Thomas Friedman of the New York Times has another attractively barking column up (potted summary: There’s nothing wrong with Mexico that couldn’t be cured with a combination of “real leadership” and vast amounts of money from America. Well I suppose it worked for Chile). But once more, he salts the sauce with plenty of good old Globollocks. Due to time constraints, I haven’t been able to carry out a full Globollocks analysis. But I picked up this gem, which will serve as an indicator of the sort of thing the New York Times will print these days.
On two previous occasions, I’ve caught Airmiles red-handed in possession of interesting facts about Mexico that weren’t true, so he’s gone onto the “always check” list. Which turned up the following little gem:
[life’s shit –dd] “… when you are an oil-rich country but you import energy from America because your constitution restricts foreign investment in the energy sector.”
Mexico imports energy from the USA? Do they? Do they really? Since the USA is a massive net energy importer from the world as a whole, it struck me as unlikely that the USA would be a net energy exporter bilaterally with one of its biggest trading partners.
Score one for me. As of 2000, when this handy guide was written, Mexico was the source of 9 per cent of the USA’s net energy imports.
2000 was a long time ago? Well yes. Because I’m more scrupulous than Airmiles, I checked up the very latest figures and crunched the numbers myself. Mexico was a net exporter of petroleum to the USA (1279k barrels/day) and a net importer of natural gas (261bn cubic feet in 2002). Mexico is a small net exporter of coal and net importer of electricity with respect to the USA, but the numbers are too small to be worth the Energy Information Authority writing down.
Using the quoted thermal conversion factors (1010 btu/cubic foot for natural gas exports and 5.865m btu/barrel for petroleum imports), I make that:
261 x 1,000,000,000 x 1010 = 263.61trn btu of natural gas net imported by Mexico from the USA during 2002
and
1279 x 1,000 x 365 x 5,865,000 = 2,737.99trn btu of petroleum exported by Mexico to the USA during 2002.
for
Net energy imported by the USA from Mexio of roughly two and a half quadrillion btus. Note that the only energy categories where Mexico is not a net exporter to the USA are electricity (in trivial amounts, I would guess most of which are attributable to the single town of Tijuana) and natural gas (where the amount imported from the USA about 20% of total demand). Mexico isn’t dependent on the USA to anything like the extent to which the USA is dependent on Mexico.
Cross-checking with the answers on page 283, I find that in 2001, in total, Mexico produced 9.35 qdrn btu of energy and consumed 6.00qdrn. This would imply that net exports to the USA in 2002 (c2.5qdrn btu for those keeping score) were about 73% of 2001 total net exports. Which seems ballpark.
So in other words, unless a) something utterly unusual happened in 2003 and b) Friedman has access to as yet unpublished statistics, his assertion that Mexico imported energy from the USA has to be regarded as “bollocks”.
But is it specifically Globollocks, or just the normal fear and hatred of the fact which characterises Airmiles’ work?
Yep, it’s Globollocks, on two counts. First up, we have “those poor capital-starved third-worlders”. Mexico is meant to be an energy importer “because its consitution restricts foreign investment in the energy sector”. In actual fact, the oil and natural gas fields in Mexico are owned by Pemex, the state oil and gas company. It’s the world’s eighth largest integrated oil and gas company, and a massive borrower on global capital markets. The idea that there are material energy resources going unexploited in Mexico because of a lack of capital is quite silly.
Second, since when did it prove anything that in order to be doing something properly, you have to be a net exporter? Once more, as with so many other Globollocks arguments, you see a mercantilist fallacy which is recognised as such if anyone tries to apply it to developed countries, but which is brought back in through the back door as a stick to beat developing countries with for being insufficiently neoliberal. So the fact that Pemex decides to pump its oil and leave its gas in the ground cannot possibly be evidence of anything other than a lack of foreign equity investment (foreign debt investment in the Mexican natural resources sector is huge).
