A WME is a short-term financial palliative that makes the rich richer but postpones economic troubles, while seeming to cure the problems of unemployment and dwindling family incomes. It tends to create debt in the economy, but most economists call it fiscal policy or monetary policy. Once the term “policy” is used, everybody shuts up and accepts the claims of WMEs’ beneficence, believing that a genius must have devised it. However, all it does is to generate more debt in the economy, and let the problems pile up, only to return with greater force in the future. Most nations have deployed it in the past 30 years, but various American administrations have been exceptionally adept in its use.

Let us see how a WME only postpones economic ills and also enriches the rich. I am sure you’ve all heard of supply and demand, even if you never took a course in economics. Supply and demand are like the two wings of an airplane; both have to be equally strong and weighty, or else the plane will crash.

What is the main source of supply? Productivity. What is the main source of demand? Wages. If you become more productive – through education or the use of better technology – you produce or supply more goods. If your wages rise, then you consume or demand more goods. For the economy to stay healthy, supply must be equal to demand, or:

Supply = Demand

Please don’t be alarmed by the use of a simple equation, because it will highlight the role of debt in a visual way and make it easily understandable. If supply is not equal to demand, then, like the airplane with unequal wings, the economy will crash some day. Here, supply refers to the value of goods produced in the entire economy, and demand means total spending or the value of goods consumed in the nation.

It so happens that, because of investment and new technology, productivity and, hence, supply rise year after year. This means that wages and, hence, demand must also rise year after, and in the same proportion. Otherwise, there is an imbalance, and unexpected problems arise. If wages trail productivity growth, supply exceeds demand, leading to overproduction. Businesses are unable to sell all that they produce and layoffs follow. Hence, the only cause of unemployment in an advanced economy is the rise in the gap between what you produce and what your employer pays you.

However, joblessness creates problems not only for the unemployed but also for elected officials, because the unemployed have the right to vote. Politicians seek to face a happy electorate and be re-elected. They don’t like unemployment anymore than you or I, which means they have to create ways to raise national spending to the level of supply. They face two choices: either to follow policies to raise your salary proportionately to the level of your productivity – which is only fair and ethical – or to adopt measures to lure you into larger debt, so that you spend more not out of a pay raise, but from increased borrowing.

Luring the public into debt in order to get re-elected, I believe, is crass corruption. It is also corruption because the politician, ever in need of campaign donations, wouldn’t dream of offending business interests that are all for low wages. With wages trailing productivity since 1981, elected officials have been following what is known as monetary policy, which tempts people into larger debts. This eliminates unemployment as spending rises to the level of supply, because now,

Supply = Demand + New Consumer Debt

With monetary policy, the Federal Reserve prints more money to bring down the rate of interest, and lower interest rates induce people to increase their borrowing or their debt. However, the wage-productivity gap has been rising so fast that the government also had to raise its own spending and debt constantly, so that total spending matched rising supply. In this case:

Supply = Demand + New Consumer Debt + New Government Debt

Raising government debt to postpone the problem of unemployment is called “fiscal policy.” Now you see why our nation is awash in debt at both the consumer and the government level. Elected officials have frequently used debt-creation policies to get re-elected, while creating the impression that they are doing American workers a favor by preserving their jobs. Are they doing you a favor? Absolutely not. Instead, they are simply enriching the rich. Let us see how.

First, job creation occurs through the cooperative action of both producers and consumers. Producers only create supply and, indeed, hire workers, but if their goods remain unsold, they lose money and workers are laid off. Second, joblessness occurs only if your boss doesn’t pay you enough to match your productivity. If you work hard and still get fired, then it is the employer’s fault, not yours. You are doing your job of being productive on the one hand and creating demand out of your salary on the other. If your demand falls or does not rise enough, then it is because your boss has not given you a raise or has cut your wages. At the macro level, insufficient national demand only means that workers have produced so much for their companies that supply exceeds demand, so that some people have to be laid off. Where then is your fault in this entire process? It is your employer’s greed that generates joblessness, not you.

Once the government has generated enough new debt to increase spending to the level of supply, the unemployed are called back to work, usually at lower wages. But the debt increase is large enough to eliminate overproduction even at puny wages. As overproduction vanishes, profits jump. You can see this clearly from the above equation. If your wages and, hence, your demand are constant, then the entire increase in debt goes into the pockets of suppliers. Without this debt growth, employers would have suffered losses due to overproduction; but with the creation of new debt, all their goods are sold, and profits soar, while your salary is either constant or grows very little; it may even fall, if you were laid off and had to find a new job. Thus, if the budget deficit is $1trillion, then corporate profits plus executive bonuses jump by $1 trillion. If the deficit is $2 trillion, then businessmen’s incomes rocket by the same amount.

This is exactly what has occurred during the Great Recession that started at the end of 2007. Millions of people were fired because the likes of General Motors, IBM, Microsoft and Goldman Sachs could not sell all they had produced. Then President Bush sharply raised the budget deficit, and the Federal Reserve printed tons of new money to bail out failing businesses. As a result, the economy stabilized in 2009 and began to grow in 2010. However, real wages fell, while profits sky-rocketed. Why? Because, the entire increase in government debt went into the coffers of producers. This is how Goldman Sachs alone could give bonuses of over $20 billion to its executives in 2009, while millions were still being laid off. Consumer debt actually fell, but the government debt rose so much that executives received hefty extra compensation.

Eliminating the Budget Deficit

It should be clear by now that our so-called monetary and fiscal policies are enriching the rich while not doing much for the jobless. What should we do? For the solution, let us take a look at the American economy in the 1950s and the 1960s, the golden decades of high growth and growing prosperity for all. GDP growth averaged over 4 percent as compared to less than 3 percent since 1981, while real wages went up to match rising productivity. The top bracket income tax rate at the time averaged above 80 percent, and corporations paid 25 percent of the total tax revenue or about 5 percent of GDP. The middle class paid low taxes, and there was practically no budget deficit.

Why was GDP growth so high back then? The answer lies in high taxation of wealthy individuals and corporations. Thus, for the 1950s and the 1960s:

Supply = Demand + Near Zero New Debt

Since real wages grew as fast as productivity, new debt was practically zero. People met their needs mostly out of their rising salaries. Demand rose in a natural way to match increasing supply. It may be noted that supply comes primarily from the rich, but demand comes primarily from the poor and the middle class. Since taxes were low on low-income groups, consumer demand grew as fast as salaries; but from 1981 on, thanks to President Reagan and his advisers such as Alan Greenspan, the tax burden was transferred from the rich to everyone else. Income tax rates sank for wealthy individuals and corporations, while most, if not all, other federal taxes jumped. The self-employed small business person, for instance, saw a rise of 66 percent in their tax rate. Taxes also rose on gasoline and tires. The crippling tax burden on lower incomes naturally reduced the growth in demand, so GDP growth (growth in supply or output) fell sharply below that in the 1950s and the 1960s. Even the oil-shocked 1970s produced higher growth of 3.3 percent.

