The coming days

The week ahead

Myanmar's neighbours meet to discuss how to help the stricken country, and other news of the week

• MORE than two weeks after a devastating cyclone battered Myanmar (formerly Burma), and with the official death toll now above 77,000—and expected by some to go as high as 200,000—the country's neighbours are finally gathering to discuss how to help. Some 2.5m people are said by the United Nations to have been severely affected by the storm and its aftermath, yet the government of Myanmar continues to resist large-scale foreign aid. Foreign ministers of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) who gather in Singapore on Monday May 19th could do most good if they tried to persuade Myanmar's awful regime to open up to more foreign help.

For background see article

• TWO more states hold Democratic primaries on Tuesday May 20th, with Hillary Clinton, who is lingering in the race for now, expected to win comfortably in Kentucky and Barack Obama likely to do well in liberal Oregon. Later in the week attention may turn towards the Republican race as a former member of the Grand Old Party, Bob Barr, is expected to be chosen as the presidential candidate of the Libertarians. Mr Barr does not have the faintest hope of becoming president, but in a tight race such a third-party candidate could divert a few voters from Mr McCain.

For background see article

• RUSSIA'S new president, Dmitry Medvedev, travels eastwards this week, making his way via Kazakhstan to China for a two-day official visit, his first since assuming his job earlier this month. He will arrive in China on Friday May 23rd. Next month he is scheduled to travel to Germany, Russia's biggest trading partner.

For background see article

• SERBIA has a rare opportunity to present itself in a positive light when its capital, Belgrade, hosts the annual Eurovision song contest on Saturday May 24th. As well as heartbreakingly awful songs and dubious voting by immediate neighbours for each other's contestants, the show gives the host the chance to promote its tourist attractions to tens of millions of viewers across the continent. As the success of pro-European moderates in the recent general election suggests, younger Serbs, at least, are seeking closer contacts with the European Union.

Food Crisis May Divide Middle East's Oil Haves, Have-Nots

May 18 (Bloomberg) -- The wealth gap among Middle Eastern nations may widen as countries with crude oil spend their way out of the food crisis and those without bust their budgets.

The region's powers are pursuing different approaches to defusing the tensions unleashed by the jump in the cost of staples such as rice, vegetable oils and dairy products. Egypt has forbidden the export of rice and is raising taxes to help pay for an 88 percent increase in subsidies, while Saudi Arabia can afford to lower tariffs and the United Arab Emirates is looking to buy farms as far away as Thailand.

``Oil producers can easily pay for food subsidies,'' John Sfakianakis, chief economist at Riyadh-based Saudi British Bank, said in a telephone interview. ``The countries without oil are more fiscally challenged and face public contention and discontent.''

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak says he will raise the issue of skyrocketing food costs when he hosts world leaders including U.S. President George W. Bush as well as business executives at the Middle East's World Economic Forum starting May 18th. Economic disparities mean regional leaders are unlikely to agree on a coordinated response.

``Our entire food system is broken,'' said Carin Smaller, an agricultural trade analyst in Geneva for the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy. ``Some countries have to take unilateral measures now because there is not enough food on the world market. It's going to intensify the crisis.''

Clashes With Police

The issue is critical in non-oil countries like Egypt, where three people were killed last month in clashes with police during a two-day riot over climbing prices. The cost of rice, staple for half the world's population, has almost doubled in the past year, reaching a record $25.07 on April 24. Wheat prices jumped 69 percent in the same period.

Mubarak has promised to increase government salaries and added 15 million people to the country's ration-card system, ending a 20-year freeze on new memberships. Egypt also has banned rice exports from April through October.

To fund the 14 billion Egyptian pounds ($2.6 billion) needed for the salary increases, parliament approved higher taxes on fuel and cigarettes and raised duties on vehicles, which will generate 12 billion pounds.

Spending on subsidies will increase 88 percent next year to 128 billion Egyptian pounds, or 39 percent of the government budget -- at a time when the current budget deficit is 6.9 percent of gross domestic product.

