Thanks for the specific examples and websites. I also apologize to the list if I am bringing up something that has been beaten to death during the last several months. I have been off the list since last September.
I would note that I have already said that the WB clearly was involved in environmentally damaging projects in the past. Some of the websites discuss such past projects that even the WB now admits were blunders, e.g. the Rodonia clearcutting project in Brazil in 1981. Some are more recent and suggest not learning the lessons.
With regard to the DDT case, I would note that there have been quite a few people in tropical countries, more in Africa than in Asia or South America, who have complained that the bans on DDT in rich countries amount to a form of imperialism, that thousands and even millions of people have died in poorer countries because of the reduced use of DDT to fight malaria. The project you denounced was an anti-malaria project. Any accounting of the numbers of people saved from malaria? Are these to be weighed in the balance when you line up the WB "criminals" to be shot?
Clearly there have been some very undesirable projects with regard to forestry, Brazil and Indonesia stick out especially, although some of these the WB seems to have gotten the word on.
They do not seem to have gotten the word on incineration of medical waste. The critique here seems very sound. But, is this a systemic issue, or is this something that with appropriate pressure could be made to change?
Dam-building was what was very much on my mind when I mentioned past ecologically damaging projects. However, the website here recognizes that the WB has pulled back from some projects such as in India and in Nepal, after criticism. As near as I can tell the major one that is being pushed that is problematical is the one in Uganda. It appears that the local government is the driving force behind this one, not the WB. I would agree that small dams and other alternatives look much better than this one.
I am somewhat mystified by the claims about education. The site agrees that the WB is providing a lot of aid for education. The WB is then somehow held responsible for any failures in the education projects. This is "savaging education"? The closest to anything of the sort seemed to be the accounts of the WB demanding fees be paid by students and teacher pay not be increased in Tanzania. This was probably unnecessary neoliberal meddling. But, is the solution to shut down the WB and therefore completely remove this source of financing?
Also, would you argue that no projects funded by the WB have been worthwhile? Certainly there have been some that were not, including some of those listed above. There would appear to be still some that are not. At the same time, it appears that in some areas, forestry and dam-building stick out, the WB appears to be at least somewhat cleaning up its act, even if it has not done so totally. Are we talking about fatal systemic flaws or are we talking about essentially minor reforms?
BTW, I would remind that many of the things that are objected to above were great favorites of the actually existing socialisms and that an international development agency run by those folks would have engaged in many very similar kinds of projects, e.g. especially the gigantomaniac dams which the USSR loved. Is the solution to have no international development aid agency under any system, or one that "behaves itself"? Barkley Rosser -----Original Message----- From: Dennis R Redmond <dredmond at oregon.uoregon.edu> To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com> Date: Thursday, May 25, 2000 6:23 AM Subject: Re: Run on the Bank
>On Wed, 24 May 2000, J. Barkley Rosser, Jr. wrote:
>
>> What damage has the "Whirled Bank" done?
>> Please be precise, no general mumbling about
>> "globalization" or "world capitalism," please.
>
>Oh, nothing too serious, just little things like spraying 3,000 tons of
>DDT on the Amazon (http://www.whirledbank.org/environment/waste.html),
>encouraging the incineration of toxic medical waste
>(http://www.essentialaction.org/waste/worldbank.html), trashing
>rainforests (http://www.whirledbank.org/environment/logging.html),
>building hideously destructive dams which trash local communities and
>rip apart ecosystems (http://www.whirledbank.org/environment/dams.html),
>plus the usual neoliberal savaging of education
>(http://www.whirledbank.org/development/education.html) and other
>essential social services.
>
>When the Revolution comes, the top honchos of the IMF/WB ought to go to
>the dock for high economic crimes against humanity, along with the Wall
>Street financiers whose class interests they have so ably pursued.
>
>-- Dennis
>
>