Al Jazeera and the Arab awakening

by Chris Bertram on February 22, 2011

Much as I’ve been loving Harry’s posts on Wisconsin, it seems odd that we haven’t said more here on CT about the more important struggle going on in Libya and about the Arab world more generally. It is difficult to get a sense of what is going on from the sporadic reports, but it looks very much as if Libya’s transition will be to the Arab awakening what Romania’s was to the end of Stalinism in eastern Europe. Gaddafi seems now to have lost his grip on reality if not yet completely on power. Let us hope that he suffers a similar fate to Ceacescu.

Anyone who does want to follow developments in the Arab world has one best option to do so: “Al Jazeera”:http://english.aljazeera.net/ . Vilified by the US under Bush (and its reporters almost certainly murdered by the US military on several occasions), Al Jazeera has been both the conduit of information and the catalyst for change and democratization.

The Emir of Qatar may be a despot, but for Al Jazeera alone he could be winning a Frederick the Great prize as the most enlightened one of recent decades. The democracies of the West, by contrast, have contributed nothing. If the Arab peoples do succeed in freeing themselves, they will have done so themselves and despite the actions and attitudes of the West and the United States with its policies of Israel-first and make-deals-for-oil. For that reason, and so unlike Eastern Europe, such influence the US has in the future will be a function of its power alone and not its moral authority, which is now non-existent. Anyone can back a democratic revolution when it is half won, or cavil at the most disgusting atrocities, but no-one is going to forget that the West backed many of the Arab dictators (especially Mubarak) until nearly the end and still supports some of the worst of them (such as the Saudis). Some might cite Iraq as the exception here but it isn’t really: Rumsfeld embraced Saddam until he went off-message just as Blair welcomed Gaddafi back into the fold when it seemed opportune to do so. Let us hope the Arab 1848 continues to more successful conclusions.

{ 122 comments }

1

shah8 02.22.11 at 8:22 pm

I think that the length of the unrest matters as well. The longer this goes on, the more it spreads to other places in the world beyond N Africa. In all seriousness, I’m beginning to doubt the long term prospects of the Saudis, and I do not think that the New Boss, Same as the Old shtick will take in Egypt, so long as there is a civil war next door. In the end, it’s neo-colonialism, masked as globalism that’s the real common thread. The longer this goes on, the more coherent and broader the memes become, and Bangladesh/Cambodia could get just as wild as Algeria. The upshot is that corporate fixed assets are in real danger from upheaval (not just in Libya), and that has a strong chance of making bad debt visible enough to make corporate and banking entities irremediably unviable.

2

Chris Bertram 02.22.11 at 8:33 pm

Daniel Ortega has phoned Gaddafi to express his “solidarity”. How utterly depressing.

3

Baoigheaodhb 02.22.11 at 8:33 pm

Just to be clear – you hope exactly (in italics – can’t figure out the tags) the same thing happens to Gaddafi as Ceausescu? It’s one thing justifying an assassination (if that’s what you’re doing); quite another a retributivist execution.

4

Keith 02.22.11 at 8:43 pm

Well said. As an American I’m embarrassed that our supposed Beacon of Democracy only shines sporadically and on those willing to do our bidding. What’s most disheartening is that when the history of these events are written, we will at best be seen as an oafish bystander, hemming and hawing while these countries and their people stand up for their rights.

I can only hope that some good will come of it and my fellow Americans will see this example and regain some of our democratic zeal and start standing up tot he corporations running our country through proxy politicians.

5

Rob 02.22.11 at 8:45 pm

Here here. For all the US politicians’ talk of creating democracy in the middle east it was always Israel first, stability second, democracy third.

6

Kaveh 02.22.11 at 9:14 pm

Good post. If you want to associate the 21st century Arab Awakening with any brand, that should be Al Jazeera rather than twitter or facebook. Not quite accurate, but not a bad place to start either.

I’ve read, e.g. on the excellent blog, Jadaliyya, calls for greater “specificity”, understanding differences between conditions leading to protests in Morocco, Yemen, Egypt, &c., and also attempts to identify the structural forces behind the revolutions–neoliberalism and food prices, &c.. These analyses all have their place, but I think the revolutions are, above all else, directly copying each other, and the shared basis they have is political discourse in an arena made up of different educated, middle-class professionals, not all of whom are wired. I have it on pretty good authority that Arabs were actually pretty conflicted about the Iranian 2009 protests, and there are even a few people on the left that were suspicious of them. The usually impeccable (on Middle East-related affairs) Guardian and Al Jazeera were both slow on the uptake and occasionally dismissive of the protesters. People were skeptical of the motives of journalists and outsiders who were instantly sympathetic to the protesters. But I think (I’m not 100% sure, but pretty sure) that the Iranian protests ultimately served as an inspiration for the Arab protests.

One important feature of this public sphere is strong connections with Teh West through professional connections and higher ed–Arabs studying in American and European universities, who have contact with friends back home. So American policy has been a dud as far as democracy is concerned, but the American public sphere is another matter altogether.

I think this is part of a wider phenomenon of greater openness and communication that includes an increasing difficulty of attempts to intimidate people who would speak up about the plight of Palestinians, and the attention Al Jazeera and the Egyptian protests have received in the US. Public protest is becoming more and more attractive, Wisconsin is part of this too.

7

Kaveh 02.22.11 at 9:16 pm

Also, here’s a great article analyzing the revolution in Egypt, an important source for the info in my last comment: http://www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/516/why-mubarak-is-out-

8

John Quiggin 02.22.11 at 9:21 pm

As regards US military power in the region, it has repeatedly proved to be a burden not a blessing, even on the most shortsighted view of US interests. The bases in Saudi Arabia produced Al Qaeda, the occupation of Iraq gave the Iranians 150 000 hostages against any hostile action, and now the 5th Fleet in Bahrein means that US hands are tied there.

9

salazar 02.22.11 at 9:31 pm

Tied? Doesn’t the 5th fleet’s presence simply mean the U.S. keeps on supporting the Bahraini regime

10

jacob 02.22.11 at 9:31 pm

Apropos Ortega’s phone call to Qadaffi (which I hadn’t seen before Chris’s comment above): did Qadaffi turn bad (in the style of so many revolutionaries-turned-dictators) or was he always bad?

11

nick s 02.22.11 at 9:34 pm

Let us hope that he suffers a similar fate to Ceacescu.

Alternatively, let’s not. Romania was hardly a poster child for post-Communist transition — dsquared’s Arsehole Theory in full effect there — and the method by which Ceausescu was dealt with set a less than useful precedent for his successors.

12

afinetheorem 02.22.11 at 9:49 pm

Clearly the US should be doing more to support democratic movements in the Arab World…but who exactly do you suspect the new Egypt and Tunisia and Libya to be allied with instead? Other Arab countries have been explicitly supporting the dictators, as have China and Russia, as have the Bolivarians, as has Castro (in the case of Qaddafi), etc. Weak as they have been, both Obama’s statements over the past week and American government actions in the past few years (e.g., funding of pro-democracy groups and behind-the-scenes rebukes of guys like Mubarak, both of which are widespread in Wikileaks) have almost certainly been stronger than words and actions from other regional and world powers, the EU certainly among them.

That said, Al Jazeera has been great indeed.

13

Keith 02.22.11 at 10:05 pm

Of course, the Right Wingers will claim it as a vindication of the Bush Doctrine, the same way they credited Reagan with the fall of the Berlin Wall. Democracy just can’t get a break.

14

aretino 02.22.11 at 10:21 pm

The democracies of the West contributed nothing to the revolutions in Eastern Europe, either. (And a good thing, too, considering the risks.) That hasn’t diminished the influence of the West in general or the United States in particular one bit. In the end, it won’t be what matters in a post-revolutionary Arab world, either. Governments, especially elected ones, have a habit of putting national interests ahead of sentiment.

15

Kaveh 02.22.11 at 10:35 pm

@12 Having witnessed the last month of revolutions, I’m increasingly of the opinion that the best thing the US government can do, both morally and for its own (society’s capitalistic) interests, is to promote open interaction and trade between the countries. Sure, this means letting corrupt regimes enrich themselves more, but the Greens in Iran are not helped one iota by making it hard for Iranian students or professionals to get a visa to come to the US. On balance, sanctions hurt ordinary people more than the government. Does denying Iran access to civilian aircraft components (leading to 100s dead in a plane crash 2 months ago) really help anyone? Previous revolutions, including Iran’s in 1979, benefited hugely from the main players having a base outside the country, e.g. in the Shi’i shrine cities in Iraq.

Of course, the people who are the main proponents of sanctions on Iran have absolutely no desire to see a democratic revolution succeed there, or in any Arab country, but at least the revolutions of the last month can help make the emperor’s nakedness obvious to more people.

