Diversity

[Brad De Long]

Re:
>
>So, it sounds like Vietnam is plagued with very similar problems to
>those of Russia and Eastern European countries: disorder, corruption,
>greater divisions between have and have nots, and a decadent youth.
>
>Now, how are these appearing as a legacy to a collapsed command, or
>top-down authoritarian but theoretically communist political-economic
>structure? Are these not the same problems that are befalling
>Indonesia or Thailand, or the Philippines, mostly current or former
>fascist or military dictatorships, filled with a sea of greedy foreign
>capitalists?
>
>See, I think what is going is a little different than a battle between
>communist utopias or capitalist utopias gone bad. I strongly suspect
>these problems arise across the political-economic spectrum, because
>of the top-down structuring itself...

I think that you are right. If I remember correctly, Paul Krugman told me a
decade ago that his view was that Japan and East Asia were going to get
into real trouble when circumstances changed, because their societies and
their governments would be too authoritarian and rigid to adapt when things
went wrong. Capitalist democracy at least gives you some circulation of
elites--and concentrates the minds of political elites on fixing whatever
is wrong with economic growth.

That said, I think there is some cause for optimism (even if only of the
"pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will" variety) for the
northern half of East Asia. South Korea and Taiwan continue to slowly but
steadily advance toward democracy. There is a chance that Japan will break
out of its version of machine politics, and find a government that will
carry out the equivalent of the New Deal. The Philippines just had a real
election in which elites definitely circulated: a president whose inability
to speak "proper" English is one of his big selling points.

But I can't even summon up optimism of the will with respect to Thailand,
Indonesia, and Malaysia. Too many of their exports go to depressed Japan.
And their political systems have too many authoritarian and military
elements in them...

(On the other hand, Latin America is a positive surprise. I wish that the
main opposition to PRI in Mexico came from Cuahtemoc Cardenas and company
rather than from PAN, and I wish the Brazilian police didn't massacre
homeless children, and I wish that Pinochet were not senator-for-life in
Chile. But in the end the Mexican financial crisis did *not* spillover to
the south. And the potential military dictators have gone back to their
barracks for a while, at least...)

Brad DeLong