All this suggests that we should move toward the tax structure of the 1950s and 1960s. Today, the top-bracket income tax rate is 35 percent. Suppose we were to raise this rate to 45 percent for annual incomes above $250,000, and to 70 percent for incomes above one million, then the income tax yield would rise from $1 trillion to $1.5 trillion, or by $500 billion. Thus, any dollar earned above $250,000 will be taxed at the rate of 45 percent; similarly, any earned above a million will face a rate of 70 percent, so that average tax rates will be well below the top rates, which will still be below those in the 1960s. For corporations, we could go back to the old rate of 45 percent tax on corporate profits, while eliminating loopholes. We would then collect about 5 percent of GDP or some $750 billion, which would bring in extra revenue of $600 billion. Thus, higher taxes on affluent families and businesses will raise our revenue annually by $1.1 trillion. Slashing defense spending and oil and agricultural subsidies would reduce government spending. This way we can almost eliminate our budget deficit, which is currently running at an annual rate of $1.2 trillion.

Eliminating the Trade Deficit

Eliminating the budget deficit would quickly revive our comatose economy. The first benefit would be felt in the fall of our trade deficit, especially that with China, which has become our foremost lender. America would no longer have to borrow money from anyone, and China would not be able to use its surplus dollars to buy more US government bonds. Such a move would cause a major appreciation in the value of the Chinese yuan, which, in turn, would reduce, possibly eliminate, our trade shortfall with China. Our manufacturing would revive and thousands of new jobs would be created, raising the tax revenue further.

The next step would be to reduce the tax burden on lower incomes by cutting the self-employment tax to 12 percent from the current 15 percent; we could also eliminate the Social Security tax on the minimum wage. Our increased tax revenue would pay for these cuts, which would further raise consumer demand and, hence, GDP growth. Note that the trade deficit is also a WME, because it tends to lower wages, while stuffing the wallets of the CEOs of multinational corporations. Just look at the fat pay checks of such CEOs in the aftermath of our trade with China.

Another WME that our government has systematically used to reduce our living standard is outsourcing; we can impose a stiff tax on this practice and raise even more revenue. This would also enable us to trim the tax burden of low-income groups.

In short, the American economy can be easily fixed if our government would stop using its vast arsenal of WMEs against us. I believe that, in just 12 to 18 months, we can bring the nation back to an unemployment rate of 6 percent, which is close to full employment.

Apekshit Mulay was also live on airwaves of 104.9 FM Funasia radio on May 15th 2011 morning from 6 am to 7 am CST to inform the listeners about the economic system of PROUT. In this interview Apekshit described PROUT as mass capitalism that gives power to the masses. He talked about how monopoly capitalism has let just 1% of Americans control more than 95% of America’s wealth. He also stated that if the “monopoly Capitalism” is left unchecked it could be destructive. Apekshit also used this interview to enable a lot more listeners to tune in to Dr. Ravi Batra’s interview on May 20th 2011.

On 20th May 2011, Dr. Ravi Batra was live on airwaves of 104.9 FM Funasia radio from 6 am to 7 am CST. In this interview Dr. Ravi Batra raised awareness of the America’s Debt crisis and make suggestions to fix problems in economy. He also answered questions from listeners in Dallas to help ordinary Americans beware of the coming fall in stock market because of drastic spending cuts proposed by Republican Party.

After a decade-long agitation by the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), several weeks of mass protests by major political parties and demands of the general public, the Nepalese monarchy was overthrown, establishing the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal on May 28, 2008. In a decade and half, millions of Nepalese lost their lives in the fight to overthrow the monarchy. What did the Nepalese gain after the declaration of the FDRN and what did they lose?

After the establishment of the new government, Ram Baran Yadav was elected as the first President, and was sworn in on 23 July 2008. The late Girija Prasad Koirala was chosen as the interim Prime Minister to serve until a general election could be held to choose the next Prime Minister. After winning a majority of votes in the general election, the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) designated its party president, Puspa Kamal Dahal (Prachanda), as the first elected Prime Minister of Nepal on Aug. 18, 2008.

After President Yadav reinstated Chief of the Army Staff (COAS) Rookmangat Katwal who had been sacked by Dahal’s government, Dahal resigned from his post on May 4, 2009. Madhav Kumar Nepal of the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist Leninist) was elected the next Prime Minister after a long process in the election in May 2009. His government was widely criticized for economic crisis, political instability and corruption but he denied the allegations and ruled the nation for over a year. He resigned on June 30, 2010 under pressure from different parties and organizations.

During the two months after Nepal resigned from his post, seven elections in the Constituent Assembly couldn’t elect another Prime Minister. The eighth election, held on Sept. 26, 2010, to elect the fourth Prime Minister also couldn’t confirm any candidates for the position. The former Prime Minister Prachanda quit the race before the election, after his seventh unsuccessful attempt.

Puspa Kamal Dahal, the president of Maoist Party, is again running for Prime Minister for the second time. Ram Chandra Poudel, senior leader of the Nepali Congress Party is his opponent.

Nepal, a developing Himalayan country, also known as the country of Mt. Everest and the birthplace of Buddha, has seen its worst economic condition in recent years. The hope the public had that removing the monarchy would bring an improvement in the conditions in the country are being diminished everyday. Unemployment is approaching half of the working-age population. The youth population is decreasing every year as they seek jobs in Gulf countries or neighboring India. They are also migrating to countries like the United States, United Kingdom, Australia and many other countries around the globe for study and personal security.

Two-thirds of female adults and one-third of male adults in Nepal are illiterate. One-third of the population is below the poverty line and because of the ongoing political instability, foreign investors resisting investment in the country’s hydropower which has a potential capacity of 42,000 MW. The public doesn’t have proper drinking water facilities even though Nepal is known as the second richest country in water resources after Brazil.

On the other hand, Nepal is preparing for “Visit Nepal 2011” to attract tourists from all over the world. However, the Tourism Board is not doing sufficient advertising because of a low budget. The government is not providing funds to adequately prepare for the program. In fact, the nation might lose what dignity and pride it has because of the poor preparations.

Without a good government, a nation cannot progress, but Nepal is even worse off because it doesn’t have a government at all. Eight elections in a row couldn’t declare a Prime Minister. If it continues, Nepal in less than a decade, will be like Ethiopia and Somalia economically, socially and politically.

I feel the success of this project stem, in part, from the comprehensive preparatory work done by the
facilitators, Allan Rosen and Matt Oppenheim. For months before the PROUT UTC workshop, they conducted
research and made phone calls to set up meetings with local leaders and groups. I would encourage anyone
who takes part in such a workshop to get involved by helping to conduct follow-ups with the contacts
already established, and, if possible, continue to make new ones. It would be great for the locals to
know that we are indeed concerned about their communityís welfare and are willing to help find solutions
to some of the problems in their area.

Next year, during the Global PROUT Conference, we can again get an outlet for the activist spirit in us
all by meeting with the same local people and activists. Like us, they are attempting to solve their
problems in a coordinated, maybe even Proutistic, manner. My personal experiences during the PAR
workshop were very inspiring. I participated in the Environmental Research Group. At fist, we were given
a very informative presentation by a local Natural Resource Management team, which included a question
and answer session. We explored the history of settlements in the Ozarks and its impact on topography,
flora, and fauna. We then visited the local swimming pool. There we interviewed two high school students
about their awareness of environmental issues. One of the boys said that the creek near his backyard was
used by residents as a dump for broken toys, appliances, car parts, and even used motor oil. After our
conversation, we went to explore this area and gathered photographic evidence of the debris scattered along
the creek.

