Chapter 68 Chapter 12 The Third World 2

2 The population problem is certainly a headache, but when the war has just subsided and the colonial shackles have just been released, the primary concern of poor countries is not their population problem.What is on their minds is what form should they take to stand in the world? Somewhat unsurprisingly, most of them took—or were forced to take—political forms derived from the old colonial masters' subsystems.The few new regimes born out of social revolutions or protracted wars of liberation (both with the same final effect) mostly followed the pattern established by the Soviet Revolution.So in theory, the New World gradually populated with countless republics with parliamentary systems and electoral systems, plus a small number of so-called "people's democratic republics" dominated by one-party systems (theoretically, these countries all Democracy, but only communist countries and social revolutionary regimes, but also emphasize that "the people" are the masters of the country, and add the title of "people" or "democracy" to its official country name).

Whether it is "democracy" or "the people", but in essence, such names are not worthy of the name. At most, they can only express the role that the new country wants to play in the international arena.In fact, they are even more unrealistic than the constitutions of Latin American countries, for the same reason that they often lack sufficient material and political conditions to help them achieve their ideals.In this case, even the new communist countries are no exception. Although they are basically totalitarian politics and have a one-party structure, they are actually more suitable for their national conditions in a non-Western background than liberal republican regimes.Therefore, in a communist country, one of the principles of Tianzi No. 1 is that the party (of the literati) is higher than the army.But by the 1980s, several regimes led by revolutionary parties, such as Algeria, Benin, Burma, the Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Madagascar, and Somalia—and, oddly enough, Libya—were all It was under military rule in a coup d'état.Just as Syria and Iraq are under the Baathist government - although the two versions are hostile to each other.

In fact, it is also the proliferation of military juntas—or the tendency to fall into military juntas at every turn—that makes the Third World, which may have different constitutions and different alliance status, show the same appearance.If we exclude several major Communist countries in the third world (North Korea, China, several countries in the Indochina Peninsula, and Cuba, etc.), and exclude the Mexican regime that has been established for a long time since the Mexican Revolution, it may be difficult to find a few since 1945. There are not many republics with military regimes (as for the remaining few monarchies, with some exceptions such as Thailand, they seem to be safer).Only India, as of this writing, is the most impressive of the Third World countries.Not only has it been consistent, it has never broken the continuation of the democratically elected government; and its government has always been elected by regular and fairly fair general elections-but whether India is worthy of being called the "largest democratic country" in the world depends on Let's see how we interpret Lincoln's philosophy of "Owning, By, and For the People".

The world has become so accustomed to military coups and regimes—even in Europe—that we must remind the reader that, on the scale of the current military regime, it is a rare and extremely novel phenomenon. Phenomenon. In 1914, no sovereign state in the world, except Latin America, was under the rule of a military government.But military coups are part of the tradition in Latin American countries, not to mention that the only major republic not under civilian government at this time and place is Mexico, which is fighting in the flames of revolution and civil war. .At that time, of course, there were many militaristic regimes, and there were also many countries where the military had more than its due political influence, and there were even countries that were extremely dissatisfied with their governments like the French military officers.However, in normal and stable countries, soldiers still stick to their obedience and their tradition of keeping away from politics.To be more precise, even if they do participate in politics, they are just like upper-class women, playing tricks behind the scenes, but they are silent on the surface.

Therefore, the political culture of the nature of military coups is completely a new product of a new era full of unstable political situations and illegal governments.A serious discussion of military rule first appeared in 1931 by the Italian newspaperman Curzio Malaparte, referring to the thinking of Machiavelli; his masterpiece "Coup d' Etat) was written in the middle of the time of the Great Tribulation.By the second half of this century, the balance of power among the superpowers was temporarily achieved, the international situation seemed to be stable, and the regimes of various countries were similarly stable, and the phenomenon of military participation in politics became more common.Just because there are many new countries around the world, most of which lack legal inheritance of political traditions, coupled with the uncertain political line and frequent political turmoil, this phenomenon of a strong military can be explained.In such cases, the armed forces are often the only forces in the country that can initiate political action (or any action at all).What's more, since most of the superpowers' international cold wars are fought by the troops of allies or subordinate regimes, the two powers will naturally replenish their members with money and weapons.Sometimes, you go and come and supply in turn, such as in Somalia, where the two powers of the United States and the Soviet Union are armed one after another.In this way, when tanks enter the political arena, there will be more space for soldiers to show their talents in politics.

