Robert Cox - Ideologies and The New International

Ideologies and the New International Economic Order: Reflections on Some Recent Literature Author(s): Robert W.
Cox Reviewed work(s): Source: International Organization, Vol. 33, No. 2 (Spring, 1979), pp. 257-302 Published by: The MIT Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2706612 . Accessed: 09/03/2012 15:24
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Ideologies and the New International Economic Order: reflections on some recent literature
Robert W. Cox
What is the NIEO literature about? Economic Order,that can be forThe demandfor a New International mallydatedfrom the Algiersconferenceof the Non-Alignedcountriesin 1973 and whichhas been pursuedwith the backingof these countriesin the United a instances,has precipitated reconsideration Nations and other international of the structureand processes of world political economy among all the principalinterests.This has resultedin a large and growingliteraturethat to date, if it has not entirelyclarifiedthe problemsand issuesbesettingthe world political economy, has at least made it possible to identify certain salient currentsof thought about them, each setting forth a mode of analysisand a strategy of action. This review article attempts to survey some of this literature.I take my stand not in some conceptionof objectivesciencefrom which to allocate meritsand demeritsto particularauthors, but ratheras an observerof the confrontationsof ideas, consideringthe role of ideas in relation to the positionsof conflictingforces. The surveycannotclaimto be comA of thoughit does aim to be representative differentperspectives. prehensive, list of the books and documentscoveredis appendedat the end, andreferences will be madeby principal authorand pagenumberin the body of the text. Ideological analysis is, of course, a critic's weapon and one most eforthodoxieswhich, when strippedof their fectivelyused againstthe prevailing transient becomeseen as specialpleadingfor historically putativeuniversality, but presently entrenched interests. Social science is never neutral. It is,
International Organization 33,2, Spring 1979 0020-8183/79/0002-0257 $01.00/0 ? by the Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System
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this therefore, only fair to warn the readerthat my purposein undertaking survey was to discoverand encourageavenues of enquirythat might in the of long run aid towardsthe transformation power relationsboth within and amongnationsin the directionof greatersocial equity.Thus, I found the work and historicalmaterialistsdiscussed of some of the radicalneo-mercantilists developed) below more potentiallyvaluable(thoughas yet very inadequately ' productsof the westernacademicestablishments. thanthe moreprestigious Some preliminaryremarksare called for before getting to the books EconomicOrder? themselves.In the first place, what is the New International about?A numberof Or, morespecifically,what, in the broad,is this literature answersare possible,all of whichare in some measurecorrect.At a first level, the NIEO is a series of specific demandsand considerationsembodiedin an rangeand numberof official documentsadoptedby international impressive conferences.The extentof these can be measuredby the size of a two-volume collectionof official paperscompiledby the librariansof the United Nations Institutefor Trainingand Researchwhichincludestexts from the Groupof 77 and its regionalgroups and the Non-Aligned Countriesas well as from the of organizations the United Nations family (UNITAR, A New International
Economic Order. Selected Documents, 1945-1975).
At a second level, the NIEO is a negotiationprocess, broadlyspeaking, betweencountriesof North and South but taking place througha varietyof wideror narrowerrangesof institutionsand forumsin which are represented functionaland geographicalinterests.This negotiationprocess is concerned with the possibilities of agreement concerning both revised international policies and reformedor new institutions(includingthe power relationships governingthese institutions). No one has yet attempted to plot the interinstitutionalcomplexthroughwhich this negotiationprocessis taking place, though UNITAR and the Ford Foundationhave sponsoreda team project with Robert W. Gregg as principalinvestigatorto "describe, explain, and analyze"this aspect. At a third level, the NIEO has precipitateda debate about the real and
1 Reviewers of this article suggested that I make my political position clear at the outset, a request that is fair yet difficult for me to comply with since I do not sit comfortably under any political label. I have thought of myself as a conservative, but to accept this designation is to risk association with those who have appropriated it to cloak an egoistic defense of acquired privilege. My conservatism is in the first place historicism, or the sense that ideas and events are bound together in structural totalities that condition the possibilities of change-what I understand Machiavelli to have meant by necessitd. My conservatism is also a commitment to a certain sense of right and equity for the underdog and a suspicion of the most recently established wealth and power-a pre-capitalist, Jacobite, anti-Whig conservatism. This makes me suspicious of all bureaucracies (though there are some good people who double as bureaucrats) whether governmental, corporate, international, or academic. I find some of the thought of the critical Left (to be distinguished from the new scholasticism of the official Left) more relevant to my concerns than anything on the Right or Center of today's political spectrum, though I am aware that many of those whose work I find helpful would regard my own historicism as a form of idealism. So much for the author's confessions. The author is grateful for the critical comments offered by Robert Keohane, John Ruggie, and Peter Katzenstein.
Ideologies and the NIEO
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desirable basic structure of world economic relations. Though the term to (consciouslychosenin preference "world" or "global" by "international" the authors of the demand) connotes a limitation of the issue to relations among countries, the debate cannot be so artificiallyconstrainedand has structural issues. Structures rangedinevitablyinto domesticand transnational here encompass the relationshipsamong regions within countries, among different industries and economic activities, among different modes of production, and among social classes, as well as those among countries of different groupings. This debate brings into focus theories concernedwith and with the causesof underdevelopment, with the physicallimits imperialism, to growth. Finally, at a fourth level, the debate becomes one about the form of these issues. In effect, the demand knowledgeappropriateto understanding for a NIEO has mobilizeda fresh challengeto the intellectualhegemonyof liberaleconomicsand its claims to an exclusive"rationality."For its critics, set historicallydetermined economicsis an ideology derivedfrom a particular of power relations, not a sciencewith absolute and universalscope, and the emergenceof new power relationsof which the NIEO is one manifestation politicaleconomy. of calls for a reformulating a moreappropriate The specific policy and institutional issues that are the subject of issuesdebated diplomaticnegotiationsand the theoreticaland epistemological in academicseminarsand symposiaare indeedintimatelyrelated.Any general organizationof power not only generatesinstitutionsand policy mechanisms but also sustainsideas which legitimateit. Such a dominantideologyjustifies the existing order of power relationsby indicatingthe benefits accruing(or the accruable) all the principalparties,includingin particular subordinate to or less favored. So long as these latter acquiescein the dominantmode of withinthe existingsystem thought,theirdemandsare likelyto be reconcilable of power. However, where there is a general challenge to the prevailing becomesa part of of structure power,then the articulation counter-ideologies on of the action, and the possibilityof reachingreasonablydurableagreement the practicalissues of policies and institutionsbecomes bound up with the possibilityof reachinga newconsensuson theoriesand modesof analysis. overlapin the Moreover,in the case of the NIEO, thereis a considerable personnelconcerned,on the one handwith the policy negotiations,and on the the otherhandwith the debateabout theory.This underlines practicalpolitical issuesand indeedgivesthe debateabouttheorya of importance the theoretical certain logical priorityin that its outcomes would provide the rationalefor to futurepolicies. Much of the literature be discussedis the productof actual as in participants the negotiationsand is thus to be considered politicalaction, an aspect of a political process (rather than as independent,objective, or observers). scientificanalysesmadeby disinterested The intellectual participantswho are politically active in the NIEO negotiationstogetherwith those academicswho play a more indirectrole can be seen as linked in a series of networks,each of which is mobilizingideas
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among arounda certainpartialconsensus.Thereare, of course,disagreements are network,but these disagreements within a individualswithin a particular certain commonalityof ideas or a basic common approach. There are also in who participate morethan one networkand who are thus certainindividuals potential hinges or go-betweens. Such individualsmight conceivablybe importantin exploringthe possibilityof broadeninga partial consensusto encompasstwo or morenetworks,ultimatelytowardsa newhegemonicideology. The presentstate of the literaturedoes not enable one to speculateabout the shape of a new hegemony,but it does make it possibleto juxtaposethe main networksand to place the various authors within this juxtapositionof perthat individualauthorsmay spectivesor partialconsensuses(whilerecognizing justifies resist assimilationto a school). The political natureof the literature this politicalmodeof analysis. Thesenetworksare not mereconstructsof my imagination,classifications of authorswhoseideasseemto havea certaincommunityof spirit.Intellectual productionis now organizedlike the productionof goods or of otherservices. The materialbasis of networks is provided by formal (usually nongovernas mental) organizations mobilizingand coordinatingagencieswith research directorsand funds (from sourcessometimesmore, sometimesless visible)for commissioningstudies, financing conferences, and symposia or informal luncheondiscussions.The materiallyindependentscholaris a rarity, though perhapsnot quiteextinct.The materialbasis of networksallowsfor a selection whichguarantees certainhomogeneityarounda basiccore of a of participants orthodoxy. However, since the object of the exerciseis consensus-building, wouldbe a self-defeatingcriterion,and the narroworthodoxyor exclusiveness activatorsof each networkextendtheir searchto those whose ideas reachthe outer boundariesof what might ultimatelybe acceptable.Above and beyond material support, the organized network holds out to the intellectualthe and prospectof politicalinfluence,of beinglistenedto by top decision-makers team. evenof becomingpartof the decision-making networks Five opinionclusters,some of whichare moreor less structured orientationsor approachesto the issues of and some less formallystruc.tured North-South relations, can be identified from the literatureconcerningthe NIEO: 1. An "establishment" perspective that could be characterizedas countries. monopolisticliberalismis the dominantview in the industrialized The Trilateral Commission is the most important formal organization upon the varietyof coordinatingthis network.Thereis no need to embroider articles, journalisticand otherwise,that have underlinedthe potentiallyinfluential nature of this assemblageof political, business, and academicpersonalitiesfrom North America,WesternEurope, and Japanincludinga number of leadingmembersof governments presentlyin power. The NIEO lies at Commission'sconcernsand is the subjectof several the centerof the Trilateral studies commissionedby it. One in particular,Towardsa RenovatedInternationalSystemby RichardN. Cooper, KarlKaiser,and MasatakaKosakais
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extremelypertinent.PierreUri has writtena book calledDevelopmentWithout Dependence for the Atlantic Institute for InternationalAffairs that concordsbroadlywith Trilateral views. Severalprominent Trilateralists figure in anothersymposiumorganizedat M.I.T. in May 1976 with the supportof the Ford Foundationwhich has resultedin a volume of paperseditedby Jagdish N. Bhagwati. The contributors,while mainly American, include some non-Americans(British,Canadian,Japanese,and ThirdWorld).The Council on ForeignRelations,anotherbody whose membership overlapswith the TrilateralCommission,has sponsoredwithinthe frameworkof its 1980sproject, a studyby AlbertFishlow, CarlosF. Diaz-Alejandro,RichardR. Fagen, and
Roger Hansen entitled Rich and Poor Nations in the World Economy. A
furtherstudythat can be readas havinga relationship this intellectual to community, also supportedin part by the Ford Foundationas well as by the U.S. National ScienceFoundationand the NetherlandsGovernment,is the report preparedfor the United Nations by WassilyLeontief and others, TheFuture of the World Economy. Basicallythesedocuments,whetherthe emphasisis on "the management interdependence" of (Trilateral, 5) or on "the correction p. of the existingeconomicinequalitiesamongcountries"(Leontief,p. 30), take the existing structureof world economy as a starting point and ask what adjustments be agreedupon by the dominantpowersto gain wideracceptcan ability.Thisis the view fromthe top. 2. What can be described as a social democratic variant of the establishmentview shares with it a basic commitment to the normative preferencefor a world economy with relativelyfree movement of capital, goods, and technology as well as an acceptanceof the rationalityof conventionaleconomics,while puttingmore stressupon the needsof the poor. It represents, otherwords,a broaderand somewhatmoregenerousviewof the in adjustmentsthat can be made without fundamentally disturbingthe existing hegemony.The networkthat is developingideas consistentwith this general is perspective less fully organizedthan the first one, thoughkey groupingscan be identified.The Club of Rome group presidedover by Jan Tinbergenthat
produced the report Reshaping the International Order (or RIO report for
short) representsa major statementof this viewpoint. Like the publications mentionedunderthe first category,this also is the fruit of a collectiveeffort. Tinbergen is a major figure articulatingthis tendency. The Institute of DevelopmentStudiesat the Universityof Sussexhas been an importantcenter and this nourishing stimulating currentof thoughtand some peopleassociated with it, now or formerly,have been of influencein shapingrelevantprograms of the UnitedNationsand otherinternational agencies,the worldemployment program of the ILO for example. Dudley Seers, Paul Streeten, and Hans Singer, all Sussex alumni, are among these. Hans Singer, who has been influentialwithinthe UN secretariat development on assistancepolicy as well as in an independentacademiccapacity, has writtenwith JaredAnsari a book intendedfor undergraduates for the generalreaderentitledRich and Poor and Countries.Fromthe ILO'sworldemployment comesa studyviewing program
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the future of the world economy from the standpoint of maximizingemployment, especiallyin less developedcountries,by Bohuslav Herman, The Optimal InternationalDivision of Labour, a study given its ideological in GeraldHelleinerof the University consecration a prefaceby Jan Tinbergen. of Toronto, whose intellectualaffinitiesare with the Sussexgroup, has edited anothersymposium,A WorldDivided. TheLess Developed Countriesin the primarily to Economy. Whereasthe Bhagwatibook is addressed International rich countrypolicy makersin answerto the question, What responsecan be to given to ThirdWorlddemands?,the Helleinerbook is addressedprimarily Third World policy makers in answer to the question, What Third World strategiestowards the First World are most likely to advance Third World to developmentgoals? The contributors the Helleinersymposiumare mainly economists from the First World (mostly non-American)who are actively with ThirdWorldaims (Reginald Green,for instance,has worked sympathetic directly in the service of the Tanzaniangovernment)together with several Third World economists. By and large, the social democraticperspectiveis that of First World understandingand sympathy with the Third World. Helleiner and Streeten are both contributorsto the Bhagwati volume and as though more at home in the second may be regarded examplesof potential links between the first two networks. Some contributorsto the Helleiner into the followingperspectives. shouldalso be assimilated symposium 3. Thereis a categoryof moreor less official ThirdWorldrepresentatives who have formalizeda continuingnetwork,the ThirdWorldForum.I do not wish to suggestherethat thereis a singleThirdWorldviewpoint.The rangeof opinion among spokesmenfor countriesin the Third World is much wider in than that to be found among participants this network,diversifiedas it is. Yet there is a body of thought-engaged-in-actionthat correspondsto the shapedless by Frenchadjectivetiers-mondiste-a form of radicalperspective abstractanalyticalcategoriesthen by existentialpoliticalstruggle.Mahbubul Haq, a senior official of the World Bank who was formerlyresponsiblefor economicplanningin Pakistanat the time of GeneralAyoub, placesthe origin in of this groupingat the Stockholmconferenceon the environment 1972. In for his book ThePovertyCurtain.Choices the ThirdWorld,whichis a kindof personalmemoirof the evolutionof thinkingof a Yale-trainedThirdWorld economic policy maker, he indicateshow this organizationgrew out of inhe formaldiscussions had withGamaniCorea(of UNCTAD),EnriqueIglesias (of ECLA) and SamirAmin (of the UN Institutein Dakar for Development Planning), all of them high level internationalofficials and Third World intellectuals. The purpose, according to Mahbub ul Haq, was "intellectual level, which could self-reliance,both at the nationaland at the international give some form and substanceto our [i.e., the ThirdWorld's]aimlesssearch for appropriatedevelopmentstrategiesat home and to our disorganizedeful forts to coordinateour negotiatingpositionsabroad"(Mahbub Haq, p. 84). The ThirdWorldForumtook shape during1972-73at a time when the Third Worldcountries'claimsseemedto have been set asideby the FirstWorldin its
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concernwith its own internaleconomicproblems.The networkwas alreadyin beingwhenthe successionof eventsof 1973,includingthe oil crisis,gavea new of momentumto the ThirdWorld. PresidentEcheverria Mexicoboth gave his countrya leadingrole in promotingthe NIEO at the United Nations and put his personalsupportbehind the Third World Forum, and the Third World of with his bid for the Secretary-Generalship the Forumwas not unassociated UN. If since that time the ThirdWorldForumseemsto have been less active, its function may be revived through the proposal for a more formal Third World secretariat. From outside the circle of Third World economic negotiators,but still within the orbit of senior internationalofficials, comes anotherrecentbook AlbertTevoedjre'sLa pauvrete,richessedes peuples (an by English edition is in preparation) the directorof the ILO's International Dahomey). Institutefor LabourStudies,a nationalof Benin(formerly Ideologically,the ThirdWorld networkof policy intellectualssharesthe ambivalenceof official Third World positions. Some, like Mahbubul Haq himself, have impeccableliberal economics credentials, though experience with the practicalproblems of Third World developmenthas led them to intervention.Others,like abandonfaith in the marketin favor of government Samir Amin, have a Marxist background. One senses a constant tension betweenintellectualanalysisthat leans towardsa rejectionof westernmodels (and thus implicitlyof the institutionsthat embodythese models, such as the World Bank) and a hope for support from the western economies (which would be deliveredthroughthese same institutions),and tensionalso between a convictionthat social and political revolutionis a necessarycondition for real developmentin the Third World and an unwillingnessto allow First World economistsand officials to use the ineffectivenessof existinggovernmental measures as an excuse for placing conditions of surveillanceon resourcetransfersto the Third World. The ambivalenceis acute in personal terms as these intellectuals,whose thinkingtends to take a radicalbent, are awarethat theirpoliticalinfluencedependsupon the supportof governments that cannot sharetheirviews. They face in an acute form the dilemmaof the intellectualwho seeks power and influencewith power as an opportunityto put his ideas into practice,while knowingin his heart that the very powerhe of solicitswill be the contradiction his goals. 4. My fourth category can be designatedneo-mercantilist.Unlike the first three it does not have a formal network, though at least one group of American policy thinkers, the group associated with the magazine Commentarysome of whose membershave also enjoyed supportfrom the Lehrman Institutein New York, may be seen as constitutingsomethingof a network withina muchlargerand more amorphouscluster.Whereasmost of the authorsin the first threecategoriesconsideredhere are in one way or another activein the negotiatingprocessoverNIEO policy issues, the neo-mercantilist works we have to considerhere are those of individualobserver-critics,not policyintellectuals. The neo-mercantilistsees economic policy as an instrumentof political
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goals-politics leads and economics follows. (In de Gaulle's phrase, lintendancesuivra.) Economic theory that makes an abstractionof economic behaviorfrom politicsis thereforeto be rejected(as biasedand misleading)in favor of a revivalof politicaleconomy. The world is to be understood,not in terms of a market equilibriummodel, but in terms of an organizationof power: a world system in which economic processes are among the major of manifestations power. Right-wingand Left-wing neo-mercantilisms be distinguished.The can coming to power of the TrilateralCommissionin the United States with the Carter election in effect displaced tendencies towards a Right-wing mercantilismobservablein the Kissinger-Nixonadministration.The vision of a reunifiedTrilateral world as the anchor of a liberalworld economy replaced the notion of a pentagonalorganizationof world powerthat seemedlikely to become one of competing economic blocs. Kautsky's ultra-imperialism seemed to triumphover Lenin's rival imperialisms.Among the books consideredhere, the Rightof neo-mercantilism the UnitedStatesis represented in by RobertW. Tucker'sTheInequalityof Nations. He distrustsTrilateralism and arguesfor the defenseof Americanpowerin a worldin whichthe balance of power among nations has not ceased to operate. The Left of neo-mercantilism recognizethe same basic frameworkof power, but write from a standpointof sympathywith those who are challenging dominantpowerin the worldeconomy.Two recentworksareworthnoting. Michael Hudson, an unconventional American radical, has written
Global Fracture. The New International Economic Order. This is a sequel to
his earlierSuperimperialism, which he arguedthat the United States had in organized a dominant imperial system in which government financial management playedthe crucialrole. GlobalFracturedates the declineof this empire from the crises of 1973 and the gradual emergenceof a world of competing blocs (the U.S. sphere recedingto the American hemisphere,a westernEurope-Arab-African complex,a Japanesespherein SoutheastAsia, the Soviet sphere, and China-each with its own center-periphery dialectic). Its title and its messageare in pointedcontrastto the GlobalReach of Barnet and Muller:powerful governments,not multinationalcorporations,are the dominant forces. The other book, intended as an academictextbook more
than as a contribution to public debate, is La dialectique de la dependence by
Andre Tiano, representing Frenchtraditionof economic thought in which a the state has always been a principalactor, and which has never (like most Anglo-Saxon economics) been able to ignore Marxian analysis but has in remained constantdialoguewith it. "La realiteinternationale qu'il convient d'expliquer," Tiano writes at the beginning of his book, "n'est pas economique, politique, juridique, culturelle ou demographique.C'est un "systeme"qui dansune connaissance idealene se plie Aaucunefragmentation disciplinaire"(Tiano, p. 11). One of the moderngreatsof Frencheconomics, Fran9oisPerroux, recentlysaid (Le Monde, 27 June 1973), in a phraseconsistentwith Tiano's approach,"Il n'y a pas de sosie en economie. . . la loi est