Lastly we conducted some interviews at the University. In summary, I found that environmental problems
were not a high priority amongst the people in this area. Instead, most people were afraid of loosing
the small town atmosphere they have been accustomed to. Everybody knows each other by name and wave to
friends and neighbors when passing by in cars or on bicycles. The recent additions of a shopping-mall,
a new highway, several parking lots, and the associated traffic were changes not accepted open-heartedly.
Nonetheless, a warm smile and a friendly “hello” from a passersby helps ease the growing pains experienced
by this community so rich in its heritage.

Volume 9, No. 2, Summer 2002 [Exact date not known ]

“To liberate society from this unbearable situation, [when bureaucracy is turned into oligarchy],
consciousness will have to be aroused among the people; their eyes will have to be opened by knowledge.
Let them uderstand the what’s the why’s and the where’s. Thus study is essential, very essential.”
 - Liberation of the Intellect, P.R. Sarkar

This summer, at the Ananda Kanan Retreat Center near Willow Springs, MO, more than two dozen Prout
activists took part in a Participatory Action Research (PAR) workshop. PAR is an activist strategy
inspired by the Brazilian revolutionary philosopher and teacher, Paulo Freire (1921 – 1997). In this
process, workshop participants form teams to learn about local issues, while reflecting upon their
values, relationships and ideals in developing an activism of liberation.

The participants–from Germany, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Mexico, and the US–were comprised of teenagers
as well as senior members of Proutist Universal. They came from all walks of life: professors, students,
writers, business owners, volunteers and social activists.

The PAR methodology enabled the Proutists to learn about each other and the surrounding community
in a hands-on setting. This action/research modality contrasts with other Prout workshops that focus
almost exclusively on theoretical study. PAR was chosen to provide an opportunity for Prout activists
to work together on a collective enterprise. The PAR workshop also allowed the Prout activists, who
were simultaneously attending the Ananda Marga Yoga Society’s summer retreat, to begin to learn about
the community and culture in and around Willow Springs, West Plains, and the South Central Missouri
Ozarks.

By learning about the community and the local issues, and especially making connections with local
activists and service providers, it is now expected that Proutists will maintain and expand these
relationships, as well as become more committed to social service in the Missouri Ozarks, as part of
their annual retreat experience. An additional goal was to introduce the participants to an effective
methodology for doing action research when returning to their local community. Hopefully this summer’s
workshop will be the first of many such local and regional PAR workshops sponsored by the Prout
Research Institute in North and Central America.

Before reporting on the details of this workshop, a brief overview of the PAR model is warranted. In
its simplest terms, the PAR model can be described in five steps: 1) participants form action teams, 2)
the teams investigate community issues and the experiences of local residents, 3) an action strategy
is developed for addressing the important community issues, 4) the action is implemented, and 5) the
team reflects upon what has been learned about the issue, the community, and the team dynamics.
In this particular workshop the traditional model was modified because the participants are not
permanent residents of the local community. Hence, at this workshop, the participants focused on
steps 1, 2 and 5.

During the introductory session Oppenheim presented an overview of PAR theory. He introduced the work
of Paulo Freire with quotes from “Pedagogy of the Oppressed.” Freire created a process of
consciousness-raising and activism, helping oppressed factory workers to reflect upon the dominant
themes of their daily lives, and then to take action to create a better future.

Freire was concerned that the oppressed could easily act through anger and recreate the oppression
of their oppressors. He emphasized activism based on love, and the ability to transcend the mental
colonization of the oppressor. PAR has evolved to become a way for communities to develop authentic
knowledge based on real world experiences and to develop goals for improving communities based on an
intimate relationship and partnerships amongst community members. PAR places an importance on
creating knowledge through experience and relationship rather than through so-called “experts.” It
is strikingly similar to Neo-humanist principles and the process that P.R. Sarkar advises for
establishing self-sufficient economic regions.

After this, the group went through team-building exercises to build a sense of unity and common
purpose. Several exercises developed an appreciation of individual strengths and talents as well
as ways of working in groups that would help the participants support each other and work more
effectively as a diverse team. It was emphasized that each person may value a different way or
style of gaining knowledge about the community, and that all these styles are essential for an
integrated understanding of a community. One person may prefer to interview someone for most of
the time instead of gathering data, while another may learn more from drawing a polluted creek bed.
Some prefer to understand a small neighborhood before looking at the overall region, whereas others
need a regional overview before focusing on local businesses.

In the second session, Rosen presented an overview of the Ozarks bio-region. The settlement patterns
and cultural legacy of the Native Americans and original European-American settlers were noted, as
was the economic development history of subsistence agriculture, natural resource (minerals, timber)
exploitation, and environmental degradation.

The current socio-economic condition was reviewed, highlighting the extreme rural isolation of the
area, its cultural, religious, and ethnic homogeneity, and the South Central Missouri Ozarks’
continuing isolation from the Ozarks’ regional economic growth centers of the Springfield/Branson
and Fayetteville, AR areas.

Important recent trends that were highlighted included the growth of West Plains as the regional
economic trade center, the emerging satellite campus of Southwest Missouri State in West Plains,
and the increasing settlement of middle-class, suburban retirees into the Ozarks, and how that is
creating tension in the region. A highlight of this session included artist Michael McClure’s
personal story of living at Ananda Kanan for the past twenty years, and his impressions of the
people and the local culture and mores. McClure has gained rich personal experiences by painting
the natural landscape and murals in the local communities, and playing basketball with local
residents. His personal story reinforced many of the themes outlined by Rosen. Notably the strong
family values and social networks, the fundamentalist Protestant Christian worldview, the slowness
to accept change, and the intensity of the Missouri “Show- Me” attitude. History of how the
introduction of the cash economy during the Great Depression public work’s programs began to weaken
the settler’s cultural legacy was particularly moving and revealing.

The third session was devoted to fieldwork preparation. The participants were divided into four
teams and trained in how to conduct their fieldwork. Each team was given a fieldwork kit with
Polaroid camera, drawing pens and paper, maps, information about their topic, and interview forms
with initial questions. Each team had three basic tasks: to develop interview questions and then
hold interviews about their topics, to visit a site that would give them valuable experiences
about their topic (for example the environment group visited a local creek where townspeople were
dumping rubbish), and to visit a local expert. Teams spent times brainstorming ways to introduce
themselves and to ask questions. Then each team assigned roles and developed a timeline to carry
out their activities the following day.

Monday morning and afternoon, July 1, the four teams conducted their field work. Twelve participants
focused on Native American issues and met with representatives of two Native tribes at their
respective community centers in West Plains. Eight participants met with the Executive Director of
the regional community action agency, Ozark Action, Inc. This group focused on family and poverty
issues. The third group, seven in all, went to the regional office of the Missouri Department of
Conservation in West Plains and met with the office manager and a field conservationist. The fourth
and smallest group, four persons, met with the Community Development specialist of the local
University of Missouri County Extension service, as well as the Executive Director of the Mountain
View, MO Chamber of Commerce. Each group spent at least two hours meeting with their respective
“expert” contact, leaving an hour or two for each team to conduct some “person on the street”
interviews.

