[no subject]

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Doug Henwood:

>
>Of course South Korean growth wouldn't have been possible without support
>from the U.S., and even before the Vietnam war - Korean firms learned how
>to do large construction projects in part by building bases for the U.S.
>military in Korea itself. I share your admiration of Cuba, Lou, but it's
>very hard to hold up North Korea as much of a model for development; yes it
>did grow for a while, but not all that spectacularly.
>

The problem in making any kind of comparison at all in this context is that
is altogether impossible to isolate the countries in question from the Cold
War and its impact on economic development. For example, on the face of it
West Germany "proves" that capitalism is superior to socialism, given the
example of East Germany. At least that was what I was taught in high
school. What I wasn't taught is that Stalin stuck to the letter of the law
and prohibited re-industrialization of the East under terms of the treaty
ending WWII. Furthermore, East Germany was primarily agricultural. Also,
there was nothing quite like the Marshall Plan for East Germany and other
European East Bloc nations. The Soviet Union had lost all of its industrial
infrastructure in the Western 1/3 of the country and the death of millions
of its citizens.

This is the same sort of discussion we were having a while back on judging
the success of the East Asian tigers. There are all sorts of mitigating
circumstances that have to be taken into account when judging Singapore,
for example. Jim Devine pointed out that a lot of Singapore's success is
related to the exploitation of Malaysia.

One of the unique features of an economic system such as the kind that
prevailed in East Germany is that it not plunder or pillage other
countries. Instead it donated trucks, printing presses, medicine,
fertilizer, etc. to Cuba and the African National Congress in exile.
Meanwhile, West German banks were bleeding Yugoslavia dry during the 70s.

Louis Proyect