The Great Debate UK
from The Great Debate:
Yemen needs an insurgent democracy
After months of uncertainty around whether Ali Abdullah Saleh has been sincere about stepping down from his post as Yemen’s president, Sunday brought confirmation that he has left the country to seek medical treatment in the United States. Under a deal brokered by the Gulf Cooperation Council with United Nations, United States and United Kingdom assistance, Saleh is barred from partaking in the Feb. 21 elections for an interim president. In exchange, he received immunity in an unamendable law -- both nationally and internationally highly controversial -- passed by Yemen’s parliament the day before his departure.
And yet Saleh made it immediately clear that he intended to return to Yemen before the elections to lead his General People’s Congress party, which holds a majority of seats in parliament. This is, of course, somewhat reminiscent of the last time Saleh left Yemen for medical treatment in June 2011. Following a bomb attack on the presidential palace which left several senior government officials dead and Saleh and others seriously injured, he sought treatment in Saudi Arabia amid hopes he would step down from office. He returned to Sana’a as president at the end of September. While Saleh will not be able to hold this office again, his intention of continuing to play a major role in the future of Yemen taints the otherwise good news of his departure.
But now what? We’ve seen leaders who had desperately tried to hold on forced from power in Arab countries before. Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali was run out of Tunisia. Hosni Mubarak, under withering domestic and international pressure, stepped down from Egypt’s presidency. And Muammar Gaddafi wouldn't leave and was finally killed.
Yemen, though, is different. Its crisis goes much deeper than socioeconomic and political dissatisfaction. It has insurgencies to worry about.
There are two: the al-Houthi uprising in the north since 2004 and the increasingly secessionist rebellion in the south that, while tracing its origins back to the brief 1994 north-south civil war, has gained violent momentum from 2007 onwards. Both insurgencies are reactions to political marginalization and economic neglect by Sana’a.
But these insurgencies have telling differences. The situation in the north has been destabilized by past military operations against a Shi’ite rebellion that allegedly received support from Iran (doubtful as it may be in its significance). For years on-and-off fighting had seen little gain for either side until the government launched operation "Scorched Earth" in 2009. That push involved Saudi forces, but the insurgency, although reduced in strength, continued. To date, a number of ceasefire agreements have been signed, and broken, most recently in 2010.
In the south, meanwhile, a battle with secessionist forces is complicated by the significant and growing presence of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). This fight has garnered significant international attention, not least because of two failed international terrorist plots that originated in Yemen — the attempt to bring down airplanes with explosives hidden in printer toner cartridges in October 2010 and the Christmas Day bombing plot in 2009. The alliance between AQAP and the southern secessionists, however, is one of convenience above all else. The southern movement is deeply divided among different factions and has limited military capabilities. It thus relies to an extent on AQAP to challenge the regime without sharing the terrorist network’s religious fundamentalism or anti-Western agenda. For the regime, southern secession is unacceptable given that most of Yemen’s dwindling oil resources are located there. Internationally, too, there is broad support for Yemen’s unity and a fear that instability in the south will further enable and embolden AQAP.
from Africa News blog:
100 years and going strong; But has the ANC-led government done enough for its people?
By Isaac Esipisu
Although the role of political parties in Africa has changed dramatically since the sweeping reintroduction of multi-party politics in the early 1990s, Africa’s political parties remain deficient in many ways, particularly their organizational capacity, programmatic profiles and inner-party democracy.
The third wave of democratization that hit the shores of Africa 20 years ago has undoubtedly produced mixed results as regards to the democratic quality of the over 48 countries south of the Sahara. However, one finding can hardly be denied: the role of political parties has evidently changed dramatically.
Notwithstanding few exceptions such as Eritrea , Swaziland and Somalia , in almost all sub-Saharan countries, governments legally allow multi-party politics. This is in stark contrast to the single-party regimes and military oligarchies that prevailed before 1990.