At the final session Monday afternoon, each group presented their findings and answered questions
from other participants. Special guests at this session included McClure, Dada IK, the rector at
Ananda Kanan, and long-time Ananda Kanan resident Dharma Putra.

After this, each team came up with four or five key themes that arose from their fieldwork. Each
team then came up with four or five over-arching themes that characterized their experience of the
Ozarks, as well as key problem areas for us to focus on in the future. Some common themes that
emerged from each team’s community study included the love of family, place and home, the clash
between old and new, the stress on local government resources, the persistent relationship between
poverty and environmental damage, the lack of widespread economic opportunity, and the ambivalent
attitudes toward education. One goal was to relate fieldwork experiences to principles of Prout,
and to begin to brainstorm a Proutist vision for the future of the Ozarks. Rather than prescribing
solutions, these principles were meant as tools to look at problems and their causes and to better
understand the dynamics of the Ozarks. For example, the group briefly discussed Sarkar’s principle
of balanced economic planning, comparing the suggested model for economic prama (balance) with
employment statistics from the local region. It was obvious that retail trade and the service
economy were rapidly outpacing the manufacturing and agricultural sectors, which would clearly lead
to a dependency on resources from outside the region – evidenced by the rapid takeover of locally
owned businesses by a Wal-Mart. A lecture on the nature of Prout movements by Dada Vimalananda also
helped participants begin to think about how local farmers, laborers and youths, students and
intellectuals could unite in a common regional movement. However, lack of time did not allow
participants to connect Prout theory to their experiences of the community in any great depth.

This last session concluded with a brief exercise where participants were asked to reflect on the
workshop and provide feedback on the process. Many positive comments were voiced, including the
following constructive criticisms: 1) It was difficult to condense so much material into a total
of 15 contact hours (24 hours over a three day period would have been better), 2) most participants
would have preferred more time to work with their team and their own trained facilitator; and 3)
more time should have been devoted to fieldwork preparations, particularly the interview protocols,
notetaking, and reporting back to the group. Still, the participants were inspired by the PAR
workshop and would like to stay connected to the groups they met with.

Several members mentioned that their assumptions about the local community changed after the
exercise. One participant, for example, assumed that local residents would not be supportive of
Native American causes, while several residents mentioned that they had strong support for their
rights. Many also mentioned that they learned much more about their fellow Prout activists through
the fieldwork exercise, as well as learning, for the first time, how to be a Proutist in a
supportive, non-invasive way. Some mentioned that local residents naturally symphatized with
Prout principles, because of the values they held for their community, for the environment, and
for the Ozarks region.

When asked how they might increase their involvement in the community while attending retreats at
Ananda Kanan, participants suggested working with public education programs, going to community
fairs, and co-sponsoring town meetings, as well as seeking volunteer opportunities at the various
agencies they learned about.

Overall, the workshop was considered a great success and a good omen for future Prout training
endeavors, including next summer’s Global Prout Convention to be held at Ananda Kanan. Oppenheim
and Rosen are already collaborating with residents of the Ananda Marga Master Unit, Ananda
Aeshvarya, in Urbana-Champaign, IL, about holding PAR workshop there this fall.

Volume 9, No. 2, Summer 2002 [Exact date not known ]

Political democracy requires a population that is well educated, with a high standard of morality and a keen socio-economic consciousness. Otherwise money can manipulate elections and corrupt politicians. Corruption and mismanagement in the past has resulted in a crushing external debt that reduces social services to pay exorbitant interest.

Economic democracy means regional, democratic control of resources, ceilings on the super accumulation of wealth, employee ownership and cooperative management of medium-scale economic enterprises, and guaranteed employment with sufficient wages for purchasing basic necessities–food, clothing, housing, education and health care. An ideal constitution should guarantee these rights and prevent financial exploitation.

Venezuela is today at a critical juncture: though wealthy in natural and mineral resources, millions of its people suffer in desperate poverty. Selfish greed has created a tremendous gap between the rich and the poor. Materialism is rapidly destroying our natural environment with no thought for the future. There is need for deep structural transformation. Prout offers a new socio-economic paradigm that provides social justice for all based on human and spiritual values.

Below are some very brief points that we believe should be included in the new constitution:

CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS

1. Every person is guaranteed the five minimum necessities of life: food, clothing, shelter, education and medical care.

2. Every person has the right to a job with adequate purchasing power.

3. Cultural expressions and indigenous languages must be protected.

4. The country’s bio-diversity and endangered species must be protected, and pollution of the air, water and land is prohibited.

5. Spiritual and religious practices for self-realization must be protected.

6. No expression of these rights can be allowed to violate cardinal human values.

7. Three socio-political principles must be guaranteed:

a) people should not be allowed to lose their jobs until and unless alternative employment can be arranged for them;

b) people should never be forced to convert from one religion to another;

c) no one’s mother (native) tongue should be suppressed.

8. The penal code must be based on universally accepted cardinal human values such as the right to a decent life. Capital punishment is banned.

9. Quality education must be guaranteed for all and free of political interference. This includes objective
knowledge, ethics, character building, creativity, spirit of cooperation and service, and selfknowledge.

10. We are all members of one human family without divisions. No person can be discriminated against because of race, sex, color, language, beliefs, sexual orientation, origin, or health status.

THE ECONOMY

Economic democracy is essential to eliminate poverty and continually elevate the standard of living of everyone. For this reason, the following policies should be implemented:

1. Private enterprise will be permitted and encouraged for small-scale businesses that produce non-essential items.

2. Most enterprises will be run as cooperatives. Industrial and agricultural, producers and consumers coops will produce essential items.

3. Key industries will be administered by the government.

4. A ceiling on income and wealth will be established to prevent superaccumulation and economic exploitation.

5. Raw materials should not be exported out of the country. Rather they should be processed or refined in the local region and then sold for local consumption. The excess can then be traded or sold abroad.

6. The banking system should be run as cooperatives, while the Central Bank will be controlled by the government. Money should be based on proportional quantity of gold bullion.

7. In addition to the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branches of the government, there should be the addition of an independent financial department. This will monitor government spending and publicize the strengths and weaknesses of its programs. This department will keep the accounts of the other three branches and prevent corruption. All of these powers should function independently.

8. The first priority of the government shall be to guarantee the production of the five minimum necessities to all people at accessible prices. Each region of the country must be made self-sufficient in these five necessities.

9. Impoverished regions will be developed especially through the development of agricultural cooperatives,
agro-industries and agricoindustries. This decentralization of the economy will create economic democracy,
in which the local people will make all economic planning. Foreigners may not interfere in economic planning.
Profits may not be exported out of the country, but rather should be re-invested for the development of the
country.

10. Income tax should be abolished, rather tax should be placed on the production of goods.

References:
Prabhat Ranjan Sarkar, Proutist Economics: Discourses on Economic
Liberation. Ananda Marga Publications, Calcutta, 1992.

It looks like Venezuela is not just another banana-oil republic after all. Many here feared that with the April 11 coup attempt against President Hugo Chavez, Venezuela was being degraded to being just another country that is forced to bend to the powerful will of the United States. The successful counter-coup of April 14, though, which reinstated Chavez, proved that Venezuela is a tougher cookie than the coup planners thought.

