[lbo-talk] Narmada Dam (was Arundhati Roy etc.)

[Patrick Bond]

James Heartfield wrote:
> More likely is that the World Bank was willing to promote development in 
> India when they were in competition with the USSR for influence, but less 
> willing when India's growth meant that they were effectively promoting a 
> US-competitor. The NGOs just manufactured a post-festum justification for 
> the shift in World Bank policy. 
>   
You are losing it now, dear James:
* The World Bank does not promote 'development' of a Third World country 
through its large dam loans, it promotes distorted and disarticulated 
short-term accumulation for export-oriented businesses, subject to huge 
contradictions like the dams being way more costly than originally 
conceived - hence many large dam projects lead to underdevelopment.
* The World Bank's portfolio in India is *vast* now, far bigger than the 
early 1980s when it was funding Sardar Sarovar, and it is still funding 
huge white elephant projects and mega power generation schemes.
* And yes, by raising a big stink, the Indian activists - and to be 
sure, some international allies - were able to generate the pressure 
required to get the Brad Morse investigation going, and its findings 
bolstered their claims, and that forced the Bank out.