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America's Dysfunctional 'Exceptionalism' and Global Health
America's Dysfunctional 'Exceptionalism' and Global Health
America's Dysfunctional 'Exceptionalism' and Global Health
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America's Dysfunctional 'Exceptionalism' and Global Health

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This book is about the people of the Third World like Trinidad and Tobago. It is about the violence of globalization, the rigidity of ideological orthodoxy and economic dogma and the unjust structure of the existing global economic order and its impact on global health. It is about the chaos created by a flawed epistemology.

LanguageEnglish
PublisherSteve Smith
Release dateNov 22, 2013
ISBN9781311004710
America's Dysfunctional 'Exceptionalism' and Global Health
Author

Steve Smith

Steve Smith (March 11, 1962–March 13, 2019) served overseas with the International Mission Board (SBC) for eighteen years, helping initiate a Church Planting Movement (CPM) among an unreached people group in East Asia, and then coached, trained, and led others to do the same throughout the world. Upon his retirement from IMB in 2016 until his death, Steve served simultaneously as the Vice President of Multiplication for East-West Ministries, as a Global Movement Catalyst for Beyond, and as a co-leader of the 24:14 Coalition.

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    America's Dysfunctional 'Exceptionalism' and Global Health - Steve Smith

    America's Dysfunctional 'Exceptionalism' and Global Health

    Steve Smith, MD

    Copyright 2010 by Steve Smith

    Smashwords Edition

    Table of Contents

    PREFACE:

    INTRODUCTION:

    CHAPTER 1

    CHAPTER 2:

    CHAPTER 3:

    CHAPTER 4

    CHAPTER 5:

    CHAPTER 6:

    CHAPTER 7:

    CHAPTER 8:

    CHAPTER 9

    CHAPTER 10:

    CHAPTER 11:

    CHAPTER 12:

    CHAPTER 13

    CHAPTER 14:

    CHAPTER 15:

    CHAPTER 16:

    CHAPTER 17:

    CHAPTER 18:

    CHAPTER 19:

    CHAPTER 20

    CONCLUSION:

    Bibliography

    Endnotes

    PREFACE:

    When health is absent wisdom cannot reveal itself, art cannot manifest, strength cannot fight, wealth becomes useless, and intelligence cannot be applied.

    Author unknown.

    As a hospital doctor in Trinidad & Tobago, I have witnessed fluctuations in medical supplies, unpredictable equipment functionality and variations in the quality of drugs and other health related inventory. The cycles were synchronous with swings in the economy. There were times when there would be heavy ad hoc purchases and investment in new equipment, unfortunately, not always with decent service contract coverage. This translated into delays in commissioning. As so often happens with imported technology the lack of on-site technical support often meant long periods of down-time due to frequent breakdowns. It all depended on the money that any given administration was willing to spend on the country's health sector. Often allocations were made with a measure of irrationality that belied any realistic planning. This aside, everything seemed to hinge on the price of oil and the revenue accruing from this single natural resource on which the economy of Trinidad and Tobago so heavily depended.

    These frustrating cycles, along with enduring nepotism fueled by partisan tribalism so emblematic of third world politics, continued relentlessly throughout my 34 years at the General Hospital in San Fernando. Twenty-six of those years were spent as a Consultant in the Department of Medicine, where I was privileged to be able to 'give back' to my community. Always there was the nagging thought that as a people, as a society, we were not progressing as we ought to. Sure, the quality of life in Trinidad had improved perceptively over those years, and although categorized as middle income by the UN, as a small country with a vulnerable economy I learned early on that that the economy was subject to external shocks - cyclical changes - boom and bust cycles - caused by fluctuations in the price of crude oil over which we had no control. Despite the setbacks, the disappointments and impatience, the country could depend on state paternalism as the driver that directed and stimulated economic growth, in addition to providing a safety net for the vulnerable and dispossessed. Government intervention was seen as vitally important to development. In many ways state capitalism was the overarching ideological foundation but without the rigidity of orthodoxy that prevented policy flexibility. Most importantly, decisions were indigenous and emanated from the aspirations of a people and their cultural underpinnings.

    Between 1962, the year this country became independent and 1972, its per capita GDP in constant 2000 US Dollars, had grown from US$ 3,799.70 to US$ 4,858.50 - an increase of nearly 28%. Between 1973 and 1982 there was a further increase in real per caput GDP by some 49%, increasing from US$ 4,905.13 to US$ 7,293.32 (constant 2000US$). The country had a series of 5 year plans that excluded both the World Bank and the IMF about whom no one knew and for whom no one cared. We were part of the 'Third World', a new order born of the Bandung experience of 1955, one that represented a radical critique of the existing world order of 'empires' on both sides of the Atlantic that jostled restlessly for global dominance plunging the world into two brutal wars in the process. Empires that claimed control of more than the lion's share of global wealth and spared hardly a thought for their minion colonies. While poor countries were being told that their problem of poverty if left to the normal workings of the world market would soon be alleviated, there was mounting evidence that their rich neighbors to the north had not been as passive in the pursuit of their own disproportionate share of the world's riches. The evidence showed that developed countries had not merely relied on the market as they were advising, but on their armies, on prison camps, legal systems, investments and tax policies and at times on robbery in their acquisition of wealth - primitive accumulation by plunder. And in the case of Trinidad, as with most other developing countries, we were merely groping, searching, seeking our best interest quietly and looking at the examples of economic success stories around us. The phenomenal success achieved by the four Asian Giants, Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore - owed a significant part of that success to their Governments' strategic intervention.