The coup leaders against President Chavez made two fundamental miscalculations. First, they started having delusions of grandeur, believing that the support for their coup was so complete that they could simply ignore the other members of their coup coalition and place only their own in the new government. The labor union federation CTV, which saw itself as one of the main actors of the opposition movement to President Chavez, and nearly all moderate opposition parties were excluded from the new “democratic unity” cabinet. The new transition cabinet ended up including only the most conservative elements of Venezuelan society. They then proceeded to dissolve the legislature, the Supreme Court, the attorney general’s office, the national electoral commission, and the state governorships, among others. Next, they decreed that the 1999 constitution, which had been written by a
constitutional assembly and ratified by vote, following the procedures outlined in the pervious constitution, was to be suspended. The new transition president would thus rule by decree until next year, when new elections would be called. Generally, this type of regime fits the textbook definition of dictatorship.

This first miscalculation led to several generals’ protest against the new regime, perhaps under pressure from
the excluded sectors of the opposition, or perhaps out of a genuine sense of remorse, and resulted in their
call for changes to the sweeping “democratic transition” decree, lest they withdraw their support from the
new government. Transition President Pedro Carmona, the chair of Venezuela’s largest chamber of commerce,
immediately agreed to reinstate the Assembly and to the rest of the generals’ demands.

The second miscalculation was the belief that Chavez was hopelessly unpopular in the population and
among the military and that no one except Cuba and Colombia’s guerilla, the FARC, would regret Chavez’
departure. Following the initial shock and demoralization which the coup caused among Chavez-supporters,
this second miscalculation led to major upheavals and riots in Caracas’ sprawling slums, which make up
nearly half of the city. In practically all of the “barrios” of Caracas spontaneous demonstrations and
“cacerolazos” (pot-banging) broke out on April 13 and 14. The police immediately rushed-in to suppress
these expressions of discontent and somewhere between 10 and 40 people were killed in these clashes with
the police. Then, in the early afternoon, purely by word-of-mouth and the use of cell phones (Venezuela
has one of the highest per capita rates of cell phone use in the world), a demonstration in support of
Chavez was called at the Miraflores presidential palace. By 6 PM about 100,000 people had gathered in the
streets surrounding the presidential palace. At approximately the same time, the paratrooper battalion,
to which Chavez used to belong, decided to remain loyal to Chavez and took over the presidential palace.
Next, as the awareness of the extent of Chavez’ support spread, major battalions in the interior of
Venezuela began siding with Chavez.

Eventually the support for the transition regime evaporated among the military, so that transition president
Carmona resigned in the name of preventing bloodshed. As the boldness of Chavez-supporters grew, they began
taking over several television stations, which had not reported a single word about the uprisings and the
demonstrations. Finally, late at night, around midnight of April 14, it was announced that Chavez was set
free and that he would take over as president again. The crowds outside of Miraflores were ecstatic. No one
believed that the coup could or would be reversed so rapidly. When Chavez appeared on national TV around 4 AM,
he too joked that he knew he would be back, but he never imagined it would happen so fast. He did not even have
time to rest and writesome poetry, as he had hoped to do.

So how could this be? How could such an impeccably planned and smoothly executed coup fall apart in
almost exactly 48 hours? Aside from the two miscalculations mentioned above, it appears that the
military’s hearts were not fully into the coup project. Once it became obvious that the coup was being
hijacked by the extreme right and that Chavez enjoyed much more support than was imagined, large parts
of the military decided to reject the coup, which then had a snowball-effect of changing military
allegiances. Also, by announcing that one of the main reasons for the coup was to avoid bloodshed and
by stating that the Venezuelan military would never turn its weapons against its own people, Chavez
supporters became more courageous to go out and to protest against the coup without fear of reprisals.

Very important, though, was that the coup planners seem to have believed their own propaganda: that Chavez was an extremely unpopular leader. What they seem to have forgotten is that Chavez was not a fluke, a phenomenon that appeared in Venezuela as a result of political chaos, as some analysts seem to believe. Rather, Chavez’ movement has its roots in a long history of Venezuelan community and leftist organizing. Also, it seems quite likely that although many people were unhappy with Chavez’ lack of rapid progress in implementing the reforms he promised, he was still the most popular politician in the country.

The media and the opposition movement tried to create the impression that Chavez was completely isolated
and that no one supported him any longer. They did this by organizing massive demonstrations, with the
extensive help of the television stations, which regularly broadcast reports of the anti-Chavez protests,
but consistently ignored the pro-Chavez protests, which, by all fair accounts, tended to be just as large.
The television channels claimed that they did not cover pro-Chavez demonstrations because protestors
threatened their lives. While this seems unlikely since the demonstrators usually unequivocally want their
demonstrations covered by the media, they could have gotten protection, if they had cared to.

The Media

Nearly the entire media is owned and operated by Venezuela’s oligarchy. There is only one neutral newspaper,
which is not an explicitly anti-Chavez newspaper and one state-run television station. During the coup, the
state-run station was taken off the air completely and all of the other media kept repeating the coup
organizer’s lies without question. These lies included the claim that Chavez had resigned and had dismissed
his cabinet, that all of the demonstration’s dead were “martyrs of civil society” (i.e., of the opposition,
since the media does not consider Chavez supporters as part of civil society), and that Chavez had ordered
his supporters to shoot into the unarmed crowd of anti-Chavez demonstrators.

The media never addressed the repeated doubts that members of Chavez’ cabinet raised about his resignation. Also, the media did not release the names of those who were shot, probably because this would have shown that most of the dead were pro-Chavez demonstrators. Finally, the media edited the video footage of the shootings in such a way as to avoid showing where the Chavez supporters were shooting-namely, as eyewitnesses reported, at police and individuals who were shooting back while hidden in doorways. Also, they did not show the pro-Chavez crowd repeatedly pointing at the snipers who were firing at them from the rooftop of a nearby building.

These media distortions in the aftermath of the coup drove home the point just how powerful the media is at creating an alternate reality. Those Chavez supporters who were at the demonstration and witnessed the events realized more than ever that power needs a medium and that those who control the media have much more power than they let on. This is why the television stations became a key target in the hours leading up to Chavez’ reinstatement. The take-over of four of the eight stations was essential to Chavez’ comeback because it showed the rest of the military and the rest of Venezuela that Chavez still had strong support among the population and that if the people really wanted to, they could fight for what was right and win.

Quo Vadis Chavez?

An aspect of the rise of Chavez to power that is often forgotten in Venezuela is that as far as Venezuelan presidents are concerned, Chavez has actually been among the least dictatorial. True, Chavez is a deeply flawed president with many shortcomings, among which one of the most important is his autocratic style. However, earlier presidencies, such as that of Carlos Andres Perez (1989-1993), the killing of demonstrators were nearly a monthly occurrence. Also, the outright censorship of newspapers was quite common during the Perez presidency. None of this has happened during the Chavez presidency.

President Hugo Chavez is an individual who raises the passions of people, pro or con, unlike anyone else. It almost seems that Venezuelans either love him or hate him. A more balanced picture of the president, however, would show, first, that he is someone who deeply believes in working for social justice, for improving democracy, and believes in international solidarity. Also, he is a gifted and charismatic speaker, which makes him a natural choice as a leader.