After years of marginalization during autocratic rule, many African political parties have regained their key role in democratic politics by mediating between politics and society. Multi-partyism paved the way for genuine parliamentary opposition and the strengthening of parliaments in decision-making. However, several shortcomings still remain: many African political parties suffer from low organizational capacity and a lack of internal democracy.
Dominated by individual leaders, often times lifelong chairpersons and “Big Men”, youth and women remain marginalized within party structures.
from The Great Debate:
Libya’s revolution pushes democracy forward
By Michael Ignatieff The views expressed are his own.
We like to think we made it happen. First in Kosovo, now in Libya, we believe our air power made it happen. Western politicians are taking the credit, but the truth is, we didn’t make it happen, any more than we made the Arab Spring happen and the air operation itself would never have been approved at the UN without the green light from the Arab League. The people of Libya, the peoples of the Middle East made it happen. We all need to understand how little of this is about us. Otherwise we risk succumbing to the illusion that we can shape the future in the Middle East.
The power we exercised in the sky gives us little control over what happens next. This is not just because we don’t have boots on the ground. Even when we did in the Balkans, we never controlled the way events rolled out after the air campaign was over. The people of the Balkans wrote their own history after the intervention and the people of the Middle East will do the same.
We called Libya a civil war and intervened to help one side win, as we did in Kosovo. But Libya was not a civil war. The dictator didn’t have deep enough support to turn it into one. It was a revolution, a people against a regime, rising up without any instigation from us, with nothing but rage, humiliation and hope to guide them. We gave them air cover and they made a revolution.
Let us not be romantic about revolutions, but let us also remember the hope they carry . The revolutionary moment—the discovery that ‘we the people’ brought the dictator down--gives the Libyans a chance to come together and build something out of the ruins. The people have discovered themselves. They have discovered their sovereignty and they will not willingly surrender it to gunmen or extremist Islamists, here or in Tunisia or Egypt. In Syria, in Yemen, in Algeria too, the people will see what the sovereignty of the street looks like and long for it too.
All revolutionary situations are poised between exhilaration and terror, and Libya is no exception. There are too many guns in the street, too many militias, too little authority and order. Revenge will be taken. Scores will be settled. Theft and vandalism will be legitimized as justice. Revolution could topple into civil war unless an army and a monopoly over the means of force are re-established. But those crowds, men and women all waving the same flag, the kids with their hands on their hearts, singing the anthem perched on their parent’s shoulders, are actually stronger than the men with guns, if they only could find a politics to express their power.
The future of Libya and the entire Middle East depends, not on us, but on something momentous and unpredictable: whether people who have never had the chance to do politics before can learn to do it now.
from MacroScope:
Give me liberty and give me cash!
Come back Mr Fukuyama, all is forgiven.
In his 1992 book "The End of History and the Last Man", American political scientist Francis Fukuyama famously argued that all states were moving inexorably towards liberal democracy. His thesis that democracy is the pinnacle of political evolution has since been challenged by the violent eruption of radical Islam as well as the economic success of authoritarian countries such as China and Russia.
Now a study by Russian investment bank Renaissance Capital into the link between economic wealth and democracy seems to back Fukuyama.
Looking at 150 countries and over 60 years of history, RenCap found that countries are likely to become more democratic as they enjoyed rising levels of income with democracy virtually 'immortal' in countries with a GDP per capita above $10,000.
" Only five democracies above the $6,000 income level have died. Even democracies above the $6,000 level have a 99 percent chance of sustaining their political system each year. The only exceptions were the military coups in Greece in 1967 ($9,800), Argentina in 1976 ($8,180) and Thailand in 2006 ($7,440), and the events in Venezuela in 2009 ($9,115), as well as Iran in 2004 ($8,475)," RenCap global chief economist Charles Robertson writes.
The $6,000 per capita GDP seems to be a crucial level, marking the point where a country is likely to shift to democracy. Tunisia, which early this year triggered the wave of uprisings against autocracy across the Arab world, recently crossed that threshold.