    This book is about the plight of Third World countries like Trinidad and Tobago impacted by the violence of globalization, by the rigidity of ideological conformity and economic dogma. It is the fulfillment of a self-made promise to raise a voice in protest at the unjust structure of the existing global economic order. An economic order that continues to be shaped by a facade of globalism distorted by the cynicism of hidden agendas, economic self-interest and the threat of military might - wolves in the sheepskin of supra-national agencies like the World Bank and the IMF that trample on the rights and freedoms of poor countries as they do the bidding of their Washington masters. It is a protest against subjugation masking as globalization that reaches into the heart of every country, and heavily influenced by white Anglo-American values that in essence represent a new kind of colonialism, has distanced itself from any notion of economic justice. We live today in a lopsided and unprincipled uni-polar world where the self-proclaimed leader is the United States, a country that has proclaimed for itself a new American century - a pax Americana. Its global influence is felt in the furthest reaches of the planet. Policies hatched through secret lobby continue to affect the peoples of the world to their disadvantage. The impact I have chosen to focus on is that of the health of the world's peoples and the way in which the political economy of globalization as a process, continues to impact negatively on it. My thesis is that it is the US to a significant extent that is primarily responsible for the assault on global health, not necessarily exclusively because of any deliberate intent to do harm, but because of a failure of concilience - of ideas and of scientific knowledge. That oversight has spawned a flawed epistemology. This failure and an introduction to pertinent concepts in human health and development are raised in the introduction to the book.

    In Chapter 1, I set the stage for the unfolding of issues, situating Trinidad and Tobago and the United States in history, outlining the philosophical underpinnings of that great country, not forgetting Mrs. Thatcher's reminder that "Europe was created by history. America was created by philosophy." Important words that invite us to compare America's founding principles with today's reality. I also touch on the history of the US Federal Reserve system and its role in the American economy. The concept of the corporation is explored. In chapter 2, I take a closer look at corporate America and its influence on politics both in the US and as filtered down to supra-national agencies like the World Bank and the IMF, along with their ties to their symbiote, the US military.

    In chapter 3, I introduce the concept of public health, the 'new' public health, and how it has been affected by globalization. Here, my focus is on the social determinants of health. By way of example, I examine the way in which social and economic issues - particularly imposed austerity - have affected people's health. I compare the health and social situation in Russia and Trinidad. In chapter 4, I examine the nexus between human development, i.e., Developmental health and economics. That relationship has profound implications. Chapter 5 examines the business of capitalism and its effects in the context of corporate networks and explores the resultant social disparities. It examines the soundness or otherwise of the Washington consensus. Chapter 6 takes a critical look at the imperialist designs of the US, how the media in that country has helped, and its track record, particularly in the light of the purported export of democracy. In chapter 7, I examine US foreign policy more so with reference to its war on terror. In that chapter, I also examine the influence of Leo Strauss and Carl Schmidt on US thinking and policy formulation. Chapter 8 seeks to look at whether a fascist shift [Wolfe] has been occurring in the US. The role of the investment bank is explored in chapter 9, along with the problem of off-shore banking. In chapter 10, I consider the treachery of the US trans-national. That chapter seeks an answer as to where their loyalty might lie by exploring their activities during the Bolshevik revolution and WW2 and the role of the Jews.

    In chapter 11, I try to link existing US health policy to its historical antecedents and to determine the way in which public policy in health has been affected by the pharmaceutical industry and the American Medical Association (AMA). The prevailing concept of US public health is explored and compared with the prevailing views of other nations and the WHO. Chapter 12 explores the food industry in the US and its impact globally. In chapter 13, I explore the global burden of chronic disease. In chapter 14, I look at how the US relates to other countries in terms of international law and its own domestic law. Chapters 15 and 16 look at issues concerning the events of September 11, 2001 and I consider likely causes of these events. In chapter 17, I evaluate the impact of existing US policy on the health status of peoples in different countries.. I attempt to tie these threads together by looking at the Bilderberg group, Zionist organizations and the club of Rome and conclude with projections based on a presumption of a 'business as usual' scenario by the corporations.

    This is not an attempt at a scientific treatise. It is my way of joining my voice with countless others, the ordinary people with ordinary lives, who are appalled at the hypocrisy in politics, the abject disregard for our place in the ecosystem and the continued rape of our global resources in a continuing act of predatory capitalism blinded by and yet inspired by rapacious greed.

    This book is dedicated to all the children of the world -

    they are the heart and soul of tomorrow.

    INTRODUCTION:

    CORPORATIONS, BANKS, GLOBALIZATION AND THE 'WASHINGTON CONSENSUS -

    'PRIMITIVE ACCUMULATION' IN A SECOND GILDED AGE -

    AN EXCUSE FOR 'TERROR- MADE IN THE USA"

    If we remain silent, victory over us is assured ......

    John Pilger

    The United States is a truly intriguing country of contrasts. It has been said that the best and the worst of humanity can be found there. My love of life, and for life, brought me to this. With no training in historiography, the law, philosophy or international relations, I write only out of concern for the health of the peoples of the world, a world which is today, more than ever before, threatened by America's thinly veiled desire for global dominance that is perhaps sustained by the disproportionate Zionist presence in the Whitehouse. US leadership has been influenced by the tunnel vision of a minority of neo-conservative thinkers whose perspective is distorted by misguided Straussian narcissism that has infected the power-crazed. The world needs to be concerned at the wanton destruction of human life that is being wrought at their hands through their double standards and penchant for official secrecy. Why this concern with distant nations? Because of the 'butterfly effect' of their policies - the product of a flawed epistemology - which resonates throughout the entire global village and far-fetched though it may seem, impacts upon every insignificant man, woman and child not only in Trinidad and Tobago, but indeed in the world as a whole.

    The United States was founded on the principle "all men are created equal". The founding fathers of that great nation, through fierce fighting and at the cost of many lives, separated themselves from the "Political Bands which [...] connected them" to Great Britain, and declared their independence on July 4th, 1876. The import of that declaration, which propelled them as a people to "assume among the Powers of the Earth, the separate and equal Station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them", also magnanimously compelled "that they should declare the causes which impel them to the Separation and to provide the community of humanity an explanation for their action out of a decent Respect to the Opinions of Mankind".