I would also highlight the importance of supporting the Egyptian labor movement, that is one of the main battlegrounds in Egypt now, the army probably doesn’t particularly care about free expression by middle class Egyptians, but they don’t want to lose control over the workforce in all those factories they own, and I’m more than a little worried that middle class Egyptians would sell the labor movement down the river, given the chance.

16

ajay 02.22.11 at 10:55 pm

Daniel Ortega has phoned Gaddafi to express his “solidarity”. How utterly depressing.

I wonder whether Mandela has?

17

anon 02.22.11 at 11:25 pm

“Let us hope that he suffers a similar fate to Ceacescu.”

A palace coup? Let’s hope not. Let’s hope the Libyans do better and have a real revolution.

18

Barry 02.22.11 at 11:35 pm

Rob :
“Here here. For all the US politicians’ talk of creating democracy in the middle east it was always Israel first, stability second, democracy third.”

I’d put it as Israel first, oil second, and democracy never.

19

engels 02.22.11 at 11:40 pm

Mr Blair insisted the process must be “managed” to avoid it having a negative effect on ongoing efforts to resolve the longstanding dispute between Israelis and Palestinians.

He said: “What is inevitable is that there’s going to be change and the question is; what change and how do you manage it?

[…] The danger in this situation is that this has obviously got vast implications for the state of Israel, the Palestinians and for the state of the peace process.

20

engels 02.22.11 at 11:41 pm

Good post. And Al Jazeera is great for non-ME news as well…

21

sg 02.22.11 at 11:49 pm

I made this point at Larvatus Prodeo but I’ll say it here too… with uprisings stretching from Tunisia to Iran, what are the chances that Saddam Hussein would have escaped the unrest if Iraq had been left alone in 2003? Watching Gaddafi get strung from a lamp post (if that is indeed what happened) would surely be an incentive for him to give it up; and with the US enforcing no-fly zones, any attempts to bomb demonstrators would be easily intercepted, enabling the US to actually be greeted as liberators.

Iraq suffered 4 million displaced, a million dead and complete loss of civil society to achieve a “regime change” that ruined it. If the US had left it alone, regime change would probably have happened within 10 years anyway, with just a tiny fraction of the upheaval and murder.

And where are the liberal interventionists now when the entire regi0n is trying to achieve democracy? Tony Blair describing Mubarak as a “champion for justice” days before he stepped down, and everyone worrying about Israel. Losers!

22

Lemuel Pitkin 02.23.11 at 12:11 am

that has a strong chance of making bad debt visible enough to make corporate and banking entities irremediably unviable

It’s a nice thought, but in fact the Arab countries don’t have much in the way of external debt. Egypt has $35 billion and the rest have less, generally much less. (Libya doesn’t even have any government debt.) Unlike in Latin America and the European periphery, it’s really not part of the way imperialism operates here.

23

Lemuel Pitkin 02.23.11 at 12:36 am

sg@21-

Of course you are right — unless you’ll buy that the uprisings are the only happening thanks to the invasion of Iraq. Because that’s what the Hitchens are trying to sell. No joke:

“Saad Eddin Ibrahim is one of the minority of Arab public intellectuals to have supported the overthrow of Saddam Hussein and to have believed that it might contribute to a democratic renaissance in the region. This argument will go on for a long time and can’t be resolved too simplistically one way or another… But the regime-change school in America can claim a degree of vindication.

24

bob mcmanus 02.23.11 at 1:28 am

22: I am not sure what was originally meant, but I am thinking of private investments, financed by debt, going sour. Cargill is building a sugar refinery in Egypt, F1 in Bahrain, many multinationals moving into Libya, etc. If I remember correctly, it was private equity that got in trouble a ways back in Dubai, that ultimately had to be backed by the UAE.

I guess Cargill and Monsanto won’t go under if their projects get nationalized or shut down, so I don’t know what the ramifications might be.

25

rhino 02.23.11 at 1:34 am

Lemuel @ 22

I think the commenter might have been referring to the result of those fixed assets being nationalized by the new regimes, rather than the result of the new regimes defaulting on external debt. Suncor is fleeing Libya at the moment, and it will not shock me if they are never allowed back.

26

Anderson 02.23.11 at 1:38 am

Let us hope that he suffers a similar fate to Ceacescu.

Cue Brad DeLong in 3 … 2 …

27

Ben Alpers 02.23.11 at 1:42 am

Vilified by the US under Bush (and its reporters almost certainly murdered by the US military on several occasions)…

And remember when Israel bombing the crap out of Lebanon was the birth pangs of democracy in the Middle East? Good times! ;-)

28

PHB 02.23.11 at 2:25 am

In his speech, the Brotherly Leader condemned foreign news services spreading the lie that he had ordered the killing of protestors and ordered the murder of anyone protesting.

The lack of self-awareness was quite astounding.

Ortega’s intervention is somewhat interesting since it is pretty clear at this point that Gaddafi is highly unlikely to survive and there is almost certainly nothing to be gained from supporting him if he should survived. I find it interesting when pols act in an irrational fashion, I doubt he is doing so from ideological commitment.

29

geo 02.23.11 at 5:04 am

sg@21: Yes, exactly. I wonder how many liberal hawks will don sackcloth and ashes.

30

Netbrian 02.23.11 at 5:05 am

@29 — Actually, most of them seem to be saying that the protests were inspired by the democracy in Iraq, so the neocons should be given credit for the uprisings.

31

Patrick S. O'Donnell 02.23.11 at 6:12 am

I have a likst of links essential to following developments related to the quest for democracy and social justice in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). I’ve not included well-known mass media sources (e.g., Guardian, Huffington Post, The New York Times…). While this list is far from complete, I suspect it will suffice for most purposes, as many of these sites contain further links that are also helpful: http://ratiojuris.blogspot.com/2011/02/post-revolutionary-developments-in.html

32

Patrick S. O'Donnell 02.23.11 at 6:28 am

I might also have mentioned I have three bibliographies (constraints: books, in English) that some might find helpful for further reading and research: on “the contemporary Arab world,” on “the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,” and on “Islamic studies.” While all three have been made available at the Ratio Juris blog, I’ve since updated them and will pass them along to anyone on request.

Finally, I have collections of articles from newpapers, blogs, and journals devoted to the Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia, the Egyptian Revolution, post-revolutionary developments in Egypt, and the quest for democracy and social justice in the MENA states generally (the latter two are ongoing projects), that I’ll send along upon request to any journalist or academic (including graduate students) doing research in these areas (you can find my e-mail address on Blogger).

33

Patrick S. O'Donnell 02.23.11 at 6:35 am

And we can tie all of this to Harry’s recent posts from Wisconsin: “We Stand With You as You Stood With Us’:” Statement to Workers of Wisconsin by Kamal Abbas of Egypt’s Centre for Trade Unions and Workers Services

See:
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/must-read/statement-kamal-abbas

34

ejh 02.23.11 at 9:25 am

but no-one is going to forget that the West backed many of the Arab dictators

I rather suspect they will.

35

Ellis Goldberg 02.23.11 at 9:35 am

I assume the of comment on CT about events in the Arab world, but especially Tunisia and Egypt as well as Libya, arise from the nearly total ignorance of most western academics on the events themselves as well as the history, background and context. And nearly uniquely it seems to me that people posting here (unlike in a variety of other forums) are willing to admit it. Or at least that’s my charitable interpretation. Having lived through the events in Cairo in the past month I would say these alone (regardless therefore of the ultimate outcome of which we all remain ignorant) will warrant significant investigation, analysis and consideration by a variety of thinkers. Simply comparing the huge gap between expectations (and we can refrain from the tiresome invocation of Orientalism) on all sides and the events themselves as well what light they throw on theories of revolution, culture, the role of intellectuals, and our understandings of the state will be immense. Whether we have just lived through is 1789, 1848, 1917, 1968, 1979, or 1979 (and I have seen all these dates invoked, usually again by people who are experts in events connected with those dates rather than with events here), there is no doubt that we have lived through events that have changed life in a profound way. “The history of Egypt” as one handmade sign in Midan al-Tahrir which I assume was written by someone whose preferred second language is French put it “has taken a new curve.”

36

stostosto 02.23.11 at 10:06 am

Look. The USA, the EU and other powerful states are by definition not NGOs. It’s rather silly to blame them for not acting like ones. If the West had openly supported the protesters, the protests would have been compromised, maybe fatally so. I think “the West” has done just right in this, exactly by being, as Keith puts it @#4, ” an oafish bystander, hemming and hawing while these countries and their people stand up for their rights.”

The West should actively pursue passivity and irrelevance, and by and large that is what it has successfully been doing over these last couple of months.

37

stostosto 02.23.11 at 10:12 am

Also, the Ceaucescu remark screams to heaven.

38

Chris Bertram 02.23.11 at 10:14 am

_The West should actively pursue passivity and irrelevance, and by and large that is what it has successfully been doing over these last couple of months._

Yes, but since it has spent the last several decades doing rather different things …..

