[A-List] US/UK imperialism: Zambia

["Michael Keaney" <michael.keaney@xxxxxx>]

Yes, we were often reminded throughout the 1980s of how dastardly and
corrupt people like Kenneth Kaunda were, and at Commonwealth Conference
after Commonwealth Conference, Thatcher would stymie his and others' efforts
to turn the screws on apartheid South Africa, which conducted its own
destabilisation campaign against Kaunda, a staunch opponent of apartheid and
supporter of the ANC. The IMF's role in all of this should surely be
highlighted by the World Development Movement, New Statesman, or anyone else
prepared to take these criminals to task. It's also a useful reminder of the
caution that should be applied when studying events in Zimbabwe. But I've
just done a quick search of the pdf copy of the full report, available here:

http://www.wdm.org.uk/cambriefs/debt/zambia/zambia.pdf

"Kaunda" (not even "Kenneth Kaunda" -- sloppy if you consider that a large
number of readers will probably not be aware of who he is) is mentioned
three times in events chronologies pasted as appendices, while "apartheid"
is not mentioned at all. "South Africa" comes up only in connection with
Zambia's trading figures for the year 2001.

It is unfortunate that the geopolitical history gets lost amid all of the
righteous indignation directed at what seems an apparent economic policy
folly. But this "folly" is so only if you ignore the context in which these
policies were implemented, and the real purpose behind them. The policies
were not such folly to those who implemented them precisely in order to get
rid of Kaunda et al. Too bad the population suffered, but it was never
seriously considered to begin with, and it is fundamentally mistaken of the
WDM to perpetuate the illusion that it was. Of course criticising economic
policy on its own terms can yield useful ammunition, but it fails to answer
why it is that the failure is repeated over and over again, despite the
mountain of evidence confirming this fact. Unfortunately WDM suffers from
the delusion shared with many others inside the green movement, not least
Colin Tudge -- if only nice, well-intentioned people were running the show,
things would be different.

Michael Keaney

ps The limitations of the bourgeois empiricism inherent in this otherwise
worthwhile exercise of excavation, analysis and condemnation are exposed in
Michael Hudson's work, not least "Super Imperialism". And it is to our great
collective shame as a list that we have been unable to get going with our
reading of this work. Assuming that Chris has given up the ghost, and that
John Enyang is a ghost (where are you, John? are you ok? knock once for yes,
twice for no...), I will attempt to take up where I left off last autumn
very soon, now that my own workload has subsided very slightly. Of course if
there is anyone out there who would like to share the burden, please feel
free to volunteer. Michael H's exposure of the real purpose and effects of
financial technocracy is of vital importance. It is a real bonus to us that
both he and Henry have taken the time, and continue to do so, to share their
insights with us here.