Food Subsidies

``The problem is Egypt doesn't have the money to pay for food subsidies,'' said Simon Kitchen, an economist and strategist at Cairo-based EFG-Hermes.

In Saudi Arabia, which has an economy three times the size of Egypt's and a third its population of 81.7 million, the government cut duties on wheat imports and lowered tariffs to 5 percent on frozen chicken, eggs, vegetable oil and canned food. That cost 6 billion riyals ($1.6 billion) a year in revenue, Okaz newspaper reported on April 3. Saudi Arabia, the world's largest oil exporter, is also planning to boost welfare payments and acquire farms abroad.

The U.A.E., which stashed away about $875 billion in its sovereign wealth fund as oil more than quadrupled, is considering purchasing farms in Cambodia, Thailand and Africa because ``the weather doesn't help us grow items in the country,'' Mohammed Ahmed bin Abdul Aziz, undersecretary of the Planning Sector at the Ministry of Economy, said in a May 13 interview.

Bought the Farm

``Buying farms is not a bad thing,'' Panos Konandreas, acting director of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization in Geneva, said in a telephone interview. ``If you are like Saudi Arabia and have all the resources in the world, you can help farms optimize their strategies and there will be more production.''

Higher prices have led to record levels of inflation throughout the Gulf and oil producing states have been under pressure to follow Kuwait and drop their currencies' dollar pegs to help slow price increases. All have kept the links, citing the need to keep currencies fixed until they form a monetary union in 2010.

Food scarcity in the Middle East, the world's largest wheat importer, is expected to be a key subject of discussion at the forum though it is not on the formal agenda, said Daniel Davies, head of the forum's Middle East program. Those attending include European Union Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson, World Bank President Robert Zoellick and U.S. trade negotiator Susan Schwab.

The increased trade restrictions and subsidies come as Middle Eastern countries have been opening their economies to global trade. Saudi Arabia joined the World Trade Organization in December 2005, Bahrain signed a free trade agreement with the U.S. in 2004, and Egypt has been cutting duties as it seeks a similar accord with the U.S.

``Countries are overreacting by imposing bans on exports or over-importing and hoarding food, which pushes prices higher,'' Konandreas said.

REFLEXIONES LIBERTARIAS
CULTURA ANGLO PROTESTANTE E IBERO CATOLICA (I)
Primera parte
Ricardo Valenzuela

Durante los últimos cinco siglos desde que Colón se encontró con el nuevo mundo en su aventura en busca de una nueva ruta hacia el La India, las colonias y después países del hemisferio occidental han seguido caminos muy diferentes que los han conducido a exhibir impactantes contrastes en sus condiciones y circunstancias. Los EU y Canadá en donde las instituciones democráticas y el capitalismo se remontan a la época colonial, han sido refinados y moldeados para promover altos niveles de progreso nacional. Se han transformado de remotas colonias dependientes de gran Bretaña o Francia, en los países dominantes de los tres polos regionales de poder mundial; América del Norte, Europa Occidental, y el Este de Asia. EU y Canadá tienen obviamente problemas, pero la mayoría son producto de su mismo éxito y prosperidad, y son pecata minuta ante las graves crisis que enfrenta América Latina.

Las antiguas colonias de España y Portugal, que iniciaron su desarrollo un siglo antes que América del Norte y tienen el doble de la población de EU y Canadá, hoy día se encuentran a un siglo de distancia en lo referente a la madurez y estabilidad de sus instituciones políticas, crecimiento, tecnología, cultura, educación, prosperidad, y justicia social. Solo en años recientes gobiernos democráticamente electos empezaron a florecer en América Latina, y muchos de esos experimentos democráticos son precarios. Los niveles de vida son solo un 10% de los registrados en EU y Canadá. La distribución de tierra, ingreso, riqueza, y oportunidades es realmente injusta para los estándares de las democracias avanzadas. El narcotrafico se ha convertido en la actividad económica más importante en América Latina, contribuyendo de una forma muy importante al aniquilamiento de los valores que deberían de estar forjando nuestro futuro.