It’s a nasty, patronising argument. And it’s based on a factual inaccuracy. And it has the effect of helping to create the idea in public debate that there is a crisis in Mexican energy policy which can only be solved by selling off their natural resource birthright. All of which makes me think that “Airmiles” Friedman might be something a little bit nastier than the harmless buffoon I had taken him for. Perhaps my words to him when I next see him in a lounge will have to be a little harsher than I had previously planned …
Footnotes:
[1] No, Thomas “Airmiles”[2] Friedman he now inescapably is, in my mind. Kristol will have to make do with the nickname “Slightly Fewer Airmiles”, or SFA for short.
[2] Crooked Timber is now sixth result in a Google search for “Airmiles”
{ 39 comments }
WillieStyle 04.05.04 at 6:28 pm
Due to time constraints, I haven’t been able to carry out a full Globollocks analysis.
Indeed.
Still, excellent work.
P.S.
As an avid reader, I really must insist that you tell me precisely what I’m suppossed to think about Globalization rather than simply telling me what not to think.
Greg Hunter 04.05.04 at 6:28 pm
Tommy F. The proponent of the “Ownership Society” along with NYT.
I would suspect NY and NYT would bitch like hell if the NYSE moved to Brazil.
Look at the top schools, top radio programs, news ….. I guess the “cream of the crop” are all on the glorious East Coast.
Tommy F. knows the big board with NYT’s help, have all the “right” answers for the world.
No wonder we are in a world of shit.
praktike 04.05.04 at 6:54 pm
Dear Thomas Friedman,
Have you ever heard of the resource curse?
Love,
Praktike
Matt Weiner 04.05.04 at 7:09 pm
here is what should be the permanent link for the column.
Vast amounts of money from the U.S. does not seem like such a bad solution to me–we could have used some of the stuff we’re pouring into Iraq–but what do I know.
david 04.05.04 at 8:46 pm
“Once more, as with so many other Globollocks arguments, you see a mercantilist fallacy which is recognised as such if anyone tries to apply it to developed countries, but which is brought back in through the back door as a stick to beat developing countries with for being insufficiently neoliberal.”
That’s really good. I think you are wrong about Friedman though. He’s a pinhead; he’s not nasty, it’s the consequences of the fact that his pinheadedness passes for wisdom that brings about the nasty. Which is not to say he shouldn’t be spoken to in the most abusive terms in whatever business traveler lounge one might find him.
Andrew Boucher 04.05.04 at 8:52 pm
Not that I particularly care, but Friedman said, “import” and not “net import”. His point could have been that Mexico needn’t have imported any natural gas at all, had it allowed for investment from the U.S.
Gary Farber 04.05.04 at 10:48 pm
“Mexico is meant to be an energy importer ‘because its consitution restricts foreign investment in the energy sector’. In actual fact, the oil and natural gas fields in Mexico are owned by Pemex, the state oil and gas company.”
I’m missing the obvious contradiction here.
Just out of curiosity, what do you recommend as a proper economic policy to make Mexico more wealthy and healthy?
“Perhaps my words to him when I next see him in a lounge will have to be a little harsher than I had previously planned.”
“Which is not to say he shouldn’t be spoken to in the most abusive terms in whatever business traveler lounge one might find him.”
Perhaps I’m just an overly timid soul, but these thoughts seem rather unpleasant to me. I can’t imagine going up to a stranger in a public place, no matter how much I despised their expressed opinions, to be unpleasant to them. It seems to me uncalled-for rudeness, given the crime. It seems rather threatening and intimidating to me.
But that’s just me. I suppose I should watch out for meeting some folks who post here if they take a dislike to my opinions. Good to know.
a different chris 04.05.04 at 11:15 pm
Maybe Airmiles could consider the possibility that their natural gas delivery infrastructure is underdeveloped, and the payback on the necessary investment is currently negative.
Hey, I know a solution to that!! They could use child labor to build new pipelines!! It’s Econ 101 according to not only some sad soul infesting Nathan Newman’s (NEWMAN!’s) comments, but apparently a good phalanx full of neo-lib globalization peddlers.
Gavin 04.05.04 at 11:48 pm
To agree with Williestyle a little, it might be helpful to see a distinction between globollocks and glotruth, as it were. What would you count as a true statement about the benefits of free-er trade, for example?
