It seems that this blog is now allowing comments and new entries again! Hurrah. Here’s one I prepared earlier:
Matt has made a few comments that I�ll address together.
I stand by my claim that the principal cause of global poverty is �the exploitation of the free-market system by economic hyperpowers, with all the structural consequences that follow. As long as corporate power is largely untamed in a global economy, there will be poverty.�
This is admittedly an oversimplification. The principal cause is far from singular. Additionally, this focuses on poverty as a global and international phenomenon, as opposed to one that is internal to a society. The two are related but distinct. The cultural rationalisation of poverty (Matt uses Indian religion and culture as his example) is an important factor, but I believe its importance is small relative to the global economic structures within which that culture exists. The relief of poverty will require a profound cultural change, but I am convinced that a structural change must happen first � which brings us back to the economic hyperpowers.
This situation is also a new one. A global economy has not really existed until this past century, reliant as it is on a magnitude of information and goods transfer impossible before recent technological developments. This magnifies a structural inequity that has been around for as long as there have been economies. Poverty has existed as long as economic systems have existed, but the economic systems have changed radically.
Matt also questions another theory of mine: �Not sure I agree. I don’t think that civilian giving shames governments and governments giving shames corporations. What gives you that idea?
This, of course, is not something that can be proved. I think it can be convincingly argued that civilian giving has encouraged greater governmental giving, certainly in the UK; although this can never be confirmed, because no government would ever admit to such a cause. There are, no doubt, other influences as well, but this one should never be underestimated, especially in the UK where the tabloid press would love nothing better than to call the government to account for stinginess. I think this link is relatively uncontroversial.
The link between governmental giving and corporate giving is much less clear, and basically an assumption based on how I think corporations make all such decisions. Any giving will, I believe, be made with one eye on the government, and the other on the public. I don’t think such decisions are made in a vaccuum, and the government’s giving sets a social context that corporations must respond to when making their own decisions. Even the most sincere of corporate donors cannot fail to be at least subconsciously influenced in their calculations by the number of zeroes in the government’s donation.
All of these points are quite theoretical. On a more practical level, Matt reminds us of the incredible difficulty of even so fundamental a task as ensuring economic aid gets to those who desperately need it. Like him, I have no solutions to offer. Perhaps – and I can’t believe I’m suggesting this seriously – aid money should be used to send auditors into the stricken zones?