Pero ¿por qué tales diferencias? Canadá y Estados Unidos fueron colonizados por Gran Bretaña que les permitió una gran autonomía para gobernarse. En ambos países el federalismo fue percibido como un gran concepto para integrar colonias independientes bajo una sola nación. América Latina sin embargo, fue colonizada por España y Portugal cuyos regímenes centralizados no permitieron libertad para gobernarse. Ambos EU y Canadá fueron productos de colonizaciones que sintetizaron Protestantismo, las teorías sociales de Locke, y los derechos naturales de los ingleses. Esta herencia de América del Norte que incluyó teología y teoría política, fue mucho mas conductiva a una estructura de dispersión del poder de sus centros, que la de América Latina de una organización jerárquica y centralizada como la iglesia católica que durante siglos controló al mundo a base de culpa, y el absolutismo autocrático de los Borbón.

Ahora, ¿por qué los líderes políticos, burócratas, religiosos, e intelectuales en América Latina consistentemente durante los últimos 150 años, han estado utilizando las instituciones equivocadas, y sobretodo las políticas equivocadas ante la avalancha de evidencias de que no nos estaban llevando en la dirección correcta? ¿Por qué nuestros líderes hasta la fecha siguen aplicando las mismas recetas erróneas que nos han tenido en agonía casi durante dos siglos, que tienen a más de la población literalmente muriendo de hambre? ¿Por qué México después de haber perdido la mitad de su territorio, haber destruido nuestra moneda, haber arruinado la producción agropecuaria, por qué después de haber perdido casi dos siglos, nuestros líderes políticos se aferran con soberbia a las políticas e instituciones equivocadas? ¿Es posible que México sufra de un pendejismo colectivo? No lo creemos y veamos el por qué.

A Estados Unidos y Canadá les tomó siglos el desarrollar sus exitosas políticas y construir sus instituciones, no son producto de la magia demagógica. Quince años después de que Japón fue expuesto al mundo con el arribo de la flota del Comodoro Perry a la bahía de Tokio en 1853, los líderes de la dinastía Meiji iniciaron un programa para adaptar estas políticas e instituciones, que de una manera muy sabia las observaron como esenciales para el futuro del Imperio moderno que ellos visualizaron. América Latina sin embargo, durante siglos ha rechazado el aplicar la exitosa receta en su región, fallando miserablemente en el establecimiento de instituciones viables que han sido el secreto del éxito de EU, Canadá---Europa Occidental, Australia, Nueva Zelanda, y mas recientemente el Este de Asia. Este rechazo no puede ser interpretado como un error de juicio. Este error ha vivido con nosotros durante casi dos siglos de independencia. Definitivamente nos negamos a creer en el pendejismo colectivo y congénito.

Las políticas equivocadas de América Latina y nuestras instituciones débiles, decrépitas, y enfermas----y lo que pudiera parecer como falta de sentido común-----es más que otra cosa un fenómeno cultural que ha fluido de los tradicionales valores y actitudes Ibero Católicos. La cultura orientada al presente y al pasado en detrimento del futuro; la cultura que nutre el autoritarismo; promueve un código de ética muy flexible, guarda como reliquia la ortodoxia; rechaza la autorealización en el trabajo, creatividad, frugalidad. La cultura que ha promovido que el hombre desobedezca cualquiera de los mandamientos, porque al fin y al cabo con la confesión se me perdona. La cultura que ha hecho de México como lo describe uno de los hombres que yo más admiro, mi padre; el país de la improvisación, la irresponsabilidad, y la falta de respeto. Esta es la cultura que explica el porque al final de este glorioso siglo para gran parte de la humanidad, América Latina sigue siendo pobre, subdesarrollada, injusta, una caricatura de los que son los Estados Unidos y Canadá.