39

Alex 02.23.11 at 12:20 pm

If I remember correctly, it was private equity that got in trouble a ways back in Dubai, that ultimately had to be backed by the UAE.

Dubai World/Nakheel was a state-owned company.

40

novakant 02.23.11 at 1:22 pm

Let us hope that he suffers a similar fate to Ceacescu.

Hm, call me a bleeding heart humanist, but I prefer my evil dictators ending up on trial in The Hague – Gaddafi, Castro and Chavez spending their retirement running a socialist book club or something.

the Greens in Iran are not helped one iota by making it hard for Iranian students or professionals to get a visa to come to the US. On balance, sanctions hurt ordinary people more than the government.

Indeed.

41

ejh 02.23.11 at 1:29 pm

Hm, call me a bleeding heart humanist, but I prefer my evil dictators ending up on trial in The Hague – Gaddafi, Castro and Chavez

I was under the impression that the last of these was democratically-elected. Are you in possession of better information?

42

Latro 02.23.11 at 2:34 pm

Chávez is democratically elected. But every single year he is less of a democrat. Right now he lives in a strange quantum state if you look at it on that axis. Or in a clear populist state ramping up to autocracy if you look at it by the correct frame.

See for example http://www.economist.com/node/18184396 . No amount of “democratically elected” grace can save him from showing up his true colors. He is constrained by democratic institutions and expectations, but then he destroys them as much as he can at every step.

Of course, I hope for a change (born in Venezuela, left when he got to power), but as the situation is bad, but not as bad as in say, Libya, I also hope the change can come without all the pains of having to throw an actual 100% despot.

43

roger 02.23.11 at 2:36 pm

I see no reason not to wish death upon the man who is using radio broadcasts to call, Rwandan style, for protestors to be killed like cockroaches. If our choice is skyhooks that will capture him in the next day and put him in a cage of brass, well, I’d be for that, out of the overwhelming love and compassion I bear the human race and all forms of life in the five trillion worlds. Alas, I don’t think there are skyhooks, and I think there is a war going on.

44

engels 02.23.11 at 3:04 pm

I was under the impression that the last of these was democratically-elected.

Yes, but only by poor people. As NK has informed us all in the past they don’t really count.

45

novakant 02.23.11 at 4:34 pm

I was under the impression that the last of these was democratically-elected.

Fair enough, my comment was half tongue in cheek, though one shouldn’t underestimate Chavez’ dictatorial tendencies and he’s been heaping praise on Gaddafi (as has Ortega). That’s not enough for the Hague, so maybe they can be a pen pals.

FWIW, I’d also like to see Bush, Blair and Powell in The Hague.

46

Cian 02.23.11 at 4:55 pm

One shouldn’t underestimate any politician’s dictatorial tendencies. Why Chavez should be specially singled out is beyond me.

I’d rank Castro around the same level as Lee Kuan Yew. Possibly a bit worse, but then Yew was never under constant threat of destabilisation by the world’s superpower. There are democracies that are worse than Cuba.

47

Cian 02.23.11 at 4:57 pm

Latro – I think you’ll need a better source than the Economist to convince many people. It has a certain, how does one put it, bias on these matters.

48

Latro 02.23.11 at 5:17 pm

The Economist is not some raving lunatic right wing Fox News wannabe. Yes, they are from the right. Not all the right is bonkers, yet. I dont agree with some of their bias or solutions, but they do not inhabit their own paranoid universe of self-delusion.

Apart from that, what the Economist reports there is a fact. One judge has been punished for going against Chávez wishes and following actual Venezuelan law in a case. This has been reported by many others, not only the Economist (that was the only English language source I got). And that is just one of the many reports of how things are rotting in the Venezuelan democracy.

The only thing one would need to convince people would be for them to open their eyes and not shield them cause, somehow, that clown is the hope of the Left, so lets keep the excuses not to evaluate him truthfully, like… discrediting the source without tackling the content of the criticisms.

Why Chávez would to be singled out? I dont know. For me is important. For Venezuelans too. If the US wants to use him as a “threat” for their own ends, well, two wrongs dont make a right.

But I’m kind of tired of having a lot of “progressive” people be so ready to throw the plight of Venezuelans , the continous decent of the countrey into more poverty and less democracy under Chávez, out of the picture cause, well, dunno, I dont really see what the use is on giving cover to that farce of supposed “revolution”.

Apart from again blowing any chance of presenting a coherent and attractive left alternative to the current “right or even more right” situation by insisting on romantic delusions of “red” princes when all you have is a red frog.

49

Latro 02.23.11 at 5:17 pm

And sorry for the broken English. I always catch the errors too late.

50

ajay 02.23.11 at 5:41 pm

Latro – I think you’ll need a better source than the Economist to convince many people. It has a certain, how does one put it, bias on these matters.

Cian, here’s the New York Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/04/world/americas/04venez.html

And the Guardian:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/dec/15/chavez-venezuela-judge-cedeno

And the United Nations:
http://www.un.org/apps/news/storyAr.asp?NewsID=33273&Cr=judges&Cr1=

51

novakant 02.23.11 at 6:33 pm

One shouldn’t underestimate any politician’s dictatorial tendencies.

True, but really not my problem, I’m an equal opportunity hater when it comes to human rights abusers. “Look, over there” is a rather weak rhetorical strategy in such discussions.

52

shah8 02.23.11 at 7:16 pm

I was not really talking about nationalization, so much as a general increase in unavailability of assets like oil platforms, factories, etc. Which can be due to labor disputes just as much as insurrection or nationalization. I was talking about this in the context of the present day economic climate where large sections of the economic infrastructure is functionally in default–which means there are many extend and pretend schemes going on. These schemes can only work so long as money isn’t truly required to carry value in services or products in quantity that the volume of present money suggests is needed. Another feature of these schemes is that the fundamental political and economic structure is assumed to be static, and that political structures can be compelled to spend credibility and assets towards that stability, a la Turncoat Clegg or Fianna Fail. In practice, this means that each infrastructure asset in this time and place of world affairs have multiple claimants who are not on the title and which the total dependency is well above what selling the asset could relieve. With respect to oil, the geopolitical game is all about extracting the large majority of the economic benefits from a natural resource to the benefit of the hub at the expense of the rim. What is happening now is that the rim is no longer able to support that extraction with even remote political stability–and this is not just true of the Middle East, there are many commodities/cheap manufacturing clusters at risk here.

Now, I’ve long considered that the next real step in the global economic crisis will be the failure of a national business concern, someone like Sinopec or a east asian style collective business group, that is essential for the proper functioning of the nation. The repercussions from the corporate bond market will be considerable by itself, let alone the ripples. The closure of Libya’s oil industry is a classic potential trigger, because Italy is dependent on Libya’s oil to some degree. If Italy has to spend geopolitical credibility to get oil from the north, some other nation is going to suddenly suffer an array of expenses relating to oil heading to Italy and not their country. Everything from the higher price of oil, to more repair work needing to be done fast on equipment that wasn’t vital until just now, to higher imposed interest rates (say, how dat bond spread on Portugal going?) because everyone knows their foreign reserves are under stress. Some big, critical supplier to industrial Italy and Germany might go down under stress like that as well.

As long as this “Arab Awakening” goes on, the more likely permanently strong increases in vital resource/labor costs will be.

53

shah8 02.23.11 at 7:21 pm

I’ve also long since ceased to care about Chavez’s dictatorial tendencies.

Check out how stable his regime is, and how stable it is in the context of all that oil, youth, and recent water issues. Think about why. Then take a look at Ahmajinedad in Iran.

The civil rights of another Khordokovsky is truly uninteresting. It might be a bad thing that that rich guy was arrested, but there is nothing that suggests that there is any kind of greater civil rights issue beyond the usual elite infighting that goes on in every nation. Lastly, we in the US could use a few adventurous arrests of business elites.

54

Lemuel Pitkin 02.23.11 at 7:45 pm

We can debate how well Venezuela meets our standards of democratic institutions and the rule of law; there are certainly legitimate criticism to be made. But claims about “the continuous decent of the country into more poverty” under Chavez aren’t debatable. They’re just ignorant nonsense.

Here are some relevant facts, from a 2009 report from the Center for Economic and Policy Research:

The current economic expansion began when the government got control over the national oil company in the first quarter of 2003. Since then, real (inflation-adjusted) GDP has nearly doubled, growing by 94.7 percent in 5.25 years, or 13.5 percent annually.

Most of this growth has been in the non-oil sector of the economy, and the private sector has grown faster than the public sector.

During the current economic expansion, the poverty rate has been cut by more than half, from 54 percent of households in the first half of 2003 to 26 percent at the end of 2008. Extreme poverty has fallen even more, by 72 percent. These poverty rates measure only cash income, and do not take into account increased access to health care or education.

Over the entire decade, the percentage of households in poverty has been reduced by 39 percent, and extreme poverty by more than half.