    Pristine motives of a brave and courageous people, now unfortunately, in the throes of a fascist shift (Wolf, 2007), but whose idea of God once inspired them to affirm with unanimity:

    We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.

    The British saw the fledgling United States as a threat to their empire, and in their quest to divide and re-conquer, rather than simply foment the secession of a few southern States, they were able to inspire Aaron Burr, the then U.S. Vice-President, to lend his aid to their designs. (http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/1932-true-history-united-states, nd). Anthony Merry, British Ambassador to the US received in writing from Aaron Burr, an offer of assistance to Her Majesty in any matter in which the British may wish to employ him. He said he was willing to assist in effecting the secession of the Western parts of the US. Some historians hold the view that the subsequent duel between Burr and Hamilton in 1804 was in effect the culmination of a veiled plot to assassinate Alexander Hamilton, the first US Secretary of the Treasury. It is of historical interest that the British East India Company was also an intensely active arm of British Intelligence.

    Very early in the history of the young US Republic, it had to bear the heavy burden that the imperialist designs of its own colonial masters placed upon it. Great Britain was willing to use treachery in high office, war, commerce and the complexities of international trade in its pursuit of re-conquest and in order to further its cause of 'primitive accumulation'. Adam Smith prophetically chose to refer to this latter prerequisite of capitalism, suitably disguised in the trading practice of the British East India Company, as free trade. (Smith, 1776 reprinted 1952) The British used free trade then, and as they still do, as an economic weapon in their attempts at dismantling the fledgling United States. Free trade by that company involved inter alia, the purchase of slaves in West Africa, and their sale to the plantations of the Southern States. The slaves worked there growing sugar cane and cotton. The latter was shipped to Britain where it was refined and converted into cheap cloth. This was in turn shipped to India where in exchange for their cargo of cloth, the ships were loaded with opium grown chiefly in the Bengal district under the auspices of the same British East India Company. The opium was subsequently exported to China where it fetched a high price. Adam Smith referred to the practice as buying cheaply and selling dear! Lord Palmerston, a one-time head of the British East India Company threatened the US that should it resort to the use of private shippers in preference to the East India Company, the British would burn all their sea-ports. The US learned well from their imperialist masters!

    The Presidential Doctrines:

    Several U.S. Presidents have enunciated each his own doctrine through which he articulated his unique approach to US intervention into the affairs of sovereign nations. Interestingly it seems that every one of the post World War 1 presidents up to Mr.Obama, has paid little attention to the United Nations Charter which came into existence:

    1. To maintain international peace and security, and to that end: to take effective collective measures for the prevention and removal of threats to the peace, and for the suppression of acts of aggression or other breaches of the peace, and to bring about by peaceful means, and in conformity with the principles of justice and international law, adjustment or settlement of international disputes or situations which might lead to a breach of the peace;

    2. To develop friendly relations among nations based on respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples, and to take other appropriate measures to strengthen universal peace;

    3. To achieve international co-operation in solving international problems of an economic, social, cultural, or humanitarian character, and in promoting and encouraging respect for human rights and for fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language, or religion; and

    4. To be a centre for harmonizing the actions of nations in the attainment of this common end

    Each President articulated his doctrine largely in response to foreign policy challenges that confronted the U.S. The Eisenhower Doctrine for example, was motivated in part by increasing Arab hostility toward the West, and increasing communist influence in Egypt and Syria following the Suez Crisis of 1956. The doctrine was announced by President Dwight D. Eisenhower in a message to the United States Congress on January 5, 1957. Under the Eisenhower Doctrine, a country could request both economic assistance and/or U.S. military aid if it was being threatened by armed aggression from another state. Eisenhower singled out the Soviet threat in his doctrine.

    The Monroe Doctrine and the 'Roosevelt Corollary':

    Great Britain and the United States, during the early part of the latter country's republican life, embraced contrasting national ethos. In the case of the United States between 1789 and 1829, a period when it can be described as being an early Republic, the philosophies of its leaders reflected more accurately the spirit of that country's Constitution. Theirs was a Constitution that was truly internalized and vitalized by the Presidents of that period. One of these was James Monroe who, in his seventh address to Congress on December 7th, 1823, affirmed that it is by rendering justice to other nations that we may expect it from them, and insisted that the people of the United States "henceforth [will not be] considered as subjects for future colonization by any European powers." His further assertion, to which the term the 'Monroe Doctrine' has been assigned, was as follows:

    We owe it, therefore, to candor and to the amicable relations existing between the United States and those [European] powers to declare that we should consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety. With the existing colonies or dependencies of any European power we have not interfered and shall not interfere, but with the Governments who have declared their independence and maintained it, and whose independence we have, on great consideration and on just principles, acknowledged, we could not view any interposition for the purpose of oppressing them, or controlling in any other manner their destiny, by any European power in any other light than as the manifestation of an unfriendly disposition toward the United States.

    His was, he felt, a noble principle of 'fairness', through which, by his country's fealty to it, he could only arrive at the logical reassurance that:

    Each [world] Government, confiding in its own strength, has less to apprehend from the other, and in consequence each, enjoying a greater freedom of action, is rendered more efficient for all the purposes for which it was instituted.

    Contrast the words of Monroe (1823) with those of Theodore Roosevelt who in his December 1904 message to the US Congress gave life to the corollary of the Monroe Doctrine:

    All that this country [the U.S.] desires is to see the neighboring countries stable, orderly, and prosperous. Any country whose people conduct themselves well can count upon our hearty friendship. If a nation shows that it knows how to act with reasonable efficiency and decency in social and political matters, if it keeps order and pays its obligations, it need fear no interference from the United States. Chronic wrongdoing, or an impotence which results in a general loosening of the ties of civilized society, may in America, as elsewhere, ultimately require intervention by some civilized nation, and in the Western Hemisphere the adherence of the United States to the Monroe Doctrine may force the United States, however reluctantly, in flagrant cases of such wrongdoing or impotence, to the exercise of an international police power.

