Message-ID: <1.5.4.16.19970603043017.25178b68@mail.telecom.net.et> Date: Tue, 3 Jun 1997 04:57:45 +0300 From: Dawit Angelo <mailto:dangelo@TELECOM.NET.ET> Subject: Re: average American's perception of the US role in the 1st To: mailto:DEVEL-L@AMERICAN.EDU
Dear Tom and all,Relatively new to the list which is in any standard vibrant though I think I read that it just became so. It is however so depressing that we do not frequently read views from recipient perspectives. Coming from one of the ''AID capitals'' of the world that is dead bored with the patronizing aspects of the development industry, I think, I owe to the list to start one though I know there are many better qualified people in the list who can provide a more articulate version. The REVIEW command turns up many such tallents who seem to have chosen to just watch and listin active discussants go thier way. Let me take the initiative to break the silence.
However, in view of the vibrancy around, instead of demanding for a tempo to entertain recipient views, in the interest of staying focused with list objectives and avoiding misunderstandings, I think it is resonable to go point by point than to attempt to generate a new recipent persipective trail. Otherwise, I am afriad, it might take an unwanted defender proponent turn. Thus, by going way back, I picked this focussed post of Tom for a start.
I hope everybody agrees that WE are justified to make this kind of a grand entry if we are welcome as there was no confessed proponent of this perspective until now so to speak. However, please hold the temptation to assume a bais against the industry because I think, every recpient recognizes the CLEAN philantropy and altruism behind the majority of activities of the development industry. Also please take the ''we'' for those who wish to foreward perspectives of the recipient world as contradistinguing from an organised group bent on discrediting the industry. Rest assured the recipient world is rather greateful and appriciative of the altruism of individuals and groups though it might not share the view that AID is the only way around.
Here we go with the first posting picked for a response;
At 11:06 AM 5/29/97 -0700, you wrote: >Is it possible that there is widespread agreement among most of
>humanity that empire-building is out of date? Those of the past were
>all built on coercion and fell when that was too expensive to
>maintain (or became inadequate). Such agreement would mark great
>progress in our social evolution (IMO). So if empire-building is
>out, how about some other suggestions about how to get to a
>sustainable future preferably including tech-transfer since that is
>our list topic? (I offered something in my last post).
>
>Tom Hodges
>
We can't agree more that there is a pressing need to come up with a brand new SUSTAINABLE order of things FOR ALL OF US TO SURVIVE. Wether it failed for being too expensive to maintain or for want of the resouces to coerce it is good to hear that empire building is deemed outdated. It is also sweat music for us that there is a realization that the present order is not sustainable.Speaking of technology transfer though, it looks like it has to be rethought all over. The history of inventions shows that it were mainly indivuals that registered the early true inventions. However, as the knowledge base of diciplines grew over time, it became more and more difficult for individuals to invent because the mass of knowledge base accumilated over the centuries began to require a life time or even more to master leave alone invent. Thus invention necesarily bacame a collective interdiciplinary endiviour that requires more resources than before and therefore came under the complete control of so called research funds that in turn are under the mercy of phillanthropists with cause.
Hence, for long, in the majority of cases it is only in the decplines that are so specific and focused towards leaps that are to the taste of the latter that inventions are being registered and patents are sought. On the other hand, deciplines that are of no siginficant END RESULT to the latter if they make breakthroughs suffer from want of funding except when they are of help to consolidate, justify or sustain the status quo. Therefore, it follows that only those researchers who can be trusted to walk between the lines get the vital funds and the majority has to starve. Those who try and choose to go it alone and outside the lines will be denied publication and coverage by the establishment that also controls the mediums.
This might in part explain the double standard applied for scientific and technological inventions on the one hand and socially benificail theories and isms though there is an element of somebody saying it or doing it first in both cases. The copyright variant does not cover social theories, isms etc. as it applies to only to works of art. They niether brings in the resultant economic benifits in the form of royalities etc. except as in book sales and appearance fees for lectures and speaches that are not in any standard comaprable. One may say that this lack of incentives in some ways explains the long period of starvation of original beakthrough in the social sciences in general and the development industry in particular. It therefore, seems that some fundamental shift from seeking for a breakthrough from individaul minds is in order.
I for one believe that the era of a theorothical breakthrough in realm of social thinking is gone for good because of the size of the mass of data and knowledge base at our disposal that is individually unmanagable and that may requires a life time or two for one to master. Therefore, humanity is left with MOVEMENTS of THE COMMON MAN who fortunately seems to be more empowered like never before to work on this mass of knowledge COLLECTIVELY by the advent of INFORMATION AGE. I think the very fact that we are seeking solutions for the issues at hand here on this list and the raison d'etre of this very list is proof enough of this fact. I will in a subsquent post try to outline how.
On a related note, how about shifting emphasis to the the sence of atonment, fairness, social justice and such other age old human wisdoms as repeatedly proposed but to ones dismay ignored in this very list, than waiting and craving for a theorothical breakthrough that seems to be hard to come by anyway?
The development industry recognises that efforts that fail to rally the support of the community are bound to fail; that there is a resentment induced by the psycology of being a recipient etc. etc that goes to the rather humilaiting and malicious conclusion pertaing to incapacity etc. However, it also seems to have failed to give the consideration due to those who try to outline the magnitude of the resentment and its root causes vis a vis the social psycology of recipients always wanting to discover it and looking for a stereotype: an issue which sall be the subject of a subsquent post.
Naturally, all subsquent posts promissed could not be expected to be original so to speak. After all, the idea is to build up a theorotical base for a sustainable future by collectively working on the already available knowledge base at our disposal because we are failing on breakthroughs.
Sincerely Dawit
>On Thu, 29 May 1997, Jay Hanson mailto:mailto:j@qmail.com wrote:
>
>> At 03:14 PM 5/28/97 +0100, cherbert wrote:
>>
>> >If the US wants to be the next Empire, it is already facing the
>> >challenge of who will succeed it. Considering a system which benefits
>> >everyone might be a better solution to these endless games of empire
>> >building.
>>
>> Empire building -- by anyone -- is rapidly coming to an end because
>> the natural resources that make it possible are rapidly coming to
>> an end.
>>
>>
>> Jay -- http://www.dieoff.org
>> -------------------------------------------
>> Pluto (pluoo-toe) noun
>> 1. Roman Mythology. The god of the dead
>> and the ruler of the underworld.
>>
>> 2. American politics. The family of
>> corporations that bought America's
>> political system.
>>
>