Inequality, as measured by the Gini index, has also fallen substantially. The index has fallen to 41 in 2008, from 48.1 in 2003 and 47 in 1999. This represents a large reduction in inequality.

Real (inflation-adjusted) social spending per person more than tripled from 1998-2006.

From 1998-2006, infant mortality has fallen by more than one-third. The number of primary care physicians in the public sector increased 12-fold from 1999-2007, providing health care to millions of Venezuelans who previously did not have access.

There have been substantial gains in education, especially higher education, where gross enrollment rates more than doubled from 1999-2000 to 2007-2008.

The labor market also improved substantially over the last decade, with unemployment dropping from 11.3 percent to 7.8 percent. During the current expansion it has fallen by more than half. Other labor market indicators also show substantial gains.

Over the past decade, the number of social security beneficiaries has more than doubled.

Over the decade, the government’s total public debt has fallen from 30.7 to 14.3 percent of GDP. The foreign public debt has fallen even more, from 25.6 to 9.8 percent of GDP.

55

Lemuel Pitkin 02.23.11 at 7:52 pm

(Sorry, everything after the colon is a quote from the linked report.)

56

juice 02.23.11 at 8:13 pm

I’m sorry where was the middle east when we were fighting our civil war?

57

Myles 02.23.11 at 8:20 pm

I’d rank Castro around the same level as Lee Kuan Yew. Possibly a bit worse, but then Yew was never under constant threat of destabilisation by the world’s superpower.

I think that’s rather glib. Even if the world’s superpower weren’t constantly destabilizing him, Cuba would still be miserably poor, just because of the system he runs. (only recently was one allowed to buy cellphones, and Canada and EU have always been perfectly happy to trade with Cuba).

Lee Kuan Yew, on the other hand, single-handedly made Singapore a country with first-world living standards, from one that was probably poorer than Cuba at the beginning. He is, democracy or no, largely supported by the population in his economic programme. There might not be democracy, but there’s consent of the governed. It’s not so much he’s imposing his will unilaterally as Singaporeans locking themselves with the PAP with the underlying fear that if it doesn’t remain in power, Singapore will be poor and obscure.

One shouldn’t underestimate any politician’s dictatorial tendencies. Why Chavez should be specially singled out is beyond me.

Quite simple: he’s not usually thought of as an actual dictator, more like a Lee Kuan Yew, except obviously not anywhere as competent and more violently repressive. The hyperbolic phrase “Venezuela is becoming Cuba” implies that Venezuela isn’t actually yet Cuba. The same applies to Putin.

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Myles 02.23.11 at 8:23 pm

Retract my comment about Chavez. I do think he’s a bastard, but discussions of him are usually mind-numbingly tedious and tiresome, so scratch that.

59

Chris Bertram 02.23.11 at 8:25 pm

_Lee Kuan Yew, on the other hand, *single-handedly* made Singapore a country with first-world living standards,_

Really? Didn’t he get just a teensy little bit of help from all the other people in Singapore?

60

Cian 02.23.11 at 8:26 pm

Latro,
Its not really the bias with the Economist which I can live with, but the fact that over the years I’ve read too many stories by them which were selective with the facts, or ignored inconvenient details. Since expanding into the US market they’ve become worse, if anything.

I don’t like Chavez, as I find his style of charistmatic S. American politics pretty unattractive, and he does seem to have authoritarian tendencies. I also think his arrogance and relucance to delegate has resulted in a number of missed opportunies. His foreign policy is variable – certainly cosying up to anyone America hates isn’t terribly sensible. But compared to the guys that preceeded him he seems pretty good. I don’t remember all this international fuss about dictators then. And I might have more sympathy for Venezuela’s elites, if they hadn’t looted the country’s wealth for their own narrow benefit, or organised a coup (yeah, yeah Chavez. But hey, Caracazo you know. Context matters).

Yes rule of law matters, even if that law is enforced by the remenants of the old ogliarchy. It shows a worrying tendency. On the other hand he has unarguably helped the poor in Venezuela, something that the old elites showed no interest in doing. Furthermore given that the elites tried to overthrow him with a coup, and have tried many other dubvious tactics, not to mention the US’s history in the region (and what happened to one of his neighbours), I think the only chance for the poor in that region is, unfortunately, a strong man. And if a few bankers and the odd judge suffer in that process – well, c’est la guerre I guess. Better them than the poor masses who were suffering before.

For me is important. For Venezuelans too.

All Venezuelans? Are you sure about this? Quite a lot of them seem to like him.

Cian

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Latro 02.23.11 at 8:28 pm

Amazing.

I’m going to forward that to relatives and friends in Venezuela. Lets see if they can find that country that, surely, has to be there but in a parallel dimension or something.

The “growth in non-oil sectors”, for example, does it shows where it is? Cause so far it is seen in, for example, the thriving industry of importing cars for the new rich (normally, goverment connected). There are many many ways to become rich in Venezuela nowadays – if you get connected to the proper people and are able to bank on the shower of oil dollars that the goverment throws around.

Does that report mentions anything of the nowadays common food shortages, because somehow that “non oil sector growth” has not meant production of actual food, and Venezuela now depends on imports, which, managed by the “revolutionaries”, rot in the ports before going to the markets?

Does it mention anything about the collapse of the electrical infraestructure (apart from “El Niño” bullshit for the goverment?) due to lack of investment?

Does it mention anything about the fact that while almost all the others Latin American countries got surprisingly well of the global finantial crisis and show positive growth, Venezuela has a contraction of ~ 1.6%? Shouldnt it be the other way, given that all is so wonderful?

Does it says anything about how those magnificent initiatives that in theory cover all that improvement end up dissolving into nothing when they meet the actual needs? Does it counts, for example, all the “Barrio Adentro” medical facilities and programs as success and all the supposed beneficiaries as those that made that number double, when Venezuelans can go and check and see that, in many cases, the “program” went as far as to put some walls together and thats all?

Chávez has not done anything sustainable to the economy. He has done exactly the same but worse as the guys that he replaced and keeps ranting about – squander a huge boost on income with high oil prices in badly managed attempts at throwing money at the problem of poverty, getting at the best bumps into some indicators that are completly unsustainable cause all depends on same high oil prices. At worst the destruction of investment (replaced by imports) and a lot of corruption. All, as it has been in Venezuela since more or less the beggining of democracy in the 50s, dependent on oil prices and waiting just a fluctuation to fail even worse.

Investment is way down, with every possible company fleeing the country, given that at any point you dont know if you are going to be nationalized. Speaking of which, does that report tells, for example, that the cement industry that Chávez nationalized was having benefits of ~ 300 million Bolivares under private hands, and loses of 78 millions in the first half of 2010, and that is typical of all the industries he nationalized? Which is not surprising given that he nationalizes whatever he decides that day to nationalize, then appoints his cronies or some military guy to oversee the thing, nobody with experience, and then of course things go down quickly.

Again, I dont care if any of you “dont care” about Chávez abuses, being safe from them on your country. I guess the ones who care will have to do exactly the same as the ones who care about the current crop of Arab “leaders” – they will have to do their own thing without expecting any real help or comprehension by the developed countries. Even if in this case it would be the left “progressives” in the rich countries who leave the people hanging out for the convenience of their own myths and narratives, instead of neocons and neoliberals which is the standard.

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shah8 02.23.11 at 8:30 pm

Singapore has no resources, yet access to the world’s largest consumer market.

Cuba has resources, yet no access to the world’s largest consumer market.

Singapore also doesn’t have a neighbor with a Monroe Doctrine. Just a poor Muslim neighbor, and the host imperial power allowed it free commercial exchange with neighboring states, Anglo and not Anglo. Something that no Carrib nation was ever allowed to do, beyond the Caymans, I think.

When relatively progressive leadership does come around, they typically meet their demise about as fast or faster than that Honduras guy. At least he’s still around, unlike that Omar Torrijos fellow. Costa Rica managed to do okay for itself, but that is mostly for reason that aren’t of huge credit to it.

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Cian 02.23.11 at 8:30 pm

Myles, does it worry you that you’ve become numbingly predictable. Maybe you need to throw a little unpredictability into the mix to keep it fresh dawg.

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shah8 02.23.11 at 8:34 pm

I think many people underestimate the extent to which East Asia prosperity was built on the back of Cold War antagonisms.

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Cian 02.23.11 at 8:39 pm

The hyperbolic phrase “Venezuela is becoming Cuba” implies that Venezuela isn’t actually yet Cuba.

Yes I think the use of the word ‘becoming’ does normally imply that.

The same applies to Putin.

Putin isn’t yet Cuba. I’m sure he’ll be relieved to hear that.

66

Akshay 02.23.11 at 8:41 pm

Nir Rosen appreciates Al Jazeera at his blog.

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Myles 02.23.11 at 8:54 pm

Really? Didn’t he get just a teensy little bit of help from all the other people in Singapore?