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celle de l'inegalite"(Thereare no identicalactorsin economics. .. the law is that of inequality),by which he meant that the notion of a homogeneous marketcomposed of numerousanonymousand roughly similarbuyers and sellersis a misleadingfiction, since economicactorsare unequalin powerand is the only validway of representing theirinteractions by a modeldepictingthe of structure theirpowerrelations. 5. The historical materialistcurrent of thought likewise disdains the the economicsof liberalismas a mode of comprehending issues posed by the which focuses upon the state, NIEO, but, in distinctionto neo-mercantilism historicalmaterialism directsattentionin the first instanceto the production process. I preferthe term historicalmaterialismto Marxismin this context, since Marxism carries so many conflicting connotations of doctrinal orthodoxiesand politicallines. In regardto the ThirdWorldand the problemof is development,historicalmaterialism now a broadintellectualcurrentwithin which a vigorous debate is taking place. Like neo-mercantilism, it is fragmented into a varietyof groupsand individuals,constitutingan informal community of discourse rather than a formally organized network. Its members know and recognize each other and debate their differences in preference engagingin polemicswith those who do not sharetheirown basic to orientation. Like the neo-mercantilists considered here, the historical generallyfar removed from influence upon materialistsare observer-critics currentnegotiationsover internationaleconomic policies. (SamirAmin is a notable exceptionas a participantin the Third World networkand link becurrent.) tweenit and the historicalmaterialist most familiarto those position on development The historicalmaterialist outside this school is that of GunderFrank: the notion of a single all-embracingworld capitalistsystem in which developmentat the centergenerates in underdevelopment the peripheries.ImmanuelWallerstein'srefinementof this notion has also become fairly widely recognized. Less known by English-language readersis the work of ChristianPalloix whose thesis of the internationalization capital seems consistent with the Frank-Wallerstein of approach insofar as it envisages a globally unifying capitalist mode of production, but is inconsistentwith Frank and Wallersteinin rejectingthe potential center-periphery polaritywith its implicationthat the revolutionary for transforming systemwill come-fromthe ThirdWorld. Some seminars the by Palloix given duringthe summerof 1977at the AutonomousUniversityof here. Mexicohavebeenpublishedas Travail etproductionand areconsidered Quite different is the approachof those who see not one big capitalist mode of production,but rathera dominantcapitalistmode articulatedwith other non-capitalistmodes. The differencein viewpointsis not likely to be resolvableby refinementsof deductivereasoningor furtherexegesis of the sacred texts (though many efforts are still being devoted to this form of of Marxistscholasticism), only by furtherstudyand observation the actual but developmentof productionprocesses,especiallyin the Third World. One of to of the majorcontributors the articulation the modes of productionnotion,
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Les P. P. Rey, has recentlyrepublished Alliancesde Classes(firstpublishedin 1973, though writtenin 1969), and Aidan Foster-Carterhas writtenfor the in New Left Review(January-February 1978)a criticalreviewof this literature " "TheModesof ProductionControversy. The centralhistoricalproblemin the historicalmaterialistperspectiveis how the world systemmay be transformed.One focus of interestis upon the crisisat the center-what the EuropeanLeft has for severalyearsbeen calling la crise. Paul Sweezy'srecentarticlein the MonthlyReview(April1978),"The PresentGlobal Crisis of Capitalism"deals with this. The other focus of inSamirAmin's articlein the samejournal(Summer terestis in the peripheries. EconomicOrder"arguesthat 1977),"Self-relianceand the New International in the present drive to promote industrialization the Third World by the peripheralbourgeoisiesis likely to lead only to a new phase of imperialism goods) and that the of (basedon exportby the periphery cheapmanufactured orderwould be if the ThirdWorldwere to only hope for a new international act collectively through mutual support of self-reliant projects and by reducingthe flow of rawmaterialexportsto the rich countriestherebyforcing the center to adjust to a less unequal internationaldivision of labor. Some viewpoints(by ArghiriEmmanueland TamasSzentesin historicalmaterialist SocialScience are particular) includedin a specialnumberof the International Journal4 (1976)devotedto the NIEO. Implicitthough not developedin Amin's analysisis the question of the classstructure the peripheral of countriesand how this conditionsthe way they link into the world economy. The possibility of Samir Amin's preferred scenariodependsupon the emergenceof an autonomous"national" class in the ThirdWorldcountries,whereasmost Marxistanalyseshave pointedto the capital. Hartmut creationof local bourgeoisiesdependentupon international Elsenhanshas arguedthe possibilityin certaincases of the comingto powerof a "state class" that could be the author of a nationaldevelopmentstrategy. SamirAmin's pessimisticscenariois, on the other hand, supportedby studies on the multinationalcorporation.Two which can be relatedto the historical materialistperspectiveare those by NormanGirvan, CorporateImperialism: minerals and Conflictand Expropriation, a case studyof one Canadian-based Portraitof a Canadian by MiningMultinational multinational, Falconbridge. JohnDeveralland the LatinAmericanWorkingGroup.
* * * *
underthe five categories By consideringthis selectionof recentliterature indicated above, it is possible to see, for each category or perspective,an intellectual framework or ideology that serves to define a particular The peculiarto that perspective. internaldebatewithineachof the problematic five tendencies also gives an indication of the range of options in the negotiation process that may be seen as feasible from each of the main positions. Finally, since theoryand practiceare fused in regardto the NIEO,
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of each intellectualposition revealsa view of the structure worldpowerand a of alliancesor potentialalliances. strategy The establishment perspective: monopolistic liberalism The ideological quintessenceof the establishmentperspectivewas, as by mightbe expected,expressed the late HarryJohnsonin his contributionto the Bhagwativolume. Economics,he defined, "to guardagainstwasteof time Briton's comment in ideologicalpolemics" (one recallsa nineteenth-century as "I wish I was as certainabout anythingas Macaulayis about everything") economics of rational behavior by individualsand economic groups "the confronted with possibilitiesof substitution" (Bhagwati,p. 247). He flays Prebish-type economics and "the economic illiteracy of the UNCTAD and economicsecretariat" refersto the Coreaplan for commodities,i.e., that of put forwardby the ExecutiveSecretary UNCTAD as "an attemptto paper over with semantic ambiguitya variety of inconsistentpolicies and policy objectives"(Bhagwati,p. 240). Invectiveaside, this is not the best of Harry Johnson. It is a pity that, standingvery close to the end of his career, the article does little to enhance his justifiably considerablereputation.Nevertheless, the articlevoices authenticallythe impatienceof the pure economist of withthe demandsand arguments ThirdWorldpromotersof the NIEO. to contributors the same symposium,more directlyinvolvedin the Other economicrelations,took a more philosophic practicalpoliticsof international warnedthat like it or not Patterson,with his GATTexperience, view. Gardner a two-tier or multi-tier internationaltrading system was emergingout of political necessity, however messy this might appear in economic theory (Bhagwati,p. 239); and HaraldMalmgren,with his experiencein U.S. trade negotiations, thought that doctrinal differences between free trade versus were "tiresomeand irrelevant,"the real issuesbeing intervention government whether adequate investment would take place in conditions of political and policiescould be carriedout in waysthat uncertainty whethergovernment know that to efficient" (p. 231). Thesepolicyintellectuals were "economically call your opponentan idiot does not help towardsnegotiatingan agreement withhim. "Efficiency" was a key word in the Bhagwatisymposium,signifyinga reconciliationof governmentintervention(regardedregretfullyas inevitable) with the notion of marketequilibrium.The fundamentalcommitmentof the establishmentperspectiveis to an open world market with relatively free movement of capital, goods, and technology. Government interventions should be of a kind that supportthis goal, and such interventionsas would are impedeit areto be condemned.Powerfulgovernments to enforcethis code of conduct upon weakergovernments,using for this purpose especiallythe they control. international organizations The volume produced in the frameworkof the 1980s project of the
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InternationalOrganization
Council on Foreign Relations, accordingto Roger Hansen in the opening "2 order. The essay, took as its guidelinethe goal of a "moderateinternational four contributingauthors express a range of perspectivesrelevant to this assertsthe primacyof generalorientation.AlbertFishlowmost unequivocally guaranteeingone global economic system (and thus avoiding mercantilist tendencies towards economic blocs) and of taking steps to make market work with the greatestefficiency;and he considersthat whatever mechanisms is done to promote economic developmentshould be subordinateto this overall constraint. Fishlow does not see the NIEO demands, stripped of radical, but ratheras "a pragmaticconcern for acrhetoric,as particularly celeratingcapital flows" (p. 31) that can be met by some reform measures consistent with market "efficiency." He cannot, however, hold out much hope either that the reformed system will have much impact on the world poverty problem, or that it will result in any very radical shift in the distributionof income among nations ("althoughthe South as a whole, and most certainlyits higher-incomenations, should benefit" p. 15). Diaz, in of contrastto Fishlow'sglobal economyperspective,takes up the perspective Third World countries, thus recognizing implicitly a certain priority for for and development local control;and he proceedsto a critiqueof arguments "delinking" and "self-reliance." Diaz concludesthat the extremecase for delinkingis self-defeatingbut that some measuresassociatedwith the general mightbe helpfulto ThirdWorldcountries-local controlof finance argument and foreign investment (supported by some internationalrules on MNC behavior),curbingof luxuryconsumption,and the use of materialand moral incentivesin the developmenteffort. All of this should, he thinks, be quite compatiblewith marketefficiency. Like Fishlow, Diaz does not expectmuch changeregardingsocial equity: "Therewill be nothing in the rules of such a world to assure either democraticpolitics or economic justice inside each nation participatingin internationalmarkets" (p. 155). Fagen, in a critical offers no prospect and morepessimistic essay, agreesthat the givenframework to for greatersocial equity, even allowingfor some responsiveness the NIEO demands, since economic development within present structures breeds inequality.The only way this mightbe changedwould be throughthe coming to power of socialist regimes in Third World countries, events that would order"predicated the 1980s by seriouslythreatenthe "moderateinternational project. The Council on Foreign Relations is to be congratulatedfor the horizonswhich(especially throughthe Fagenessay) opennessof its intellectual allow a glimpseof the seamyside of the liberalutopia. Sincethe NIEO is concernedwith the directionof development,much of the thinkingassociatedwith it is prospective.The major schools of thought
2 inthis Presumably termis to be readin the sense of StanleyHoffmann'suse of "moderate or challenges and upheavals extreme system"as one thatis not besetby revolutionary ternational organizations. issuesthroughinternational scope for accommodating whichallows considerable See Hoffmann, "Internationalorganization and the internationalsystem," International
Organization 24, 3 (Summer 1970).
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can be comparedby the differentshapesof the futurethey suggest.The liberal studies portraya future with the same broad outlines, though establishment with some differences in detail. The most explicitly futurological is the the Leontiefreportconcernedspecificallywith narrowing incomegap between developedand less developedcountries,which, accordingto the report'smost optimisticscenariomightbe reducedby about half by the year2000 (Leontief, p. 3). The RIO report (discussedin the next section) has a more ambitious target, which would reducethe presentratio of 13:1 betweenthe richestand poorest deciles of world population to 3:1 by the end of the century. The TrilateralCommissionstudy rejectsthe RIO target as "beyond the realm of practicality"(p. 27) and is noncommitalabout alternativetargets.Bhagwati, in his introductory essay, acceptsthat the LDCs shouldget an increasedshare of world resources,though no targetsemergefrom the symposium.It seems clear,however,that some changein relativeincomesin favor of the reasonably as perspective what the issue poor countriesis recognizedin the establishment is all about. The long current three-way division of the world into First (rich capitalist),Second (socialist), and Third (less developed)countrieshas given way to a four-way division. The less developed countries are now seen as falling into two groups, the Third World being limited to middle-income countries, including the OPEC countries and others like Brazil that are becoming industrialized,a group that Fred Bergstenrefers to as "the new middleclass" (Bhagwati,p. 351), and the poorestcountries,or FourthWorld, whose indebtednesshas increasedas a result of the rise in energyand food or by imports uncompensated any progresstowards either industrialization self-sufficiency. (The division into Third and Fourth Worlds is agricultural mainly a First World perspective.Promoters of Third World cohesion are bound to resist it. I have used "Third World" in the more comprehensive perspective. sense in this articleexceptfor the discussionof the establishment This conceptualissue is basicallypolitical.) Leontief's classification,though morecomplexsinceit dividescountriesinto fifteen regions,is compatiblewith analysis:develthe four-way division broadly acceptedin the establishment oped market regions, developedcentrallyplanned regions, medium-income regions,and low-incomedevelopingregions. developing Though the Soviet bloc is generallyexpectedto play a biggerrole in the world economy, no special problems or structuralchanges are considered likely in consequence.The real issues are those relatingthe First to the Third view, flow and FourthWorlds. Capitalinvestmentwill, in the establishment increasinglyinto the developingmarket economies-according to Leontief, the share of capital movementsreachingthese economieswill rise from less than 20 percentat presentto 57 percentby the year 2000 (Leontief, p. 62). A large portion of it should come from the OPEC countries.The ThirdWorld generallywould receivecapital on commercialterms. These countrieswould increasetheir manufacturedexports to the rich countriesand international trade in the productsof light industrywould in general show a substantial
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increase. The principal agencies of this development would be the multinationalcorporations,and thereforedevelopingcountriesshould avoid any actions likely to discouragethese benefactors.All of the establishment texts consideredhereare quite firm on this point, though some recognitionof the validityof criticismsof MNC conductis recognized.Bhagwatiwritesthat "MNCs are a good thing but need to have their internationalconduct regulatedby explicit codes and legal sanctions" (Bhagwati, p. 19). These reservationsbecome explicit with regard to such matters as bribery. The
Trilateral Commission report reads: ". . . foreign-owned firms can be a
powerful stimulus to economic developmentby introducingmore efficient management and marketing techniques, production technologies and capital.... Countriesthat want economic developmentwould be well-advisedto welcomeforeignfirmson appropriate terms" -adding that the World Bank will be glad to advise what terms are appropriate(Trilateral,p. 27). Leontief is more cautious (his report is addressedto the milieu of the UN indicatesthat the greaterflow of capitalto GeneralAssembly)but nevertheless developing countries envisaged would depend upon "the solution of such problems as the exercise of sovereigntyover natural and other economic resources,as well as national and internationalregulationof transnational corporations,"adding that "One condition for the continued international in lendingof capitalis a sustainedflow of incomefrom foreigninvestment the oppositedirection"(Leontief,p. 62). The Fourth World is acceptedas a welfare burden. These countriesare candidatesfor concessionalaid and for measures debtrelief. It is recognized of they cannot hold their own in the world economy. But the aid to which they may aspire would not be without conditions. Peter Kenen, in the Bhagwati symposium, sought to avoid any sense of panic regardingthe effects of potential default upon world financial markets, but advocated debt relief (selectiverather than general) as "a defensive measure." New rules in the worldeconomyshould, however,ensurethat new borrowing suchcountries by wouldbe limitedby keepingfuturedebt-servicewithinthe boundsof expected currentaccountreceipts(Bhagwati,p. 59). Bhagwatihimselfwritesthat higher aid flows focused on the FourthWorldwould be "disbursedwith diplomatic surveillance,performancecriteria,and scrutinythat would make these more substantial flows acceptable publicopinionandparliamentary to institutions of the donor countries"(Bhagwati,pp. 20-21). The summerof 1978has given a of concreteillustration the meaningof thesegeneralphrasesas the consortium of countriesadministering foreign debt of Zaire, following the rebel inthe vasion of Shabaand counterattack Frenchand Belgianparatroops,agreed by to refinance the debt on condition that InternationalMonetary Fund and World Bank staff take over the internalmanagementof the Zaire economy. One thinks back to the late nineteenth-century Europeanconsortiumfor the of management the Ottomandebt.3
3 See Herbert Feis, Europe the World's Banker, 1870-1914 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1930).
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What policies are developingcountries, then, expected to follow? The Bhagwativolume gives most of its attentionto the policies the rich countries should follow and does not have much to say about the poor countries' policies. Nor does the Trilateralreportgo into this. Leontief is more explicit and divergessomewhat in emphasis from the other two documents in this respect.Leontiefis at pains to rejectand set aside the implicationsof the first Club of Rome report on the limits to growth. He does not see population but obstacleto development as a trendthat will be growthas an overwhelming correctedgraduallyduringthe next century.Mineralswill not run out (except that lead and zinc will become scarce). Nor will the cost of combating pollution be exorbitant."The principallimits to sustainedeconomic growth in are development political,social, and institutional character and accelerated rather than physical. No insurmountablephysical barriersexist within the twentieth century to the accelerated development of the developing regions.... To ensure accelerateddevelopmenttwo general conditions are necessary:first, far-reachinginternalchanges of a social, political, and institutional character in the developing countries, and second, significant
changes in the world economic order . . ." (Leontief, pp. 10-11). The critical
internalpoliciesmentionedby Leontiefare restrainton personalconsumption of and encouragement a more equal distributionof income with a view to maximizinginternal investment, and land reform and related institutional production.Self-sufficiencyin to changesas indispensable raisingagricultural food is, he argues, a necessaryform of import substitutionin view of the growingdependencyof poor countrieson importedfoods. Leontiefestimates of regionshavelargereserves arablelandthat could be that all underdeveloped of productivity broughtundercultivationand that an increasein agricultural at least threefoldwould be possible (Leontief, pp. 4-5, 7-8, 35, 41). By conto trast, contributors the Bhagwativolumetend to see the food problemof the poor countriesin terms of access to world stocks, e.g., the grain insurance by schemeadumbrated D. GaleJohnson(Bhagwati,pp. 257-272). The food questionleadsto the idea of self-reliance.This termhas become currentin the discourseabout developmentthat takes place in international organizations.Originally,it seems to have been derived from the Chinese experience and became associated with a strategy of inward-looking developmentinvolving a break with the world economy, perceivedas the of sourceof dependency.What, however,is one to make of the endorsement "self-reliance"by the WorldBankand OECD?We mustinferthat it has a lot to do with Leontief'sinsistenceon poor countriesgrowingmore of their own food and with aid directedas welfareassistancetowardsthe poorest strataof population (in large part those living in rural areas). Self-reliance, in the establishment view, is a complementto the patternof growththrougha world of economy which it advocateswherebymanufacturing consumptiongoods would shift towards the Third World, a complementthat applies to that sector of world populationthat does not participatedirectlyin impoverished this pattern of growth. Self-reliance, accordingto at least one segment of
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for establishment opinion, is appropriate the welfaresector, but, in the words into a rejection of the Trilateral report,should not be allowedto "degenerate worldeconomy"(Trilateral, 17). of an integrated p. If the Bhagwati volume does not have much to say about specific development policiesin poor countries,it is repletewith moraljudgmentabout in governments thesecountries.Bhagwatihimselfdividesthe moralcriticsinto two camps: the "neo-conservatives" (they sound like Daniel Patrick Moynihan,though that person is not directlycited by Bhagwati)who argue that governments in less developed countries that are undemocraticby American standardsand are violators of human rights should not receive Americanaid; and the "liberals"(RichardCooperis his exemplar) who argue is that development a matterof people, not governments, and that aid should criteriashow that somethingis being only be given wherepolicy performance done for the most disadvantagedgroups (RichardCooper adding that "it wouldbe hardto rivala policy of liberaltradeby developedand less developed countriesalike as a mechanismfor ensuringsteady improvementin the real earningsof the poorest [healthy]residentsof less developedcountries," pp. 355-356). The inferenceto be drawnin practicefrom both of these positionsis justification of a reduction in resource transfers to elitist and oppressive regimescharacteristic Thirdand FourthWorldcountries.It was left to Ali of Mazruiat the end of the Bhagwativolume to cut throughthe cant: "Those who claim that the workersof Detroit should not be forced to subsidizethe rulingelite of Kenyaor Zaireare, unfortunately,the same ones who wouldbe alarmed by the ruling elites of Kenya and Zaire going socialist. Salvador Allendepaid with his life not becausehe was gettingtoo elitistbut becausehe economicelitismin Chile" (Bhagwati,p. 374). was tryingto transcend If the establishmentview offers itself the moral luxury of criticizing elitismin poor countries,it is elitistindeedwhenit comesto powerat the world level. Should 150 countriesparticipatein all or most of the mattersof internationaldiscussion?the Trilateral reportasks rhetorically,and repliesthat this would "seriouslyimpede the necessarycooperation." The Trilateralists then proceed to restate classic functionalismas the political route towards an rebuilding international economicorder.The issues should be dividedand with each, beginning dealtwith separately the governments most concerned by with "those who have the largest stake in the issue." These are usually the Trilateralcountriesand particularlyan inner core consisting of the United States, the FederalRepublicof Germany,and Japan. "Many issues can be handled through a series of circles of participationinvolving, in the outer rings, generalconsultationand discussion,and movinginwardtowardscloser and cooperationuntil, in the innermostrings,close collaboration coordination Such an approachis not antiof policies occursamong the innergroup... in institutions,but ratherseeks a more effectivemode of reachingagreements the proper institutionalframeworks.Informal collaborationin the earlier stages of discussion would support eventual agreementin more formal institutionalsettings." In case this is insufficientlyclear, the report spells the