Conversely, democracy is most fragile at the lowest income levels and when incomes are shrinking. The world's populous democracy, India, is a notable exception as its per capita income was under $800 from 1950-1967, and only exceeded $2,000 in 2003.
from The Great Debate:
Why democracy will win
Philip N. Howard, an associate professor at the University of Washington, is the author of "The Digital Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy: Information Technology and Political Islam". The opinions expressed are his own.
The Day of Rage in Saudi Arabia was a tepid affair, and Libyan rebels have suffered strategic losses. Only two months ago, popular uprisings in Tunisia inspired Egyptians and others to take to the streets to demand political reform. Will the tough responses from Gadaffi and the Saudi government now discourage Arab conversations about democratic possibilities? It may seem like the dictators are ahead, but it’s only a temporary lead.
Ben Ali ruled Tunisia for 20 years, Mubarak reigned in Egypt for 30 years, and Gadaffi has held Libya in a tight grip for 40 years. Yet their bravest challengers are 20- and 30-year-olds without ideological baggage, violent intentions or clear leaders. The groups that initiated and sustained protests have few meaningful experiences with public deliberation or voting, and little experience with successful protesting. These young activists are politically disciplined, pragmatic and collaborative. Where do young people who grow up in entrenched authoritarian regimes get political aspirations? How do they learn about political life in countries where faith and freedom coexist?
The answer, for the most part, is online. And it is not just that digital media provided new tools for organizing protest and inspiring stories of success from Tunisia and Egypt. The important structural change in Middle East political life is not so much about digital ties between the West and the Arab street, but about connections between Arab streets.
Research has demonstrated three clear democratizing effects of the Internet, especially among young people in the region: more individuals are using the Internet to openly discuss the interpretation of Islamic texts, more people are forming individuated political identities online and creating their own media, and more citizens are actively debating gender politics and pan-Islamic identity. Satellite television has fed a transnational Middle East identity for several decades. But it is only in the last decade that people have started transnational conversations about politics and shared grievances.
Some experts thought the Internet was going to be a boon for radical voices and fundamentalist Islam. But it turns out that digital media more often push such extremists to the side, and bolster the networks of civil society groups over terrorist groups. Individuals learn that they can become sources of information, and that Dropbox accounts, Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, Google and a host of other tools provide ways for people to spread information beyond the reach of their despot.
“Democracies” can be a very broad range of governments. The word “Democratic” appears in the names of countries western liberal semi socialist democracies would consider autocracies or anti capitalist societies.
The countries that claim to be democratic are not necessarily going to be best friends or agree on fundamentals. .
The big disadvantage of the Internet is that it is most accessible to the affluent and techno-savy segment of society. It is also easy to post false and misleading information. There is little “quality control” and that is almost impossible to define. But “repressive” regimes seem to be those that exercise censorship of any media content. Freedom of the press is a commonly accepted belief at the UN level and is one of the principles of Human rights, but it is also subject to interpretation.
The large principals of human rights and good government are being established by agreements made in the UN and the administrative affairs of one’s native country are being subtly and not so subtly guided into conformity of global standards of practice and belief.
The US and Euro zone will be happiest with democracies that allow them the greatest opportunities to cross invest. The fundamental goal of all the governments of the world – of living, not failed states – is to provide the best possible standard of living for themselves. They want to profit from their relationships. They disagree internally on how that standard of living is distributed.
The west sells a market oriented way of life. All values are subservient to the market or appear to be. And ideally everyone has access to it on as equal terms as possible. During most of my life the west has even been characterized as libertine by not only puritanical communist regimes, or arch conservative Islamic parties but also the Catholic and fundamentalist Christian Churches. Israel and the Palestinians both have their under worlds, as do most all the countries on earth. And even religions have their living black markets or underworlds. There are such things as the governments of the ungovernable.
One could almost suggest that what the western Democracies want is the right for as much liberty shading into underworld activities as it can maintain without loosing itself in its own luxury and vice. The regimes it fears most are those that want to tone the “party” down too much. They tend to be depressing, brutal and bland. They tend to be systems that speak louder than those than live within them. The advanced economies don’t like things “sub-standard”. The UN also does not like substandard but its terms are broader than what is commercially defined.