    Sadly, by turning the Monroe Doctrine on its head, Theodore Roosevelt willed into existence the tyranny of American imperialism that today has morphed into its own brand of terrorism - made in the USA. In effect, his 'big stick' policy paved the way for American expansion and intervention into Latin America and the Caribbean through the use of means that are by definition acts of state terrorism. As will be shown later, the overturning of the Monroe doctrine also paved the way for the United States to involve itself in the internal affairs of not only the countries of the western hemisphere but indeed any country in the world once such intervention was perceived to afford it a geopolitical advantage. The change in US policy at that time was the seed from which sprang the threat to human life and wellbeing the world over today.

    The International Monetary Fund [IMF] and the World Bank [WB]:

    Both the IMF and the WB came into being at the close of World War II as a result of discussions held at the UN Monetary and Financial Conference at Bretton Woods, New Hampshire in July 1944. The Conference was convened as part of a collective effort to rebuild Europe following its devastation during the war. It was also convened to devise strategies that might forestall future major economic depressions (Stiglitz, 2002). The original name of the WB was the 'International Bank for Reconstruction and Development' [IBRD]. The 'Development' aspect of the WB function had nothing to do with Developing countries. It was felt that they were the responsibility of their respective colonial masters. Following the Third World Debt crisis in 1982, the roles of both the IMF and the WB changed. This was when they began implementing Structural Adjustment policies (now called 'Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility Program') which in the 1990s, were intrusive to institutions of governance in sovereign countries and began undermining democracy, decentralization, central bank independence and corporate governance (Chang, 2007).

    The IMF was founded because of the prevailing belief in the need for global collective action to bring about economic stability. This desire for political stability resulted in the creation of the United Nations. The IMF remains a public institution that was established using tax-payers money obtained from several countries around the world. It reports to the Ministries of Finance and to the Central Banks of the countries that fund it. It accounts neither to the tax-payers whose monies it uses, nor to the people whose lives its policies affect. Suffice it to say, the leading developed countries run the show and only one country the United States can veto any of its decisions (Stiglitz, 2002).

    Democracy 'American style' - a plutocracy:

    The pattern of development that has ensued in those few countries cited as 'successes' by the IMF, have exhibited unequal spread in the distribution of wealth. The greatest share generally went to the well-off, namely, the most affluent 1% of the society (Stiglitz 2002). Incomes at the lowest echelons fell. This pattern certainly has not been a chance occurrence as it reflects the deliberate social policy of the United States. James Madison during the 'Constitutional Debates', espoused the view that the State should be run by benevolent aristocrats - people of breeding, knowledge and wealth - who would be the core decision-makers. This thinking was echoed in the deliberations contained in the Federalist Papers in which Madison suggested that in a democracy, there will always be the problem of inequality because of the random mix of a plurality of interests; and because of these vested interests various factions will emerge. Madison's view was that in such a situation the people of wealth, ought to be the ones to make the necessary decisions on behalf of, or as representatives of all of the people, as they ought to be the ones with the requisite know-how. Such an arrangement is not a democracy but rather a plutocracy. As will be discussed, the freedoms conferred are as illusory as they are lop-sided, and weighted in favor of a small elite.

    Aristotle whose writings inspired the idea of framing a democratic Constitution, on the other hand, dealt with the problem of inequality by ensuring that the highest priority be accorded to the greatest number or the 'common good'. Although he classified democracy as a deviant constitution, he nevertheless asserted that there is a case for popular rule. He argued "the many may turn out to be better than the virtuous few when they come together - the whole is greater than the sum of each part! He was wise when dealing with reductionism! He rationalized that however minuscule, each individual possesses a portion of virtue and practical wisdom and when these assets are pooled the collective wisdom can often surpass that of the wisest single individual - the wisdom of the multitude".

    Globalization and the myth of the 'free market':

    Arguably, the concept of globalization has generally been used to both describe as well as prescribe the transnational economic, social, and political relations that prevail in today's world (UNDP 1997) (Harris & Seid, 2004). It is a term that has multiple meanings, but most would agree that globalization can be viewed as:

    A process of greater integration within the world economy through movements of goods and services, capital, technology and (to a lesser extent), labor, which lead increasingly to economic decisions being influenced by global conditions. (Labonte & Schrecker, 2005).

    The International Monetary Fund and World Bank programs have acted as catalysts in the dramatic growth in cross-border flows of trade, consolidated by the Uruguay Round Agreements of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), which established the World Trade Organization (WTO) (Harris & Seid, 2004). Stiglitz feels that the phenomenon of globalization has resulted in many benefits to the developing world. He regrets that it is the "more narrowly defined economic aspects of globalization that have been the subject of controversy.(Stiglitz 2002) There is nothing narrow" about these economic aspects, for these are the chief considerations that have given impetus to the process of globalization and they constitute precisely the origin of its negative impact on health.

    Stiglitz suggests that the ideas and intentions behind the creation of these twin international economic institutions, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank were legitimate ones, yet they gradually evolved over the years into something remarkably different (Stiglitz 2002). Ideas are powerful, but so is the power of vested interest and the two are not necessarily mutually exclusive. He asserts that the Keynesian orientation of the IMF, which emphasized market failures and a role for government in job creation, was replaced by the free-market mantra of the 1980s as part of a new "Washington consensus - the latter being in effect an understanding between the IMF, World Bank and the United States Treasury (Stiglitz 2002). That consensus signaled a radically different approach to economic development and stabilization. That new approach was fueled as I will show, primarily by the ideas of Milton Friedman and the Chicago school of economics, but it was powered by vested interest. Paul Krugman a Nobel Laureate in economics lamented that economics went astray because economists as a group, mistook beauty clad in impressive looking mathematics for truth." It was, and still is, the 'vested interests' that continue to empower these misguided ideas.