I imagine he did. But my point was that Singapore’s development hinged upon Lee Kuan Yew’s (and more broadly, PAP) rule. It couldn’t have become a first-world country otherwise, no matter how much help the people gave or didn’t give their leader.

Myles, does it worry you that you’ve become numbingly predictable.

How unfortunate.

Yes I think the use of the word ‘becoming’ does normally imply that.

I did retract my comment about Chavez, didn’t I? I honestly find discussions of Venezuela lugubrious.

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chris 02.23.11 at 8:55 pm

Even if the world’s superpower weren’t constantly destabilizing him, Cuba would still be miserably poor, just because of the system he runs.

Because of course “the system he runs” has nothing to do with those destabilization efforts or his perverse and inexplicable desire to keep breathing notwithstanding those destabilization efforts.

I’m not about to sign up as a defender of Castro, but dismissing the idea that there is collateral damage from the US’s anti-Castro efforts without even examining it, in your rush to blame everything on Castro and only Castro, is a bit much. Castro could be the worst villain unhung and it could *still* be the case that attempts to destabilize his regime have done more harm than he has himself. (Cf. Saddam Hussein — as bad as he was, the attempt to remove him was worse; even its success can’t justify the amount of damage done in the process.)

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Latro 02.23.11 at 8:59 pm

Cyan, compared to the guys that came before, Chávez is half exactly the same, half worse. He is way worse in democracy (the previous rulers not having the “IM THE PEOPLE” revolutionary excuse, had to be more subtle in their shady dealings), having legitimized conflict and hate and rule by mob (when he things he have the mob behind) as politics – as shown by the case I linked, if you in any case dont follow exactly what he wants you get any kind of arbitrary punishment he can give to you cause you are clearly against the revolution and need to be crushed.

In economy, he is exactly the same kind of populist that drove Venezuela to the ground before him, amped to 11. Even worse, because he and his people are completly amateurs at it. Their whole view of economy is that Venezuela has oil, oil is money, you can throw money at things and fix them and of course as the money and the oil is of all Venezuelans then of course all Venezuelans will benefit from it – as interpreted by them who are sitting on the valve that control that money. So whatever good idea they have in the beginning gets transformed into another hole to throw money at, badly managed by corrupt amateurs, and every attempt to transform the economy toward something sustainable and growing gets destroyed half because it is easy to throw oil money at things (and more profitable for the politically connected who divert it to themselves), and half because they will not permit ANY source of autonomy that they cant control, and successful business is one of those; better to have everything tied to oil money, that they control and can decide who gets it and who doesnt.

Exactly the same as I lived in the 70s, the 80, the 90, exactly the same they tell me in the 00’s, and now in the 10’s. Same policy – waste the oil money instead of using it to jumpstart an economy, cause by controling the oil money they ensure the control of the country. Same problems – inmense corruption, wasted opportunities, clientelism instead of actual political systems, destruction of local industry, inflation, and the certainty of having even worse every time oil descend from “insanely pricey” to “just pricey”

And the issue of Chávez and what is he doing is important to Venezuelans. Pro and against, it is THE issue in Venezuelan politics, and the issue that will make the future of the country for decades to come. If it is not important to you cause, really, is just an irrelevant South American country that is not going to represent a problem to the US at all (how? Chávez lives by selling oil to the US, rethoric or no rethoric), well, fine for you. Yes, there are those in the US that would like to blow him up to a threath for their own gains (I’m sure he loves that too – he loves the spotlight), and you can be “bored” of reading about something that is not going to affect you at all. But really, I get dissapointed at how easily is for the side I want to be in and I agree with in many, many issues (like, for example, this Wisconsin thing of yours), dismiss and deny what I clearly see as the same kind of abuse they decry and fight… when it is inconvenient for their picture of the world.

By that account, what the hell do I care you guys get idiotic, ideologized fanatics like the Tea Party guys running on a platform of blind ideology and hatred and stupidity and go to dismantle all they can in their hateful haste to destroy anything that they see as unAmerican? Its your problem, it will not affect me, I’m sure Scott Walker has good reasons (or somebody wrote a good set of lies to pretend they are the reasons), you are all rich anyway (or not, but well, I dont really care…)

Thing is, I care. I just want somebody to care with me when the threath is from a different set of idiotic ideologized hateful demagogues in a different place that I have ties to… and then all dissapear cause “there are more important things to do”, “I dont care”, “its just a lie”, “its just rightwing propaganda” … same as a conservative leaning person in the US is saying about Wisconsin, I’m sure, just mirror image.

As long as the international “liberal” (US meaning) community chooses heroes like Chavez and employs the same defense tactics that the world communists used when it was bad to talk about the USSR (from blind praise to silence cause hush, we cant hurt the revolution), instead of condenation and scorn and distance, you reap the same as the democracies of the West are getting in Libya, Tunisa, Egypt, etc; discredit, suspiction and distrust.

There are very good models to have around. Right next to Chávez there is Lula and its legacy of actually doing something real, sustainable, and having the economy of Brazil grow with real social benefits and no loss of democracy. If the world left told clowns like Chávez to cut the bullshit and do REAL work …

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Myles 02.23.11 at 9:04 pm

Because of course “the system he runs” has nothing to do with those destabilization efforts or his perverse and inexplicable desire to keep breathing notwithstanding those destabilization efforts.

Look, my point was in response to Cian ranking Castro and Lee Kuan Yew about equal. The point was entirely contextual, that the two aren’t equal and one’s entirely worse than the other.

Nowhere did I claim that the destabilization efforts didn’t do significant harm. I am merely stating that Castro is a magnitude greater of a bastard than Lee Kuan Yew ever was, which I think is a rather defensible position. In any case, like Venezuela, Cuba seems to have the ability to cause people to lose their sense of humour entirely. How intensely boring and enervating.

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Kaveh 02.23.11 at 9:14 pm

@60 If things are as bad as you say, how do you explain the reported 50% drop in poverty rate, and the large drop in infant mortality? Whatever anecdotes you have heard about the ineffectiveness of government programs, those results would be impossible without real improvements for many people. It’s hard to see how they could do this if all the new clinics were really as useless as you say, and other social programs are really that insubstantial. Do you think the Venezuelan govt cooked the books?

Isn’t Venezuela under Chavez a fairly unexceptional example of a “development state”?

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novakant 02.23.11 at 9:31 pm

I think the only chance for the poor in that region is, unfortunately, a strong man.

Yeah, right – that strong man concept who will bring the poor into the socialist paradise if they only believe in him and cut him some slack has worked really well all over the world.

F@ck that.

73

engels 02.23.11 at 9:38 pm

I did retract my comment about Chavez, didn’t I? I honestly find discussions of Venezuela lugubrious.

Do you? Personally I find them lambent. Refulgent, even.

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Latro 02.23.11 at 10:05 pm

Kaveh, if you improve this year mortality rates by a crash course of pumping oil money at it (and losing 9 of every 10 $ in the process), while at the same time you destroy the rest of the economy, what is going to happen when you find that you have 1/2 the money cause oil went down?

All the bumps in indicators, and yes, they are cooked a lot, but even the real “improvements”, are all like that. Oh, windfall of oil prices, just throw money at it.

Meanwhile there are serious doubts about PDVSA, the state oil company. Cause, being managed by cretins and ideologes, it is rotting in place, as everything else. When Venezuela says it produces X milion barrels of oil, their own friends at the OPEC look at the figures and say “eh… no, you dont”. There are serious doubts about their capacity to keep production.

Chávez style is purely populist. Oh, this barrio needs healthcare! Throw money at it! Something gets done… the first year. Maybe the second. Third year, well, you know, we forgot. Or there was something else to throw money at. Or this barrio elected as major somebody that is not my pal, so screw them. Or somebody stole all the supplies. Or the guy in charge decided to steal more money. Or hire more “workers” that dont work but are voters. Or …

If everything is “as good ” as you read on health care issues, can you tell me how come Venezuela went from having erradicated malaria (oh, how proud were Venezuelans of that, another proof of being the best coutry in Latin America) to 12% more cases in 2009, with 30000 new cases or so? Does that sounds like a country that is well managed and progressing toward better?

Again, all improvements (when you remove the cooking) are temporary improvements of throwing the boon of oil prices to issues in the most mismanaged, chaotic and corrupt way possible – and it works. for a while. Then it collapses and leaves everything worse than before.

