AGF response to AHA accounts (fwd)

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                   ANDRE GUNDER FRANK
250 Kensington Ave - Apt 608     Tel: 1-514-933 2539    
Westmount/Montreal PQ/QC         Fax: 1-514-933 6445 or 1478
Canada H3Z 2G8              e-mail:agfrank@chass.utoronto.ca 

My Home Page is at:       http://www.whc.neu.edu/gunder.html
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---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Mon, 18 Jan 1999 18:55:57 -0500 (EST)
From: Gunder Frank <agfrank@chass.utoronto.ca>
To: agf <agfrank@chass.utoronto.ca>
Subject: AGF response to AHA accounts (fwd)




KPM kindly invites me to 'amend' her and her friend's  account of the
two sessions on my ReOrient book at /around the Washington AHAs.
 Here goes, but only on SOME more MAJOR matters.

KPM reports that AGF said:

"Any other approach [than mine?] , Frank warns, will land us in the
Landes/Huntington framework. and the fallacy of supposing "unique" and
"independent" factors at work."                                               

This shows how changing word order can change meaning.

AGF did of course push for WS approach on grounds that the whole
helps explain the parts. Explaining the parts within a
'scientific' framework that prioritizes ONLY or primarily  their 'unique'
'independent' factors ,apart from being scientificaly unsatisfactory,
can if carried to its logical conclusion land us up in the
politically dangerous Landes/Huntington.

So AGF did not say that doing anything but 'my way' lands us up in/with
Landes/Huntington.

AGF has no 'further information'on re the two questions from  the floor
that KMP re-poses.
But AGF inturn asks KPM for 'further information' on:

       " And my [KPM's] own views on all this?  Anon!

        But let me throw out a hint. Let our reflexive mode apply to
social science (and world-system theory) itself. In which case we may be
permitted to opine  that Weber and Marx, like the Middle Kingdom and the
Moguls, remain central in the lon ger term."
  
AGF asks: opine yes, but agf asks for 'further information': on the
basis of what w-s theoretical framework and what longer term historical 
evidence? please supply!

MC writes
 " This work [ReOrient] is responding to
a political situation that is responding to a social and economic
reality; the rise of Asia and China.  World is de facto being
re-oriented.  Policy will be informed by these views."

Farther down MC again writes and atributes to AGF:

"We must write new history, then
new theory and new political policy will follow".    

NO, AGF did NOT say any of that either time.On the contrary, 
AGF said many times that theory and policy follow
from reality and mostly re-enforces it, and 'views' follow from both.
The whole thrust was that  policy, views/theory are in/formed by reality,
an not vice versa. The writing of this book is only one example.

Farther down, MC again  writes and attrributes to AGF
" The economic/political reality is Globalization. Acknowledges broad
history of economically advanced states up to 1800."

NO, AGF said exactly the opposite. there is no globaliZATION since the
world has been global/ized for a long long time.

AGF did not speak or acknowledge anything  of 'states'

and what is 'history of economically advanced states up to 1800'
supposed to refer to an mean? If to Europe, then AGF said exactly the
opposite, namely that they were backward. If it is meant to refer to 
Asia, that is today not 'advanced' yet.

" Frank warns us that the call (e.g. Huntington) to confront the coming of
Islam and China is dangerous and at the base of ethnic cleansing.  It
encourages us to be divisive rather than to be united.  History-writing
(generally) has an ideology, but (ideally) strives to be objective.
History with an agenda strives to unite (KPM and MPC agree that something
is missing here).  Frank confronts the ideology he thinks is dangerous
for the world."

AGF agrees that 'something is missing here' either from the report or
from what was said, since as written this makes no sense and part is
absurd..
Huntington an Co. 'legitimize' or can be used to legitimize ethnic
cleansing, but are not at the base of it. The guys who practiced 
ethnic cleansing in Bosnia did not wait to read Huntington first.

Again, the whole thrust of what i said is that influence => goes
from reality of econ>soc>
politics/policy>ideology/theory and NOT the other way around, and i 
showed that with the writing of history and invention of social theory
that i presented there and in my book, and indeed in what I myseld am
doing.
..
Indeed i started by quoting Keynes most quoted saying about policy
makes acting out theories of long since dead economists they dont even
 know about,and pointed out that that is the most MISTAKEN thing 
JMK ever said, as shown by his own work/theory and its use 
[RMN saying we are all  keynesians now in 1972 -- just before his
successor Jimmy Carter dumped Keynesianism and replaced it in 
1977 with monetarism and then Reaganomic supply side].
Instead, i said at the very beginning that Gunnar Myrdal was right when he
said that theory, especially econ theory & policy, responds to political
reality, which in turn responds to the underlying econ/soc reality.

It is rather distressing that this central thesis - and its
exemplification again and again in my talk - did not get across
even to my colleagues. what in the world did/does the 'lay' public 
then think? 
Perhaps nothing, since two days ago i heard 3 McGill university 
students in a class of "International Development" report on their reading
of two articles of mine on the subject and one critique of AGF by Samir
Amin. I could not find even the remotest resemblance between what they
had read and what they reported they had read. And to the 
HAVE YOU STOPPED BEATING YOUR WIFE questions they posed to me, 
my answer was simply I AM NOT MARRIED.
  
To end with the issue about history agendas, AGF said that most 
historians have been paid to write and teach 'national' history for use in
builiding  nation states for the benefit of their elites.

AGF also quoted the epigraph at the beginning of ReO chapter 6
"to confront world history is to confront the ultimate questions of human
destiny.... To avoid the challenge of a global perspective is to
abdicate in the face of the historian's central task....
World history has become a pursuit of world unity"
[Paul Costello 1994 -  OOOOPS p258 says 1964. the references cited
1994 is correct]
The same might be said of W-S/WS with or without hyphen!

respectfully submitted
gunder frank

PS. Since KPM was not at the opening of the bookstore thing, I
prepared my own [rather different] a summary for and sent it to her. 
I can supply the same here if desired, though it probably is still full of
my usual typos, SOME OF which i could try to take out beforehand.
but on jan 19 i am going to lie on the beach in Miami! any takers? 

agf

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
                   ANDRE GUNDER FRANK
250 Kensington Ave - Apt 608     Tel: 1-514-933 2539    
Westmount/Montreal PQ/QC         Fax: 1-514-933 6445 or 1478
Canada H3Z 2G8              e-mail:agfrank@chass.utoronto.ca 

My Home Page is at:       http://www.whc.neu.edu/gunder.html
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~