From reading Sachs' book, I get that the lack of an interconnected effort between actors is one of the greatest obstacles to eradicating poverty. I think that is a very valid argument. More tolerance and cooperation would go a long way. For example, Sachs argues that debt forgiveness (like that alloted to Poland) would allow a country to rise up as a contributing nation on the global scene (126). "The end of poverty," he states later, "will require a global network of cooperation among people who have never met and who do not necessarily trust each other" (226). Sachs shows that this joint effort to erradicate poverty not only goes for nation-states, but for organizations as well (such as IMF, the World Bank and the UN). He states that development is very possible, but it requires a great amount of outside help that can only be effective under international cooperation.
The interesting part about this argument, however, is that Sachs believes that such a focus on development would be in our self interest. He argues that the fight for national security is rooted in eliminationg global poverty. "Economic failure...often leads to state failure as well" (332). Is this true? Would a greater US focus on 3rd world development not only satisfy the philanthropist but lead to a safer nation as well? I find it to be a very compelling argument. What do you all think?
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Recently (for our other class...) I was checking out the USAID and MDG websites, and this argument is all over the place - underdevelopment is a cause of terrorism, terrorism is a threat to US national security, ODA helps with underdevelopment, thus ODA is indirect spending on national security. I think Sachs would argue that ODA is more effective spending on national security - he juxtaposed currency stabilization funds and cold-war military spending when he was talking about Russia and Poland.
ReplyDeleteI think it's a solid argument, although there are other considerations, viz. ODA may make terrorism worse as the West "meddles", or ODA may not be helping underdevelopment. However, there's one other reason I'm skeptical of the argument: Sachs is clearly not a national security nut. He's a development nut. On page 203, he mentions advice he got from Dr. Bruntland - "If you want to get someone's attention about the health crises in Africa, 'show them the money.'" In a post 9/11 world, "show them how your program stops terrorism" could be more effective than dollars and cents.
That might just be poisoning the well, though (Don't listen to Sachs on national security because he's only interested in saving lives for altruism's sake). Really, I just find it fascinating - usually we expect interests to use altruism as a mask, not the other way around.
I definitely think that in some cases, economic development would lessen the tension between nations. However, if the developing nations became economic competitors--couldn't that also lead to conflict?
ReplyDeleteThe national security argument is a big one. The US is not the only country that has been touting this logic. The Canadian International Development Agency (Canada's USAID) has been producing that type of rhetoric since at least the mid 1970's
ReplyDeleteDr. Furlong of our own USU in 1985 wrote a chapter in an official USAID publication "The US and World Agricultural Development" outlining the connection between development, specifically food security, and political stability. He described what is known as the Davies Curve. In this curve, when the difference between Expected need satisfaction and actual need satisfaction become intolerably large revolution occurs. There are two cases for the satisfaction gap to become too big A. a declining economic or political condition. B. a condition of rapidly rising expectations.
Proper and successful development prevents this satisfaction gap from opening too wide and revolution from occurring. In the chapter he uses revolution very loosely. As in some type of drastic action to change the status quo... "Because the status is not quo!" Thank you Dr. Horrible.
I think it is plain to see that there are many positive externalities that come along with good development and it is even more plain to see that one of those is political stability and peace. Chris does bring up a good point that while it does shower rainbows on all of humanity it can also lead to negative externalities that can nullify any positive effect.