But lets not fool ourselves: societies can be totally controlled by a few when they are most full of people distracted from the main sources of influence and power. And no political system can entirely protect its citizens from that. In fact the elites of all types of governments like as few hands stirring the pot as possible. Why else are elite schools so expensive?
from FaithWorld:
In free Egypt, Islamic Jihad leader says the time for the gun is over
(Abboud al-Zumar in an interview with Reuters in his home after his release from Liman Tora Prison at Helwan, south of Cairo, March 17, 2011/Mohamed Abd El-Ghany)
Abboud al-Zumar went to jail 30 years ago for his role in killing Egyptian President Anwar Sadat. Now a free man, he believes democracy will prevent Islamists from ever again taking up the gun against the state.
Zumar was a prisoner for as long as Sadat's successor, Hosni Mubarak, was president. His release with other leading Islamists jailed for militancy is a sign of dramatic change in Egypt in the five weeks since Mubarak was swept from power by mass protests. Zumar, 64, was a founding member of the Islamic Jihad group which gunned down Sadat during a military parade in 1981. He was released along with his cousin, Tarek al-Zumar, who had also spent three decades in jail on similar charges.
"The revolution created a new mechanism: the mechanism of strong, peaceful protests," said Zumar, released on March 12 and one of the political prisoners who owes his freedom to the peaceful revolt against Mubarak. "Public squares around the Arab world are ready to receive millions who can stop any ruler and expose him," added Zumar in an interview in his home village of Nahia on the rural outskirts of Cairo.
To many Egyptians, Zumar's name evokes a violent chapter in the history of a country that has been an incubator for Islamist militancy. Seeking to ease concerns, Zumar describes the Islamist movement as the "first line of defense" of Egyptian society. Islamists merely want to enjoy the same freedoms as everyone else in the new Egypt, he says.
from Pakistan: Now or Never?:
Pakistan’s political crisis
Never in the history of Pakistan has a democratically elected civilian government served out its full term and then been replaced by another one, also through democratic elections. It is that context that makes the latest political crisis in Pakistan so important.
Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani is scrambling to save his PPP-led government after it lost its parliamentary majority when its coalition partner, the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), announced it would go into opposition. A smaller religious party, the Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Islam (JUI-F), already quit the coalition last month. If the government falls and elections are held ahead of schedule in 2013, the opportunity for Pakistan to have a government which serves its full term will be lost.
The prevailing view among political analysts appears to be that the government is now less likely to last until 2013, even if it manages to survive in the short term. But given the peculiar nature of Pakistani politics, where the military exerts a powerful role behind the scenes, no one is predicting anything with any certainty.
The main opposition leader, former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, has shown little enthusiasm for forcing an early election which could propel his Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) into power at a time when the country faces huge economic and security problems. Better to wait it out until an election in 2013 that his PML-N is seen as likely to win. Having been ousted in a coup in 1999, Sharif also remains deeply suspicious of the army, and he has ruled out supporting any moves against the government that might be orchestrated by the military. Giving democracy time to bed down, by allowing the government led by the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) to serve its full term, could set a useful precedent for a future PML-N administration.
The army itself has shown no inclination to run the country directly, and it already controls the issues that matter most to it - foreign and security policy. It has barely disguised its frustration with Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari -- who also leads the PPP -- particularly after he travelled to France and Britain last summer while the country suffered from devastating floods. But that does not translate into wanting to see Sharif back in power. According to a U.S. embassy cable released by WikiLeaks, army chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani made it clear to U.S. officials that "regardless of how much he disliked Zardari, he distrusted Nawaz (Sharif) even more".