    Well intentioned or not, certainly there was a body of knowledge from highly credible witnesses who raised strong reservations and at times open criticism of the policies inflicted by these organizations (Caprio & al., 1998). Indeed, the IMF itself incredibly, on reviewing the fruit of its own labor, and furnished with evidence drawn from at least one hundred countries that had sunk into economic and social crises as a result of implementing these policies, questioned their ultimate benefit. One wonders why on earth they were continued. If three countries implemented economic policies that resulted in social and economic chaos, would close to ninety seven other countries with their eyes wide open willingly choose to do the same? Is it not likely that they would have been forced to do likewise and if so why? Who benefitted from the imposition of mayhem? The measures that were imposed upon vulnerable developing countries in the name of economic development were NOT those that were being followed by countries that exhibited growth. It was and continues to be a situation of do as I say but not as I do - or it will work for you never mind that it has not for me! Shameful hypocrisy! Noam Chomsky referred to this dichotomy as an "intriguing contrast between doctrine and reality".

    "Reaganesque rugged individualism a phrase used by Youssef Ibrahim in an article in the Times, conveys the image of the kind of invincible individualism that was actively encouraged by both Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan during the 1980s. They both preached the free-market gospel". Not only did they preach this mantra, they insisted that it be embraced by developing countries and countries that were in financial difficulties and had approached the IMF and the World Bank for loans. The IMF programs were initiated from Washington and executed by its mission staff (Stiglitz 2002). These programs included the standard fare of trade and capital market liberalization for financially troubled and vulnerable developing countries. Yet, during the period following World War 2, all of the advanced developed countries built and stabilized their respective economies by doing the exact opposite: they protected their markets! To the extent that the evidence supports protectionism as the preferred practice in trade, in the same way, the implementation of capital market liberalization is wholly unsupported by the available evidence (Stiglitz 2002). It is often said that Ronald Reagan, was the postwar President with the most passionate love of laissez Faire, but presided over the greatest swing toward protectionism in the U.S. since the Great Depression in the 1930s (Chomsky, 1997).

    Gingrich and conservative Reaganites extolled the glories of the market and warned against the debilitating culture of dependency that is facilitated by government handouts to the poor while boasting proudly to their colleagues in business that Reagan had "granted more import relief to U.S. industry (i.e., handouts) than any of his predecessors in more than half a century" (Chomsky, 1997). Handouts are acceptable once they are to the rich!

    Politics, International Banking and International Corporations:

    Chomsky when asked pointedly his thoughts on the issue of who American Presidents work for, answered: "the narrow sectors of power and privilege - the corporate sector basically. This is their constituency" he asserted, and admonished that one would have to be blind not to see this. Economic and strategic reasons are behind this. That there is a link between the corporate sector and the political leadership in the United States cannot be disputed. This said, the corporatocracy - the oligarchs to whom Anglo-American politics pay homage have roots that can be traced historically that are buried in both the United States and Europe. This thesis will be explored in later chapters.

    With this realization and with the historical reality that the United States and Great Britain both funded the Bolshevik revolution in Russia, a revolution that gave birth to Communism and the Soviet State, and that US Banks with the aid of the US Federal Reserve, also supported Hitler's rise financially, with support from prominent German and European investment Banks, as well as Wall Street, it leads one to wonder what value is being placed on human life. A plausible case can be made for manipulation of the global economy. Arguably, there is compartmentalization of work which takes on the basis of a pyramidal structure and is so organized that each level of the pyramid being confined to one set of tasks, is unaware of what adjacent levels below and above are doing. It is only at the apex that there is a confluence of knowledge - a place where the eye sees all as it were.

    Alfred Crozier criticized the Aldrich Plan - in effect the law that was passed that brought into being the Federal Reserve Bank in the US - and in 1912 warned that there ought to be a distinction between what he referred to as "law-made money and individually earned wealth"; the former referred to wealth that was acquired through the application of unjust legislation such as the Federal Reserve Act to which Crozier was referring (Crozier, 1912). He asserted that:

    Law-made wealth, [...] obtained improperly by private interests through acts of Congress or State Legislatures, if it tends to increase the burden of the people for the profit of the few, should be either confiscated or strictly regulated for the public benefit.

    Crozier at the time, was moved out of a deep sense of duty, to commit to historical record, the "official evidence conclusively proving the existence of a great and dangerous conspiracy between Wall Street and the big banks for the creation of a giant central money trust that in time [.....] will rule the republic and destroy genuine popular government." If we are to believe Noam Chomsky, then Crozier's words were indeed prophetic. Expropriation, unfortunate as it is for most, is a sine qua non of liberal capitalism.

    Greed, poverty [pauperization] and democide:

    Outlined below are a few helpful definitions:

    Genocide: among other things, the killing of people by a government because of their indelible group membership (race, ethnicity, religion, language).

    Politicide: the murder of any person or people by a government because of their politics or for political purposes.

    Mass Murder: the indiscriminate killing of any person or people by a government.

    Democide: The murder of any person or people by a government, including genocide, politicide, and mass murder.

    Over the course of the 20th Century - between 1900 and 1999 - it is estimated that democide (death by government) has accounted for an estimated 262,000,000 deaths worldwide. Of these 50,000,000 occurred in the colonies. Governments, politicians who ran the affairs of countries, have been responsible for the deaths of more than a quarter of a billion souls over the span of the 20th century through genocide, politicide, massacres, extrajudicial executions and other forms of mass murder.(Rummel, R. http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/NOTE1.HTM )

    Poverty is tricky to define. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) defines it in the following way:

    "In pure economic terms, income poverty is when a family's income fails to meet a federally established threshold that differs across countries. Typically it is measured with respect to families and not the individual, and is adjusted for the number of persons in a family. Economists often seek to identify the families whose economic position (defined as command over resources) falls below some minimally acceptance level.¹ Similarly, the international standard of extreme poverty is set to the possession of less than 1$ a day."

