The divide
"More than four billion people--some 60 percent of humanity--live in debilitating poverty, on less than $5 per day. The standard narrative tells us this crisis is a natural phenomenon, having to do with climate, geography, and culture. It tells us all we have to do is give aid to help poor countries up the development ladder. If poor countries would only adopt the right institutions and economic policies, they could join the ranks of the rich world. Anthropologist Jason Hickel argues that this story ignores the broader political forces at play. Global poverty--and the growing inequality between the rich countries of Europe and North America and the poor ones of Africa, Asia, and South America--has come about because the global economy has been designed over the course of five centuries to favor the interests of the most powerful nations. Global inequality is not natural, inevitable, or accidental. To close the divide, Hickel proposes dramatic action rooted in real justice: abolishing debt burdens in the global South, democratizing the institutions of global governance, and rolling out an international minimum wage, among other steps. Only then will we have a chance at a world built on equal footing."--Jacket flap.
Stats for nerds
2recommend
6mentions
5people
2019–2025years
50% recommend33% neutral17% critical
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- Sure: two somewhat recent books that cover this are "Silent Coup" by Claire Provost and Matt Kennard, and "The Divide" by Jason Hickel. Another that covers this topic is "Superimperialism" by Michael Hudson.
The purpose of the IMF is not to help countries out of some kind of benevolence, it's to use debt as a control mechanism over other countries.
- In case you don't see the comment above, a few books that I know cover this topic include "Superimperialism" (Hudson), "Silent Coup" (Kennard), and "The Divide" (Hickel).
- Undoubtedly that personal award goes to Citations Needed Episode 73: Western Media’s Narrow, Colonial Definition of ‘Corruption’. You can read the transcript on Medium [1] or listen on Spotify [2].
It may seem a bit bromide for HN, but it really shattered my world view. Or at least was the impetus of a rather radical shift in how I viewed global power structures, old wealth, and the evil systems in place today that continue to perpetuate global inequality. In the episode, they dig into these popular "corruption" indices, why the Global South is always painted as the "most corrupt", true sources of institutionalized corruption, where the real tax havens and how they operate. It even highlights a (previously unknown to me at least!) stark and admittedly macabre distinction between London, the city in England and the ancient The City of London [3]. Yes there is a huge difference with the latter being a 1,000 British colonial-era holdover that's home to the largest tax haven hub in the world.
As a bonus, it features Jason Hickel, an economic anthropologist who wrote The Divide [4]. Which, for reasons outlined above, is also one of my favorite books ever. If you find my poor attempt of summary or the article/podcast interesting, I'd implore you to buy the book and learn something new.
All the world is a stage and indeed we are merely players.
[1] - https://citationsneeded.medium.com/episode-73-western-medias...
[2] - https://open.spotify.com/episode/7cf3g7670FYKrD9OE6vHQd?si=v...
[3] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_London
[4] - https://www.jasonhickel.org/the-divide
Edit: Just to clarify, this episode is from 2019. I did not interpret the question clearly and assumed it was in the spirit of "Favorite podcast episode you listened to this year". Hope this helps.
- Now you're getting it. Adamantly trying to focus on "eliminating poverty", when my original comment was about the morality of neoliberalism, is a straw man argument. I'm glad that after enough contemplation you have come to understand this.
So, if you'd like to address my original comment, I'm all ears, otherwise this discussion is a complete waste of time. Before you do that, though, it would be prudent to learn about what neoliberalism actually is, and why foreign intervention is directly related to it and your original premise. Once you do that, we'll be able to have a fruitful discussion.
An excerpt from The Divide:
> People commonly think of neoliberalism as an ideology that promotes totally free markets, where the state retreats from the scene and abandons all interventionist policies. But if we step back a bit, it becomes clear that the extension of neoliberalism has entailed powerful new forms of state intervention. The creation of a global 'free market' required not only violent coups and dictatorships backed by Western governments, but also the invention of a totalizing global bureaucracy – the World Bank, the IMF, the WTO and bilateral free-trade agreements – with reams of new laws, backed up by the military power of the United States
- I'm currently reading The Divide by Jason Hickel, a book that explores the origin and causes of global inequality. This article reminded me of the book's chapter about the enclosure movement in Britain: Families used to just farm and live off the land. The enclosure movement made most of this land the property of the aristocracy, who would then lease it back out to farmers - but they would keep increasing the price of the lease, so the farmers now had to work themselves to death and use every means to increase yield, in order to keep up, and not get replaced by someone else. It was much more efficient than the previous subsistence farming. (And left many thousands without a home or the means to support themselves)
- What a great critique. I'd like to see a similar treatment of Jason Hickel's "The Divide", which feels both terribly important and very biased and sloppy.