Or equally, perhaps you could take on an article by Bhagwati rather than just small-fry like Friedman.
I’d like to see it.
Abiola Lapite 04.05.04 at 11:53 pm
Dsquared,
For once, I am mostly in agreement with what you have to say, but the following bit strikes me as a bit … off.
“And it has the effect of helping to create the idea in public debate that there is a crisis in Mexican energy policy which can only be solved by selling off their natural resource birthright.”
Perhaps the public ownership of the oil sector might actually have something to do with Mexico’s poor record in terms of governance and corruption? Perhaps it isn’t a good idea under most circumstances for governments to have available to them major sources of revenue that are in no way dependent on taxing their citizens? Just a thought.
Praktike mentioned the “resource curse” above. You might want to think a bit more about how that has worked out in other major oil producers before talking about “natural resource birthrights.” There’s precious little evidence that such “birthrights” have had any long-term positive impact, much less a “precious” one, on citizens of countries that weren’t wealthy to begin with (e.g. Norway and the UK). I don’t see how Nigeria, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea, Angola, Venezuela, Iraq and even Saudi Arabia are really any better off for having basked in windfall gains for a few years only to sink back into levels of squalor that have in many cases been worse than anything they knew before their oil booms.
Anyone who says oil is a “precious” thing, a “natural resource birthright” dearly worth holding onto, should please explain to me why countries like Israel, Japan and South Korea that are entirely lacking in such “birthrights” are doing so much better economically than those that have them. Israel in particular, though small in size, is a giant stick in the eye to its neighbors for being so prosperous although oil-free, while surrounded by oil-rich but impoverished despotisms – even for the mighty Saudis, income per head is already below $7,000 and still plunging.
asg 04.06.04 at 12:13 am
The sentiments expressed by gavin and williestyle do seem well-placed. Or else one might be tempted to infer a potted summary along the lines that there’s nothing wrong with Mexico that wouldn’t be fixed with an $8/hour minimum wage, a pep talk from the AFL-CIO, and a copy of van Parijs’ “Real Freedom for All.”
Billy the Kid 04.06.04 at 12:31 am
-Every job we lose is a good thing.
-Every investment dollar we lose is a good thing.
-Every tax dollar we lose is a good thing.
At what point does our faltering system become a bad thing? What is the threshold for the Tom Friedmans of the world? Just curious because on the one hand we need to follow the stars, but on the other hand we need to recognize that the big rock island in front of us ain’t our friend.
james 04.06.04 at 2:15 am
Its possible Friedmen meant power generation. This would clear up allot of inconsistencies in the article. Mexico does import electricity and export Oil. Does Mexico’s constitution prevent foreign investment in power production and transmition?
I always question the validity of any solution that starts with “… spends vast sums of money.”
david 04.06.04 at 2:48 am
Electricity privatization is a hot topic in Mexico, and a policy that Fox has been pushing.
dsquared 04.06.04 at 7:12 am
Couple of comments:
I must say I think the “resource curse” is the most unholy balls. How can it be better to not have oil than to have it? The only real curse, as far as I can see, is to have something that Great Powers want to steal, in the absence of a sufficiently large army to stop them from nicking it. I don’t see Lebanon or Ethiopia managing to reap the gains of good governance from having no natural resources. Also the example of Israel cuts both ways; you’re looking there at a country which has a large source of untaxed government income (transfer payments from overseas) equal in size to a couple of oil wells, which hasn’t seemed to suffer the “resource curse”.
On talking to people in business lounges; like heck. Friedman invites people to interact with him. He publishes “unsolicited” anecdotes from people he meets along the way in his books.
On my positive vision for Globollocks; I will write something about Bhagwati in the near future. But I don’t think a positive vision is appropriate. There’s no doubting that the future will be more or less the neoliberal vision; there are too many powerful interests at work for this not to be the case. It’s much more important to warn people about what the dangerous parts of this program are, than to write recipes for kitchens that aren’t ever going to be built.
