Page 2814 - 1970S

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G et ready for another North-vs.–
Soutb "war between the
states," fougbt· over slavery.
This time the battles won't be fought at
Gettysburg, Viclcsburg, or Bull Run. Th.e
new skirmishes may be fought anr.where
from Saskatoon to Singapore, and tbe
arsenal of pÓtential weapons may range
from prices in your supermarket to nu–
clear weapons.
The two antagonists are, generally
speaking, the Nonh (the developed
world) and the So~ th (the under–
developed world). This classic matcb-up
may eventuaUy heat up enougb to dis–
place the East-West square-off as the
p_redom.inant ideological, political, and
military confrontation on earth.
"CML
WAR"
In somewhat of a role reversa!, it's the
soutberners w!io' are trying to free the
slaves, whicb they consider to be them–
selves. "Down South' .. is where the
world's ,misery and agony lie concen–
trated. In the ricber, '(lonhern nations,
problems may ebb and ftow, but in the
poorer, southem nations, we find a per–
manent ~ackwater wbere virtually aU
major problenis are pcesent all tbe time.
Large percentages of the population
in tbe South are always unemployed or
underemployed. Inftatio~ perenniaUy
hovers at Jevi:Js we would call spiraling.
rampant, or runaway. Many millions of
¡leople living below IJ>e. 30¡.1¡_ Rarallel_
1
The. poor nations are standing
up lor thelr rights (see cover)¡
and the 30th páral/el may
become the Mason-Dixon llne
lor a worldwlde reenactment
of the "war between the
states." The two antagonlsts
are, rough/y speaklng, the
northern developed world and
the southern underdeveloped
world. And the issue one<e
agaln ls s/avery.
by Ron Horswell
6
sulfer c:Qntinu·a¡ m~lnourishment; many
J})illións more are starving. .
What .is ·more significan! is tbe south–
ern conviction that the responsibility for
alleviating their 'plight reses squa.rely' on
• northem shoulders. "We are poor," goes
tbe soutbem dogma. "because we have
been exploited as slaves by the rich."
Redistribution ofWorld
Wealth
What the soutbemers want is no dif–
ferent tban what tbe nonhemers already
have. Every developed nation has sorne
means for redistributing wealth. The
United States has welfare, while Britain
and Sweden bave acbieved the status of
"welfare state." Most sóutherners would
like to go one step fu.nher. 'fbey would
generally likc to see a "welfare world."
,As would be expected, the North. ob–
jects on severa! counts. One is tbe purely
tbeoretical reservation that redistribu–
tion will not solve the basic poveny
problem of tbe world. lf the world's
wealth were equaUy divided, we would
al/ b'e poor. Thé Nórth could also cite
severa! examples to support their con–
tent ion that excessive empbasis on re–
distributioo, would retard production of
new capital. which is what the poor
world needs most.
On tbe other side of the coin, it should
be mentioned · that the1 most fervent
nonhem attaclcs on redistribution have
overtones of the slavebolder's refrain:
"Dear slaves - please accept our God·
ordained economic thcories," which
means, accept our God-given lot as your
superiors and your God-givcn lot as
poor slaves.
Thus the essence of the argument
rages between tbe ricb man's wallet -and
tbe poor man's belly. The North is ar–
guing (or merely remaining smugly si–
lent) from its positíon of power, while
the South is arguing with two main
weapons: rhetor ié in the U.N.'s key con–
ventions and the introduction of "pro–
ducer's associations."
Rheioric wiU be discussed later.
"Producer,sAssOciations''
,Producer's associations, or resource
canels, are, if their defenders can be
believed, tbe greatest force for economic
good to emerge since Keynes discover~d
that nations could spend more than tbey
earn. Their value, aecording to one U.N.
document, is in '"assistiQg in promotioo.
of s ustained growth of world eeonomy
and accelerating developmeot of devel–
oping countries."
Producer's Associations exist for two
basic reasons. One is to stabilize the
often wildly iluctuating prices of com·
modities. The o ther reason is to use col·
lective clout, of one form or another, 10
raise the marlcet price of the commodity.
In esseoce, this cbannels wcalth from the
ricb commodity buyer to the relatively
poor commodi ty seller.