However, one has to recognize that he has some very serious shortcomings. Among the most important is that
while he truly believes in participatory democracy, as is evidenced in his efforts to democratize the
Venezuelan constitution, his instincts are that of an autocrat. This has led to a serious neglect of his
natural base, which is the progressive and grassroots civil society. Instead, he has tried to control this
civil society by organizing “Bolivarian Circles” which are neighborhood groups that are to help organize
communities and at the same time to defend the revolution. The opposition easily stigmatized these circles,
however, as being nothing other than a kind of SS for Chavez’ political party. Another crucial flaw has been
his relatively poor personnel choices. Many of the ministries and agencies suffer from mismanagement.

Finally and perhaps the most often mentioned flaw, is his tendency for inflammatory rhetoric. Accusations that Chavez divided Venezuelan society with his constant talk about the rich and the poor are ridiculous, since Venezuelan society was divided along these lines long before Chavez came to power. However, by trying to belittle his opponents by calling them names, such as “escualidos” (squalids), he made it virtually impossible for real dialogue to take place between himself and his opponents. |

The crucial question that Chavez-supporters and opponents alike are now asking is whether Chavez has grown
through the experience of this coup. In his initial statement after being freed from his military captors,
was, “I too have to reflect on many things. And I have done that in these hours. . I am here and I am
prepared to rectify, wherever I have to rectify.” Right now, however, it is too early to see if he really
is going to change his ways, so that he becomes more productive in achieving the goals he has set for
Venezuela.

While Chavez’ many progressive achievements should not be forgotten, neither should his failures be
overlooked, most of which have important lessons for progressives everywhere. The first lesson is to keep
the eyes on the prize. Chavez has become so bogged-down with small day-to-day conflicts that many people
are no longer sure if he remembers his original platform, which was to abolish corruption and to make
Venezuelan society more egalitarian. While greater social equality is extremely difficult to achieve in a
capitalist society, it is fair to say that Chavez’ plans have not had enough time to bear fruit.

He has a six-year social and economic development plan for 2001-2007, of which only a small fraction has so
far been implemented. However, on the corruption front, he has fallen seriously behind. The second lesson is
that the neglect of one’s social base, which provides the cultural underpinnings for desired changes, will
provide an opening for opponents to redefine the situation and to make policy implementation nearly impossible.
By not involving his natural base, the progressive and grassroots civil society, Chavez allowed the
conservative civil society, the conservative unions, the business sector, the church, and the media to
determine the discourse as to what the “Bolivarian revolution” was really all about.

The third lesson is that a good program alone is not good enough if one does not have the skillful means for implementing it. Chavez has some terrific plans, but through his incendiary rhetoric he manages to draw all attention away from his actual proposals and focuses attention on how he presents them or how he cuts his critics down to size.

Finally, while it is tempting to streamline policy-implementation by working only with individuals who will not criticize the program, creates a dangerous ideological monoculture, which will not be able to resist the diverse challenges even the best plans eventually have to face. Chavez has consistently dismissed from his inner circle those who criticized him, making his leadership base, which used to be quite broad, smaller and smaller. Such a narrow leadership base made it much easier for the opposition to challenge Chavez and to mount the coup.

Whether Chavez and his opposition have learned these lessons remains to be seen. Venezuelan society is still
deeply divided. One has to recognize that, at heart, this conflict is also a class conflict. While there
certainly are many Chavez opponents who come from the lower classes and numerous supporters from the upper
classes, the division between Chavez supporters who come from the lower light-skinned classes and the
opponents who come from the higher dark-skinned classes cannot be denied. What Venezuela needs, if social
peace is to be preserved, is a class compromise, where social peace is maintained at the expense of a more
just distribution of Venezuela’s immense wealth. However, today’s globalized world makes such a compromise
increasingly difficult to achieve because free market competition militates against local solutions to this
increasingly global problem. But perhaps Venezuela is a special case because of its oil wealth, which might
allow it to be an exception. Such an exception, though, will only be possible if power plays, such as the
recent coup attempt, come to an end.

Gregory Wilpert is a former U.S. Fulbright scholar in Venezuela. He lives in Caracas and is currently doing independent research on the sociology of development. He can be reached at: Wilpert@cantv.net

Cavallo and de la Ru’a were all about cow tow-ing to the international finance community, particularly the
IMF. They cut jobs, pensions, and government salaries. After massive protest in the waning days of 2001,
Cavallo and de la Rúa had to resign. Since then [**three] more presidents have resigned.

The current president, President Eduardo Duhalde, has made several moves that “appall Washington’s orthodox
economic policymakers,” says the Washington Post. “Duhalde has blamed the U.S.-backed freemarket approach
for his nation’s troubles and proclaimed it a ‘broken model,’ raising the specter that Latin America’s
third-largest economy may turn away from globalization and spark a movement toward protectionism in a region
where President Bush had hoped to forge a hemisphere-wide free-trade zone,” said the Post in a January article.

In truth, the Argentine economy has been tumbling since 1997. In order to service national debt, public
enterprises were sold to foreign and domestic capitalists, and the new owners fired thousands of workers.
Unprofitable mineral and energy operations were closed, essentially eliminating the economies of entire
towns. Public workers were laid off or just not paid. Education, health care and other social services were
cut way back. Ironically, but not unsurprisingly, the Argentine bourgeoisie moved billions out of the country
following the crash that followed rampant foreign investment in the country. By 2001, unemployment surpassed
50 percent in some parts of the country, and the majority of households fell into poverty.

Clearly, the neoliberal model of globalization, that requires countries to maintain high international credit
ratings no matter what the domestic expense, was not working. It seems that Cavello and de la Rua had
bought in to a paradigm that the people of Argentina now know is flawed: that by allowing capitalist elites
to get rich off Argentina, Argentina also would benefit; that the deluge of capital into the country would
float all boats; that the profit potential of investors must always come before the needs of common people.

In the Barrio’s, the unemployed had had enough, both with austerity programs designed to appease the IMF,
and with party bosses and union bureaucrats who had done nothing to change their plight. The Unemployed
Workers Movement (MTD) started as a grass roots movement in the urban and suburban barrios. The
organization has a horizontal structure: the assembly makes decisions, and even negotiations with the
government takes place in front of assemblies. The MTD began organizing roadblocks in 2001 to have their
voices heard. Thousands of men, women, and children participated. The blockades had great popular support,
making it difficult for the gendarmes to arrest their leaders. The government had to negotiate.

The MTD demanded locally administered state-funded jobs, food relief, the freeing of political prisoners,
and investments in roads, water, and health facilities. The MTD didn’t want temporary jobs, but stable
employment at living wages. In General Mosconi, for example, the leaders of the MTD movement came up with
over three hundred project ideas, some of which have been implemented. These include a bakery, organic
gardens, water purifying plants, first aid clinics, and more.

The local unemployment committee in fact runs this town. In some suburbs, the unemployed movement also has
displaced the local government, setting up a parallel economy and offering a vision to the nation of the
capabilities of the unemployed to take command of their own destinies.