Another option, possibly more palatable to the army, would be an alternative coalition of smaller political parties which might be able to challenge both Zardari and Sharif in the next election. But that will take time to fall into place, possibly right up to 2013, if at all. Don't rule anybody out, however unlikely they seem now, as part of an alternative coalition. That includes former military ruler Pervez Musharraf, who set his sights very firmly on 2013 when he launched his political party in London in October.
A couple of final points. We don't actually know for sure whether there is a groundswell of popular support in favour of ditching the current government, though there is, as Nadeem Paracha argued in Dawn, a great deal of populist sloganeering on television channels about the state of the country. "Akin to a black comedy is the fact that most TV anchors and hosts that go on spouting all these concerns – unemployment, inflation, drone attacks, ‘good governance’, Aafia ki wapsi (jailed Pakistani scientist Aafia Siddiqui) etc. – are sitting pretty with hefty salaries and perks, and, what some would suggest, an agenda to safeguard the interests of some of the most anti-democracy classes in this country i.e., the military, the mullah and large sections of the upper and middle-classes."
Having studied the article and the available comments on the article and the knowledge of the Pakistan’s Politics it is not fair to make a sweeping remark. I would suggest that the best would be to find out what is wrong with Army and the Political Leaders of Pakistan that they both failed to run the government and establish democracy in real meaning of the term.
Pakistan is in trouble no doubt but for whom the entire situation has deteriorated, the army or the politicians are the questions. Democracy is not the fruit that grows on tree.
In West, all say their country are democratic, but is that notion true in all respect. No, it is not true. Sorry to say it they too are not fully democratic as the definition of democracy: “For the People, By the People, and of the people”. How could one adjust the wrong doings of the government looting of government treasury fund by the politicians and government officials in collusion and claims it to be democratic act. So also discriminatory Justice System, racism, Religious intolerance are not democratic acts but these are until now prevalent in the country.
Are these democratic if not what is democratic and what is democracy Killing people and declaring war against sovereign state on false pretext could be the acts of a democratic country or to pursue a double standard for Christian, Muslims and Jews covertly most of the time and openly sometimes can not be the acts of a democratic country. Finally, supporting Political, military, civil forces and civilians committing crime against human rights are not fit for a democratic country, which advocates democracy.
Therefore, before pointing finger on others is it not wise to search self. Now coming to the question of nuclear arsenal safety of Pakistan because of the political instability in the country has no basis to think of that because of the assurance given by the government repeatedly. It is not enough to say this may happen, that may happen, because of the fact that many can hypothetically happen but it does not in reality.
Which country is safe having nuclear arsenals? I would say none. Do any of my friends know how many nuclear bombs Israel possess? No none knows not even US Government know, where as US finances, supplies food, gives American’s taxed paid money with which it buys latest sophisticated armaments to commit genocide recently. Is it safe to have nuclear bombs in the hands of a genocide committal country?
It is strongly believed that because J. F. Kennedy refused to allow Israel to have nuclear establishment was assassinated, leave aside the killing of Indira Ghandi, Bhutto and others.
Think of the safety of nuclear arms in the hand of the most dangerous terrorist nation. Why worry about Pakistan’s nuclear arsenals falling in the hands of the terrorists. The nuclear arsenals are already in the hands of the terrorist nation. First, My friend Steve Coll should write about all countries possessing nuclear Bomb to be disarmed irrespective of countries big or small and help the US President’s endeavor to make the world totally free of nuclear arsenals instead of pin pricking a particular country without any cogent hard fact except on hypothesis of “Ifs” and “Buts”
from Pakistan: Now or Never?:
Pakistan, India and the value of democracy
Of the many comments I heard in Pakistan, one question particularly flummoxed me. Was democracy really the right system for South Asia? It came, unsurprisingly, from someone sympathetic to the military, and was couched in a comparison between Pakistan and India.
What had India achieved, he asked, with its long years of near-uninterrupted democracy, to reduce the gap between rich and poor? What of the Maoist rebellion eating away at its heartland? Its desperate poverty? The human rights abuses from Kashmir to Manipur, when Indian forces were called in to quell separatist revolts? Maybe, he said, democracy was just not suited to countries like India and Pakistan.