The communist core state is under the leadership of the party, and in theory the military is subject to a civilian government—although in Mao Zedong's final years, he seemed to give up the idea of ​​party leadership at any time.As for the core countries in the Western camp, due to the lack of a background of political unrest, coupled with the fact that the state has sufficient mechanisms to control the military, opportunities for the military to participate in politics are greatly limited.Therefore, after the death of General Franco, with the support of the new king in Spain, all parties were able to successfully negotiate and began to embark on a road of liberal democratic politics.At the same time, a coup d'état planned by the stubborn Francoists in 1981 was immediately put down because the king flatly refused to accept it.In Italy, there is a force behind the scenes of the United States, ready to overthrow the possibility of the powerful local Communist Party forming a government. Therefore, Italy’s civilian government has always been preserved—but in the 1970s, the country’s military, intelligence units, and underground Behind the shady scenes of terrorist organizations, there has been a series of whirlwinds of inexplicable activities.Military officers in the Western world will be tempted and eager to try a military coup only when the old empire can't bear the hatred of the colonies from the rule (that is, the defeat of the colonies is huge and deep). The fall of France in the Indochina Peninsula and Algeria in the 1950s, and the collapse of the Portuguese Empire in Africa in the 1970s (but the change in Portugal has a left-leaning implication).However, the French and Portuguese militaries soon returned to the control of civilian governments.The only military regime in Europe that has the backing of the United States (but it may have been initiated locally) is actually only one place in Greece. It was established in 1967 by a group of far-right colonels and officers.Greece at the time was still in the shadow of its earlier civil war (1944-1949), and the bitterness between the communist and anti-communist camps continued.This regime established by a group of stupid military officers was notorious and specialized in dealing with dissidents by cruel means. Seven years later, it collapsed because of its low political IQ.

On the contrary, in the countries of the third world, there are always incentives for the military to intervene in politics, especially in the newly established small countries. They are small and weak, and hundreds of armed soldiers can play a decisive role-not to mention the guns. There are foreign powers to help, and sometimes foreigners do the work at all.Coupled with the fact that the government is inexperienced and incompetent, chaos and corruption have emerged endlessly, making it a mess.In fact, the typical military rulers that usually appear in most African countries are often people who really intend to clean up this mess, rather than dictators who hope to make a fortune.Although they themselves were in power for a while, they hoped that the civilian government would soon take over-but this wish was often lost.In the end, both the ideals of statecraft and literati rule failed, which is why the regimes of African military leaders cannot last long.But no matter who is in power, as long as the local government has the possibility of falling into the hands of the Communist Party, even if the chance is extremely small, the United States is guaranteed to come to help.

Simply put, military politics, like military intelligence, tends to emerge when and where there is a vacuum of normal political power and intelligence operations.This kind of political form often does not have a certain name and symbol, but it is caused by the instability of the surrounding environment.However, for these countries from former colonies or dependent economies, the national policies they are committed to often require their own stable and efficient national conditions to succeed.However, stability and efficiency are precisely the conditions they lack, so military rule has become the main theme of politics in the third world.They single-mindedly pursue the independent "development" of the economy, because after the Second World War, under the world revolution and global colonial liberation, the prosperity built on the origin of agricultural products in the past has no future, and can no longer rely solely on supply The world market of the imperialist countries is the way out.Old economic models of this kind were preceded by the ranches of Argentina and Uruguay, which Diaz in Mexico and Leguia in Peru hoped to emulate.But since the Great Depression of the world economy, this kind of old way is obviously no longer feasible.What's more, under the voice of nationalism and anti-imperialism, it is natural for a country's policy to break away from its dependence on the old imperial power as its top priority.As a result, the Soviet Union came forward to find another way for the "development" of the newborn country, serving as a model for all countries to follow. In the few years after 1945, it was the moment when the Soviet Union was most ostentatious.