Interestingly, while the IMF–essentially an agent of U.S. capital–required Argentina to give up
sovereignty on fiscal matters, the US government itself is at this moment exercising the right to deficit
spending. George Bush sites the recession as justification for giving a Keynesian boost to our economy,
but when Argentina was in much worst economic straits, it was Washington’s position that budgets must
be balanced, never mind that unemployment was through the roof and Argentines and the domestic Argentine
economy were starving for lack of domestic spending. How does the U.S. government expect the Argentine
middle class to react to this kind of hypocrisy? One of the causes of economic depression and recessions in
capitalist economies is the reduction of the money flow due to its concentration in the hands of a few.
Since the majority under such circumsance has no purchasing capacity, the syndrome is self re-enforcing:
the rich have no incentive to invest in an economy that promises no returns. This clearly happened in
Argentina, which witnessed not only the flight of foreign capital, but also the withdrawal of billions of
dollars from the country by the Argentine bourgeoisie. Now common Argentineans can’t even get back the money
they’ve deposited in banks.

Argentine Proutists have responded to the situation with proposals of their own. Perhaps now more than ever,
disenfranchised Argentines are willing listen.

David Griffin is a freelance writer from Minneapolis, Minnesota, a copyeditor, and a member of the
Prout Journal editorial board.

References:
James, Petras, The Unemployed Workers Movement in Argentina, Monthly Review, 2002

This is, of course, the version of events that the officials now in charge, and thus also of the media,
would like everyone to believe. So what really happened? Of course I don’t know, but I’ll try to represent
the facts as I witnessed them.

First of all, the military is saying that the main reason for the coup is what happened today, April 11.
“Civil society,” as the opposition here refers to itself, organized a massive demonstration of perhaps
100,000 to 200,000 people to march to the headquarters of Venezuela’s oil company, PDVSA, in defense of
its fired management. The day leading up to the march all private television stations broadcast
advertisements for the demonstration, approximately once every ten minutes. It was a successful march,
peaceful, and without government interference of any kind, even though the march illegally blocked the
entire freeway, which is Caracas’ main artery of transportation, for several hours.

Supposedly at the spur of the moment, the organizers decided to reroute the march to Miraflores, the
president’s office building, so as to confront the pro-government demonstration, which was called in the
last minute. About 5,000 Chavez-supporters had gathered there by the time the anti-government demonstrators
got there. In-between the two demonstrations were the city police, under the control of the oppositional
mayor of Caracas, and the National Guard, under control of the president. All sides claim that they were
there peacefully and did not want to provoke anyone. I got there just when the opposition demonstration
and the National Guard began fighting each other. Who started the fight, which involved mostly stones and
tear gas, is, as is so often the case in such situations, nearly impossible to tell. A little later,
shots were fired into the crowds and I clearly saw that there were three parties involved in the shooting,
the city police, Chavez supporters, and snipers from buildings above. Again, who shot first has become a moot
and probably impossible to resolve question. At least ten people were killed and nearly 100 wounded in this
gun battle-almost all of them demonstrators.

One of the Television stations managed to film one of the three sides in this battle and broadcast the
footage over and over again, making it look like the only ones shooting were Chavez supporters from within
the demonstration at people beyond the view of the camera. The media over and over again showed the footage
of the Chavez supporters and implied that they were shooting at an unarmed crowd. As it turns out, and as
will probably never be reported by the media, most of the dead are Chavez supporters. Also, as will probably
never be told, the snipers were members of an extreme opposition party, known as Bandera Roja.

These last two facts, crucial as they are, will not be known because they do not fit with the new mythology,
which is that Chavez armed and then ordered his supporters to shoot at the opposition demonstration.
Perhaps my information is incorrect, but what is certain is that the local media here will never bother to
investigate this information. And the international media will probably simply ape what the local media
reports (which they are already doing).

Chavez’ biggest and perhaps only mistake of the day, which provided the last remaining proof his opposition
needed for his anti-democratic credentials, was to order the black-out of the private television stations.
They had been broadcasting the confrontations all afternoon and Chavez argued that these broadcasts were
exacerbating the situation and should, in the name of public safety, be temporarily shutdown.

Now, all of “civil society,” the media, and the military are saying that Chavez has to go because he turned
against his own people. Aside from the lie this is, what is conveniently forgotten are all of the
achievements of the Chavez administration: a new democratic constitution which broke the power monopoly of
the two hopelessly corrupt and discredited main parties and put Venezuela at the forefront in terms of
progressive constitutions; introduced fundamental land reform; financed numerous progressive ecological
community development projects; cracked-down on corruption; promoted educational reform which schooled over
1 million children for the first time and doubled investment in education; regulated the informal economy so
as to reduce the insecurity of the poor; achieved a fairer price for oil through OPEC and which significantly
increased government income; internationally campaigned tirelessly against neoliberalism; reduced official
unemployment from 18% to 13%; introduced a large-scale micro-credit program for the poor and for women;
reformed the tax system which dramatically reduced tax evasion and increased government revenue; lowered
infant mortality from 21% to 17%; tripled literacy courses; modernized the legal system, etc., etc.

Chavez’ opposition, which primarily consisted of Venezuela’s old guard in the media, the union federation,
the business sector, the church, and the traditionally conservative military, never cared about any of these
achievements. Instead, they took advantage of their media monopoly to turn public opinion against him and
managed to turn his biggest liability, his autocratic and inflammatory style, against him. Progressive civil
society had either been silenced or demonized as violent Chavez fanatics.

At this point, it is impossible to know what will happen to Chavez’ “Bolivian Revolution” -whether it will
be completely abandoned and whether things will return to Venezuela’s 40- year tradition of patronage,
corruption, and rentierism for the rich. What one can say without a doubt, is that by abandoning
constitutional democracy, no matter how unpopular and supposedly inept the elected president, Venezuela’s
ruling class and its military show just how politically immature they are and deal a tremendous blow to
political culture throughout Latin America, just as the coup against Salvador Allende did in 1973. This
coup shows once again that democracy in Latin America is a matter of ruling class preference, not a matter
of law.

If the United States and the democratic international community have the courage to practice what they
preach, then they should not recognize this new government. Democrats around the world should pressure
their governments to deny recognition to Venezuela’s new military junta or any president they happen to
choose. According to the Charter of the Organization of American States (OAS), this would mean expelling
Venezuela from the OAS, as a U.S. state department official recently threatened to do. Please call the
U.S. state department or your foreign ministry and tell them to withdraw their ambassadors from Venezuela.

Gregory Wilpert is a former U.S. Fulbright scholar in Venezuela, and is currently doing independent research
on the sociology of development. He lives in Caracas, Venezuela and can be reached at: Wilpert@cantv.net

The current global political and economic climate is imbalanced and unstable. Western democracies, while philosophically guided by the principles of modernism (equality, fraternity, and liberty) are often not emphasizing the same principles when global economic policies are drafted.

More precisely, the globalization forces promote political democracy while often using undemocratic means when dictating economic policies. Driven by the profit-hungry forces of neo-liberalism, or economic globalization, policies set in the West–through institutions such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF)–have often bypassed local democratic institutions and proven to be economically counterproductive and devastating to the so-called developing nations. “Theirs is not an ideology of freedom and democracy,” writes William Finnegan in Harper’s magazine. “It is a system of control. It is an economics of empire.”

Even in countries with a tradition of political democracy, such as in South East Asia, and in South America, the neo-liberal policies have often been economically disastrous. Argentina, for example–for a long time the poster-child of economic globalization–is today suffering the worst economic crisis in its history. In short, economic democracy is still a far cry for most developing nations. Indeed, economic democracy is also only a dream for millions of poor in the rich Western nations.

