are open to re-federating, but in the meantime…

All of the thriving national states you have named exist under the implied or real security guarantee of the US.

Yes, but isn’t this in itself a form of confederation, or loose federalism? I’m all for more integration between the US and other societies, by the way. If we could get these states to integrate further economically, and could make our political borders largely irrelevant within the confederation: then security costs would largely be paid for. My co-blogger Jacques Delacroix has actually written one of the most stimulating papers on the subject of integration between states: “If Mexicans and Americans Could Cross the Border Freely.” I highly recommend it. Remember, one of the pillars of individualism is internationalism. Hayek, among others, lamented that we had lost this fight to the Marxists in the 19th and 20th centuries.

Secondly, whatever the attraction of economic integration without political integration seems to be coming apart at the seams with the example of the European Union as we speak.

Ah, but the problems of the EU don’t stem from economic integration, they stem from more political integration. The European Central Bank – a political creation if I’ve ever seen one – and proposed measures for a European parliament with more delegated powers is what has caused the strife in the Eurozone, not the ability of Greeks to work and vote in France, and vice versa.

Breaking up Africa’s multi-ethnic states- unless they were replaced with a robust form of federalism- would, thus, seem to condemn that continent to perpetual interference by the big powers, and economic weakness.

Agreed! But again, I don’t want to go around breaking up states. One big hole I see in my support for secession theory so far is the question of what if: what if the new state’s neighbors don’t play ball economically? Won’t that new state be isolated? Co-blogger Fred Foldvary actually wrote an article on this subject using Turkey’s rejection from the EU as an example: “Let Turkey Join NAFTA.” Another highly recommended piece!

Whew. Thanks again for contributing to the conversation, Rick, and don’t be bashful in throwing more fastballs my way. It helps me learn and clarify my thoughts!

Keynes on Free Trade

Brandon Christensen Economics, History, Politics , , , , , , , ,

I found this great quote from John Maynard Keynes earlier today:

In a regime of Free Trade and free economic intercourse it would be of little consequence that iron lay on one side of a political frontier, and labor, coal, and blast furnaces on the other. But as it is, men have devised ways to impoverish themselves and one another; and prefer collective animosities to individual happiness.

I found this in a journal article (pdf) on political decentralization and economic integration. The quote is from 1920 (the article is a couple of years old).

John Maynard Keynes’s system is collapsing in front of our eyes. It is doing so slowly, but it is collapsing nonetheless. What is interesting to note is that Keynesians share much of their ideology with libertarians. We are all liberals of one stripe or another, but the Keynesians won the public policy battles of the post-war period.

I’m not entirely certain I know what these policy battles were all about. Again, it seems like there is very little that we disagree with the technocratic Left about ideologically. Yet since the Keynesian system is collapsing it seems like now would be a good idea to go over how they got to technocratic planning from what is essentially the same starting point as the libertarian one. I think we would do well to exercise a great deal of our thoughts to thinking about this divergence.