The question surprised me, in part because I had never really been forced before to defend democracy, possibly because in the West we take it so much for granted that we have forgotten why it matters. It also surprised me for the sheer conviction of the sentiment.
In Pakistan, this is not a mere academic debate. Just last week, Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani said there was no threat to democracy and the army had no intention of taking power. Yet the very fact he had to say so at all spoke of deep disquiet in the country over the civilian government's handling of Pakistan's floods, which with it has brought new mutterings of an eventual return to military rule.
"Why the prime minister needed to hammer this point home once again could be anybody’s guess," the Daily Times said in an editorial. "The diminishing returns of a corrupt and incompetent democracy are leading to the inescapable suspicion that something is in the air, in the possible shape of an anti-democratic intervention."
To be clear, there is no sign of an imminent military coup. The army neither wants to, nor needs to take power, since it already calls the shots on the issues that matter to it -- foreign and security policy. But equally, the army's lead role in flood relief has increased its clout and encouraged misgivings about the value of democracy which could act as a slow-burning fuse if the civilian government is not able to improve its performance. And according to some, it is a slow-burning fuse lit by the military itself -- or by what Dawn columnist Cyril Almedia calls the 800-pound gorilla of Pakistani politics, the army.
Democracy must deliver or else, seems to be the refrain currently gripping Pakistan. So far, however, few have spelled out the value of democracy, nor for that matter said precisely what they mean by "or else".
Democracy in India does not compare with that in the developed Western nations. It has its own unique flavor. I can compare the roads in India to those in the developed West. In Indian roads one sees pedestrians, bicycles, bullock carts, cows, old trucks, motor bikes, cars, beggars and everything is on a slow move with constant honks filling the background. In Western roads, one finds clean and spotless quality with honks seldom heard, modern vehicles going much faster. Both are transportation systems. But they appear vastly different.
What matters is the exercise. India has not achieved full maturity in democracy. It will probably take a couple of centuries to get to that level. But the exercise cannot be given up because it does not resemble that in developed nations which have dabbled with it for more than two hundred years.
For democracy to thrive, all one needs is wisdom. One does not have to be literate or elitist. The poor man in India has enough political wisdom to throw out candidates. Through a persistent exercise, Indian democracy has reached a somewhat elementary school level from kindergarten. Until about twenty years ago, one family and one political party dominated the Indian political scene. It was much like Pakistan being under military rule and a preference for it by Pakistanis for lack of alternatives.
I’d say that the Nehru dynasty simply mothered Indian democracy until it could crawl and move on its own. Now there are regional parties that have taken on the stage at the center and coalition governments have become the norm. In the 1970s, regional parties had no clout at the center. At the state level, dynastic politics still continues. But with more economic progress, this should change.
India has vast variation in terms of development on one side and utter backwardness on the other. The Maoist issue has arisen mostly due to political neglect and utter backwardness in those states. Like Arundhati Roy says, the barrel of the gun will not subdue it. But it is all part of the overall mosaic.
Democracy in India has gained some kind of momentum. No one can take away people’s right anymore. Many oppressed communities like Dalits and Muslims have realized the power of voter blocks. They vote en masse and politicians want their votes.
In Pakistan, cold war geo-politics wiped out the roots of democracy. The US always prefers dictators in other countries for quick returns. Its business like attitude has destroyed many small countries. Pakistan became a victim of American geo-politics. The US encouraged and supported Pakistani military generals, showered them with state of the art weapons, turned a blind eye to their regional ambitions and never helped democracy take root. A military that had become blood thirsty will never allow any other system to take its power away.
Pakistan has the same type of people as India does. If India managed to keep its democratic system alive all the way through, Pakistanis are fully capable of the same. It is just that they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Sixty years later, one cannot simply plug in democracy there and expect it to mature fast. The foundations for that have been destroyed. Though Pakistan sports a democratic government, it is its military that is the real power.