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point out again: ". . . the main task of assuring consistency in the various
fields will fall to the Trilateral nations which assume leadership in the system.... This need puts a premiumon coherentpolicy makingwithineach of thesekey countriesand, especially,the UnitedStates, Japan,Germany,and theirpolicy, at one or two others.But it also calls for methodsof coordinating leastinformally.To formalizethis functionmightwell proveoffensiveto some this of the Trilateral othercountrieswhichdo not take part. By exercising and countriescan role informallyand by being responsiveto others, the Trilateral effectivelyhelp in coordinatingthe activitiesof variousinternational agencies
and in solving concrete problems relevant to many outsiders.... Some group
of nations will have to take the responsibilityfor insuring(sic) that the internationalsystemfunctionseffectively.No single nation appearsto be likely to assumethis role in the nearterm. The United Statesno longerseemswilling to play it fully. Japan and the EuropeanCommunityare not yet ready to assumesuch leadership. Accordingly,it can only be done collectivelyfor some time by the membersof the trilateral regionand notablysome of its key states. They must act to providethe initiativesand proposalsfor wider acceptance. Theymustbe on the watchto assurethat the systemdoes not breakdown as a resultof the varioustensionsand pressures" (Trilateral, 34-38, 41-42). pp. Contributorsto the Council on Foreign Relations volume do not apparentlysee the structureof power in the future world political economy in quitesucha clearpattern.Both Fishlow(p. 48) and Diaz (pp. 131-132)say that the days of U.S. or even westernhegemonyare past, and they muse that a more equal distributionof power should facilitatethe workingof the world market.Here they seem to lapse into non-historicalabstraction.Whileit may not be possibleto deny categorically a moreequaldistribution poweris that of incompatiblewith the kind of liberalworld economy they have in mind, one can point out that thereis no historicalevidenceto supportit. Past experience indicatesif anythingthat a tendencytowardsmore equalityof powerhas been accompaniedby protectionism.The only relatively open world economies have been founded on hegemonic powers (Britain in the mid-nineteenth centuryand the UnitedStatesafterWorldWarII). ThoughI for one doubtthe it viabilityof the collectivehegemonyconcept of Trilateralism, does have an over the "nonhegemonic of edge in plausibility interdependence" Fishlowand
Diaz.
The reform proposalsfor the world economy likely to emergefrom the Areopagusenvisagedby the Trilateral Commission,if one mayjudge fromthe literature reviewedhere, arelikelyto appearrathermeagerby comparison with Third World demands. There is some recognition of the legitimacy of of stabilization exportearnings(on the lines of the Lome convention),coupled with firm rejectionof commodity "price rigging" (HarryJohnson) and indexation(Trilateral, 25; Bhagwati,pp. 240-249). Thereis also the hint of a p. possible agreementto facilitate further processingof raw materialsin less developedcountriesthroughtariff de-escalationand other measuresto open rich country marketswider to LDC manufactures,though this is linked by
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accessby developed FredBergstento securingLDC agreementon guaranteed countriesto LDC rawmaterialsand eliminationof exportcontrols(Trilateral, p. 26; Bhagwati, pp. 199-214). The feasibility of the "link" whereby the creationof new SDRs throughthe IMF would be used as a meansof resource countries then having to "earn" their transferto LDCs, the industrialized reservesby exportingto the LDCs, is examinedin a very frank analysisby John Williamsonof the Universityof Warwick,contributedto the Bhagwati symposium.He concludesthat the schemeis likely to founder on the United States'veto, since the United Stateswill be unwillingto forego in favor of the LDCs the seigniorageit derives from the present "nonsystem." The best resultsthe LDCs are likely to get, in his view, would be by exploitingin their own intereststhe "nonsystemthat presentlyexists and that seems likely to persist indefinitely," e.g., by placing their reservesat higher rates in the markets(Bhagwati,pp. 81-97). Beyond this small comfort, is Eurocurrency the trialballoonlaunchedby RichardCooperof a levy on deep-sea fishingand on ocean mineralrightsto go to the LDCs (whichwould implya renunciation on theirpartof claimsto a 200-mile exclusiveeconomiczone-there is no free lunch here)(Bhagwati,pp. 105-115). And finally, a piece of fiscal gimmickry in the form of a proposed brain drain tax that seems more calculatedto alleviatethe conscienceproblemsof Third World emigresthan the resource of deficiencies ThirdWorldcountries. The social democratic perspective to Duringthe later 1960sand early 1970san alternative the establishment perspectivetook shape in reaction to the apparentfailure of development assistanceprogramsto materiallyimprovethe conditionsof the vast majority of people in the poor countries.Not only were the proclaimedtargetsof the UN Development Decade generally not achieved, but even in those few countrieswhereeconomicgrowthdid take place, it seemedto benefit only the richof the poor countries.The strategyof givingpriorityto economicgrowth, whichmeantincreasing shareof the richin the nationalincomeand hoping the for a trickle-downeffect towardsthe poor to take place has been viewedwith and developmentplanners, growing skepticismby many aid administrators who began to think more and more in terms of projectsdirectedspecifically towards the poorest segments of the population. Faith in the market was intervention abandonedand the need for governmental recognizedas a means of producing greaterequityboth withinand amongnations.The centralthesis of the Singer and Ansari book, accordingto the authors, is that "the imbalancebetweenthe rich and poor countriescannot be correctedby meansof which an automatic,self-operatingmechanism"(p. 35). The new perspective, officials concernedwith aid and specialists arose mainlyamong international of view is more characteristic associatedwith them (whereasthe establishment those close to the policy making of donor governments), stressed the
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satisfaction of simple basic needs of the poorest people, the expansion of employment opportunities among them, and the mobilization and participation of the poorer elements in the developmenteffort. Where normativelythe establishment view puts its emphasison "economic efficiency," the new official perspective stressesan "equitablesocial order"and even hints that manyof its promotersconsiderthis to be achievablethrough"humanistic socialism." These phrasesare drawn from the RIO report preparedby the committeesponsoredby the Club of Rome under the chairmanship and influence of Jan Tinbergenwhich can be read as a consensualstatementof this new quasi-official perspectiveon development.It is here referredto as the social democraticperspectivenot because of any self-proclaimedpolitical affiliation but because of a general consistency with social democratic positions in the western political spectrum.Many of those who have contributedto formulatingthe new views on developmentcome from the social democratictradition and both Sweden and the Netherlandsare prominent amongthe westernmodelsto whichit refeTs. The social democraticperspectivein essence was a synthesis of some elementsof a radicalcritiqueof existingdevelopment conceptswith the central tenets of the liberalview of the world economy. The principalradicalcritique was the dependencia thesis, in particular AndreGunderFrank'sanalysisof the "developmentof underdevelopment." The new targets of the basic needs orientationrepresenteda conscious effort to avert or at least alleviate the underdevelopmentconsequences of capitalist expansion, especially the of marginalization both ruraland urbanpopulationsaccompanying spread the of moderntechnologythroughforeigninvestment.The new synthesisrejected, however, the implication of the radical critique that autocentric or inward-lookingdevelopmentstrategiesthat involveda breakwith the capitalist worldeconomywerea necessary conditionfor overcoming underdevelopment. The essential conditions for an expanding world capitalism were to be preserved-relativelyfree movementof capital,goods and technology,and an internationaldivision of labor based on the principle of comparativeadvantage-as the central strategy of world development, accompanied by policies designedto moderatethe negative welfare effects this strategyhad hithertoproduced.Statedin these terms, there is only a nuanceof difference betweenthe establishment perspectiveand the social democraticperspective (since much of the basic needs argumentis now acceptedby establishment opinion),thoughas a matterof practicalemphasisin the currentliterature this nuanceis important. The analysisof the prospectsof the world economy in the RIO reportis not dissimilarto that found in the establishment literature.The RIO report, like the Leontiefreport,beginsfrom the limitsto growthproblematic is at and some pains to modify its pessimisticforecast. The RIO reportattachesmore seriousnessto the prospectsof population increase than does the Leontief reportand it is not so sanguineconcerning availability newland in Third the of Worldcountriesto be broughtundercultivation.Like the Leontief report,it
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will does not envisagethat shortagesof naturalresources be a majorconstraint upon development,though energyand water conservationwill be important preoccupations. of Nor is the view of the futurestructure the worldeconomysignificantly thereis the samevision of the less developed differentin the two perspectives: countriesbecominggreaterexportersto the rich countriesof manufactured consumergoods, with the rich countriescontinuingto hold the edge in the export of producer goods. This internationallyintegratedworld economy wouldbe flankedby "self-reliance"sectorsin the poor countrieswhichwould be directedtowards self-sufficiency in productionof food and other basic processes.The technologieswith labor-intensive needsthrough"appropriate" RIO reportis, indeed, quite explicitabout the dualist natureof the national economies to be promoted in the Third World: a modern sector with increasing productivityenhancing the competitive position of Third World advantagelies in an abundance countriesin worldmarketswhose comparative to of the laborfactor;and a basic needssectorattempting caterfor the welfare of those left outsideof the worldeconomy. (Thereis verylittle evidenceabout the practicalimpact that attempts to implementbasic needs strategieshave had. From this standpointit is worth noting that the ILO's International Institute for Labour Studies, with the financial backing of the Federal Republic of Germany, is completing an evaluation on such efforts in the Cameroons.) advantagenotion is elaboratedin the Hermanstudy on The comparative division of labor preparedfor the ILO's world employment the international of program,whichcarriesthe imprimatur Tinbergen.This deals only with one part of the dualism, that part integratedinto the world economy. Indeed, it program seemsto ignorethe basic needssector(thoughthe worldemployment had endorsedthis approach)or even to reject it by the assertionthat "inward-looking policies do not help to foster economic developmentmainly becauseof the largeelementof inefficiencythat they allow" (Herman,p. 131) and that "no true developmentcan be achievedif the harsh realitiesof the market mechanism are ignored" (p. 132). The Herman study classifies countriesaccordingto their factor endowments-in particularcapital-labor The ratios-and groups industriesaccordingto typical factor requirements. purposeof the exerciseis summedup in the phrasethat "a country should that match the country's specialisein the activitieswith factor requirements factor endowmentmost closely" (Herman, p. 51) and that to do so would of achievea maximization employment.This leadsto some curious specifically inferences, such as the grouping of Japan with Colombia, Greece, South Africa, and Venezuelain termsof factorendowments,and the findingthat the United States has the comparativeadvantagefor supplyingthe world with weapons,and aircraft(Herman,AppendixD). armaments, Tinbergen,in his foreword, regardsthis sort of thing as a "pioneering exercise"in world indicativeplanning.One can also read it in the context of the more soberjudgmentof Singerand Ansari (whose book sharesmuch of
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to perspective) it is misleading put so muchemphasis that the socialdemocratic whenmoreattentionshouldbe paid to factoruse. Trade on factorendowment in the modern world, they point out, does not reflect the assumptionsof whichare takenoverby Hermanin Ricardian theory(pp. 65-66), assumptions his model (Herman,pp. 31-32). Recent investmentsin less developedcountries, they point out, have not been guided in their factor use by the existing factor endowment;rather, importedtechnology has determinedfactor use, leading to dualism and unemployment(Singer, p. 38). All, however (Tinbergen, Singer and Ansari, and Herman), agree that rich countries should proportion of policiesto facilitateimportation an increasing adoptadjustment of theirconsumermanufactures from the less developed. corporationsare, of course, cast in the role of making The multinational use of the comparativeadvantage the less developed countries have for producing standardized consumer manufactures. The social democratic perspective does not, however,take an uncriticalview of the MNCs. The RIO report envisages greater regulation and in a vague way the ultimate incorporatist-type corporationof the MNCs within some form of international will still form part of enterprises structure:"In the long term, transnational or the world structure,in eithertheir presentform of privateenterprises in a
renovated form comprising genuine international ventures.... The statutes
of transnational enterprises shouldbe underthe supervision,and theirprofits taxed by, an inter- or supra-nationalauthority. Transnationalenterprises should form part of an internationalframeworkof concrete economic activities and their labor conditions should be negotiatedwith representative nationaland international tradeunions" (p. 160). Singerand Ansariforeseea mutualadjustmentof LDCs and MNCs in whichtheirdivergentinterestscan be made compatible,since they are both "slowly graspingthe fact that they and the cannot wish each other out of existence." "Both the multinationals LDCs," they write, "are relativelypermanentunits of economic activity in
this second half of the twentieth century.
. .
. They must work towards
compromises in which each party sees that its basic interests are being promoted" (p. 196). Paul Streeten, writing in the Helleiner symposium, suggeststhat LDCsshouldnot relyon gainingconcessionsfrom richcountries but should exploit interestalignments,and among these he sees a potential common interest with MNCs in gaining access to rich country markets: "Multinationaland transnationalproducingfirms are importantadvocates and pressure countries.To the groupsof bettermarketaccessin the industrial extent to which some of their operationstake place in developingcountries, this pressureis a useful ally. Trade unions and competing firms form an like abovecan oppositionto this access.If interestpressures the ones described be combinedwith adjustmentassistanceto those displacedby the low cost imports, they are likely to be more effective as well as more humane" (Helleiner,pp. 87-88). SamirAmin, writingfrom a standpointof Marxiananalysis, rejectsthis strategyof symbiosisbetween the MNCs and the LDCs as the doctrineof a
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new phase of imperialism.The RIO report specificallyhe interpretsas an ideologicalmanoeuvre:"The fact is that the themesof the new orderinvolve the aspirationto control naturalresourcesand to strengthennationalstates, which imperialismdoes not accept. Imperialismwould therefore like to substitute for the new order the "RIO project" (Reshaping of the International Order!)whichis an ideologicalformulationof the need to transfer underthe wing of the some of the industriesof the centersto the peripheries realisticthan multinationals" (Amin, p. 20). SingerandAnsari,morecritically the authorsof the RIOreportthoughsharingmanyof theirpolicyviews, sense that something like this is indeed happening: the type of international economic integration advocated by western economists through trade liberalization, they write, "will tend to perpetuate the economic and technologicaldependenceof the LDCs on the industrialcentresand will increase the gap betweenthe haves and have-nots on both a national and an international level" (p. 108).Theygo on to arguethat statepowerin the LDCs
should be strengthened to counterbalance that of the MNCs, since ". . . in-
ternationalintegrationbased on cooperationbetween national states, conby scious of developmentneeds, will be preferred the developingcountriesto the international integrationthat would resultfrom an uninhibitedexpansion of profit-motivated foreignprivateinvestment"(p. 212). Visionsof the futureinstitutionsof the worldeconomycontrastmarkedly as betweenthe social democraticand establishment perspectives.In place of Commissionwhichwould put the "piecemealfunctionalism"of the Trilateral the rich-country-dominated agencieslike the IMF, WorldBank,and GATTat the centerof the institutional picture,the RIO reportenvisagescomprehensive planningon a worldscaledevelopedon the basis of the presentUnitedNations a ("the only machinerywith the potentialfor constructing fairerworld," p. planetary sovereignty."Functionalism 43), underthe sloganof "decentralized becomes a principle of sovereignty that relates the appropriatelevel of decision making to the range of impact a decision will have rather than a issues. It will lead to some issuesbeingdealtwith at the recipefor fragmenting global level while others can be handledlocally since they are only of local institutionswould not be limited consequence.Participationin international but of to governments shouldincludenongovernmental organizations various kinds (MNCs and trade unions, for example-there is a corporatistbias in RIO prescriptions planning).Therewould be a gradualtransferof power for aid to certainfunctionallydefined world authorities.International programs would evolve into a system of internationaltaxation operating through a World Treasury. Monetary reserves creation would take place through a World CentralBank. A World Food Authority would be created. And the with broad economic powers as the United Nations would be restructured center of a functional confederationof internationalorganizations.Other contributorsto the social democraticperspectivemore modestly advocate in to greaterautomaticity resourcetransfers poor countries. Possiblyit was this RIOvision of a futureworldorderthat inspiredHarry
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Johnson's perceptionthat "the demand for a new internationaleconomic order is essentially a demand to replace the market system by a vast bureaucratic system" and his outburstagainst it as a new imperialism:"All the elementsof imperialism there, from the collectionof imperialtribute, are regarded a matterof right, to the freedomof the imperial as rulersto wastethe tribute in lavish and wasteful consumption and grandiose unproductive constructionof monumental buildings;the only real difference,thoughit is a crucialone, is that whereasthe ancientempireswerebuilt and held by military conquestand force, the new empiresof the poor nationsare hopedto be built by politicalmajorityin the UnitedNationsand keptby moralblackmailon the one hand and the extensionof the power of an international ruling class of international officialsand expertson the other"(Bhagwati,p. 360). Pace Harry Johnson, the menace of the new international bureaucratic imperialism attenuatedby the political naivetethat often characterizes is the social democraticliteratureand the RIO report in particular.This is not politicaleconomy in any sense; it is work writtenby professionaleconomists who seemto thinkof politicsas the domainof anotherset of specialistswhose job it is to find a way of puttingthe economists'own prescriptions effect. into The RIOreportrefersto a "powerstructure" a kindof deusex machinabut as neverconsidershow economicpolicies are imbeddedin power positions that will have to be changedif materialchangesin policy are to be broughtabout. It is easy to say that LDCs should carry out land reforms, for example, withoutspecifyinghow the balanceof social and politicalforcescan be shifted so as to achievethis goal, or how such a shift mightaffect the achievement of the other major goal, i.e., export-orientedindustrialization through foreign investment.To considerthe political dimensionseriouslywould lead to the analysisof class strugglesin poor countriesand class alliancesbetweenpoor and rich countries,and this the social democraticperspective avoids. "In the final analysis, our world is ruledby ideas-rational and ethical-and not by vestedinterests."So statesthe RIO report(p. 107). In such a view, politicsis reducedto exhortation.Singerand Ansariillustratethis idealisticapproachto politicswhenthey writethat unlesssomethinglike a moreautomaticmeansof resourcetransfersto poor countriesanalogousto a progressive international taxationsystemis achieved,then "it is inevitablethat we are moving rapidly towards an internationalcatastrophicholocaust in which civilisationas we knowit maywellbe destroyed"(p. 143). In the context of global politics of the NIEO, the Trilateraland RIO reports are the two faces of hegemony. They share the same fundamental about the progressive assumptions natureof worldcapitalismbringingabout a new internationaldivision of labor, and both recognizethe need in addition for an international welfareprogramto be carriedout as far as possibleby the poor themselves.Wherethe Trilateral the reportunderlines essentialstructure of powerin the worldpoliticaleconomy,the RIO reportstressesthose aspects of a new hegemonicconsensusthat deal with concessionsand satisfactionsfor the subordinate. an unofficialenterprise As carriedout by a numberof people
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close to official decision making, the RIO project appearsas a prospective in limitsto adjustingthe existingpowerstructure explorationof the acceptable the world political economy to the demands of the poor countries. In this regard, the reactions and reservationsof some participantsin the project, appendedat the end, are of special interest. An American and a German participant(Grantand Hesse) agree in thinkingthe reporthas gone too far, in particularly its stresson planning,to be of muchuse in influencingopinion thinksit reflectstoo many (Girbrat) in theircountries,and anotherparticipant Swedish and Netherlandsviewpoints. A Marxist contributor(S. Brucanof Rumania)seemedsatisfiedthat the reportadequatelyreflectedexistingworld power relations (an encouragingnote to the authors, no doubt, since they stressed the importanceof Soviet collaborationin their design). Elizabeth Mann Borghese, however, expressedsome frustrationwith the exercise in and sayingthat the reportdid not adequatelydeal with the structural political it factorsthat lie behindthe inequalities addresses.I for one wouldunderscore thereis no analysiseitherof the causesof hersenseof the report'sinadequacy: or underdevelopment of the natureof the crisisin the worldpoliticaleconomy for such as wouldbe a precondition realisticstrategiesfor change.That this is to perspective so has somethingto do with the failureof the social democratic cometo gripswith politicaleconomy.
Third World perspective