Tbe Nonh takes a dimmer view of
sucb "produceis assóciations," usually
calling them cartels. The Northemer
would argue, and rigbtfully .so, tbat tb.e
immense financia! strain placed on
many poor natioos is far greater tban
·the effect that sucb cartels bave on tbe
ricb nations. In other words, Bangladesb
suffered far more than the Uruted States
because of the oil car tel's irresponsible
tripling of petroleum prices in 1973.
Far from sustaining world economic
growth, such cartels bear a g(>Od deal of
the blame for tbe worldwide recession.
At present. there are producer's· asso·
ciations, of varying degrees of cohesion,
for petroleum, bauxite, phosphate, c;o¡>–
per, tin, cbromium, colfee, rubber , and
bananas. Many are weak' and inexperi·
enced. Effectiveness raoges from the
very successful Organization of Petro–
leum Exporting Countries to the tempo–
rary fail ures experienced by would-be
banana and coffee canels. •
Tbe NewEconomle Oi'der
Exponehts of producers' associations
view the canels as the comerstone of a
new world etonomic order, which tbey
have set out to erect. lt is a soutbem
teoet of faitb that tbe present world eco–
nomic system, devised and maintained
by nonhem exploiters, is responsible for
global miseri~ Tbe "new intemational
economic order" wiU be built on a foun–
datioo of resource cartels.
For months tbe Third World has in–
sisted upon discussing aU world prob–
lems in the context of this hypothetical
..óew intemational economie order."
The developed world has resisted such
proposals, thus hamstringing numerous
intemational conferences. Sorne observ·
ers fear that the inability to come t(l
basic agreement on ev~n how to go
about discussing tbe issues may rendet
useless all international forum$_ in–
cluding the United Nations, thus con–
t ributing lo heightened world te.nsions.
Th'e exact goals of the "new inter–
national economic order" are impossible
to precisely discern, but its prirnary goal,
.no doubt, is the redistribution ofwealth
worldwide. lt is this redistributionist
philosophy that legitirn.izeS producers'
~ations, as weU as the acts of na–
tionalization a,nd expropriation. Under
this pbilosophy, these acts are defined as
nothing more than righteously moving
toward greater equa.lity and properly
clairning "reparations" fqr nonhem
"'imperialism."'
In addition, the Soutb perceive$ that
the economic inteUigentsia of Westem
capitalism has failed, after two decades
of trying, to come up with 'ao ad~quate
theory to explain how it would be pos–
sibl.e for some of tbe more dis–
advantaged nations to acbieve any
significant growth. Prom sucb a posture,
sorne nations feeJ their ptigbt can only
be bettered if they Jay claim to the
wealth Of others.
Tbe World Fabiao Soc:iety
Daniel Moynihan, newly appointed
U.S. ambassador to the United Nations,
cla,irns there is yet another lai-gely unrec·
ognized reason for the emergence of the
redistribution movement. Writing in a
recent issue of C~mentary magazine,
Mr. Moynihan states tbat the world is
feeling the résults of the "Britisb revolu–
tion." Tbe Third World, according to
Moynihan, has ideologicaUy fallen into ·
neitber the capitalist nor the commurust
camp, but rather into the camp of the
British Fabian Society.
The Fabian Society is dedicated to tbe
advancement of socialism· via parlia–
mentary ratber tha n revolutionary
means. In the late 19th and early 20th
centuries i ts tanks included sorne of the
most famous Britisb intellectuals. its in–
fiuence throughout the empire (which
has now become most of the Third
World) was so great tbat, at present, the
sun never sets on tbe London Scbool of
EC:ooomies.
lo light of. that. the rich Nortberners
migbt have foreseen tbe day wheo Third
World missionaries would arrive on the
shores of tbe developed world preaching
tbeir doctrines of equatity, iedistribu–
t ion, and reparations. According to
Third World theology. any inequality of
such magnitude is not only evil, but is
also a moral sin marring the moral slate
of the wealthy.
Soutber n theologicat eloquence
reacbes its peak in the."Declaration on
the Establishment of a New lnter–
natiooal Economic Order,' ' pushed
througb the Uruted Nations General As·
sembly last year by theThird World
bloc. VirtuaUy every paragraph reveals
an idealistic infatuation with "equality."
The "new intemational ecooomjc or·
der," states the document, "shaU correct
WEEK ENDINO OCTOBER 18, 1975