As PROUT founder P. R. Sarkar writes, economic democracy is the “birthright of every individual.” To achieve economic democracy–or what author and PROUT activist Dada Maheshvarananda calls “a dynamic economy of the people, by the people and for the people”– economic power must be vested in the hands of local people, not foreign corporate interests.

The Fist of Free Trade

Economic liberalization has now reached all corners of the world, but has yet to take hold in the Middle East. In the days leading up to the Iraq war, President George Bush drew several rather surprising links between the need for free trade liberalizations and a “free Iraq.” Here is a quote from a National Press Conference:

” I appreciate societies in which people can express their opinion. That society — free speech stands in stark contrast to Iraq. Secondly, I’ve seen all kinds of protests since I’ve been the President. I remember the protests against trade. A lot of people didn’t feel like free trade was good for the world. I completely disagree. I think free trade is good for both wealthy and impoverished nations. But that didn’t change my opinion about trade. As a matter of fact, I went to the Congress to get trade promotion authority out. ”

No surprise then that free trade and the messianic vision of market fundamentalism was an important part of The National Security Strategy of the United States, issued by the White House in September 2002. “We will actively work to bring the hope of democracy, development, free markets, and free trade to every corner of the world,” the Strategy claims. “The possibility that the Marines and high altitude bombers might need to be involved in spreading the good news about free trade does not, in context, seem far-fetched,” writes Finnegan.

No, it does not seem far-fetched. As New York Times columnist and economic globalization advocate Tom Friedman wrote in his book, The Lexus and the Olive Tree:

“The hidden hand of the market will never work without a hidden fist. McDonald’s cannot flourish without McDonnell Douglas… And the hidden fist that keeps the world safe for Silicon Valley’s technologies to flourish is called the U.S. Army, Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps.”

In other words, the war against Iraq was more about fostering the freedom to make a profit on hamburgers than about finding WMD’s. It was more about McWorld vs. Jihad than it was about Bush vs. Saddam.

Free trade and corporate globalization–whichever way it is implemented–has not, however, been a boon for the world’s developing countries. While the US and Europe has increased its wealth, most people in developing nations have become poorer. Indeed, even the IMF recently reported that their policies have failed in lifting these countries out of poverty. Even in the US, globalization has had negative effects on peoples income. Real wages have fallen 4 percent since 1973, while economic growth has averaged 3 percent. In contrast, during the decades prior to globalization–between 1947 and 1973–economic growth averaged 4 percent and wages increased by 63 percent. So, why should Iraq celebrate a future designed by the warriors and free traders in Washington?

Now that the high altitude bombers have finished their work in Iraq, and the US promises the “liberated” Iraqi people that they will soon bask in the glory of democracy, this promise does of course not include the promise of economic democracy. For free market fundamentalism and real-life economic democracy are not mutually inclusive. Just ask the people of Bolivia. Although rich in natural resources, it is the poorest country in South America. Why? Most of the resources are utilized by foreign corporations. “The World Bank is the government of Bolivia,” a Bolivian newspaper editor claims. So, how can the US promise Iraq what the Washington strategists cannot even provide millions of its own citizens, not to speak of the impoverished people in the third world?

A “free Iraq” must therefore not only mean the political freedom to vote, but also freedom from poverty, and the freedom to choose the path of economic self-sufficiency. A truly liberated people should be able to exercise both political and economic democracy. Most of all they should feel secure that no foreign economic power can dictate their economic future–that they are not victims of the “dictatorship” of foreign economic powers.

There are many stated and unstated reasons behind the US-led coalition’s war against Iraq. Most of those reasons–to protect US national self-interest, to prevent future attacks by Iraq and other terrorists, to stop the proliferation of the not-yet-proven Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, to ensure US geopolitical control of the Middle East, and to ensure trade liberalization in the region–do not meet the high moral aim of simply liberating the Iraqi people from an unjust tyranny.

The economic sanctions will soon be lifted so that Iraq, and thus the whole Middle East, can open up for the commercial and cultural hegemony of Western corporations. Aid will also be flowing in. And with this aid, for the hungry and painful bodies of Iraq, will also come aid for their souls. The Messianic message of Billy Graham, his son, and many other Christian evangelical preachers will soon be heard all over the dusty towns of this ancient, Muslim country. For, as there is a holy alliance between McDonald’s and McDonnel Douglas, there is also a holy alliance between US-born capitalism and Born Again Christians, between fundamentalist Christendom and fundamentalist economics.

World Government and Economic Democracy

Unfortunately, we have a UN without a spine and a global economic system without a soul. What we need instead is a World Government with a militia, and a global economic system that fosters economic democracy, or people’s democracy.

As the civilizational and economic conflict between the North and the South, between the rich and the poor, increases, there will be a growing need for both a World Government and for economic democracy. The people of the world will soon be tired of the US operating as the World’s Cop. There will thus be demands for a world authority governing from a higher moral ground than both the UN and, especially, the US is currently operating on. In the words of philosopher Ken Wilber:

” My own belief is that, in the coming century, we will see the present United Nations peacefully replaced by the first move toward a genuine World Federation, driven particularly by threats to the global commons that cannot be handled on a national level (such as terrorism, global monetary and economic policy, and environmental threats to the global commons).”
” This would mean, for example,” writes Wilber, “that America is allowed to despise Iraq (in the privacy of its own…national, cultural space). America is not, however, allowed to attack Iraq.”

What are some of the benefits of a World Federation or World Government? Sarkar suggests four main benefits:

1. The huge expenses of maintaining a militia in each country will be reduced, and these savings can be used to benefit people’s needs.

2. There will be a great reduction in psychological tension.

3. There will be less bloodshed.

4. There will be free movement of people from one corner of the globe to the other.

While Wilber has been primarily preoccupied with blueprinting the cultural and political landscape fostering a more benign world, Sarkar has also mapped its economic aspects. Sarkar believed that political democracy cannot fulfill all “the hopes and aspirations of people or provide the basis for constructing a strong and healthy human society. For this the only solution is to establish economic democracy.”

According to Sarkar, the following guidelines are needed to establish economic democracy:

–The minimum requirements of life must be guaranteed to all. The minimum requirements of a particular age — including food, clothing, housing, education and medical care — should be guaranteed to all.

–Increasing purchasing power must be guaranteed to each and every individual.

–Local people will control economic power, consequently local raw materials will be used to promote the economic prosperity of the local people. This will create industries based on locally available raw materials and ensure full employment for all local people.

–Outsiders must be strictly prevented from interfering in the local economy. The outflow of local capital must be stopped by strictly preventing outsiders or a floating population from participating in any type of economic activity in the local area.”

Paul Hawken, an author whose writings and talks envisions a world of economic democracy, cultural vitality and ecological sustainability, was recently asked by a journalist: “Aren’t you just dreaming?” He replied: “Absolutely I’m dreaming; somebody’s got to dream in America.” Indeed, somebody’s got to dream of a better future, and not just in America, in all countries of the world.

So, in the spirit of Paul Hawken, Ken Wilber and P. R. Sarkar, let us all dream. Let us all dream of a better future for Iraq, and a better future for the world.