Could work for a much longer (forever) if that money was well managed and if also the economical policies were ones that made sense and provided real growth. Instead he wastes oil money not only by badly managing what needs to be done (healthcare), but by his stupid measures. For the money that took to “nationalize” all the bullshit he nationalized (and now runs huge deficits), he could have done even more. And put the country in a sustainable path of growth that let him do even more with taxes-

Lets get another story. PDVSA had a plan to bring gas service to the people from 2007 to 2013. A plan to bring gas to many many poor Venezuelans, improving their lives (instead of having to carry huge gas canisters up to their homes in the barrios). Good, thats a worthy objective

Last year it had to be “relaunched”. From 2007 to 2010 the project managed to bring gas to… 1% of the target population of 2 millions

On neighbourgh Colombia, with their oligarch right wing presidents and all (and they arent nice guys, really), they managed to bring natural gas to 4 million Colombians in 10 years. On Venezuela, with the revolutionary friend of the people in power, you get that. 1% of 2 million, 20000, in 3 years. For many reasons. Starting from “where is the money?” to “Well, as the gov keeps devaluating the currency this all is even more expensive…” to of course that if Chávez that day rose from bed and thought that he needed to nationalize the sardines-in-a-tin industry or the bicycle industry or whatever the hell he dreamed that night, well, there goes more money…

Does that look like a country getting out of poverty? Does that look like an achievement? Like a goverment that is really doing things well, that is responsible and efficient investing the country money? Cause this is exactly the same in everything – if you manage to see a positive growth in some indicator, is just a mirage, subject to crashing down at any moment, when money runs out or the idiotic management manages to screw up or all the inefficiencies and corruption end overtaking it.

He has done exactly the same as his predecessors. Another shot of the miracle drug Oil Dollars, patient seems to be in less pain for a while, then crash when the drug wears off. But hey, its effective while it last… not so much on the patient, but very effective if you are connected and can get some of those $ to go your way.

Again. If Venezuela is a fairly unexceptional “development state” … then the revolution is a huge fiasco, cause it manage to do even worse that the neighbourghs that, being in the same category, didnt follow that route.

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chris 02.23.11 at 10:07 pm

As long as the international “liberal” (US meaning) community chooses heroes like Chavez

Wait, what? Citation needed.

employs the same defense tactics that the world communists used when it was bad to talk about the USSR

I’m young enough that I have to ask: did this ever actually happen? Or is it of a piece with spitting on Vietnam vets, etc., just one more straw-leftist constructed by the right over the years?

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chris 02.23.11 at 10:10 pm

Cause this is exactly the same in everything – if you manage to see a positive growth in some indicator, is just a mirage, subject to crashing down at any moment, when money runs out or the idiotic management manages to screw up or all the inefficiencies and corruption end overtaking it.

Is this describing Venezuela, or the US? It seems like it could be either.

77

NomadUK 02.23.11 at 10:12 pm

Not all the right is bonkers, yet.

I haven’t noticed any evidence to support this.

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Charles Crawford 02.23.11 at 10:19 pm

Most of the comments are a bit Westo-centric.

What about the role of the ‘East’ in propping up these wretched places too? The votes of Russia and China at the UN in effect blocking any united active position against Gaddafi’s brutality? The way the ex-KGB have ducked and weaved to keep alive all their Soviet-era contacts in the region?

As each country concerned finds its feet and starts the decades-long road to better conditions, it will be mainly ‘Western’ money and advisers who are there to help. That’s where EU-style ‘soft power’ supported by US funds too actually does make a steady difference, albeit slowly (see Belarus, Ukraine).

The USA’s immediate problem is that President Obama in his “I am the anti-Bush” early mode seemed to invent a new doctrine of deliberately not rocking the boat with any corrupt Arab/Muslim regimes. See his strange Cairo speech. So he now has a credibility problem. But that too should pass.

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Latro 02.23.11 at 10:19 pm

Chris:

1 – You get lot of “celebrities” from the “left”, like Chomsky or Stone, absolutely praising Chávez and all his “good work”. On the other side, you have well, same tactics as may posters here. Oh, somebody mentioned Venezuela, oh, how boring, oh, how bad and disgusting and irrelevant and dont we have something else to focus on, this is you now, bad taste…

2 – Yes, you are young. Look at eurocommunism for an example of actual leftists waking up and saying “maybe we have been doing this wrong all this years, with all the uncritical praise and subordination to the Soviet Union, time to do something different cause really, who wants to be like them”

3- If it could be either, then what justifies the venom, hate and strong-arm tactics like the case with Judge Afiuni? Those are predicated on the supposed need to defend the revolution from those that would put the country in the hands of “oligarchs” who would, of course do things… exactly the same?

If the result is EXACTLY the same… the only one being defended is him.

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engels 02.23.11 at 10:30 pm

On the other side, you have well, same tactics as may posters here. Oh, somebody mentioned Venezuela, oh, how boring, oh, how bad and disgusting and irrelevant and dont we have something else to focus on, this is you now, bad taste…

You mean like trying to focus on a complete different subject, like, say, Al Jazeera and the Arab Awakening? What a despicable tactic…

81

belle le triste 02.23.11 at 10:34 pm

I think he means Myles, who is indeed on the other side to “celebrities” and the “left”, and has been elegantly yawning his distaste throughout most of the thread.

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Cian 02.23.11 at 10:47 pm

I am merely stating that Castro is a magnitude greater of a bastard than Lee Kuan Yew ever was

Why? Both occasionally lock up people who disagree with them, both are rather authoritarian. Castro wouldn’t let people leave, so that’s a difference, but other than that I’m not really seeing it Myles. One can make the argument that Lee is a better manager than Castro, but that’s a completely different argument (and rather a pointless one give the impossible of separating out the context in which both found themselves).

I can without much effort come up with a list of dictators far worse than Castro. People who killed and tortured their enemies, where their subjects lived in fear. And yet its also Castro is really bad. Chavez is really bad. I mean even Latro (who I’m guessing is, or was, a member of Venezuela’s more privileged classes) has basically admitted that Chavez is no worse than his predecessors.

If you think Castro and Chavez are among the world’s worst dictators, then either you’re extremely badly misinformed, very naive indeed, or have a bit of an ideological obsession with leftists. Criticise them for their failings by all means – but please, some proportion here.

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Cian 02.23.11 at 11:04 pm

Latro,
So you’re saying that giving money to the poor and screwing over the economy is worse than the elites stealing it all and the poor getting nothing. I’m not sure I’d see that way if I was poor.

Anyway Latro, the stuff I’ve read about Venezuela written by people who are not particularly sympathetic towards Chavez doesn’t support your analysis (neither does it support his uncritical supporters in the west, who are a little embarrassing). It seems to boil down to some good, some wasted and not brilliantly managed. And they haven’t yet managed to find a serious replacement for oil, hardly surprising as this is a struggle for any resource rich country. Not something I’d particularly want to emulate (I like to aim big myself), hardly the victory that Chavez boasts of, but neither the disaster that his enemies would have us believe. Though I’m sure it would feel that way if you were a member of the wealthy elite. Reducing the gini coefficient tends to be unpleasant if its your money being redistributed.

And to be honest Latro, you sound like every member of an elite bitter that his guys aren’t in power. I heard similar types of things from upper class Tories during the Labour years. Or indeed the kind of stuff you’d hear from right wing ex-pats. Its all rather hysterical and lacking nuance. I mean if he’s really that bad, how do you explain the figures.

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Cian 02.23.11 at 11:08 pm

Yeah, right – that strong man concept who will bring the poor into the socialist paradise if they only believe in him and cut him some slack has worked really well all over the world.

Given that in my comment I made it quite clear that this is because only a strong man would survive the onslaught brought on by both the continents Ogliarchs, and the USA, I think it was very clear why I wrote what I did. I also made it very clear that I didn’t like this fact, but couldn’t see any alternatives.

So what explains your deeply unserious response? Stupidity, or trolling?

85

Myles 02.23.11 at 11:10 pm

If you think Castro and Chavez are among the world’s worst dictators, then either you’re extremely badly misinformed, very naive indeed, or have a bit of an ideological obsession with leftists.

Do I sound like I see them as the world’s worst dictators? Not only is Castro now a crashing bore, he seems to have an amazing ability to make crashing bores out of others. Perhaps insouciance is the medicine to remedy for History’s Greatest Monsters, after all.

One can make the argument that Lee is a better manager than Castro, but that’s a completely different argument (and rather a pointless one give the impossible of separating out the context in which both found themselves).

I daresay Granma is a touch more censored than the Singaporean press, that while Lee locks people up, he doesn’t usually torture them (corporal punishment for petty, non-political crimes is really a different category), that Lee has never supported terrorism, that the ability to emigrate is a very fundamental human freedom; and most obviously, economic freedom, which is entirely missing in Cuba, makes up a very important part of human freedom, and while Singapore may be little ahead than Cuba in other freedoms, it is miles ahead in economic freedom. Just because Uncle Sam was mean doesn’t mean that Castro is absolved of evil, and just because others were nice to Lee doesn’t mean his accomplishments are diminished.

Really, it’s an extraordinarily silly argument that Castro is no worse than Lee. In any case, isn’t this rather dull?

