Re: Asian Economic Melt Down

Tue, 17 Feb 1998 19:18:34 GMT
Richard K. Moore (rkmoore@iol.ie)

My reading of the meltdown is different that the others expressed on this
list, and I'd like to hear some feedback.

Consider the situation prior to the meltdown.

SE Asia was doing very well in the global economy, and was doing so
precisely because of NOT abiding by the principle of global market forces.
That is, they were organizing their economies on a national (and regional)
basis and providing subsidies of various kinds (to workers and companies)
to increase their collective competitiveness in global markets. Greider
(in One World Ready or Not) characterized SE Asian successes as being an
embarrasment to neoliberal theology. The IMF, who is now the self-appointed
expert on SE Asian economic failures, saw fit in its 1997 annual report to
give the region high marks on economic management.

Politically, there were signs of a growing sense of regional power. In the
International Herald Tribune of 2 August 1997 (p. 4) there's an article
called "ASEAN Aims to Test Balances of Power". The article begins:

"When the nine countries of ASEAN hold their first summit meeting
with China, Japan, and South Korea in Malaysia later this year,
they will take another major step in a strategy to shape a blance
of power in the region in which the United States will play a less
dominant, though still important, role.

"By meeting for the first time without the presence of Western
nations, the Asian heads of government will also send a signal to
the United States and Europe that they cannot afford to take the
region for granted, Asian officials and analysists said Friday.

"'People haven't yet woken up to the fact that the summit December
will be a momentous event,' said an official of an ASEAN country.
'Neither North America nor Europe has paid enough attention to this
part of the world. This summit is a wake-up call for them to do so.'"

My thesis is that North America and Europe (ie, the ruling elites thereof)
have in fact "paid attention" to this regional-upstart challenge by
engineering the financial crisis. Does anyone know what the December
summit was actually devoted to? Somehow I suspect the focus shifted to the
meltdown. In any case, with the IMF auditors in charge of the countries,
as if they were wayward bank branches, the above rhetoric about "shaping a
balance of power" now has a very hollow ring to it.

I suggest that the meltdown was an arranged affair and that it accomplished
two major objecives.

The first was about balance of power. North America and Europe have simply
re-asserted their traditional imperialist power. They've slapped down an
upstart, as thoroughly as they did Hitler and Tojo in WW II, only with more
skill and subtlety. As the IMF oversees "reconstruction", the economies
will find themselves largely owned by outside interests and permanently
subjugated to international bankers.

The second was about addressing the global crisis of over-production. In
one fell swoop, thousands of sound producers were put out of business, thus
reducing global supply. _Instead_ of a global depression we have the
managed economic destruction of a single producing region. Another region
could have been picked instead; the choice of regions was left to political
considerations (above).

---

As usual, I'm arguing that more attention should be paid to agency. It is necessary to _look_ at the situation and _learn_ what is due to agency and what due to economic determinism: it is unscientific to try to force all data to fit a favorite formula.

Incidentally, I'm still hoping for more responses to my posting of 2 Feb 1998: Re: inevitable collapse of global capitalism (Andrew)

rkm