Though sharingmany of the specific proposalsof the social democratic the perspective, ideas expressedby some ThirdWorldexponentsof the NIEO have a quite different intellectual quality for being far more thoroughly consciousof politics.They are awarethat the,successof any programdepends upon the politicalstrengthit can muster.Mahbubul Haq, whosebook makes some of the most interestingreading of this extensiveliteratureby giving a glimpseof the mentalprocessesof someoneengagedin the global bargaining process, recalls with feeling the fate of PresidentAyub of Pakistan, whose governmenthe had servedin his capacityas economic developmentplanner. The Presidenthad reactedpositivelyto Mahbubul Haq's reversalof opinion on the wisdom of pursuingeconomic growth that was accompaniedby increasing income disparities and asked him to prepare a new emergency program to redress income inequalities, but Ayub fell from power a few months later. "One of the bitter lessons he must have learnedwas that the alliances of privilegedgroups that he had forged to promote accelerated growthwere totally unwillingto let him trim their privilegesand that he had change"(p. 7). few politicalalliancesat his disposalto engineera meaningful At the internationallevel, Mahbub ul Haq is an advocate of "poor power" and he makes an inventoryof the bargainingresourcesof the poor the nations: demographically, rich nations which now account for some 30 percentof the world populationwill see this proportionreducedto about 10
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percentby the middle of the next century;militarily,the poor countriesare bound to breakthe rich countries'monopoly of nuclearweapons("however this regrettable" may be) after which the rich minority"will begin to realize how dependent it is on the goodwill of the majority for its continued existence"; the purchasingpower of the Third World will increasinglybe neededto sustaindemandin the rich countries'economies;and control over by scarcenaturalresources ThirdWorldcountrieswill give thema increasingly growingadvantagewith the rich. Howeverone rates these forecasts,they are franklypoliticaland of the essenceof toughbargaining. fhe Mahbubul Haq's personalrejjection-of economicdevelopmentcredo he learnedat Yale and which he had helped to apply in Pakistan with the supportof the HarvardDevelopmentAdvisoryGroup, throughwhich, as he put it, "economic developmenthad become warpedin favor of a privileged minority" (p. 6), was a microcosm of a much broader revulsion of Third In Worldopinionfromwesternthesesabout development. its purestform, this change was from one total view to another totally different. The Chinese experienceoffered a presumedpoint of referencefor the new alternative, which was often presentedin terms of a revolutionarychange. Technology importedfrom the west createdlinks of dependency.Financialaid from the yet leadersto take "soft options" requiring west led ThirdWorldgovernment further foreign assistance and leading to deepening dependency. Growth of policiespromotedby the west led to absoluteimpoverishment the poorest withinThirdWorldcountries."The income disparities groupsand increasing developingcountries," Mahbubul Haq told the InternationalDevelopment Conferencein Washington,D.C. in April 1972, "have no choice but to turn inwards,in much the same way as China did twenty-threeyears ago, and to adopt a differentstyle of life, seekinga consumptionpatternmore consistent with their own poverty-pots and pans and bicyclesand simpleconsumption habits-without being seducedby the life styles of the rich. This requiresa redefinitionof economic and social objectives which is of truly staggering proportions,a liquidationof the privilegedgroupsand vested interestswhich of may well be impossiblein many societies,and a redistribution politicaland economicpower which may only be achievedthroughrevolutionratherthan through evolutionarychange" (pp. 40-41). These countries, he went on, would have to becomemore franklycapitalisticor more genuinelysocialistic; but the capitalistoption would only be feasiblein a society "willingto accept income inequalitiesover a long period of time without exploding or where extremely highgrowthrates(10 to 15 percent)can be financedwith a generous "does not from Westernfriends."The socialistalternative inflow of resources mean bureaucratic socialism;it meansa majorchangein the politicalbalance of power within these societies and drastic economic and social reforms. Whetherthe developingcountriescan managesuch a changewithout violent is revolutions a criticalquestionof our time" (pp. 44-45). this How is one to interpret talk of revolutioncomingfrom a high official of the World Bank-and one who, despitethe radicalcritiquesof the World
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Bank from many who would share his sympathy with the revolutionary option, nevertheless is ready to give the Bank his certificate of approval ("Over the last three decades, it [i.e., the Bank] has shown considerable dynamism and brilliant improvisations in the light of changing situations" (p. 213). Herein lies the ambivalence of the Third World perspective: on the one hand, the prospect of revolution, rejection of western models and western aid and pursuit of inward-looking development; on the other hand, the menace of revolution as bargaining counter designed to encourage further concessions from the west, perpetuating existing structures with some incremental changes in poor countries. Mahbub ul Haq is not unaware of this ambivalence. In a passage aimed at the leadership of Third World countries, but which with equal force might be read as applying mutatis mutandis to the World Bank, he writes: "It is ironic . . . that many countries in the developing world, which still rely on their alliances between army, bureaucracy, landlords and industrialists, in some combination or another, adopt the slogan of poverty removal. This can only be either because of a cynical disregard for the intelligence of the masses or out of a naive faith that an alliance of vested interests would still accommodate fundamental reforms" (p. 68). Robert McNamara, President of the World Bank, seems to have opted for the basic needs orientation of development policy as a means of preempting revolution, in a passage quoted approvingly by Mahbub ul Haq: "When the highly privileged are few and the desperately poor are many-and when the gap between them is worsening rather than improving-it is only a question of time before a decisive choice must be made between the political costs of reform and the political risks of rebellion. That is why policies specifically designed to reduce the deprivation among the poorest 40 percent in developing countries are prescriptions not only of principle but of prudence. Social justice is not merely a moral imperative. It is a political imperative as well" (McNamara to the Board of Governors of the World Bank, September 1972, cited in Mahbub ul Haq, p. 10). Similarly, Roger Hansen, in the Council on Foreign Relations volume, reacting to the skepticism of all the other contributors with regard to the basic needs approach, sets forth in a concluding essay an argument for its feasibility. Insofar as a Southern governing elite feels, less securely in control, it may come to perceive basic needs programs (especially when supported by substantial international funding) as conducive to "an extended lease on its own privileged position," while at the same time "a heterogeneous Northern elite group, for many different reasons and from many different value perspectives, may converge on the proposition that a global basic human needs strategy is congruent with their goals for a moderate international order in the next ten to twenty years" (p. 247-248). These statements fairly clearly present basic needs as an element in strategies to sustain the status quo in transnational economic power relations, at least in the medium term. The argument skirts the issue that Marxists would describe as that of reproduction, i.e. that the pattern of power relations and organization of production characteristic of world capitalism tends to per-
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petuate itself and to continually recreate the inequalities of uneven development. A basic needs approach that did not attack the issue of transforming world economic structures would accordingly be condemned to failure, though it might buy time (and Hansen does not really claim more than that for it). A basic needs approach that did indeed become a strategy for structural change with an alternative pattern of development would challenge the "moderate international order" goal. As Fagen points out: "At issue are conceptions of the nature of class relations in Southern societies; the state as an expression, facilitator, and perpetuator of those class relations; market mechanisms as related to class and distributional inequities; and the manner in which Southern links with the North serve to reinforce existing patterns of power and privilege" (p. 191). Albert Tevoedjre shares with Mahbub ul Haq the mood of rejection of western models, the admiration for the Chinese experience, and the basic needs orientation. But his is a very different kind of book, even more in the genre of a personal testimony, inspired more by ethics than by economics, and is political more in the sense of being a kind of manifesto designed to attract support in specific quarters than in that of analyzing the strengths and weaknesses of a program. Poverty is revalorized in a positive way as the simple life lived in conviviality and cooperation, and is dissociated from the connotation of wretchedness (misere)-a notion supported by quotations from the Latin classics, the fathers of the church, the Koran and Jewish authorities, and more eclectically selected contemporary sources including Mao, Ivan Illich, Enrico Berlinguer, and Porgy and Bess. ("I got plenty o'nuttin. An nuttin's plenty for me.") There is a significant Catholic inspiration, a kind of Third World Franciscanism that sees Peking as the model of a Christian society (p. 40). Tevoedjre describes his vision as a utopia, necessary as a remedy to violence and despair. It reads more like a Sorelian myth. The RIO report is a utopia with blueprints for change unsupported by any analysis of how the changes can be brought about. This book offers no blueprints but rather unspecified general notions like the "contract of solidarity" intended to mobilize opinion and channel energies. Its very vagueness is a political asset. In its criticism of Third World elites subservient to western styles ("ce pouvoir de style nouveau riche") and in its appeal to an autochthonous pattern of development, this book like that of Mahbub ul Haq-both the works of politically sensitive people-seems to reflect a powerful current of opinion within the Third World, one that Tevoedjre identifies with its youth. Looked at in the establishment perspective, however, and shorn of rhetoric, this current of opinion need not appear as menacing. The stress on basic needs, the ennobling of poverty, serve incidentally to remove attention from the "widening gap" that would require massive resource transfers to bridge. Programs of direct services to the poorest 40 percent of the less developed countries correspond to the welfare counterpart to capitalist development contemplated by the establishment. For the establishment, this
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could appeal as a moral alternativeto triage. Each side-establishment and ThirdWorld-may be thinkingof differentgoals, but thereseemsto be a basis of mutualcompatibility. The Helleinersymposiumbringstogethersome ThirdWorld economists with some westerneconomistswho have pro-ThirdWorldcommitments. The symposiumas a whole is difficult to classify neatly undera single one of the categoriesset up for this review. Some of the westerneconomistscan be assimilatedinto the social democraticperspective; symposiumas a whole is the devoted to the practicalitiesof Third World strategies;and particularcontributions strengthen neo-mercantilist and historical materialist analyses. Helleiner himself points out that the broad demands sought by the Third World have reachedthe limit of their effectivenessand that more focused goals and carefullypreparedpositions are now required.The generalgoal of the essays is to explore strategiesthat will give Third World countriesmore control over externallinks into their national affairs. In that vein, the symposium contains some suggestions concerning policy and institutional As preferences. one mightexpect, one contribution(by Radetzki)exploresthe potentials for monopolisticcommodity pricing by developingcountriesbut finds them not especially bright (a copper cartel might work but only if Canadaand Australiawould join and if it were to collude with exportersof bauxite or aluminumproducers,and even so would not achieve the level of successof the oil cartel).In general,however,Helleiner(echoingin this respect an essay by John White) expects Third World countriesto place increasing relianceupon region-specificor function-specificinternational organizations over which they have full control, and to decrease reliance upon broader-based international organizations, especially those controlled in practice by the rich countries. He even anticipates some selective disengagementfrom bodies like the IMF and GATT. Among such region- and function-specificorganizations,those aiming to increasetrade among Third World countries (reorientingtrade towards South-South patterns against North-Southones) could be of growingimportance(this is arguedin an essay by FrancesStewartin the Helleinersymposiumand the same point is also madeby Singerand Ansari-pp. 115-116). Reflecting this aim of promoting collective self-reliance is the recent prominenceof the initials TCDC (TechnicalCooperationamong Developing Countries) in the United Nations-a conference on the question was held in Buenos Aires in August and September 1978. A paper on TCDC which is interestingfrom the standpoint of ideology was preparedfor the Secretary-General E. Oteiza, A Rahman, R. Green, and C. Vaitsos by (A/CONF.79/PC/12, 1 July 1977). The authors-who are expressingtheir own views as consultants-place a large part of the responsibilityfor underdevelopment upon the post-World War II international orderwhich they see as workingagainstthe interestsof the vast majorityof populationin Third World countries. They specifically criticize the IMF for reinforcing the dependency of these countries, and they criticize traditional technical
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assistance of all international agencies as being linked to the concept of developmentthat has idealized the congrowth-modernization as sumptionpatternsof westernsocieties.TCDCis then presented an essential aspect of the NIEO designedto generateknowledgerelevantto self-reliance, indigenous technology, and economic integration among Third World countries.The collective self-relianceapproachto development,they write, "implies 'delinking' from those components of the internationalsystem in which a balanced relationshipcannot be established,and relinkingamong Third World countrieswith whom a balancedrelationshipmay be attained" (p. 12). The neo-mercantilist perspective justify the applicationof the term neo-mercantilism Two characteristics to the threevery differentauthorstreatedhere. One is that they recognizethe economicfactor, like it or not, and view international state as the determining economicrelationsas essentiallyrelationsamong states. The otheris that they leave aside formal economicsin their searchfor an explanationof change in power relations-relations perceived, in other words, as history and to be analysed through political economy. Within this "realist" approach, they preferences. havetheirown differentnormative Robert W. Tucker's book is addressedto the defense of the national interestof the United States, but this national interesthas to be understood with reference a modelof the international system.This, as Tuckersees it, is to now a fragmentedsystem with divisions among the democraticcapitalist powersthat enableThirdWorldcountriesto pressfor advantages.The "poor power" of the South he dismissesas eitherromanticnonsenseor the reflection of a failureof nervein the North (p. 135)-but nothingobjectivelysubstantial in itself. The fragmentedcondition has, however, resulted in a "growing betweenpowerand order"(p. 93), in whichthe capitalistcountries disjunction of still have the powerbut are no longerthe principalguarantors order,while the challengers not havethe powerto createa new order. do In many ways, this reads more like a book about morals than about economics-or rather,one mightsay it is about the moralfiberof the west and the United States in particular.It is writtenin terms of an extremeidealism that traces changes in the world system to ways of thinkingratherthan to changes in the relations of materialforces. The chief culprit leading to the disjunctionof powerand orderis what he calls the "new politicalsensibility" to of whichis comprised "a risingdisinclination use or threatenforce, whether from the belief that force is no longer expedientor from the convictionthat force is no longera legitimateinstrument more likely, from a combination or, of the two; a view that the developed states are in many respects highly vulnerable; a persuasion that growing interdependenceis threatened by chaos or war;a that, if allowedto persist,will resultin generalized inequalities
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to inequalities,thoughwithouta commitment generally reducinginternational of clear idea of-or, for that matter, interestin-the effects a redistribution of wealthwould have on the redistribution world power;and, finally, a sense of guilt over a past for whichwe are now thoughtto be payingthe inevitable price" (p. 110). Tucker examinesin turn and rejects to his satisfactionthe however,theirimpacton foundationsfor each of these beliefs. Cumulatively, westernand U.S. policy in his view had been tantamountto an abdicationof power, or (which amounts to the same) an unwillingnessto do what is to necessary maintainthe orderingfunctionof power,and this is traceable a to change in moral values following World War I: "It was the belief in the inof trinsicsuperiority Europeancivilizationthat from the startprovidedmuch In period, of the self-assurance elan of Westernimperialism. the interwar and this self-assurancealso began to erode in the solvent of an outlook that acknowledgedthe differences, though not the inequalities,of cultures" (p. 30). Tucker's prescriptionsfor U.S. policy are somewhat less clear in a positive sense than his diagnosis of the moral problem. He rejects the "inon worldsystem(e.g. trilateralism) conceptof a reconstructed terdependency" the groundsthat the kind of consensualbasis requiredfor it is only feasibleif all the partiesagree, which is extremelyunlikelyover time. People invariably theirown collective(i.e. national)welfarefrom that of outsiders,a distinguish attemptsto preserveglobal consensusin fact which will inevitablyundermine the face of conflicting national interests. The "moderate" or "accommodationist" changes in the system contemplated by the liberal establishment will, Tucker thinks, only lead towards increasingdisorderdegeneratinginto chaos (p. 177). The NIEO, as he sees it, is not a demandfor a new systembut merelyfor an adjustmentof powerwithinthe presentsystem. Yet he is skepticalboth as to the willingnessof westernEurope and Japan independence from the United States, and reallyto achievepolitical-military of as to the viabilityof cooptingleadingOPECstatesinto the management the presentsystem-because cooptationimpliesan establishedorderto whichthe becausethey coopted conform, whichwould not be the case, i.e. presumably fail the test of Europeancivilization, faith in which has been largelyabandonedby the democratic capitalistpowersthemselves. I come away from this book with the feeling that theremay be a specifically Americanquality to this attempt to restate a "realist" view of world it politicswhichdistinguishes from earliernon-Americanversionsof realism, ranging from Albert Sorel's analysis of the eighteenth century European balanceof powerto E. H. Carr'sanalysisof the interwarperiod (both cited favorably by Tucker) and including the well-known views of Charles de Gaulle (whom Tucker passes over in silence). All of the latter would have on accordedmoreweightto the materialsourcesof and constraints powerand less to ideology. I am left not so muchwith a sense of hard-headedrealismas with the spectacle of an eighteenth-centurynatural-law liberal feeling increasinglyalone in the world. Tucker is not a pessimistimpressedwith the
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limitinghumanaction;he is, to borrowGeorgesSorel'scategories, constraints optimistwho blamesa failureof will. The "newconservatism," a disillusioned if that is whatit is, is like nothingso muchas the old liberalism. Michael Hudson portrays the demand for a NIEO as born of the of breakdown UnitedStateshegemony,a hegemonythat has operatedthrough standard."The United Stateswas able to the mechanismof a "Treasury-bill run a continuingbalanceof paymentsdeficit throughthe 1960sand into the 1970sbecauseits principalcreditors-western Europe, Japan, and Canadaby agreedto re-lendAmericandebtto the U.S. Treasury holdingtheirreserves bills. In this way, U.S. involvementin Viet Nam and in the form of Treasury the takeover of foreign businessesby U.S.-based MNCs was financed by foreignersand U.S. public debt came to be very largelyforeign owned. The turningpoint came in 1973, in a series of four crises: the currencycrisis in Marchthat led to generalizedadoption of floating exchangerates; Europe's rejectionof the Kissingerplan for a new Atlantic charter;the impositionof commoditiesand exportembargoesby the United Stateson forty agricultural scrap metal during the summer;and the autumn Middle East war and attendantoil embargo.He sees the NIEO as a reactionto these events by both Europe and the Third World (indeed, Hudson's view of the NIEO focuses rathermoreon Europethanon the ThirdWorld)in whichboth seek to become "independent of the U.S. economic orbit and more closely integrated and economically politicallywith one another"(p. 1). The book is a coherentand challenginganalysis, criticalof U.S. policy to and sympathetic Europeanand ThirdWorld reactionsto it. It is at times, however,difficult to distinguishbetweenHudson's perceptionof a tendency towardsindependencefrom the United States and an assertionthat that independencehas indeed become a reality. Hudson sees evidence of a new European independencein the creation of the "snake"-"the first major move" in breakingout of the U.S. orbit-in the Pompidou-Jobertinitiative towards a special relationshipwith the Arab world, and in the Tindemans reporton the possibilityof a Europeanforeignpolicy. Anothermore skeptical author might have describedall these initiativesas abortiveor unsuccessful and the realityof Europetoday as still very much bound into the American economic orbit. Andre Tiano, himself sympatheticto the goal of European is independence, morecautious:he portraysEuropeanand Japanesecapitalas he healthierthan Americancapital (higherproductivity); applaudsthe closer of relationship mutualinterestbetweenEuropeand the ThirdWorldexpressed in the Lome convention(appraisalof the Lome conventionwould call for a separatereviewarticleand no attemptwill be made to do that here);he underlines without disapproval the effect of the oil crisis in distinguishing Europeanand Japanesefrom Americaninterests;but he does point out that since 1973 both the oil crisis and the dollar crisis may have workedso as to make Europemore and not less dependentupon the United States. Hudson himself is cautious enough to qualify his indicators as marking only a issueis for him the one whichwould ultimatelydefine threshold.The currency
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the realityof independence, which would requirethe creationof a European equivalentto the dollarand for this far moreEuropeanintegration than exists in or is currently prospectwouldbe needed(p. 33). Hudson also forecast the decline of the MNCs: "Ironically,economists chose to formulatea theoryabout multinational control over the directionof world economicdevelopment the precisemomentthat the processbeganto at deteriorate. (This is one more example of how the analysis of historical processestendsto be formulatedat the end of these processes,generallywhen new ones are under way)," (p. 120). The MNCs are no longer the main channelsof capitalmovementto the ThirdWorld.The privatebanksnow play this role, and many ThirdWorld countrieshave become heavilyindebtedby borrowingin private financial markets. The rollover of this debt is now a matterof majorconcernin North-South intergovernmental relationsand the U.S. Treasury policy is to deal with it throughthe IMF and the WorldBank, i.e., giving governmentalpolicy supremacyover MNCs in controlling the allocationof worldmonetaryresources. Andre Tiano's La dialectiquede la dependenceis, despite its title, a economicand financialrelations-and is universitytextbookon international a superb example of the genre in its lucid summariesand comparisonsof different theoreticalperspectivesin internationalpolitical economy, in its criticalanalysisof processesand tendencies,and its description institutions. of An English translationwould be put to good use in the currentboomlet of universityprogramsin internationalpolitical economy in North America. Nevertheless, pending its availability in this form for students, English-speakingreaderswill turn to it less as a textbook than for the author's of interpretation the dependencyquestion. Tiano rejects equally the liberal advocacyof free tradeand comparative advantage,on the one hand, and the "breakwith the worldeconomy"advocatedby some Marxists(thoughonly in rhetoricas he points out), on the other. For these, he substitutesthe notion that dependency a fact-though one which is difficult to define; indeed, by is making underdevelopment criterionhe seems to have been caught in a its circular definition-but a fact that can be changed through a dialectical processin whichthe dependentcountryexploitsthe weaknesses the external of forcesupon whichit is dependent.The leadership the state in less developed of countriesis a necessary conditionfor pursuingthis dialectic,and Tiano offers some examples of how it can be done: selective approval of foreign investment,the possibilityof using export controls, e.g., to encouragefurther processing,developinga national corps of engineeringcadresboth youthful and (especially)politicizedso as to be committedsupportersof the policy of workingtowardsnational economic independence.The criticalissue for the LDC is to gain control over the productiveapparatusof the country. This notion of a dialectic he regardsas consistent with the Marxian tradition, though not with a certain Marxist sectarianismthat advocates a dramatic breakwith dependency. In one of the essaysin the Helleinervolume, ConstantineVaitsos makes
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some suggestions that seem to fit well with Tiano's dialectic. Vaitsos, like Samir Amin in the passage cited above, takes a critical view of the vision of a future world economy in which capital and the production of new technology is controlled by multinationals based in the rich countries, while labor for the production of standardized goods is increasingly provided by Third World countries embarked upon a path of dependent industrialization. Like Samir Amin, he sees this as likely to maintain the pattern of uneven development, and proposes an alternative strategy to the poor countries. He envisages that in some cases the LDCs should develop their own companies with international operations. Furthermore, he suggests the possibility that access to the labor resources of the Third World might be the subject of international negotiations in which the LDCs jointly would hold out'for something over and above the actual wages paid. The intervention of governments in this matter would be linked to the promotion of greater income equality (and avoidance of creating in the Third World pockets of labor aristocracy in the sectors where MNCs operate) (Helleiner, pp. 137-140). The suggestion is thus one for using the elements of a situation of dependency in order to transform it. The realism of these neo-mercantilists is put to the service of change, not maintenance of the status quo. Tiano writes as a French socialist advocating a continuation of Gaullist policies for a Europe more independent of the United States, and confident that the European Left would work hand in hand with the socialists of Third World countries dependent upon Eulrope towards facilitating the dialectical movement towards a more equal relationship. Hudson sees an exclusive Soviet-American detente, in which both parties seem to share an interest in preventing the unification and strengthening of the European Left, as the greatest threat obstructing progress towards "economic independence from the United States and its Treasury-bill standard, its new wave of commercial protectionism, its self-centered foreign-aid philosophy and its tampering with the domestic political affairs of foreign countries" (p. 166). He argues further that the costs of warfare are now prohibitive to all but a few Third World dictatorships, and that since the United States in particular cannot any more afford extensive overseas military involvement-Viet Nam having led to the present crisis of the world economy-"repressive regimes will not be able to call upon the United States at will to support their power by overt or covert means as in the past. The path will thus be opened up for foreign economic, political, and social change that has been stifled for three decades" (pp. 225-226).
The perspectives of historical materialism The characteristic feature of historical materialism is its focus on production as that of neo-mercantilism is its focus on the state. That is not to say that these are mutually exclusive or necessarily contradictory emphases or that other perspectives do not share either of them. It is largely a matter of
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points of departure.Questionsof compatibilityarise furtherdown the road.