Chris Bertram 04.06.04 at 7:36 am
I don’t know, D^2. I was convinced that having oil was a bad thing, given the incentives it provides for would-be predatory dictators to predate, by Thomas Pogge’s arguments in World Poverty and Human Rights which “I blogged about on Junius ages ago”:http://junius.blogspot.com/2002_10_06_junius_archive.html#85551036
. If this _is_ balls then I’d like you to have an extended crack at it in a posting.
Chris Bertram 04.06.04 at 7:41 am
I should, of course, have put the necessary “other things being equal” modifier in the earlier comment. Which they aren’t if you’re Norway. Also, I don’t see the relevance of your mentions of Ethopia and Lebanon. No-one is going to thing that because you lack one particular impediment to good governance that you are guaranteed to be well-governed!
Matthew 04.06.04 at 9:12 am
a stick to beat developing countries with for being insufficiently neoliberal
Nice one, sums up nicely a lot of the “free trade” arguments.
Abiola Lapite 04.06.04 at 10:27 am
“Also the example of Israel cuts both ways; you’re looking there at a country which has a large source of untaxed government income (transfer payments from overseas) equal in size to a couple of oil wells”
The difference though, and it is a crucial one, is that Israel isn’t free to do as it pleases with American aid; in particular, Ariel Sharon, corrupt though he may be, can’t open a Swiss bank account and funnel a few billion in American taxpayer dollars into it, in the manner of a Sani Abacha or Teodoro Obiang Nguema. With oil there is no accountability to anyone, not even the taxpayers of another country.
Chris Bertram’s post at Junius had it exactly right. The lure of billions in raw cashflow from oil is an extremely powerful incentive to corruption and coup d’etats. Just look at Nigeria in comparison with many of her neighbors; Ghana now has a higher per capita GDP, though it has no oil, and per capita income in mineral-resource-free Ivory Coast was higher still, at least until ethnic infighting messed things up in that country. Angola is awash in oil revenue, yet its government isn’t the slightest bit ashamed of begging for foreign aid to relieve a famine that it ought to have been able to deal with from its own resources, were that country’s leaders not too busy funneling the income to Liechtenstein and Andorra. I just don’t see any evidence that oil has ever done poor countries much good in the long term.
dsquared 04.06.04 at 10:31 am
I suppose that a decent natural experiment would be the republics of the former Soviet Union. Have the resource-poor ones (Armenia, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova and Tajikistan) done any better in terms of governance?
Trying to pair them with more resource-rich but otherwise more or less comparable fSU republics, and taking these alnmost certainly bogus rankings at face value, I get the following:
Moldova has done better than Ukraine and Belarus
Georgia has done better than Azerbaijan, as has Armenia
but Tajikstan and Kyrgyzstan come out worse than Kazakhstan, substantially worse than Turkmenistan and only a little better than Uzbekistan.
So, pretty inconclusive.
dsquared 04.06.04 at 10:37 am
Ghana now has a higher per capita GDP, though it has no oil
If you’re gonna convince me that Ghana is a natural resource-poor country, you’re going to have to come up with a pretty convincing explanation of why money from gold mines is in some way more difficult to launder than money from oil wells.
Abiola Lapite 04.06.04 at 1:45 pm
“If you’re gonna convince me that Ghana is a natural resource-poor country”
I’m not going to try. I’m well aware of the importance of gold-mining in the Ghanaian economy. The point is that oil is far more corrupting, as it is much less labor-intensive (at least in the Third World countries that are major exporters of the stuff), which means the profit margins are much greater; the cost of shipping Bonny Light is a very small percentage of the current price, and the rest is almost pure profit. What is more, the market for oil is far larger today than that for gold, which has few practical uses in a world of fiat money. The details do matter.
At any rate, the real issue here is whether oil-producing countries are any better off for enjoying their “natural resource birthright”, and even your statement about the inconclusiveness of the evidence suggests that they aren’t, even if one can’t conclude that they are actually worse off than non-oil producers.
If the best one can do is show a net washout effect to having oil, then Friedman can’t be attacked for suggesting the opening up of the Mexican oil industry to private foreign capital. At the very least, foreign private ownership can help change government incentives for the better by forcing greater transparency in the handling of oil revenues.