Corruption is a big menace in Indian politics. But we have not given up on our democracy. It definitely has become better compared to before. We’ll run along this road filled with bullock carts, cows, bicycles, pedestrians, beggars, luxury cars, auto rikshaws, buses and old trucks. We know there are many pot holes everywhere. But with time, things will improve.
A shoddy democracy is better than no democracy at all.
“Always a borrower, never a lender be”
-Laurence Copeland is professor of finance at Cardiff University Business School. The opinions expressed are his own and do not constitute investment advice. -
The first chapter of the Eurozone crisis story has ended as expected, with the Germans (and Dutch and Austrians) left to foot the bill, repeating the pattern we have seen in the last couple of years, at the micro and macro level: savers bailing out borrowers, the solvent rescuing the insolvent, the responsible minority rescuing the feckless majority from the consequences of their irresponsibility. No wonder banks don’t want to lend and firms don’t want to invest.
Apart from the injustice, the really damaging aspect is the message it sends out loud and clear about the way modern Western democracies operate. The younger generation will be noting the lesson — even if David Willetts, the Minister for Universities, is not — that those who work and save must bear the burden of carrying those who do neither, because nowadays the welfare state operates at all levels: personal, national, global.
The choice is, as they say, a no-brainer. Shakespeare’s Polonius needs updating: “Always a borrower, never a lender be”.
This state of affairs is not something sudden, but rather the culmination of at least half a century of evolution, as the dynamics of democracy led us from a society based on the principle that nobody should be disadvantaged by accident of birth or chance, which was agreed in all Western countries by the end of World War Two, to the current consensus that nobody should be disadvantaged by indolence or fecklessness.
With its corrosive and cumulative effect on the will to work and save, it is a philosophy which local governments could never have afforded to embrace –- so they had to be bankrolled by central government. Now that central governments in turn are going bankrupt under the burden, they are left to scour the world for a sugar-daddy willing to bail them out, like a struggling Premier League football club looking for a billionaire with money to burn.
Are you totally mad? The elite in this country reads the Telegraph, not the Guardian.
It works in finance, and receives far greater subsidy than state employees, even ones like yourself.
The other great subsidees are the farmers on the payroll of the CAP. As the bedrock of tory opposition to the EU, they have their own claims on hypocrisy records.
Can I have your dealers number….. pease?
Inflation or deflation: a stress test for democracy
-Laurence Copeland is professor of finance at Cardiff University Business School. The opinions expressed are his own-
The policy debate is hotting up. On one side, we have the expansionists, arguing that it’s the Nineteen Thirties all over again, that Keynes is right now as he was then – we need more, not less government spending, we are digging our own graves by cutting back, especially as the fiscal retrenchment is continent-wide, covering thrifty North Europe as well as profligate ClubMed. According to this view, fiscal contraction will exacerbate the situation by magnifying the fall in the level of economic activity, leading to a downward spiral and, incidentally, making it harder than ever to repay our debts.
On the other side, the contractionists argue that comparison with the Nineteen Thirties is grossly misleading. Debt levels were far far lower for all the major economies in those days. Most important of all, in the Nineteen Thirties the threat (which duly materialised) was deflation, not inflation, so government spending financed by printing money was riskless.
The central question then is this: is inflation actually a risk today? Or is deflation the bigger risk?
On the one hand, falling prices could be catastrophic for two reasons.
First, ever since Keynes, economists have believed that deflation causes unemployment because wage levels rarely fall pro rata, so employers, squeezed between lower prices for the goods and services they sell and unchanged labour costs, are forced to lay off workers so as to protect their businesses.
Secondly, a falling price level implies a rising debt burden, or an increase in the real cost of repaying the country’s outstanding debts. If you think this is purely a matter of economic theory, just compare it with the situation facing a householder with a mortgage – inflation raises his wages and the price of everything he buys, making the burden of his mortgage lighter every year, while deflation does the opposite, meaning he has to struggle to repay a debt which remains unchanged while the value of everything else (including his house) is shrinking.