Mahbub ul Haq can hardly be considered a Marxist, yet he writes: ". . . once
productionhas been so organizedas to leave a fairly large numberof people unemployed,it becomes almost impossibleto redistributeincomes to those in who are not even participating the productionstream. We have a better now of the evolution of moderncapitalistinstitutionsand their appreciation hold on politicaldecisionmaking,and hencewe are more awarethat the very pattern and organization of production itself dictates a pattern of consumption and distribution which is politically very difficult to change.... We
have a numberof case studiesby now whichshow how illusoryit was to hope the without first reorganizing that the fruits of growthcould be redistributed
pattern of production and investment. . . " (Mahbub ul Haq, pp. 33-34). This
for asidefromone authoris the point of departure others. pertinentin the is The use of the pluralform of perspectives particularly Boundfor a long time in an orthodoxyconfined materialism. case of historical to the Leninist view of imperialismand the contradictionsof developed has capitalism,the field of historicalmaterialism morerecentlybeen extended througha varietyof attemptsto respondto the challengeof the North-South to and problematic particularly found realisticstrategiesfor the ThirdWorld countries. ReginaldGreen expressedthe resentmentof those committedto dealingwith ThirdWorld problemsagainstthe conventionalMarxistcall for revolution at the center as a prior condition for allowing change in the and this, he wrote, is "no less arrogant,no less Eurocentric, no less periphery; neo-colonialistthan its bourgeoisparallel"(Helleiner,p. 252). The complaint is, however,lesswell foundedtoday thanit may havebeenseveralyearsago. The recent literaturehas raised a number of basic issues concerning concepts and approachesabout which the historicalmaterialistsare divided amongst themselves.They are engagedin a debate that goes on quite apart from that in which most of the other orientationsare involved. It revolves aroundthreemaincleavages. forcesas The firstconcernsthe relativeemphasisto be givento productive forcescan lead at againstthe relationsof production.The stresson productive (modernindustry,the historical one extremeto a technologicaldeterminism work of capitalism,becomesa priorconditionfor the transitionto socialism); that on relations of production at another extreme to a revolutionary of (revolutioncan reshapesocietyindependently its technological voluntarism base; indeed revolutionwill generateits own technology).In politicalterms, as the formerreflectsthe orthodoxyof Marxismparticularly exemplifiedby the Sovietmodeland the latterthe Chineseroadto socialism. The second conceptualissue concernsthe relativeemphasison modes of productionversussocial formations.Marx, of course, used both conceptsbut for differentpurposes.The mode of productionwas his deductivemodel that enabledhim to explorethe propertiesand dynamicsmainlyof capitalismand to a more limited extent of pre-capitalistforms, as in Capital.The social
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formation was his framework for analyzing the interaction of different forms of production and social classes in a particular historical conjuncture, e.g., France following the revolution of 1848 in his Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte. The choice of concepts in the present historical conjuncture can lead in quite different directions. To pick the mode of production has led some to theorize about a world system defined as capitalism-the fate of the periphery being bound up with a crisis that is determined from the center. To pick the social formation, and specifically the peripheral or Third World country as a social formation, leads others to explore what they have called the "articulation of modes of production" or the complex interrelationship of capitalist and non-capitalist forms of production-or varieties of capitalist forms-in Third World countries and their linkages with the world economy. The view from the periphery via the social formation approach suggests a more complex world system and a greater range of choice in Third World strategies than does the center-based notion of a world-encompassing mode of production. Finally, there are divergent epistemologies of positivism and historicism within the intellectual tradition of historical materialism. The positivist aspect has been most prominent recently among the French school from Althusser to Poulantzas who have tried to make Marxism into a universal general theory by rejecting in particular the Hegelian elements in Marx's thought-an attempt criticized by another historical materialist (with reference to Poulantzas in particular) as "structural-functionalism clothed in Marxist concepts" (G. van Benthem van den Bergh cited by Aidan Foster-Carter in the text considered here, p. 56). The historicist aspect has been most prominent recently in Italian theory, especially that of Gramsci, but is also evident in the British historical works, e.g., of Eric Hobsbawm and Perry Anderson. These themes of debate can be seen running through the recent historical materialist literature. One is tempted to find an overlapping alignment between, on the one hand, those who stress the primacy of productive forces, reason in terms of a worldwide capitalist mode of production and tend towards general theorizing, and, on the other hand, those who give their attention to the varieties of production relations to be found in peripheral social formations and who take a more concretely historical approach. But though there may be something in this, it oversimplifies a more complicated picture. It is more prudent to observe how these different themes arise in different authors. The case for the primacy of productive forces is stated in an article by Arghiri Emmanuel-whose work has been associated above all with the notion of unequal exchange based on differences in labor costs between center and periphery-entitled "The multinational corporations and inequality of development" published in a special number of the International Social Science Journal devoted to the NIEO. This is, in a sense, a Marxist defense of the historical role of the MNC and rejection of some current dependencia
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In theses on underdevelopment. effect, Emmanuelsets aside GunderFrank's assertion that the "development of underdevelopment"is an effect of orderof observesthat if you list countriesin decreasing capitalism.Emmanuel orderof GNP per capita, the two lists capitalreceivedand againin decreasing coincide: "So either there is no causal link between foreign capital and unin cannotbe accusedof having derdevelopment, whichcase the multinationals caused a deadlock at the periphery,or the deadlock occurrednot because international capitalflowed in but becauseit has stayed out" (ISSJ, p. 760). He is contemptuous of "self-centred" development and "appropriate technology" ("An appropriatetechnologyfor poor countriescan only be a
poor technology . . . an anti-development technology" p. 764). The progressive role of capitalism should not be forgotten by its critics: ". . . capi-
talism is not a bad dream but a social system which has a historicalpart to play; a systemwhich, as it developed,gave not only gadgetsand pollutionbut also widespreadliteracyand an averagelife expectancyof seventy years inwhileawaitingthe socialrevolutionit is steadof forty. And that, consequently by no meansa matterof indifferencefor people whetherthey live in India or the United States, no matterwhat similaritymay be recognizedbetweenthe productionrelations in these two countries" (p. 762). One is left with the feeling that "awaiting the social revolution" means awaiting the full developmentof a modernindustrialbase; but Emmanuelgoes on to say that capitalismcannot bring this about in the Third World (apart possibly from some insignificant exceptional cases) so these countries must "skip the capitaliststage," an assertionthat seemsto containa voluntaristic leap. ChristianPalloix grounds his analysis in the labor process. The labor process,as he understands termin Marx'susage, has two components: the one is the linkage between the different physical phases of production(capital goods, intermediate goods, consumergoods);and the otheris the way in which humanbeingsare organizedinto productionand a laborsupplyis assured.He the calls these respectively objectiveand the subjectiveaspects,and in the text consideredhere he deals mainlywith the objectiveside. Palloix is at one with Emmanuelon the primacyof productiveforces over relationsof production. He rejectsthe (Chinese)thesis of the autonomyof productionrelations,i.e., the possibilityof beginninga transitionto socialismby a revolutionary change in the powerposition of social classesand in the way people are organizedto do work, in the absenceof any significantchangein the qualityor quantityof the physicalapparatus production.To ignorethe constraintthat productive of forces impose upon the possibilityof making the transitionto socialism, he warns, is to lapse into idealism(Palloix, p. 72). The inferenceis that LDCs should adopt strategiesthat emphasize acquiringthe kinds of production activitieswhich supplythe meansof production,in other wordswhich would give them commandover the labor process instead of remainingdependent upon the supply of these means of production from outside. Palloix here echoes views expressedby Samir Amin to the effect that LDCs should not follow the route of "comparativeadvantage" (in the sense used by liberal
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economists), since "if the international division of labor is unequal, the argument of comparative advantages loses its validity" (Amin, p. 18), and should instead put their efforts in areas of comparative disadvantage, in particular by developing basic industries. Amin's criticism of the RIO report (cited above) is on the grounds that it would perpetuate the structural inequality between center and periphery by maintaining control of the labor process in the center through its monopoly of the generation of the means of production. Amin sees the alternative road for the LDCs in terms of cooperation among themselves in raw materials exchange and in the development and sharing of technology. A somewhat more pessimistic viewpoint is given by Norman Girvan in a
collectionof republished essays entitledCorporateImperialism: Conflictand