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Myles 02.23.11 at 11:15 pm

And in any case, I see a giant, blinking inconsistency between your recognition that a strong man might be the only option for Venezuela, and complete obduracy that somehow Lee, someone who wasn’t even that harsh of a strong man, who at least kept up a pretence of rule of law and did institute rule of law for most thing, is no better than someone who seems incapable of throwing aside his own silly ideology so that his people can stop being dirt-poor, when that is the most eminently practical thing to do.

China’s leaders seem to get it. Castro doesn’t.

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Cian 02.23.11 at 11:17 pm

Oh, economic freedom. You’re one of them. Viva Pinochet.

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Cian 02.23.11 at 11:19 pm

So we’ll add Cuba to the list of things that you know very little about, yet feel compelled to comment on then, Myles?

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Myles 02.23.11 at 11:23 pm

(It’s one of those arguments where even when you win (and you aren’t), you lose. One proves only the irrelevance of the debate, when with one’s own eyes one can see Singaporeans leading largely free, largely autonomous lives, and Cubans leading largely unfree lives. It’s just really quite obvious that Castro is a much worse human being than Lee Kuan Yew, just by looking at the countries they run. If he actually cared about his people he wouldn’t be so horrendously insistent on his failed socialist experiment, and reform the economy like China has done.

Castro, really, is a rather classic case of the humourless ideologue. It’s a tragedy that his country is completely without levity.)

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Myles 02.23.11 at 11:25 pm

Oh, economic freedom. You’re one of them. Viva Pinochet.

Math time!

If Country A has 100 units of civil freedom and 0 units of economic freedom, and Country B has 150 units of civil freedom and 200 units of economic freedom, which country has more overall freedom?

The point is that not only does Singapore have a bit more civil liberties, it has tons more economic liberties. It has more of both.

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Myles 02.23.11 at 11:28 pm

(And you still haven’t answered why Cubans deserve to be crucified so Castro’s personal beliefs are satisfied. I don’t see why he deserves such a large sacrifice. As far as I know, he doesn’t seem to have godly powers, nor is he an Inca king.)

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geo 02.23.11 at 11:30 pm

I found the figures Lemuel cited @54 very compelling; but Latro’s objections are also quite plausible, and very disturbing. If anyone has any authorititive-seeming references on the subject of Venezuela’s welfare under Chavez, I’d be grateful.

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Eric Treanor 02.24.11 at 12:38 am

“The democracies of the West, by contrast, have contributed nothing”?

This claim is absurd. Among our contributions: the ongoing model our democracies have provided the world of the merits of self-rule. Foremost among those models—the straw that poked the camel, if you will—was the historic election of Barack Hussein Obama. It’s impossible to overstate the transformative power of Obama’s rise in the minds of the Arab world. In a flash, the catalogue of conspiracies that have shaped the Middle Eastern discussion of America for generations went up in flames.

“Let me be clear”: Obama’s election made these revolutions possible. It shamed the Arab world into action. These nations—their youths, primarily—could no longer sit their cafes and blame all their ills on America. America now had a president descended from their history, bearing their name. America had elected—in their minds—one of them. It had repudiated and replaced its own leadership. The world stood in disbelief—and thought, So that’s democracy.

Yes, it is.

Perhaps we won’t get much change in America. But by voting for it, we’re getting it across the world—and that, in the end, will be better for everyone.

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novakant 02.24.11 at 1:19 am

I also made it very clear that I didn’t like this fact, but couldn’t see any alternatives.

There are no alternatives to Hugo Chavez? Give me a break.

Castro wouldn’t let people leave, so that’s a difference, but other than that …

And that difference is far from negligible. If a government sucks so much that it has to imprison its people to prevent them from leaving in droves, it’s a total failure, cf. GDR.

95

Lemuel Pitkin 02.24.11 at 1:22 am

George-

You could look at the UN’s Human Development Index. I think you’ll find it’s basically consistent with the picture in the CEPR report.

96

john b 02.24.11 at 2:46 am

@novakant:

Cuba has a population of 11 million, it’s situated around 120km from the US, and the US grants permanent residence rights to anyone who leaves Cuba for the US. If the US extended that policy to *anywhere else* in the Caribbean or Central America, no matter how well-governed or otherwise, then that country would lose a vast proportion of its people a matter of months. It’s not a reflection on Cuba’s regime in particular that many of its people would like to take advantage of the US policy.

Given that point, you can see why Cuba is reluctant to allow people to emigrate en masse to a hostile regime that’s dedicated to overthrowing it. I’m not an expert on WWII-era population controls, but AIUI we weren’t particularly keen on granting visas for people to emigrate from the US or UK to Japan, Germany or Italy between 1941-1945…

97

novakant 02.24.11 at 4:35 am

“Would it not be easier
In that case for the government
To dissolve the people
And elect another?”

98

Cian 02.24.11 at 8:32 am

It’s just really quite obvious that Castro is a much worse human being than Lee Kuan Yew, just by looking at the countries they run.

Its really quite obvious that Mandela is a worse human being than Berlusconi by just looking at the countries they ran/run.

Nope, really not seeing that as a viable argument.

If he actually cared about his people he wouldn’t be so horrendously insistent on his failed socialist experiment, and reform the economy like China has done.

Yeah Myles I get it, you don’t know anything about Cuba. There’s no need to keep demonstrating it. Unless your argument is that he’s a horrible human being because he hasn’t done exactly what China has done, in which case. No even you couldn’t be arguing that.

Math time!

If Country A has 100 units of civil freedom and 0 units of economic freedom, and Country B has 150 units of civil freedom and 200 units of economic freedom, which country has more overall freedom?

Okay I get it, you’re pre-college. Everything starts to make sense now.

99

Cian 02.24.11 at 8:34 am

There are no alternatives to Hugo Chavez? Give me a break.

Okay then Novakant, what are the alternatives to Chavez in Venezuela. Bearing in mind that said alternative will need to survive coups, external destabilisation, etc. You can do it, I just know you can.

100

Cian 02.24.11 at 8:36 am

Its about as easy to get into the US from Cuba as from any other Caribbean country, so there’s that I guess.

No doubt the people on this thread who so hate Cuba, spend as much time condemning all the other shitty governments in the Caribbean. No doubt.

101

Myles 02.24.11 at 9:10 am

Okay I get it, you’re pre-college. Everything starts to make sense now.

This is no substitute for not facing up the simple maths of Singapore having more of both economic and civil freedom than Cuba.

No doubt the people on this thread who so hate Cuba, spend as much time condemning all the other shitty governments in the Caribbean. No doubt.

I see you’ve adopted the Melanie Phillips method of argumentation re: Israel and Iran/Syria/whatever. Very charming, indeed.

Unless your argument is that he’s a horrible human being because he hasn’t done exactly what China has done, in which case. No even you couldn’t be arguing that.

Why don’t we let the Cubans vote on it, for once? I don’t particularly think Cuba needs parliaments and four-year elections and the rest of it right now, but just ask them, on an one-off basis, whether they want to keep Castro-style socialism, or become an American economic province, or whatever? I am more than willing to shut up if they indeed do endorse Castro’s policies, which they might or might not do. (Public opinion polling in Cuba is always a bit shady.)

(And yes, I am more than willing to extend this experiment to China; I am pretty sure that if there was a Yes/No referendum right now, the majority, likely even a supermajority, would endorse keeping the Communist Party in power. Approval ratings for the Communists in urban areas would probably top 70%. I am not quite sure if that’s the case for Cuba, although feel welcome to correct me on that point.)

I feel a bit cheapened that I have wasted so many words talking about Castro, of all people, but there you have it. You are under the mistaken impress that I care very much about Castro; I actually don’t. I find him quaint and amusing, unlike some of his more rotund defenders. Charming fellow, really, and wonderfully gesticulative. Sort of like a best-loved silly uncle. Hope the man is available to stand in photos with tourists?

102

Myles 02.24.11 at 9:36 am

By the way, I am just noting, before you actually go off the rails, that I honestly don’t care what Castro does, I find him more comical than sinister, and the rest of it. The people you’ve got to convince isn’t me; it’s rows of rows of people who are sympathetic to Castro’s basic aims but believe that he’s more or less been a tragic mistake.

103

AB 02.24.11 at 10:08 am

If Europeans wish to show any decency towards the Middle East, it is high time for them to mobilize and support the struggles for democracy and freedom in Egypt, Tunisia and Iran; support the efforts of the Iraqis to stabilize and improve their democratic institutions. Right now Europeans should stand up for an immediate intervention in Libya and welcome the refugees instead of deploying warships against them. All this must be done at least with the same levels of engagement and enthusiasm that we saw in the mobilization across Europe against the invasion of Iraq in 2003. Good luck.

104

engels 02.24.11 at 2:26 pm

I find him quaint and amusing, unlike some of his more rotund defenders. Charming fellow, really, and wonderfully gesticulative.

Myles, you’ve really got to stop spending so much time on Word of the Day websites. For your own sake as much as anyone else’s.