To give an example, presently some $19 billion in oil revenues that came in to Nigeria’s NNPC during the 1990s is entirely unnacounted for, the money having seemingly vanished into thin air, and the government is under no real pressure to explain where it all went. If NNPC were a public company with a listing on the NYSE or in London, it would have to publish regular accounts that would be submitted to credible auditors as a condition for keeping its listing, while foreign shareholders would have a far greater incentive to pressure the company to keep its books straight, if only to keep their fair share of the profits from being diverted by corrupt employees; what is more, they’d have a far greater chance of being listened to by the domestic press and their own governments. Just look at the stir Khodorkovsky’s arrest caused: were he a mere apparatchik running a public parastatal, who in the West would have given it a second thought?
WillieStyle 04.06.04 at 2:35 pm
But Abiola,
Isn’t Norway’s solution – A sort of national trust fund for oil revenues – an even better solution?
I wouldn’t be so confident about privatizing oil fields as a means of fighting corruption. As I understand it, for all the furor over the arrest of Khodorkovsky, corruption is still rampant in Russia’s oil industry. Foriegn investors would care about their profits, sure, but I think many of them would come to see the inevitable sweet heart deals, bribes and 419 as an operating expense in Nigeria, for example. Go through the regular channels and you might loose out on the multibillion dollar contract. Open a discrete swiss bank account for some Oil Minister’s nephew and you’re gauranteed a 400% return on your “investment”
dsquared 04.06.04 at 3:36 pm
Abiola: First, I’m unconvinced by what looks like an ad hoc attempt to push the “oil is special” argument. Could easily be argued the other way; Gold is easy to smuggle because you don’t need a tanker to carry a large value of it, and gold can be hoarded on its own as a store of value; it doesn’t even need to be laundered or sold, and profits are just as high in the gold, diamonds, etc industry as in oil.
More generally, I’m flabbergasted by this argument:
If the best one can do is show a net washout effect to having oil, then Friedman can’t be attacked for suggesting the opening up of the Mexican oil industry to private foreign capital. At the very least, foreign private ownership can help change government incentives for the better by forcing greater transparency in the handling of oil revenues.
This is a triumph of blackboard economics over visible fact. All the great oil/political disasters of the world (Iraq, Iran, Nigeria, Congo) have involved foreign capital. Quite apart from anything, it’s very hard to take bribes if there isn’t foreign capital involved, because domestic capital is much more scarce. Even a cursory glance at the history of the involvement of the oil industry in domestic politics, or a google search for “Armand+hammer+seven+sisters” ought to give you a clue how funny the idea that “foreign investors promote transparency” is, unless very severely qualified indeed.
In fact, if you look at the state oil monopolies of the world (Russia, Venezuela, Mexico, Norway, Malaysia, Argentina pre-YPF/Repsol), you see a bunch of countries which, while by no means perfect, have done very much better than countries which let foreigners into their oil industry.
Abiola Lapite 04.06.04 at 9:29 pm
“First, I’m unconvinced by what looks like an ad hoc attempt to push the “oil is special†argument. Could easily be argued the other way; Gold is easy to smuggle because you don’t need a tanker to carry a large value of it, and gold can be hoarded on its own as a store of value”
But gold is extremely labor-intensive, and tends to draw in large portions of the workforce naturally; the history of a country like South Africa, with its pass laws to ensure large reserves of cheap labor, and the unworkability of any scheme for racial separation in a country vitally dependent on cheap black labor, makes no sense without recognizing this fact. The same is true of diamond and coal mining – it simply isn’t possible for governments to embezzle billions in such fields without a sizable portion of the profits leaking to the general public, if only through the wage bill.
Oil, especially the offshore variety, really is different in that respect. For example, most Equatoguineans have never even set their eyes on an oil rig to date, and domestic labor involvement in offshore production is pretty much nil. It’s pretty much the same in the Niger delta – there wouldn’t be so many jobless Ogoni and Ijaw youths making trouble for the government if oil were a more labor-intensive business.
“profits are just as high in the gold, diamonds, etc industry as in oil.”