Expropriation. It is useful to have these writings by a stimulating thinker within the covers of a single book, especially the first chapter which is a revised version of his "Multinational Corporations and Dependent Underdevelopment in Mineral-Export Economies," published in Jamaica in 1970. Girvan's framework is one of overlapping and contradicting economies or policy areas: on the one hand MNCs, on the other LDCs, each struggling to maximize its control over the relationship and to become less dependent upon the other, with the LDCs losing out. At the present time, he notes an effort to coopt the leadership of Third World countries into "a new model of dependent industrialization" which would involve an extended role for the state bureaucracies of the LDCs: "Cooptation of economic nationalism involves developing a new and enhanced role for the Third World state in the resource industries. Previously limited to the provision of infrastructure for the benefit of the corporations, which was paid for ultimately by the population, the state's functions can be expanded to embrace formal ownership, provision of capital, and administration of the labor force" (p. 6). This new model requires a new set of political and class alliances and a new legitimizing ideology. This is meeting with some resistance within the center, notably resistance to the demands for a shift of decision-making power towards LDCs which is implied in the NIEO, yet, Girvan continues, "it is difficult to interpret this demand as an assault on what we have called the system of corporate imperialism. There is no evidence that Third World states as a whole are seeking to reverse the process of concentration of private capital on a world scale, or that they wish to liquidate the role of the transnationals as the principal instruments of the international transfer of capital and technology" (p. 8). Girvan's call is for "subversion" of this new order in which Third World governments are accomplices of MNCs in a new phase of imperialism. Other historical materialists study more optimistic and less apocalyptic scenarios. Tamis Szentes, a professor of economics from Budapest, contributed an article to the special number of the ISSJ in which the Emmanuel article cited above appears, in which he envisages the possibility of Third World countries moving towards planned socialist development without any dramatic rupture in their international relations. The decisive factor would be
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if the state were to follow policies to eliminateeconomic dualismby transforming agriculture,a task which could only be achievedby developingindustryso as to providethe inputs for and interactwith the ruralsector. Like of Emmanuel,Szentesrecognizesthe positivecontribution foreigncapitaland world technology,but arguesthat the tendencyof a private-investment-paced economy to fragment national economies and integrate the pieces internationallyshould be resistedby the national state in the LDCs: "the role of over theireconomy,in and responsibility Stateswith legitimatesovereignty economicrelations the development,orientationand control of international firms and privateventures should be increasedas againstthose transnational which represent the interests of certain business groups or dominant economies" (p. 806). One can see here a potentialconvergenceof historical approaches the NIEO. to materialist neo-mercantilist and in Strategiesfor overcomingunderdevelopment this more optimisticvein of historical materialismare being considered in the work of Hartmut Elsehans, of the Universityof Marburg,though unfortunatelyvery little of this is availableto the Englishreader.Elsenhansappearsto be exploringwhat Tiano called (see above) the dialecticof dependence,or how the LDCs can in consciouslyuse their links of dependency orderto gain more autonomyof development.Though his point of departureis in the productiveforces, he, more than Emmanuelor Palloix, for example, arrivesat a balancebetween of productionrelationsand productiveforces ratherthan a subordination the one to the other. Elsenhans, by contrast with Emmanuel, for example, does endorse he somethinglike GunderFrank's formulation: "Underdevelopment," has written, "is not identicalwith non-development,but ratherthe result of the of development the capitalistmode of production"(Elsenhans,1975,p. 294). heterogeneity" which, This resulttakes the form of what he calls "structural in the presenthistoricalconjuncture,takes place through the formation of of countries.The economiesof these "bridgeheads" capitalismin peripheral countriesbecome characterized export of raw materialsor standardized by manufactures,import of capital goods (the means of work), import increasinglyof the basic essentials, principallyfood, and a limited domestic demandbecause of the relativelysmall proportionof "bridgehead"income earnersin relationto the whole population.Marketforceswill not changethis pattern so as to resolve structural heterogeneity into an all-embracing capitalism primarilybecause of the blockage of domestic demand arising from the structureof the labor force and incomes. The alternativeway of and is resolvingstructural heterogeneity by a state-led socialistdevelopment it is towards devising a strategy for such a course that Elsenhans' work is directed. the are revolutionthat Internally, basic policyrequisites 1) an agricultural will increaseproductionso as to satisfy the food needs of the populationand on incomespolicy that eliminatedependency importedfoods, 2) an egalitarian will create a mass marketfor food and simple goods (cf. the "basic needs"
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conceptdiscussedin the first threesectionsof this review),and 3) an industrial sector (fertilizers,tube wells, policy that producesinputs for the agricultural for irrigationtubes, tractors,etc.) and simplemanufactures the arousedmass dependent but demand.All three are interdependent, the first is particularly upon the third. Industrialpolicy thus has a strategicleadershiprole, though the primary targetis ruraldevelopment.LikeEmmanuel,Elsenhansrejectsthe discussedabove)in favor argument especiallythe ThirdWorldperspective (see of labor-intensivetechnology, "intermediate"technologyor "appropriate" technology. The way in which the Chinese experiencehas been frequently depictedin these terms he dismissesas westernromanticism.The technology question should rather be posed in terms of the proper combinations of capital- and labor-intensiveprocessesand the ends to which they are put. A fertilizerplantthat providesinputsfor an agricultural highlycapital-intensive revolutionservesdevelopment,while a consumergoods factoryproducingfor thoughrelatively countrystandards by exportthat is labor-intensive industrial heterogeneity. by capital-intensive LDC standards,consolidatesstructural Externally, Elsenhans eschews the myth of a break with the world economy and advocates for the LDC a combinationof "associative" and "dissociative"behavior-a controlledcooperationwith capitalistcountries.It would not, is this aspectthat bringshim closestto Tiano'sdialectic.Elsenhans for example, rule out LDCs cooperating with MNCs, but in any such cooperationthe LDC governmentshould bring the MNC activity into conthe goals-by requiring MNC to increaseits formitywith its own development of local procurement inputs, for instance,and by taxationnot only of profits but of employeeearnings.Differencesin time-dimensions-the profit-making dimensionof the MNC being somewhatshorterin time than the structural changedimensionof the LDC government-may allow for a certaintransitory coexistence of MNC and LDC policies pursuing fundamentallydifferent goals. Like a number of the other authors considered(Amin, Tiano, and Singerand Ansari included),Elsenhansalso attachesimportanceto regional cooperationamongLDCs. Where Elsenhansseems to make an advance upon the other historical materialistauthors so far consideredis in pressinghis enquirybeyond the realmof "productive forces" strictlyspeakingin orderto considerthe possible sociopoliticalbasis for the policy route towards overcomingdevelopment. Severalpointsareworthmarkinghere. First, there is the subjective dimension of political mobilization or politicalconsciousness.A culturalrevolutionin thinkingand attitudeson the part of the peasantry will be a necessary component of agricultural development.Relativelyprivilegedworkersin the "bridgehead"sector will have to be persuadedof the desirabilityof a more equitableincomes policy. writes Meanswill haveto be found to mobilizethe urbanmarginals.Elsenhans that the content of politicalconsciousnessis to be consideredas a productive force (Elsenhans,1975, p. 304), but he is here on the thresholdof production relations.
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Second, there is an internaldialecticas well as the externalone Tiano pointed to. The necessary development of industry and importation of will technologyintendedas the motor of change in agriculture give strategic prominenceto a relatively skilled labor force and will encourage income incomespolicy. The way that disparities conflictwiththe goal of an egalitarian in which this contradiction(betweenmaterialincentivesfor skill on the one handand incomesolidarityon the other)is handledcan be takenas a criterion of authenticity a regime. of the developmental Third,thereis the notion of the stateclassas the leaderor potentialleader of change and the question of the sociopoliticalbasis of this class, to which manuscript.As with Tiano, his real Elsenhanshas devoted an (unpublished) worldmodelis Algeria,a case that has receivedless attentionthan some others in Anglo-Saxon literature.The emergenceof a state class with authentic national developmentgoals-both of capital accumulationand structural change-he considersto be a distinct possibility on condition that the unstrataof society have been effectivelymobilized,i.e., normally derprivileged througha prolongedanti-colonial struggle.Developmentalauthenticitycan only be maintained so long as this class remains under pressure of the disadvantagedstrata, this pressure being constantly necessary since the leadershipin the state class is in the nature of things held by relatively privileged groups (intellectuals and town-dwellers). Commitment to the agriculturalrevolution is itself one way of maintainingthis pressurefrom below. Another source of pressure from the base of society upon the leadershiparises in dialecticalfashion out of rivalrieswithin the state class groupswithinthe state apparatus,impatientunderthe rule itself. Subordinate of establishedmembersof the class, seek externalallies in the underprivileged the frombelowupon the leadership. groupswhichthusincreases pressure countriesthat have WhileElsenhanslooks to the state class in peripheral made an anti-colonial breakthrough(like Algeria) as the initiators of a dialecticof development,others such as Girvan(as discussedabove) picture of in of new developments the statemachinery LDCs as but the counterparts a here?Not, I think, at least Is new phase of imperialism. therea contradiction per so far as Elsenhansis concerned.For him, thereis nothingprogressive se in leadershipif the the state class. There is only a potential for developmental historicalconditionssurroundit with the necessarysocial pressures.Yet even in the case of a state class that colludes (RIO-like accordingto Amin) in the new MNC-directed internationaldivision of labor, Elsenhans would find praxis,by examining"how far the existenceof islands scope for revolutionary of prosperityintensifies the revolutionarypressure of the underprivileged measuresfor forcing, in turn, the state apparatusto introducecompensatory (Elsenhans,1975,p. 309). the satisfactionof the needsof the underprivileged" Here we rejoin Samir Amin, who comments that "in theory" the new internationaldivisionof labor does permitthe coopting of LDC rulinggroups: "But only 'in theory,' because what counts in history are the unexpected and accidents,and there can be some here and there in the peripheries in the
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centers (and serious ones for capitalism)during the transition, laden with contradiction,. . . to the new phase of imperialism"(Amin, p. 13). We have come a good distance from the technologicaldeterminismimplicit in Emmanuel towards a more voluntaristicview of revolutionarypotential in the Third World, but one grounded neverthelessin the analysis of historical conditions. about modesof productionand social formationstakesa The controversy rather different tangent from the historical materialistliteraturethus far discussedand presentssome of the featuresof a level of analysisissue. On the of one hand are those who write about the internationalization capitalas the homogenizationof a world system in the form of the capitalist mode of productionwhich has to be analyzedas a single whole. On the other, is the ''new economic anthropology" examining the combinations of different modes of production in the peripheries, or what has been called by Pierre-PhilippeRey, one of the seminal thinkers of this school, "the articulationof modesof production." in The world system approach, particularly the form expressedby Immanuel Wallerstein(building on GunderFrank and especiallyon Francois Braudel'srecentlytranslatedwork) is now fairly well-known to American readers.ChristianPalloix's work is probablyless well knownand, it must be added, intellectually less accessible (apart altogether from the language barrier,Palloix is often very obscurefor Frenchreaders).Palloix's use of the laborprocessas an avenueof analysisis, however,relevantto the issuesraised in the new economicanthropologyeven though he does not acceptthe notion of articulationof modes of production, since everything,for him, is explainablein termsof capitalism.Thereare, for Palloix, two laborprocesses:1) the labor process of capital or industrialmass-production(Taylorismfor short), and 2) the domesticlabor process or relativelysimple productionfor use or immediateconsumptionas in the household.Up until the last decades of the nineteenthcenturycapitalismgrew on the basis of a labor supplythat was sustainedand replacedthroughthe domesticlabor process. The workers themselvescame initially from rural villages; their food was produced in eastern Europe or Latin America by "pre-capitalist" methods; it was and prepared theirworkclothesmendedby theirwives at home; and they and their wives produced a new generation of workers. The "domestic labor process" is thus a convenient way of classifying the whole mixture of non-industrialproductionprocessesas a subordinatecategoryto the "labor process of capital." This (for capitalism)happy symbiosisbetweenthe two labor processescame to an end in the United Statesat the end of the century when waves of immigrantsprovidedthe labor for burgeoningAmericanindustry.Cut off from theirnativevillagesin easternand southernEurope,the domestic labor process could no longer serve their needs so adequately. developingthe labor Capitalismmoved in to fill the breachby progressively by processof capitalto fulfill functionsformerlyexercised the domesticlabor (and therebychangingits labor process) agriculture process-by mechanizing
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and by penetratingthe worker'shousehold with mass-producedarticles. In Palloix's somewhat ponderous formulation, capitalism interiorized the reproductionof labor power which had formerlybeen exteriorto the labor process of capital. The massive inflow of immigrantsalso gave capital the of opportunityto break the restrictiveness old work patternssupportedby traditionalunions by moving whole hog to Taylorism, thereby increasing ariseshere, however, capital'scontrolover the labor process.A contradiction when labor acquireda degreeof autonomy(e.g., more effective tradeunions and politicalsupport)and was able to resistthe tendenciesof the laborprocess to disqualify work and to increase its intensity (mass production and the automation).The costs of interiorizing domesticlabor processbecametoo high for capitalwhich respondedby segmentingthe labor force into one part which is still "interiorized"with access to mass consumptiongoods and another part which is marginalized (the usual mechanism being racial segregation)-and this led to profound social crisis within the capitalistcity. Another responseof capital, however, has been to shift productioninto the relationship ThirdWorld in an attemptto restorethe old nineteenth-century between the labor process of capital and the domestic labor process which continues to exist in those areas. This, Palloix argues, is the basic reason divisionof labor. behindthe new international tell Whatdoes this historicalinterpretation us about the presentstructure of the world system?Like Wallerstein (not to mentionJuliusCaesar),Palloix divides it into three parts, although the ambiguity of Wallerstein's "semi-periphery"(which was the Italian city-states in the sixteenthcentury and is the Soviet Union in the twentieth)is absent. Most countries today, according to Palloix, are in an intermediateposition in the global labor upon othercountriesfor the process,sincethey are at the sametime dependent goods (and likelythe most criticalones) of importation some of theirproducer of and are exporters otherproducergoods to othercountries.France,he says, is in such an intermediarystatus because it has lost control over the of reproduction its own productivesystem;while some ThirdWorldcountries (he was speakingto Mexicans who might see themselvesin this role) had moved into a position of supplying some capital goods to less developed as countries.The hierarchy,thus, could now be represented 1) the hegemonic who alone controlledthe social formations(UnitedStates, Germany,Japan) global labor process, 2) the intermediary formations and 3) the unformations(altogether dependentupon the outsidefor producer derdeveloped the politicalissue, in consequence,could be defined as whether goods). And the NIEO would enlarge and consolidate the intermediary space (Palloix's versionof what Amin arguesis the RIO strategy)or whetherthe intermediary formations would ally with the underdevelopedin order to break with capitalism (Palloix, pp. 131-132).Thus for Palloix the dialecticis at the center of the system. Revolutionmust mean a change in the global system itself. There is no hint of the subtle dialecticsA la Tiano or Elsenhansthat could
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introducechangefrom the peripheries of throughexploitingthe contradictions the system. If Palloix has in a sense sidestepped challengeof the ThirdWorldby the its assimilating varietyof concreteconditionsto the "domesticlaborprocess," the new economicanthropologytakes a more directlook at real conditionsof production in the Third World-it probes what Elsenhans refers to as structural heterogeneity.In a key work of this school, Pierre-PhilippeRey's Les alliancesde classes,the authorsees threestagesin the impactof capitalism on a pre-capitalistperipheralformation. In a first stage a relationshipis established through exchange, during which capitalism reinforces precapitalistmodes of production. In a second stage, capitalism"takes root" withinthe peripheral formationand subordinates pre-capitalistformswithout In supplanting them, i.e., they continueto coexistsymbiotically. a thirdstage, not yet reached in the Third World, capitalismwould absorb or eliminate else. The greatadvantage this approachis that it directsattention of everything to the study of actual productionprocessesand to the complementarities and conflictsbetweenthem. Initially,in termsof the subjectmatter,this arisesfor countriesinto which capitalismarrivedfrom outside;but by implicationthe same method might as well be appliedto the study of the differentforms of production process which have evolved in the industrializedcountries. In to short, it heraldsa move from a debate over abstractions a study of actual production.AidanFoster-Carter underlines possibilityin his reviewof the this debatein "The Modesof ProductionControversy" one can only applaud and his sharpness rootingout tendencies reification:"It is alreadyone level of in to abstractionto have 'classes' (ratherthan 'people') as the subject of history; but to endow so conceptualan entityas 'mode of production'with this role is idealismindeed. As modes of productionare not the subject of history, so neithershouldtheybe the subjectof sentences"(p. 55). This practicalemphasisraisesby implicationthe matterof clarifyingjust what a mode of productionis. Foster-Carter points out that the questioncan be answered one way by defining it upwards, making it identical (A la Wallersteinor Palloix) with the world system-there is a single mode of production.It can be answeredanotherway by definingit downwards "on to farm/in firm" relationsat the point of production,thus, accordingagain to Foster-Carter, "producing inevitable inflation and debasement of the coinage:each Andeanvalley has its own mode of production,and individuals may changethem two or three times a week like underwear"(p. 74). Nevertheless, it is in this latterdirectionthat the most seriousgap in the thoughtof historical now seemsto lie. Theorizingabout the worldsystemhas materialism achieveda certainacademicstatus,but relativelylittle is being done towardsa better understanding the varietiesof the real world of production-even of where, as with the historicalmaterialists,productionis proclaimedto be the basis for both theory and action. Work in this directionshould lend further subtletyand realismto the formulationsof such as Tiano and Elsenhans.It
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would show historicalmaterialismnot as a refinementof dogma but as a methodof work.