105

Cian 02.24.11 at 2:49 pm

This is no substitute for not facing up the simple maths of Singapore having more of both economic and civil freedom than Cuba.

Just like the simple maths of adding apples and kilowatts no doubt.

I’m a little bemused by your insistance that I’m an uncritical supporter/friend/whatever of Cuba.

And Myles, I’m really not terribly interested in what you think about the matter, because its eye bleedingly obvious that on this topic, like so many others, you are completely clueless. I mean you’re seriously demanding that Castro should have some reforms? While you’re at it, why not demand that Putin should tear down the Berlin wall.

106

Chris Bertram 02.24.11 at 2:55 pm

So I start a thread about Egypt, Libya and Qatar and somehow you guys end up making multiple comments about Cuba, Venezuela and Singapore ….

107

novakant 02.24.11 at 3:01 pm

Okay then Novakant, what are the alternatives to Chavez in Venezuela.

I am simply unwilling to accept the dichotomy you posit (sellout to evil capitalists vs. authoritarian leadership) and the conclusion you draw (condoning authoritarian leadership and human rights abuses as the lesser evil). As I said above, such a way of thinking has been used frequently by authoritarians of both the left and the right to present themselves as the only possible solution, to vilify dissenting voices as “unpatriotic”, “counter-revolutionary” or “traitors” and to justify power grabs and the erosion of human rights and civil liberties. It’s always easy to blame external and internal “enemies” – the hard part is working to establish a pluralistic and democratic society.

108

engels 02.24.11 at 4:14 pm

And what contribution you are making towards ‘the hard part’ of ‘working to establish pluralistic and democratic society’ in Venezuela? Do you have any ideas about how this should be done?

109

Myles 02.24.11 at 4:32 pm

Myles, you’ve really got to stop spending

Ahh yes, deliciously bad spelling error. I meant orotund, and ended up typing in rotund.

110

Cian 02.24.11 at 4:56 pm

I am simply unwilling to accept the dichotomy you posit (sellout to evil capitalists vs. authoritarian leadership)

That dichotomy’s in your head, mate. I gather that you have problems reading properly, so I try to make this really simple.

Chavez faced down a coup, and various attempts by the elites to undermine the economy. One of his neighbours, also democratically elected was kicked out via a coup only recently. Others over the years have also lost power in similarly nefarious circumstances. The conclusion I draw from this is that anyone who wishes to stand up to these elites probably has to be pretty ruthless, otherwise they will be driven out in some form of coup.

And because you seem to be really struggling. I do not particularly like Chavez. But I’d rather criticise him for his real failings, rather than the propaganda of his (many of them far worse) enemies.

111

chris 02.24.11 at 7:21 pm

@104: If you rewrite that “I start a thread about three dictatorships and you guys end up making multiple comments about three other dictatorships or alleged dictatorships”, it doesn’t sound quite so odd. There’s nothing peculiarly Arab about dictatorships.

112

novakant 02.24.11 at 10:48 pm

Cian, you’re position boils down to “he may be a bastard, but he’s our bastard” – that approach hasn’t been very beneficial in the past except for the bastards. Also, you seem to be unaware of Operation Zamora, which is rather ironic.

113

P O'Neill 02.25.11 at 4:10 am

Clowning statements from Chavez foreign minister and ambassador to Libya make it harder not to put Chavez in the Ortega camp.

114

Cian 02.25.11 at 10:56 am

Cian, you’re position boils down to “he may be a bastard, but he’s our bastard”

Nope, that’s the position you’d like to boil it down to because its easier to argue with.

Also, you seem to be unaware of Operation Zamora, which is rather ironic.

El Caracazo you mean?

115

Salient 02.25.11 at 12:39 pm

So I start a thread about Egypt, Libya and Qatar and somehow you guys end up making multiple comments about Cuba, Venezuela and Singapore…

Well, ok– am I understanding correctly that Gaddafi just deputized all of Libya? Or was his call for anybody who happens to feel like it to “arrest” protesters mistranslated?

And for more tech-minded folks: how difficult would it be for the US (or some other benevolent power) to decommission a broadcast satellite over the Middle East and passively open its accessibility, effectively providing Internet access / phone services that couldn’t be overridden by kill-switches on the ground (and conveniently ensuring that benevolent power has unilateral access to and control over nearly all Internet communication from the region)? Presumably this would require hardware on the ground that isn’t widely available in the short-term, but medium-term to what extent is something like this feasible?

116

chris 02.25.11 at 1:55 pm

Presumably this would require hardware on the ground that isn’t widely available in the short-term, but medium-term to what extent is something like this feasible?

As I understand it, it’s not so easy to make a conveniently human-portable device that can communicate two-way with a satellite (let alone one in geosynchronous orbit, which would seem to be required for it to be “over the Middle East” in any lasting sense). That’s one reason why we still have so many cell towers. (Another is that many of the richest, highest-tech countries are in high latitudes where geosync satellites are inconveniently low in the sky, but that would be less of a problem in Libya.) But cell towers are stationary targets, pretty easy for the government to shut down or blow up if it doesn’t like how they’re operating.

But I’m not an expert on satellites, so I could be wrong. On the Internet. You know what would happen then.

117

Tim Wilkinson 02.25.11 at 2:39 pm

Good to see Latro’s problem with broken English (‘Why Chávez would to be singled out? I dont know. For me is important.’, etc), as apologised for @49, has cleared up.

118

dsquared 02.25.11 at 4:34 pm

I can’t remember if the Wall Street Journal headline “Venezuelan Dictator Loses Referendum” was real or apocryphal, but si no vera …

119

Ellis Goldberg 02.26.11 at 11:19 am

I think Salient has it right. Evidently most Western social scientists just don’t have enough of a clue about what is going on in the Arab world to talk about anything other than what they’re comfortable with which seems to be Latin America and East Asia. I don’t think Qaddafi “deputized” people. I can’t remember his exact words but it seemed more like a call for his supporters to kill his opponents out of hand. While Al-Jazeera has riveting coverage especially for violent breaking news, I think you generally get a clearer picture of what’s going on by watching BBC Arabic (especially last night’s hour long show on events in Egypt). Two things missing from media discussions I’ve read are the use of contemporary media for satire like the hilarious send-up of Qaddafi in his Tik-Tok car that some kid in the working class Cairo suburb of Shubra did and the intense debates going on in the daily newspapers about events. But I assume that at some point in the near future the language barrier and cultural prejudice will once more relegate changes in the Arab world to the complete back burner of European and American social science.

120

Hidari 02.26.11 at 12:41 pm

I’m glad that this discussion has contributed to the most important debate currently ongoing between white, middle aged, middle class, males in the US, the UK and Australia, which is ‘In the world of Saudi Arabia, Myanmar, Libya, North Korea, China, Equatorial Guinea and the LRA, is Hugo Chavez the most Evillest Man in the Whole Cosmos who has Ever Lived (Ever!) or is he merely the most World’s most Evillest Man in the Whole World of The World of Earth!

And it’s good to see that we all feel this is a relevant debate to have while Tripoli burns.

121

jose 02.26.11 at 2:21 pm

it is absolutely correct to laud al-jazeera for outstanding coverage. it has become so vital that it is likely to land important distribution deals in the US as a result.

mr bertram allows for nuance when discussing Qatar but not western democracies. that’s unfortunate. in the same way that country can be paradoxical in its support of human rights, so can the US and EU, etc.

for example, how did the US “prop” Mubarak? one way is the training of Egyptian military officials, very likely a means of influencing the transition in Egypt towards civility and away from murder and mayhem.

the sum of what the US does is more important than what its most retrograde politicians take credit for or advocate doing.

a similar desire for clean and clear distinctions between the good guys and the bad guys recurs throughout the comments that follow, especially in the almost quaint discussion about America’s dictators and/or caudillos: Chavez, Castro, Ortega, Pinochet et al.

such a desire is entirely understandable but also unreasonable. the enemy of your enemy is not your friend, nor necessarily anyone’s friend but his/her own.

122

Donald Johnson 02.26.11 at 4:58 pm

In all the talk about Chavez, will no one respond to comment 93?–

” Obama’s election made these revolutions possible. It shamed the Arab world into action. These nations—their youths, primarily—could no longer sit their cafes and blame all their ills on America. America now had a president descended from their history, bearing their name. America had elected—in their minds—one of them. It had repudiated and replaced its own leadership. The world stood in disbelief—and thought, So that’s democracy.”

Yeah, the self-deluded liberals who voted for Obama thinking that he represented some sort of revolutionary “change” should pat themselves on the back. They were the inspiration for all those lazy Arabs in their cafes, who decided to get off their butts and risk their lives in a fight to overthrow the brutal dictators who dominate their lives. Dictators the Obama Administration would have been happy to continue supporting.

I’m sure Obama’s cave-in to Netanyahu was equally inspiring.

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