This is an empirically testable statement, and it simply isn’t justified by the facts. It’s easy enough to get copies of the historical annual reports for Ashanti GoldFields, Anglo-American, Barrick, Billiton, Rio Tinto, etc., and the fact is that their profitability cannot bear any comparison with that of oil companies. As for De Beers, the Oppenheimers should only be so lucky as to enjoy the sort of net income even a relatively minor oil producer like Angola (800,000 bpd) does.
“In fact, if you look at the state oil monopolies of the world”
Eh, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation is also a state oil monopoly …
John S 04.06.04 at 10:03 pm
I’ve been dreaming of your business lounge encounter with Friedman:
d2: I read your April 4 column, Friedman you w**r.
TF: Great, and…?
d2: And? You m**r. You MORON. I checked up the very latest figures and crunched the numbers myself….261 × 1,000,000,000 × 1010 = 263.61trn btu of natural gas net … Friedman? Friedman???
TF: zzzz…. oh, er, sorry, where were you? I mean what about my big idea?
d2: Big idea, you f**t? Oh yeah, I calculated that too: 1279 × 1,000 × 365 × 5,865,000 = 2,737.99trn btu of petroleum exported …Net energy imported by the USA from Mexio of roughly two and a half quadrillion btus. Note…
TF: What are you talking about? Calculated what?? You mean how important it is for Mexico to be an economic success otherwise there’ll be no end to Mexicans crossing the Rio Grande illegally? And how that might be helped along by deeper economic integration along the lines of the European Union? Even to the point where we adopt a programme like the EUs to create transport networks? You calculated that?
d2: [silence] Er, still you f***g s***d, what about the 1279 × 1,000 × 365 × 5,865,000 = 2,737.99trn btu of petroleum exported? Hmm? What about that then?
dsquared 04.06.04 at 10:17 pm
The same is true of diamond and coal mining – it simply isn’t possible for governments to embezzle billions in such fields without a sizable portion of the profits leaking to the general public, if only through the wage bill.
Yes it is; example, any diamond producing country except Botswana.
While Nigeria has a state oil monopoly, it’s not a monopoly like Pemex, Statoil or Petronas. AFAICT, (and I’m willing to be corrected), it’s never had a monopoly on drilling Nigerian oil and it’s never been the largest E&P company in Nigeria — it’s largely a downstream company. This means that the Nigerian oilfield has been largely developed with foreign money, very much unlike the Mexican, Malay, Norwegian, etc.
asg 04.06.04 at 10:34 pm
But I don’t think a positive vision is appropriate. There’s no doubting that the future will be more or less the neoliberal vision; there are too many powerful interests at work for this not to be the case. It’s much more important to warn people about what the dangerous parts of this program are, than to write recipes for kitchens that aren’t ever going to be built.
Reading this brings a warm sense of relief to my heart. It is always heartening to know that the critics (or at least one of them) of a worldview one basically agrees with have no positive vision and no unifying principles. The course d^2 endorses– warning people about what’s wrong with others’ views rather than presenting and defending one of his own — is the most reliably proven recipe for abject political failure yet discovered.
dsquared 04.07.04 at 7:21 am
Really? We had you on the run in Seattle, didn’t we?
asg 04.07.04 at 9:18 pm
Yes, Seattle worked so well that every anti-globo demonstration since has built on and exceeded its successes. Not.
You write:
There’s no doubting that the future will be more or less the neoliberal vision; there are too many powerful interests at work for this not to be the case.
Why should anyone who does not already agree with you believe this? That is, why should anyone who does not already agree with you take your word that the reason your vision will fail when arrayed against the neoliberal one is “powerful interests” rather than that your vision is just crackpot? Or that your vision is only cosmetically different from the neoliberal one? Or that it oversimplifies things? Etc. This is why not elucidating the positive alternative to neoliberal globalization is political surrender — because no one who doesn’t already share your views (whatever they are) will be charitable when thinking about why your views will not prevail.
liberal 04.08.04 at 10:13 am
Re the resource curse: there is an argument that it’s not valid.
See Jeff Madrick, “Resources Form the Basis for Economic Growth,” The New York Times, 2004 Feb 19.