    Absolute poverty measures poverty in relation to the amount of money necessary to meet basic needs such as food, clothing, and shelter. Relative poverty defines poverty in relation to the economic status of other members of the society: people are poor if they fall below prevailing standards of living in a given societal context. There are two specific contexts within which UNESCO's definition of poverty needs to be examined: first, is in relation to the family. And secondly is in the situation of the relevance of money.

    What of the relatively isolated indigenous tribe say in the Amazon forest whose members may have little regard for conventional clothing, whose only 'property' might be the communal land on which they live and who possess or own nothing except perhaps a bow and arrow? Are they 'poor' and therefore in need of help? In many if not most instances such people are happy and are not wanting of material resources. Such a consideration harks back to the adage that a man's wealth is determined by his ability to satisfy his needs and not pander to his wants. One may then be rich indeed if one owns nothing and desires nothing. The primitive tribe cited above will then be happy and rich although by Western and UN standards, they are living in 'poverty'. Yet they are as content as any rich family. They can still be 'pauperized' however if they are forcibly displaced, if their water supply is polluted or privatized, if the forests on which they depend are decimated.

    Pauperization is defined as a falling into poverty. Is this accurate? The global preoccupation with poverty I view as a smokescreen as it distracts from the germane issue which is best defined as pauperism (Ogunkoya, 2009) in the service of primitive accumulation (see below). To pauperize a person is to render that person poor. But can a person living in poverty be pauperized? Certainly, a poor person can be pauperized since pauperism is multi-dimensional and as a phenomenon, it is not restricted to unavailability of food, poor clothing or poor shelter. The poor can be pauperized if they are degraded, dehumanized and marginalized and deliberately deprived of any hope of upward mobility by being disempowered. In much the same way, a poor nation that is pauperized because of external political pressure will become unstable (Ogunkoya, 2009).

    It is entirely and perhaps deliberately misleading to think of poverty in purely economic terms. Often the very measures that are designed to eradicate economic poverty have the perverse effect of inflicting pauperization. Pauperism ought to replace 'poverty' as the global scourge that needs eradication since the word encapsulates notions of injustice, an absence of fairness and the debasement of the human person. By contrast, by its use in the vernacular of deprivation, it conveys the understanding that the eradication of poverty must involve simultaneously, the humanizing of a person or a people by a commitment to justice, fairness and dignity.

    'Health' as a concept:

    The politics of globalization, the IMF, the WB and WTO they, and what they do each day, impact on the health and wellbeing of the world's population, particularly the peoples in the Third World. Their impact on health is just as certain and as definite as the flu. If their actions and policies affect our health, and cause death then those who formulate these policies are culpable. That adverse economic circumstance is a proximate cause of sickness and death is well-established. It is a well established fact that even in the richest countries, the poor have significantly shorter life expectancies and succumb to more illnesses than the rich (Marmot & Wilkinson, 2003).

    The term 'health' as applied to the practice of public health, harks back to its origin in the old English word 'hael' - to heal - (Naidoo & Wills, 2007), and supports a holistic interpretation. In this regard, the best conceptual definition that can be applied is that of the World Health Organization (W.H.O.) as outlined in their constitution (W.H.O., 1946 ) which is that 'health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity'. 'Health', as a concept, is as complex and as varied as the diverse subjective perspectives from which we may choose to describe or define it.

    Our focus is on health in the context of a conceptual 'continuum' (Lindstrom & Eriksson, 2006) along which its existence is defined in terms of either the reasons for disease - the 'pathogenic' health model (Naidoo, 2002), or alternatively, in terms of the causes of health - the salutogenic model or 'salutogenesis' (Lindstrom & Eriksson, 2006). In the first instance, health can be said to exist when disease or ill-health is absent. (Naidoo, 2002), The practice of Western scientific medicine is based on this view of health. (Naidoo, 2002) On the other hand, Aaron Antonovsky (1923 - 1994) who was not a doctor but a medical sociologist, at a time when the 'ruling paradigm in Public Health focused on disease and risk factors' turned his research interest to 'social class and health and later to the impact of stress on health' (Lindstrom B. a., 2006). Antonovsky's thesis was that 'it was more important to focus on peoples' resources and capacity to create health than the classic focus on risks, ill-health and disease'. Both these 'models' of health are relevant.

    From the forgoing, it is clear that individual health is multi-dimensional and is the result on the one hand, of averting the many identifiable risk factors that can deprive us of this state of wellbeing, and on the other, involves seeking to satisfy the social and emotional dimensions of our lives that would add to our stock of good health. Of course lurking in the background are those fixed and unchangeable factors with which we are born, our individual genetic templates that to a significant extent invariably impact upon our health. Helping each of us is the innate sense of self-preservation with which each of us is imbued. We all want to live and live well. Well enough to leave for our children and grandchildren, not a legacy of material wealth, nor a noble name, but rather a sound education and a sense of awareness of their individual worth as human beings. This is often all we can bequeath to our offspring!