* * * *
About a centuryand a quarterago, KarlMarx wrote "Men make their own history,but they do not make it just as they please." He pointedboth to the potentialityof human volition and the material limits of the possible. About another centuryand a quarterbefore that Giambattista Vico (whose thoughtMarxknewand seemsto haveappreciated) propounded reverseof the this proposition:that historymakesmen, or that whatwe call humannatureis not somethinguniformand universalbut is changingand shapedby history. These propositionsare not mutuallyexclusive;they are reciprocallyrelated: the mindthat conceivesand comprehends historicalactionsis itself moldedby history-thought and action are bound togetherin a structuralinterrelationship that can only be understoodhistorically.Both Vico and Marxwouldhave agreedon that. The significantbreaksor turningpointsin historyare pointsat which mental constructswhich have hitherto been recognizedas generally valid science (because practicallyuseful as guides to action under specific historicalconditions)come to be seenas ideology. It remainsan open questionwhetherthe debateover the NIEO is such a turningpoint. MichaelHudson thinks it is, seeing in it a sequel to the first industrialrevolutionthat producedthe classical economics of Adam Smith the and the second industrialrevolutionthat engendered economicand social theories now establishedin the western world counterpoisedto Marxism: relationsinevitablywill be associatedwith "Today'scrackingof international a similar set of new ideological forms, rationalizationsand justifications" (Hudson, pp. 174-175). Otherssee the NIEO not as a turningpoint but as an adjustment in an established ongoing hegemony, the coopting or embourgeoisementof the Third World. As the quick survey of literatureattempted here brings out, though the establishmentstill speaks with the authorityof "science," the ideologicalfoundationsof the differentpositions are made more explicitby the radicalcritics, especiallythe neo-mercantilists and historicalmaterialists. Radical criticismis, in its nature, unfinishedbusiness. The themes advanced by the critics are potentiallyrich, and yet their work still has a very preliminaryquality. Much remains to be done to give the lines of critical studies-a taskthatconfrontsthe analysisopenedup a fullerbasisin empirical obstacleof the academicestablishment's control over resources predominant for research.And out of this effort, if successfullypursuedso as to overcome this and otherobstacles,may come a new sciencethat itself in due time will be perceivedas ideology tied to historicalfoundationsthat have in turn become obsolete.
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Appendix: Books, articles and documents reviewed Samir Amin, "Self-relianceand the New InternationalEconomic Order," MonthlyReview29, 3 (July-August1977):1-21.
Jagdish N. Bhagwati (ed.), The New International Economic Order: The
North-South Debate (Cambridge,Mass.: The MassachusettsInstitute of and TechnologyPress, 1977),390 pp., hardback paperback.
Club of Rome, Reshaping the International Order. A Report to the Club of
Rome. Jan Tinbergen,coordinator.Antony J. Dolman, editor. Jan van Ettinger,director.(NewYork:E. P. Dutton and Co., 1976). John Deverelland the Latin AmericanWorkingGroup, Falconbridge.Portrait of a Canadian Mining Multinational (Toronto: James Lorimer and
Co., 1975), 184pp. Hartmut Elsenhans, "Overcoming Underdevelopment.A Research Paradigm," Journal of Peace Research 4 XII/1975: 293-313. , "The state class in the Third World: For a new conceptualization of
modesof production"(unpublished). periphery Arghiri Emmanuel, "The multinational corporations and inequality of
development," International Social Science Journal XXVIII, 4 (1976):
754-772. Councilon ForeignRelations, 1980sProject. AlbertFishlow, CarlosF. DiazAlejandro,RichardR. Fagen, RogerD. Hansen,Rich and Poor Nations in Economy(New York:McGraw-Hill,1978)264 pp. the World Aidan Foster-Carter,"The Modes of Production Controversy,"New Left Review 107 (January-February 1978):47-77. This is to reappearin John
Clammer, ed., The New Economic Anthropology, to be published by Mac-
millan,London, 1978.
Norman Girvan, Corporate Imperialism: Conflict and Expropriation. Transnational Corporations and Economic Nationalism in the Third World
(WhitePlains, N.Y.: M. E. SharpeInc., 1976),243 pp.