Main point: “But Mr. Wright and Mr. Czelusta point out that almost every one of these studies uses the proportion of exports of the particular natural resource as a proxy for a nation’s mineral abundance. Among other obvious problems with this measure, a high proportion of resource exports may simply reflect a lack of other kinds of exports, which is almost a definition of underdevelopment in the first place.”
Second paragraph: “Gavin Wright will have none of this. Mr. Wright, an economic historian at Stanford and long a specialist in the role that natural resources play in economic growth, agrees that overdependence on a single resource can lead to poor policies, but it is by no means inevitable. To the contrary, many developed and developing nations have used their mineral resources as springboards to wealth and broader-based development – not least the United States itself.”
liberal 04.08.04 at 10:16 am
My impression from Dean Baker is that Mexico has been much better than Venezuela at capturing the value of its oil for the public (as opposed to the value winding up in a few pockets).
Abiola Lapite 04.08.04 at 12:44 pm
“See Jeff Madrick, “Resources Form the Basis for Economic Growth,†The New York Times, 2004 Feb 19.”
This article isn’t news to anyone who’s been looking into the subject, and it isn’t interesting either. The most important issue, which isn’t discussed in the article – the structure of ownership – is precisely what’s been at issue in this discussion.
In America, oil wells and gold mines were owned by private individuals, not by the government, and politicians had to get their share of the proceeds by taxation, which meant, of course, that they had to actually be responsive to the voting public, mindful of the fact that wealthy owners of resources could and would do their bit to influence public opinion in their favor, in an age without silly campaign-finance restrictions.
You picked just about the worst possible article to use to justify an anti-private ownership stance. In fact, I’d say that the example of the United States is a gigantic problem for Dsquared and all those of similar persuasion who wish to argue that private ownership of natural resources is somehow a bad thing.
dsquared 04.08.04 at 4:10 pm
In fact, I’d say that the example of the United States is a gigantic problem for Dsquared and all those of similar persuasion who wish to argue that private ownership of natural resources is somehow a bad thing.
Before we go any further, Abiola, I must insist that you withdraw that remark. I never said any such thing and I can’t go on with this discussion until you agree that I didn’t.
Gary Farber 04.08.04 at 7:25 pm
“Really? We had you on the run in Seattle, didn’t we?”
That’s an impressive description of a positive vision.
dsquared 04.08.04 at 8:31 pm
Actually, it is; what the Seattle riots achieved was the scuppering of the Seattle TRIPS agenda. This would have extended first-world patent law globally. As a direct result of the collapse of the Seattle talks, Brazil and South Africa were emboldened to increase their demands and force through a revised TRIPS draft which allowed them to suspend intellectual property law domestically where necessary in order to provide cheap generic AIDS drugs.
If I’ve got a positive vision of the future, then global technology operating under locally determined intellectual property laws is a good start.
OK now cough up; what’s your vision that’s so much better.
asg 04.08.04 at 8:58 pm
Yay! We got d^2 to endorse a policy prescription! See, was that such a huge expense of energy?
Before I state my own vision of globalization though (and I’m flattered you want to know!), I’d like to know what you meant when you were referring to “the neoliberal vision” that would dominate the future because of powerful interests behind it.
Abiola Lapite 04.08.04 at 10:19 pm
“I never said any such thing and I can’t go on with this discussion until you agree that I didn’t.”
Fine, I won’t put words into your mouth. It simply looked to me like the logical conclusion to draw from your statements, quoted below:
Now, proceeding on the assumption that I was wrong about your position on the issue, what exactly do you believe about the proper ownership structure for “natural resource birthrights?” If you don’t believe governments ought to own them, how do you reconcile that with your statements quoted above?
dsquared 04.12.04 at 9:28 pm
Abiola, the Mexican constitution prohibits foreign ownership of the oilfields, not private ownership, and says nothing about ownership of refineries and pipelines. You can have as much of that as you like, but AFAICT, selling off the actual ownership of the fields only makes sense if you’re going to recognise a right of future generations to expropriate them, which Airmiles doesn’t.
Asq: Well cobblers to you then; I’m not playing twenty questions.
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