Those who are more ambitious will clamor for systematic industrialization to end the backward agricultural economic system, either by taking the example of the centrally planned Soviet Union or by replacing imports—the methods may be different, but they also need the government action and control.Those with lesser ambitions, although not as ambitious as the former—such as dreaming of building their own huge tropical steel factory, building giant hydropower facilities under giant dams, and driving the giant wheels of the factory in an endless stream—but they are also wholeheartedly planning to use Own strength, control and develop the country's resources.In the past, oil was often controlled by Western private companies that were closely related to imperial powers. Now countries have followed the precedent of Mexico in 1938, and all of them are nationalized.As for those countries that avoided the nationalization policy, they also found that within the borders, "one oil and one gas in hand" is the best bargaining chip for negotiating with large foreign companies—after 1950, the Arabian American Oil Co- ARAMCO) set a precedent by agreeing to share the benefits with Saudi Arabia equally, especially in the 1970s, the "Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries" was targeting the world and asking for ransom on oil prices .This is possible only because the ownership of the world's oil has been transferred from the big companies to a few oil-producing countries at this time.But to put it simply, even these countries that enjoy the support of foreign capitalists old and new—the so-called “new” refers to what the contemporary left refers to as “neo-colonialism”—operate under a state-controlled economic system.In the late 1980s, the most successful country operating in this way was the French Ivory Coast (French ivory Coast).

Those who fail the most in promoting modernization are those countries that overestimate the limitations caused by their own backwardness—they are backward in technology and inexperienced; they lack technical personnel, administrative personnel, and economic experts; Unfamiliar with and unresponsive—the higher the ideal, the worse the failure. Some countries are so ambitious that even developed countries have set goals that are difficult to achieve—such as the industrialization goal of the central comprehensive plan.Along with Sudan, Ghana, which was the first in sub-Saharan Africa to gain independence, tried to establish an economic system controlled by the state under such unrealistic ideals, and squandered its accumulated wealth of 200 million U.S. dollars ( From high cocoa prices and wartime earnings. This figure is even higher than the pound stocks of independent India).The "Pan-African Union" advocated by Nkrumah is even more ambitious and high-profile.As a result, his ambitions were fruitless and he suffered a crushing defeat.In the 1960s, cocoa prices fell sharply, making matters worse.By 1972, Ghana's ambitions had completely failed, and the industry in this small country could only survive with various protective measures such as high tariffs, price controls, and import licenses.The black market economy is prevalent, and corruption is rampant. So far, it has been out of control, and it has become an irreversible scourge in the country for a long time.Three-quarters of wage earners are employed in the public sector, and basic agriculture on which subsistence depends is completely ignored (as is the case in many African countries). In 1966, the Nkrumah regime was overthrown by a military coup that is commonplace in the third world, and the country continued to walk on the road of disillusionment. On the way, there were many ups and downs, ordinary soldiers coming and going, and occasionally civilian governments. Dotted in between.

While the record of these new nations in sub-Saharan Africa is poor, their development achievements cannot be ignored when it comes to former colonies and dependent states elsewhere.These regions and countries have chosen a path of economic development planned by the state. Therefore, since the 1970s, international people have begun to use the popular term of so-called Newly Industrializing Countries (NIC). In addition, the formation of these new industrial countries is based on the economic policies led by the state.Anyone who has some knowledge of the national conditions of Brazil and Mexico knows that the result of government intervention is often extreme bureaucracy, incomparable corruption and waste—but at the same time, it has also created a lot of trouble for Brazil and Mexico over the past few decades. 7% annual growth rate.All in all, despite bureaucratic corruption, both countries have successfully transformed into modern industrial economies as they wished.In fact, at one point Brazil was even the eighth largest industrial economy in the non-communist world.In addition, the two countries have large enough populations to provide a large domestic market, so a policy of developing domestic industry to replace imports could work here, at least for a long time.Brazil's state-owned enterprises once handled nearly half of the country's gross domestic product. Among the country's 20 largest companies, state-owned units accounted for 19.In Mexico, state-run workers account for one-fifth of the total employed population, and the total salary books of public units account for two-fifths of the country's total wages (Harris, 1987 pp. 84-85).As for the countries in the Far East, the degree of direct management by the state is relatively small, and most of them are operated by some private enterprise groups approved by the Mongolian government, but the control of credit and investment is controlled by the government.Therefore, although the superficial methods are different, the dependence of their economic development on the government remains the same. In the 1950s and 1960s, it can be said that the wind of planning and state-led economics was blowing all over the world. In the newly industrialized countries, this wind even blew into the 1990s.As for the economic benefits generated under the popularity, its success or failure depends on individual conditions and human errors.