Max Weber hacia una interesante diferenciación de las culturas de acuerdo a sus practicas religiosas en la cual el ligaba el racionalismo, la ética, lo practico del protestantismo Calvinista, con el capitalismo, el desarrollo económico, y prosperidad. Por otra parte el explicaba las condiciones mucho menos favorables de los países católicos como la consecuencia de un fatalista, irracional, forma de ver la vida como “solamente este valle de lagrimas. La verdadera recompensa la tendremos en el otro mundo.” Pero la mayor diferencia la hacia con las dos afirmaciones: El católico; que se haga la voluntad de Dios. El protestante; que se haga mi voluntad, con la ayuda de Dios.

Saturday, May 17, 2008

Five Best
The Modern American West

1. What You See in Clear Water
By Geoffrey O'Gara
Knopf, 2000

This timely work sheds light on the conflict over water rights in the American West, but it also describes the history of the Arapaho and Shoshone tribes who now live on the enormous and gorgeous Wind River Reservation in Wyoming, and it explores their relations with white settlers and their descendants. Geoffrey O'Gara's writing, though informed by careful research, is rooted in the land. He writes of Indian Inspector James McLaughlin's trek to the Wind River Canyon a century ago: "On the long trip north, he rarely looked up at the tall skidding clouds, or down at the sudden draws that dropped through the floor of the plains. It was spring, but barely spring, and scalloped ridges of snow still snugged against the lee sides of the hills." It's all there in "What You See in Clear Water" -- a tragedy in the making but overlaid with such tender beauty that you can't tear your eyes away from the page.

2. The Meadow
By James Galvin
Holt, 1992

As James Galvin tells it, the patch of ground that gives "The Meadow" its name is a sort of no-man's land accidentally left off the map when lines were being drawn between Colorado and Wyoming. But the land exerts a powerful hold on the people who work it. Weaving back and forth across the past century, Galvin traces the ownership of the meadow from Appleton Worster, who homesteaded the land in 1895, to App's son, Ray, and then to Lyle Van Waning in the present day. It might be fairer to say that the men were owned by the land than the other way around: "The way people watch television while they eat -- looking up to the TV and down to take a bite and back up, that's how Lyle watches the meadow out the south window while he eats his breakfast. He's hooked on the plot and he doesn't want to miss anything."

3. The Solace of Open Spaces
By Gretel Ehrlich
Viking, 1985

"It's May and I've just awakened from a nap, curled against sagebrush the way my dog has taught me to sleep -- sheltered from wind," begins this collection of essays by Gretel Ehrlich about her beloved Wyoming. "A front is pulling the huge sky over me, and from the dark a hailstone has hit me in the head. I'm trailing a band of two thousand sheep across a stretch of Wyoming badlands." Ehrlich is frank about the rural "small-mindedness that seals people in," but she has a rough affection for the sheepherders she chooses to work with and for an uncompromising way of life, the "sperm, blood, and guts of ranching."

4. Refuge
By Terry Tempest Williams
Vintage, 1992

In "Refuge," Terry Tempest Williams tenderly records two disasters -- one natural, one personal and unnatural. The first is the rain-fueled rise of the Great Salt Lake in the 1980s to record levels, destroying a migratory-bird habitat that she cherished. The second is her mother's slow death from cancer, an illness -- like that of her grandmother and an aunt -- that Williams attributes to the fact that her family lived downwind from a nuclear-weapons testing facility. Williams concludes that her only refuge is in the acceptance of change. "The birds have simply moved on," she writes. "They give me the courage to do the same."

5. Breaking Clean
By Judy Blunt
Knopf, 2002

"I rarely go back to the ranch where I was born or the neighboring land where I bore the fourth generation of a ranching family." Thus Judy Blunt opens her dryly funny memoir about the hardships and frustrations of the ranching life in remote northeastern Montana -- where she grew up, married a rancher and then, after a dozen years as his wife, decided to escape into the arms of poetry and learning in a college town. Anyone who has ever chafed at the isolating intimacy of rural life will cheer her on.