I realize this has been hashed out on the list before, but how much do the living standards of the U.S., Europe, and Japan, really rest on "third world oppression", anyway? Cheap bananas and coffee are great, but does the U.S. really depend on them in any real way? And as for oil - while it certainly hasn't been shared equally, the oil exporting nations have certainly been enriched by their relationship with the western powers. While OPEC is not the power it once was, it still shows the ability of third world holders of strategic resources to affect their own destinies.
After all - one of the reasons the oil majors are so eager to drill in the ANWR (and were so eager to drill in the north sea, despite it's dubious economics) is because they would much rather exploit resources inside a stable industrial country (despite regulation, high wages, etc.) than operate in a third world dictatorship of dubious stability.
Reading Danial Yergin's "The Prize" is almost enough to make you feel sorry for oil executives. Again and again, they go into a primitive country, spend millions exploring and developing its oil resources, and are unceremoniously kicked out once the natives have become rich.
Jim Baird
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