Development

Dec 28, 2009 Editorial

President Jagdeo’s articulation of the Low Carbon Development Strategy (LCDS) earlier this year, has sparked quite a debate on the issue of development itself. This is very positive and exemplifies our position that debates on policy issues involving the general citizenry is the very essence of democracy.

Development practice is not new. Ironically, it dates back to the same European colonising enterprise, when colonisers enforced a “civilised,” ordered, white, male, Christian ethic. Guyana is one example of this “development”. Dr Walter Rodney, however, showed that development is dialectically linked to underdevelopment – we were to be developed in ways that ensured that the interest of the “Mother Country” always came first. Ever wondered why we never had a sugar refinery during colonialism?

Organised, ongoing development aid became established during the post-colonial, post WWII period. The theory behind development aid assumed that the methods, techniques, and ways of solving problems and delivering services in the developed countries could be successfully transferred to the newly labeled Third World. The yardstick was to be increased Gross National Products (GNP) of the target countries. However, delivering aid was not just a technical matter; it also involved political concerns. For example, during the Cold War, U.S. provision of aid was largely directed to those countries that were, or could come, under Soviet influence. Sadly we lost out, because President Kennedy in 1961 decided that Dr Jagan might actually create “another Cuba” in the Western Hemisphere.

Mr Burnham’s government did receive substantial aid and some of the projects are still existing – the highways especially. However internal and external conditions conspired to radicalise the PNC regime. The 70’s were marked by rapid growth of American and European multinational companies in the developing world. While these companies expanded markets and made new goods available, they also exerted predatory competition on indigenous industries.

Two theoretical debates emerged in developing countries, especially in Latin America: the center-periphery theory and dependency theory. The center-periphery (or metropolis-satellite) theory argued that movement within and between the center and the periphery was possible. This theory introduced the concept of a world economy, and said that movement within and between the strata of this economy was regulated by market forces.

For dependency theorists on the other hand, developing countries were trapped in a cycle of dependence on international capital in which there was little room to maneuver. The answer was to break the linkages and become self sufficient. The PNC, with the firm support of the PPP nationalised 80% of the economy and attempted to direct surplus to open up new industries and sources of foreign income.

Such movement became especially difficult, however, by early 1980. Due to the financial crisis, many developing countries including Guyana, could not pay their external debts, and had to adopt economic adjustment measures imposed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank in order to borrow money. We defaulted on our 1970’s programmes and only saw light after 1989 under new programmes by the IFI’s.

During the 90s, these newer programmes such as HIPC saw a massive reduction of our debt stock and allowed us greater flexibility in our social spending. A renewed focus on institutions was combined with a series of world summits organised by the United Nations to discuss development. Environment and development was the theme of the 1992 Rio de Janeiro summit and several other themes were tackled in subsequent years.

Finally, the Millennium Development Goals were established by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) in 2000 in order to help developing countries promote change in eight core areas that would help reduce poverty and improve peoples’ livelihoods. In a subsequent editorial we will evaluate how Guyana has fared by the standards of these several “development” standards.

A legally binding Climate Change Treaty, which is now scheduled for next year, is obviously going to be the “next big thing”. Rather than railing at the developed countries for getting “brain waves” every five years we might as well extract what we can from their initiatives while seeking to foster our development in every which (other) way.