Mahbub ul Haq, The Poverty Curtain. Choices for the Third World (New
Ward. Press, 1976),pp. xvii, 247. Forewordby Barbara York:University

G. K. Helleiner, ed., A World Divided. The Less Developed Countries in the
UniInternational Economy (London, New York, Melbourne:Cambridge versityPress, 1976),pp. x, 299.

Bohuslav Herman, The Optimal International Division of Labour (Geneva:
International LabourOffice, 1975).Forewordby Jan Tinbergen.

Michael Hudson, Global Fracture. The New International Economic Order
(NewYork:Harper& Row, 1977),p. 296.

Wassily Leontief and others, The Future of the World Economy (New York:
UnitedNations, OxfordUniversity Press, 1977), 110pp.

Christian Palloix, Travail etproduction (Paris: Maspero, 1978), 134 pp.
Hans Singer and Javed Ansari, Rich and Poor Countries(London: George Allen and UnwinLtd., 1977),228 pp.
302
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Robert Cox - Ideologies and The New International

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Ideologies and the New International Economic Order: Reflections on Some Recent Literature Author(s): Robert W.

Ideologies and the NIEO

Ideologies and the NIEO

Ideologies and the NIEO

Ideologies and the NIEO

Ideologies and the NIEO

Organization 24, 3 (Summer 1970).

Ideologies and the NIEO

Ideologies and the NIEO

Ideologies and the NIEO

Ideologies and the NIEO

Ideologies and the NIEO

. They must work towards

Ideologies and the NIEO

Third World perspective

Ideologies and the NIEO

Ideologies and the NIEO

Ideologies and the NIEO

Ideologies and the NIEO

Ideologies and the NIEO

points of departure.Questionsof compatibilityarise furtherdown the road.

Ideologies and the NIEO

Ideologies and the NIEO

collectionof republished essays entitledCorporateImperialism: Conflictand

Ideologies and the NIEO

Ideologies and the NIEO

Ideologies and the NIEO

would show historicalmaterialismnot as a refinementof dogma but as a methodof work.

Ideologies and the NIEO

(WhitePlains, N.Y.: M. E. SharpeInc., 1976),243 pp.

Ward. Press, 1976),pp. xvii, 247. Forewordby Barbara York:University

UniInternational Economy (London, New York, Melbourne:Cambridge versityPress, 1976),pp. x, 299.

International LabourOffice, 1975).Forewordby Jan Tinbergen.

(NewYork:Harper& Row, 1977),p. 296.

UnitedNations, OxfordUniversity Press, 1977), 110pp.

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