RES: RES: RES: [lbo-talk] Does Imperialism Block IndependentDevelopment?

Alexandre Fenelon afenelon at zaz.com.br
Sun Jan 25 05:12:47 PST 2004


But perhaps that right political-institutional context included that of the existence of the former Soviet Union? Or perhaps not, in view of the problems they were running into by the 1980s.

-Probably you´re right. The presence of USSR as a threat to US hegemony -probably was one factor the increased the margin for maneuver for -smaller countries. Sweden itself broke diplomatics relationship with -the USA inearly 70´s. This would be unthinkable today. But I would add -to "the right context" that of world economy in the 50´s-70´s, where -there was much less capital mobility and local economies were less -dependent on foreign trade as a whole. In an environment of high capital -mobility it´s easy for the local enterprise to blackmail the government -by threatening to invest their capital abroad if "business" friendly -policies are not implemented.

Still, the link posted suggested that the "failure" was a political-institutional one, rather than straightforwardly economic. And perhaps that includes the simultaneous collapse of the former SU and the corresponding rise of neo-liberalism? Would it then be possible to say that, yes, the world imperial order shapes and constrains all before it, including not just small, third world nations, but also larger first world ones, including France, Germany, etc.?

-I would say you´re right, the imperial order shapes and constraints -all, but in different degrees. But France and Germany are not big -countries. Their population is intermediate and their land area -is small and there is scarcity of natural resources.

But re Sweden and exports -- I believe Sweden has always had a higher export/gdp ratio than the average for what the World Bank calls "high income group". So, in the early 1980s, exports were more than 30% of GDP, at a time when it was in the low teens for the US and in the mid-20s for Britain.

-Yes, and the 80´s marked the start of the crisis in Sweden. Probably -exports to GDP ration was lower in early 50´s.

Finally, I think there's a need to put the Swedish "failure" in some perspective. Just as it's easy to mock Great Britain as the "former Great Britain". Sure the gloss has come off, it's become the gurkhas for the American empire, but it's -- what -- still among the top 25 economies in the world measured by gdp/capita. Would we have had a Swedish "failure"!

-No doubt the Swedish failure must be placed inside its context, that -is why I talked about "fall of Swedish model". This failure was not -a economic collapse like that of USSR, but the fact that some of the -Swedish achievements were no more possible. Sweden is no more a -country with full employment and levels of unequality worsened, even -if they are still among the lowest in the world. And, furthermore, -economic growth also declined. So the "failure" is relative, and must -take in context the expectations of Swedish society (and the "exterior -world", of course).

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