    Capitalism and 'primitive accumulation':

    It seems so terribly ironic that Karl Marx, the man who challenged the very underpinnings of capitalist theory, should provide perhaps if not the best working hypothesis on the genesis of liberal capitalism, then certainly the best insight. What Adam Smith referred to as 'previous accumulation' Marx called 'primitive accumulation'. Intuitively, I have often pondered as many others would have, on questions such as what inspires the spirit of entrepreneurship. What ignites it? Where do these corporate class people get their energy and drive? More importantly, it seems that in order to get started in any business enterprise, and to function successfully in a capitalist environment, there is a need for prior capital accumulation. This harks back to the adage that it takes money to make money. Marx himself made the astute observation that "[i]n themselves money and commodities are no more capital than are the means of production and of subsistence. (Marx, 1887). He theorizes that on the one hand, those who produce goods, the laborers, but more so free laborers - those who are neither encumbered by the means of production such as peasant proprietors, nor form part of the apparatus of production themselves, such as slaves or bondsmen - must come face to face and into contact with the owners of money, those who own the means of production and the means of subsistence, who are eager to increase the sum of value they possess, by buying people's labor power." He thus defines the sine qua non of capitalism as follows:

    The process, therefore, that clears the way for the capitalist system, can be none other than the process which takes away from the laborer the possession of his means of production; a process that transforms, on one hand, the social means of subsistence and of production into capital, on the other, the immediate producers into wage laborers. The so-called primitive accumulation, therefore, is nothing else than the historical process of divorcing the producer from the means of production. It appears as primitive because it forms the prehistoric stage of capital and of the mode of production corresponding with it. (Marx, 1887)

    Inherent in the firm establishment of a capitalist regime, seems to be the dissociation of 'labor' from any attachment or ownership of property or as Marx himself said:

    The immediate producer, the laborer, could only dispose of his own person after he had ceased to be attached to the soil and ceased to be the slave, serf, or bondsman of another.

    Additionally, such a laborer should also have escaped from the regime of the guilds, their rules for apprentices and journeymen, and the impediments of their labor regulations. It is only when these things are in place that the laborer can become a free seller of labor power, and one who carries his commodity wherever he finds a market.

    Marx therefore ends by exposing what certainly seems to be one of capitalism's deepest and most intrinsic and subtle hypocrisies - the very same democracy export that the US today is touting as the harbinger of liberty to a hitherto shackled Middle-East Islamic world, is nothing but the fraudulent legitimization of the act of dispossessing large swaths of the population of their property and of any semblance of 'ownership'. Marx has a legitimate point in claiming that the historical movement which changes the producers into wage-workers, appears, on one hand, as their emancipation from serfdom and from the fetters of the guilds. He suggests that this is the only side bourgeois historians see and extol in their writings. The other more unsavory side of the coin is that these new freedmen became sellers of themselves only after they had been robbed of all their own means of production, and of all the guarantees of existence afforded by the old feudal system. This process of expropriation of all possession - so-called 'primitive accumulation' bears within it the origins of capitalism and the way in which it took place is the very same way it is today taking place around the world. In the words of Karl Marx:

    "the history of this, [the] expropriation [of labor], is written in the annals of mankind in letters of blood and fire."

    Today that same history is being re-written by the US and Western nations in the name of and in service to the Corporate State.

    'Might is Right - the case of the Chagos Islands:

    The Anglo-American relationship is one that is cemented by history and by a common ethnicity. It is one in which both parties espouse a common belief that might is right. It is a bond that is premised on class and ethnic arrogance. The United States learned well from its erstwhile colonial masters, and its leaders have retained and perpetuated the horrid art. A case vignette will serve to show how the US is willing to use its might to bully weak nations, and employ coercive state power to unjustly and forcibly displace entire populations from their own country. - The people who lived on Diego Garcia had been there for 200 years. The following account of their forcible uprooting is based on research done by journalist John Pilger. His report has been substantiated by the official records of the British government that were declassified in 1982 and by the lawyers involved. It tells the story of the people of Chagos Islands, and specifically the inhabitants of Diego Garcia, a small island in the Indian Ocean (Pilger, 2004)

    His report serves to exemplify the extent to which the United States holds sacred their belief that might is right and reinforces the conviction that the world is run for the benefit of the rich and powerful to the exclusion and marginalization of the poor and vulnerable. It aptly demonstrates the blatant lies that politicians often utter and the use of the façade of democracy to hide their lies. It is a story that underscores the reality that 'poverty' in economic terms, is wholly unsuitable as a measure of hardship and tells us that measure should be replaced by "pauperism" - a debilitating affliction that utterly ignores human dignity. The 2000 inhabitants of the Chagos islands were economically poor, but their lives were richer than many whose only preoccupation is the acquisition of more and more material wealth, by whatever means necessary. The Chagos Islands were run politically from Mauritius, located 1000 miles away. When Mauritius was granted independence from Great Britain in 1968, it was with the understanding that it would make no claim to the islands.

    Diego Garcia is the main island in the Chagos Archipelago. It is today, the home of one of the largest among the 800 or so US military bases in over 130 countries the world over. It is home to 4000 US troops, two Bomber runways, each of them 2.5 miles long, 30 warships and a satellite spy station. It is from this base that the US launched attacks against Afghanistan and Iraq. The US Pentagon calls it an indispensable platform for policing the world. That island which lies midway between Africa and Asia continues to be a British colony.

    The Americans first came to the region in the 1960s, and met indigenous inhabitants who had been living there since the late 18th century. They were people of Creole descent, a black community of around 2000 people. There were shops, a railway, a hospital, a church, police station and jail, as well as a school. All of this made for a quiet but contented life. In the 1960s, the UK government led by Harold Wilson in a hush-hush deal with the United States agreed to hand over to the US the main island of Diego Garcia. The Americans demanded that the surrounding islands be swept and sanitized. Without the knowledge or approval of either the US Congress or the British Parliament, and in manifest violation of the UN Charter, both governments plotted furtively to get rid of the indigenous population. In an action that is a crime against humanity, the entire community was hurriedly deported by boat from the island and deposited in the port on Mauritius and left there. They were induced to leave their homes following the poisoning of all the dogs on the island by US personnel and a threat of being treated the same way should they not comply with orders to leave. This exercise is an excellent example of terrorism. With no money, and having nowhere to go the islanders and their children were condemned to a life in the slums of Mauritius and it was only in 1982, that the UK government in feigned empathy with their plight, handed them each a payment of £3000 in return for each of them affixing their signature or thumbprint to a document in English - a language which none of them understood. They were tricked into relinquishing their right to return to their homes. Twenty years passed by with many of the displaced people falling ill and several of them dying; some even committed suicide. The scandalous way that these people were discriminated against became widely known only after Mark Curtis, John Pilger and their own lawyers had unearthed recently declassified documents in the British Public Records Office that pertained to the secret agreement between the British and Americans. Up to this time no one has been returned to their homeland.

    Conclusion:

    The above vignette shows the disregard for human rights along with the utter contempt for the democratic process and the fascist abuse of power by two governments in unlawfully displacing the entire population of an island through the use of intimidation so that they might have had their way. Yet in 1982, when the government of Argentina threatened to repatriate the Falkland islands - which they claimed as their own and which they called the Malvinas - the same British government sent a fleet of war ships to defend the white British population of 2000 inhabitants there, and chose not to uproot and deport them, as they had done with the 2000 black British folk from Diego Garcia. There are off-shore oil deposits in the seas off the Falklands. This use of American and British terror coupled with the effective stripping of the population of their rights through the use of fascist power was not an isolated event but has been repeated many times.

    In ending, my concerns are threefold: first, that the advantages to be derived from globalization and an increasingly integrated world are at best doubtful, and at worst pose a threat to the health of the worlds peoples; secondly, that the dominant forces that continue to exert their overwhelming influence on the process have been those of the West - primarily the United States and Great Britain - which in many instances redounds to a process of 'primitive accumulation' that has been facilitated by the shrinkage of government and the paucity of government's regulatory arm; and finally, that in the wake of this process not only has the health status of the world's peoples deteriorated but the wealth of the world's richest continues to increase at the expense of its poor majority. The United States continues actively seeking to exert its influence on almost every country in this world. While its actions might not always be overt, it has contributed to the deaths of many innocent people and cannot be exempt from accusations of democide.

    This volume is not intended to be a scientific or technical treatise. The reason for my writing it is to highlight the dangerous and often covert designs of the Anglo-American imperialists and thereby stimulate further discussion and disclosure.

    CHAPTER 1

    SETTING THE STAGE

    Children are the heart and soul of tomorrow -

    Sherwyn Mitchell (Pt. Fortin)

    Trinidad and Tobago are two remarkably beautiful islands in the southernmost part of the archipelago that forms the English speaking West Indies. Like the rest of the islands in the Caribbean, we are the product of a colonial past. Like many British colonies, our twin island state was used for the benefit of those who claimed them as their own in the name of one or other monarch. In many ways, the story of these islands is the story of many small colonies in the world today - a tale of brutal disregard for the rights of the other and espousal of the mantra might is right. This tale speaks to the initiation of the process of global integration, the saga of globalization that began with the advent of the European to the West. After enduring a hundred and sixty-five years of British rule, this country achieved its independence on August 31, 1962.

    The Republic of Trinidad and Tobago has a combined landmass of just 5,128 sq km; Tobago is the smaller of the two at 300 sq km. It is estimated that about 55% of the total landmass of both islands comprises forest and swamp. About 30% of the land is classified as agricultural while about 15 % is built-up. (Armstrong, J, 2006) On average, the population density is 249 persons per square Km. Trinidad, the larger of the two islands is classifiable as a 'Small Island Developing State' - SIDS - and like other such sovereign States, has its unique land use problems. Studies have suggested that between 40-50% of the total landmass ought to be retained in forest and vegetation cover, so as to 'mitigate soil erosion, to preserve aquifers, and to protect environmentally sensitive areas and wildlife habitats.' (Armstrong, J, 2006)

    Trinidad and Tobago, in the opinion of Eric Williams, historian and first Prime Minister, had long been the object of metropolitan indifference except for the occasional distraction caused by sporadic outbursts of riot and disorder as in 1903 and 1937. The absence of indigenous gold left the islands' first occupiers, the Spanish, disenchanted as that was their obsession. Later on, the discovery of oil piqued the interest of the British as did its natural deep water harbor at Chaguaramas which the British used as a pawn in their quest for American aid during the Second World war (Williams, 1982).

    Trinidad's original peoples were Amerindians. These were the natives met first by Columbus when he came to this part of the world. It should be said that Columbus' journey was aided by existing maps of the world which guided him to these parts. [Williams] That he had a map meant that someone had preceded him. He also had a compass - a Chinese invention. His journey was not one of discovery, for someone had already 'discovered' the Caribbean in 1424 (Menzies, 2002). The Chinese, during the Ming Dynasty which lasted from 1368 to 1644, were a truly advanced civilization. Historical evidence holds that they built ships that were five times longer than Columbus' flagship, and under the command of one of Emperor Zhu Di's most able admirals, Admiral Zheng He, who 'discovered' the Americas some seventy years before Columbus set sail. Having sailed with a crew numbering 28,000 and a flotilla of 72 ships, the Chinese have never claimed any of the lands they discovered.

    Columbus' voyage was not one of 'discovery' as is naively taught, but rather one of conquest in the name of an expanding Spanish empire. He harbored imperialist designs and thoughts of acquiring assets at the behest of, and in the name of the Spanish monarchy. Indeed at the time of Columbus' voyages there had already existed a well-established slave-trade. The European State had at the time already developed economic instruments of protectionism, grants of charter and monopolies [Williams]. Economics of the balance of trade were sufficiently sophisticated as was the perceived need for the conserving of precious metals. Hence when the Spanish monarchy engaged Columbus in a contract of discovery, that agreement dealt with hard realities: their finance for his voyage in return for royal control of the lands he discovered and a significant part of the profits realized from his exploitation.

    One almost gets a sense of déjà vu, for this pattern of conquest, in the name of some obscure foreign power, with the arbitrary grants of land titles or the wholesale grants of entire countries continues in much the same way today. Williams describes Columbus as merely the mouthpiece of the medieval tradition which was to be followed in the 17th century by French concessions inspired by the feudal system in

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